From Reuters:

Kurds wave secession threat in Iraq flag row

The leader of Iraq's ethnic Kurds brandished the threat of secession on Sunday as a row with the Baghdad government over the flying of the Iraqi national flag exposed an increasingly bitter rift.

After the Kurdish regional government banned the use of the Iraqi flag on public buildings, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki issued a blunt statement demanding use of the national tricolour and implying that the Kurds' own banner was illegitimate.

Massoud Barzani, president of the Kurdistan region, told its parliament that Iraq's flag was a symbol of his people's past oppression: "If at any moment we, the Kurdish people and parliament, consider that it is in our interests to declare independence, we will do so and we will fear no one."

The Kurds do not take independence lightly. They are an amazingly pragmatic people. Kurdish leaders know that were they to declare independence from Iraq they would be surrounded by hostile neighbors for whom Kurdish independence is anethema. Iran, Iraq (what is left of it) and Turkey will not view an independent Kurdistan on their borders kindly. The Kurds know this. They also know the US will not support such a move, and they have relied upon the protection of the USA since the first Gulf War.

In the aftermath of our failure to protect them from Saddam's troops (after giving them false promises of support and encouraging an uprising that was brutally suppressed), we finally established a Northern "no-fly" zone and began emergency assistance under Operation Provide Comfort. The Kurds are therefore distrustful of us, but have been free to establish themselves in Northern Iraq under our protection, and have done VERY well in reconstructing, or in some cases, constructing an autonomous Kurdish region. It shows what Iraq could have been had we planned for success and taken control of the civilian population immediately following the fall of Saddam. The Kurds are very impressive and have much to be proud of - but they risk much in declaring independence from Iraq. There will likely be war between an independent Kurdistan and what is left of Iraq, and not just because of the disputed oil-rich area surrounding the city of Kirkuk.

So how bad does it have to be in Iraq for them to take such a bold, confrontational move? Again, just to point out the most appropriate way to view an act like forbidding the flying of an Iraqi flag and ordering a Kurdish flag flown instead, the Kurdish leaders are no fools. They do not make dumb moves, and they are not firebrands or radicals. They are the survivors of a very-oppressed people that was viewed by Saddam as a threat to his survival - and yet they continued to resist. Once free of Saddam following the first Gulf War they created a very nice, well-run, prosperous society, instead of engaging in long drawn-out fighting between themselves which was encouraged by both Iran, Iraq, and Turkey. The Kurds established a government, kept corruption to a minimum, and created a vibrant, peaceful, prosperous almost-nation-state. Kurdish leaders are not rash.

Thus, I wonder how bad it really is in Iraq right now, because you don't see much about what is really going on in the media - not that it is being suppressed, but because you can't tell what is going on from inside the green zone. Perhaps the Kurds don't like what they see and have finally decided the safer, more prudent course of action is to get the heck out of Iraq.

Scary stuff.