ABSTRACT

Modern Iraq emerged as an independent kingdom in 1932, its boundaries and major institutions defined while it was a League of Nations mandate under British tutelage. This chapter first examines the land and the people that are the foundation of the contemporary state and on which post-2003 Iraq must rebuild and then proceeds with the evolution of independent Iraq. Cradled in the land segment of the great tectonic trough downfolded between the Arabian Platform to the southwest and the Zagros ridges to the northeast, Iraq has four distinct natural regions, with identifiable roles in Mesopotamian political and economic life. Both because of oil beneath it and because of its mixed ethnicity, Kirkuk has long been a center of contention, where dominant Sunni Arabs oppressed Sunni Kurds and Sunni and Shii Turkmans during the Baath regime and where tensions flared following resurgence of Kurdish influence after 2003.