Southern Kurdistan under Britain's Mesopotamian Mandate: From Separation to Incorporation, 1920-23

Author: Eskander S.

Source: Middle Eastern Studies, Volume 37, Number 2, April 2001 , pp. 153-180(28)

Publisher: Routledge, part of the Taylor & Francis Group

Abstract:

In October 1918, the British forces entered Southern Kurdistan, where its Kurdish inhabitants warmly welcomed them. In the absence of a well-defined British policy towards the long-term future of Kurdistan, the British authorities in Baghdad experimented with the idea of Kurdish self-government. In June 1919, British officials on the ground ended Kurdish self-government, after suppressing an armed revolt led by the head of the Kurdish government, Sheikh Mahmud. From that period onwards, political conditions steadily deteriorated, as a direct consequence of the imposition of direct British rule in Southern Kurdistan. In 1920, two new factors came into play, which directly influenced the future of Southern Kurdistan. Firstly, at the San Remo Conference (April 1920), the Allies agreed to allow Southern Kurds to join a future Kurdish state, if it was established in Northern Kurdistan (Turkish Kurdistan). Secondly, London decided to end British direct rule in Mesopotamia by forming an Arab state under British supervision. These were the principal developments that preceded the differences between the Colonial Office and the British High Commission in Baghdad regarding Southern Kurdistan's political future. Between the mid-1921 and the late 1922, the former called for the reestablishment of Kurdish self-government under British supervision, whereas the latter advocated the immediate incorporation of Southern Kurdistan into the Arab Iraqi state. Eventually, the British High Commission succeeded in persuading the new Conservative Government in London to incorporate Southern Kurdistan into Iraq, despite the opposition of the vast majority of the Kurds.

Keywords: Southern Kurdistan; Sheikh Mahmud; imperialism; San Remo Conference; Mesopotamia; self-government; Iraq

Language: English

Document Type: Research article

Publication date: 2001-04-01

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