in Aug. 2002 when G. Dubya, in one speech or another, first officially mentioned a likely military action against Iraq, and a few of us vets said then (on a local web board), "we'll leave it worse than we found it, just like Vietnam."
Wasn't that we were geniuses, it was a no brainer. The MIC didn't give a damn how or if we ever left Vietnam. And, it was clear Dubya didn't care if we ever left the sandbox. Exit Strategy? Ha! None needed.

Trump's stupid decision also places our forces in jeopardy.

Is that really true? What seems to place our forces in jeopardy is this insane strategy of us fighting a shifting war with shifting goals with shifting allies. It seems to me that inherently such a situation is ridiculously perilous. How did Trump's "stupid decision" really change anything? What decision, in that context, would've been smart (other than, of course, full withdrawal).

Who Are the Kurds?

The Kurds are one of the indigenous peoples of the Middle East and the region's fourth-largest ethnic group. They speak Kurdish, an Indo-European language, and are predominantly Sunni Muslims. Kurds have a distinct culture, traditional dress, and holidays, including Nowruz, the springtime New Year festival that is also celebrated by Iranians and others who use the Persian calendar. Kurdish nationalism emerged during the twentieth century following the disintegration of the Ottoman Empire and the formation of new nation-states across the Middle East.

The estimated thirty million Kurds reside primarily in mountainous regions of present-day Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Turkey and remain one of the world's largest peoples without a sovereign state. The Kurds are not monolithic, however, and tribal identities and political interests often supersede a unifying national allegiance. Some Kurds, particularly those who have migrated to urban centers, such as Istanbul, Damascus, and Tehran, have integrated and assimilated, while many who remain in their ancestral lands maintain a strong sense of a distinctly Kurdish identity. The Kurdish diaspora of an estimated two million is concentrated primarily in Europe.

Well, I read a little further and found out that no one was responsible for the dispersal of the Kurds. It just happened after the fall of the Ottoman empire. "the fall dispersed..." yea. Colonial powers didn't have anything to do with it...

Saw that a recent survey in UK says that they think their colonial days were OK. They don't have the perspective of the targets. For example, they raped India for decades, over a hundred years, to support their empire. And UK split up India and Pakistan and look what joy that has given the world.

Historical Context

Since the fall of the Ottoman Empire dispersed Kurds into four nations nearly a century ago, they have pursued recognition, political rights, autonomy, and independence. Throughout this period, Kurds have been persecuted, Kurdish identity has been denied, and thousands of Kurds have been killed. In each of the four nations, Kurds have had uneasy relationships with authorities, at times rebelling and at other times cutting deals with the governments. The destabilization of Iraq, civil war in Syria, and the rise, and collapse, of the Islamic State present new challenges, but also opportunities, for the Kurds.

From wikipedia we find some more background

The Sykes–Picot Agreement /ˈsaɪks pi.koʊ/, officially known as the Asia Minor Agreement, was a secret 1916 agreement between the United Kingdom and France,[1] to which the Russian Empire assented. The agreement defined their mutually agreed spheres of influence and control in Southwestern Asia.

The agreement was based on the premise that the Triple Entente would succeed in defeating the Ottoman Empire during World War I. The negotiations leading to the agreement occurred between November 1915 and March 1916 [2] and it was signed 16 May 1916.[3] The deal, exposed to the public in Izvestia and Pravda on 23 November 1917 and in the British Guardian on November 26, 1917,[4][5] is still mentioned when considering the region and its present-day conflicts.[6][7]
The agreement allocated to Britain control of areas roughly comprising the coastal strip between the Mediterranean Sea and the River Jordan, Jordan, southern Iraq, and an additional small area that included the ports of Haifa and Acre, to allow access to the Mediterranean.[8] France got control of southeastern Turkey, northern Iraq, Syria and Lebanon.[8] Russia was to get Istanbul, the Turkish Straits and Armenia.[8] The controlling powers were left free to determine state boundaries within their areas.[8] Further negotiation was expected to determine international administration in the "brown area" (an area including Jerusalem, similar to and smaller than Mandate Palestine), the form of which was to be decided upon after consultation with Russia, and subsequently in consultation with the other Allies, and the representatives of Hussein bin Ali, Sharif of Mecca.[8]

The agreement effectively divided the Ottoman Arab provinces outside the Arabian peninsula into areas of British and French control and influence,[9] and led later to the subsequent partitioning of the Ottoman Empire following Ottoman defeat in 1918. The Acre-Haifa zone was intended to be a British enclave in the North to enable access to the Mediterranean.[10] The British later gained control of the brown zone and other territory in 1920 and ruled it as Mandatory Palestine from 1923 until 1948. They also ruled Mandatory Iraq from 1920 until 1932, while the French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon lasted from 1923 to 1946. The terms were negotiated by British diplomat Mark Sykes and a French counterpart, François Georges-Picot. The Tsarist government was a minor party to the Sykes–Picot agreement, and when, following the Russian Revolution, the Bolsheviks published the agreement on 23 November 1917, "the British were embarrassed, the Arabs dismayed and the Turks delighted".[11]

Does this sound like mafia dons dividing up the spoils?

to react either intelligently or compassionately to this looming crisis. The worst thing the USG could do, is to be drawn into fighting any of the Kurds' battles for them. Which might be exactly what our benighted State Department will want to do. As full of neocons and Zionists it is, I'm sure the temptation must be there. I'm guessing that Israel would fully approve of such a Kurdish revolt, and might even be instigating it.

The Iraqi Kurds are acting like their own worst enemy here. They wouldn't stand a chance against the combined forces of Iraq, Turkey, and Iran, no matter how brave they are. Is Barzani too stupid to know this? Or is he playing some other kind of game? I hope Trump will be smart enough to steer clear of it whatever it is, but I suppose we'll soon see.

How the British Screwed Up the Middle East, in 10 Classic Cartoons

Maybe someone can do an article on the ongoing effects of colonization.

It is enough to do the British as a stand alone topic.

Then one could come to the US and go through how we pretend not to be an empire. Ask the Native Americans, Spanish, etc.