Sunday, October 26, 2014

Three Water Conflicts To Watch

Here is an illuminating report about three water conflicts which could escalate to full scale war:

http://www.geopoliticalmonitor.com/three-international-water-conflicts-watch/

Here is the conflict which seems to be influencing ISIS:

Turkey-Iraq: Ilisu Dam and the Tigris River

Turkey’s newly re-elected Erdogan government has been keen to push through the final part of its long-running Southeastern Anatolian Project: the Ilisu Dam on the Tigris River near the border of Syria. The Ilisu Dam is the most recent in a long line of Turkish projects meant to tap into the hydroelectric potential of both the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, and once completed the Ilisu Dam will generate 1,200 MW, or roughly 2% of Turkey’s energy needs.

The Southeastern Anatolian Project entailed the construction of some 22 dams and 19 hydroelectric plants in the Tigris-Euphrates basin, so this is an international water conflict that has existed for quite some time. The big loser in Turkey’s upstream activities is Iraq and, to a lesser degree, Syria. Iraq has historically enjoyed the lion’s share of these rivers’ waters, which have historically supplied the seasonal marshlands needed to grow food. But these waters have been receding over the past decade, even well before the Ilisu Dam’s completion.  In fact, northern Iraq and Syria are currently experiencing droughts so protracted that some analysts are questioning whether or not they have contributed to the rise of ISIS in the region. Some of the more extreme projections hold that, owing to a combination of climate change and upstream dam activity, the Tigris and Euphrates rivers won’t have sufficient flow to reach the sea by as early as 2040.

The headwaters of both of Iraq's major river are in Turkey and Syria. Doesn't it seem like a strange coincidence that the water being retained in Turkey was balanced by the number of Iraqis the US and its coalition forces killed in Iraq? In other words, is the Turkish dam system part of a NATO/Israeli plan to exterminate the Iraqi people?

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