Never mind the Baghdad politics, Iraqi Kurds need help to fight Islamic State

The threat from Daish, the Arabic acronym for the so-called Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, has gone from a side issue to a central imperative, judging by discussions with Kurdish leaders on my four fact-finding trips to the Kurdistan region in the last year.

Last November, I was told how Daish operatives were assiduously measuring building sites in Mosul in an extortion racket. In February, I learned of their external funding and their continuing growth. In June, they captured Mosul with a small force that immediately acquired thousands of adherents, and established a 650-mile border with the Iraqi Kurds.

The major shock, though, was how quickly the Iraqi Army had ‘disappeared in a puff’, as the governor of Kirkuk put it to me in his office in the city. Kurdish leaders knew that Daish would turn its guns on them, but were taken by surprise in early August.

Daish forces outgunned the Kurdish Peshmerga, who had to retreat in some places.