.The war in Iraq has spanned the full spectrum of military operations: intense combat, stability‐and‐support operations, and peacetime activities. Regardless of their nature and relative intensity, military operations are shaped by the characteristics of the military operating environment. Consequently, the scale, tempo, and complexity of any type of military endeavor are linked to the physical and cultural landscapes of the region in which it is conducted. Military geographers use geographical information, tools, and techniques to examine those links. Iraq's operating environment is studied to identify the relevant components of its physical and human geography. This military geographical examination of Iraq tells us a great deal about how the physical and cultural environment have influenced the war, as well as how the complexity of its human landscape continues to affect the postwar rebuilding of the country.
1. Europe. 2. Russia. 3. North America. 4. Middle America. 5. South America. 6. North Africa/Southwest Asia. 7. Subsaharan Africa. 8. South Asia. 9. East Asia. 10. Southeast Asia. 11. The Austral Realm. 12. The Pacific Realm.
In the benchmark publication American Geography: Inventory and Prospect (1954), Joseph Russell reported that military geography had long been recognized as a legitimate subfield in American geography. Despite the occasional controversy surrounding the subfield since his assessment (Association of American Geographers 1972; Lacoste 1973), and the general period of drought it experienced within American academic geography during the Vietnam era, military geography displays unquestionable resilience at the dawn of the twenty-first century. The subfield links geography and military science, and in one respect is a type of applied geography, employing the knowledge, methods, techniques, and concepts of the discipline to military affairs, places, and regions. In another sense, military geography can be approached from an historical perspective (Davies 1946; Meigs 1961; Winters 1998), with emphasis on the impact of physical or human geographic conditions on the outcomes of decisive battles, campaigns, or wars. In either case, military geography continues to keep pace with technological developments and seeks to apply geographic information, principles, and tools to military situations or problems during peacetime or war. Throughout the twentieth century, professional and academic geographers made enormous contributions to the US Military’s understanding of distant places and cultures. The vast collection of Area Handbooks found in most university libraries, serves as testament to the significant effort by geographers during wartime. Although some of the work remains hidden by security classification, a casual glance at Munn’s (1980) summary of the roles of geographers within the Department of Defense (DOD) enables one to appreciate the discipline’s far-reaching impact on military affairs. The value of military geography within a theater of war can hardly be disputed. The subfield has also been important during peacetime, however, providing an important forum for the continuing discourse among geographers, military planners, political officials, and government agencies, as each relies upon geographic tools and information to address a wide range of problems within the national security and defense arenas. Despite the subdiscipline’s well-established tenure, the Military Geography Specialty Group is in its infancy. The time-lag is attributable to the subfield’s tumultuous experience during the Vietnam era and the associated demise that ensued.
Abstract Over the past seventy-five years, landscape has been variably characterized as "the basis of geography," the "unit of study" in geography, an approach or framework, and an important geographic concept. How can this important term maintain such tremendous variation in status, meaning, and usage? To many geographers, the plasticity of landscape is advantageous since its meaning can be easily molded to suit their needs. Yet consistent use of such a key term is not only critical to communicating effectively across the boundaries of the discipline, but absolutely essential for establishing and maintaining dialogues within geography. The purpose of this paper is to come to grips with the concept of landscape by tracing the origin of the term, examining current definitions and conflicts, and discussing the significance of the concept to the discipline, and to propose an alternative definition.
Military geosciences are concerned with using the broad scope of the earth sciences for military purposes. These purposes range from direct support for military operations to a broad spectrum of non-combat military activities and military land management applications. Historically, the focus has been on geology and geography, but other earth science disciplines such as geophysics, remote sensing, and geocomputation have become increasingly important as a consequence of technological progress made during the final decades of the twentieth century. The eighteen chapters in this volume address the critical aspects of the role of geosciences in military undertakings by focusing on historical perspectives, geoscience for military operations, and military environmental stewardship.
For nearly two millennia, the Kurds have inhabited a mountainous region known as Kurdistan, a territory including parts of Iraq, Syria, Turkey and Iran. Within Iraq, Kurds are the second largest ethnic group, comprising 15–20% of the population and constituting the majority of citizens in the provinces of Dohuk, Irbil and Sulaymaniyah. Historic rivalries between Iraqi Kurds and Arabs contribute to current social and political unrest, and pose an even greater challenge to long-term stability in the country. One of the most volatile issues fuelling Kurd-Arab tensions concerns the „Green Line‟, which on various maps separates Iraq‟s Kurdish and Arab populations. Initially established by Saddam Hussein in 1991, the ambiguous boundary has shifted north during Arabisation schemes and south as a result of Kurdish settlement and encroachment. More recently, on 19 March 2003, the Green Line was defined as the area controlled by the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG) and recognised by the Iraqi Transitional Government when it passed the Transitional Administrative Law (TAL) in 2004. Although the Iraqi Constitution recognises Kurdistan as a federal region, the precise boundary remains contentious. At stake are the historical ties to the territory along the Green Line, the associated oil reserves, and the status of the symbolic city of Kirkuk. Resolution of the disputed territories along the Green Line, the associated revenue sharing of the oil wealth, and the fate of Kirkuk, constitute a single, complex, multifaceted issue that will have a decisive impact on the future stability, if not integrity, of Iraq.
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