The result was a weak patchwork of hostile factions with radically different ideals and beliefs, thus making a peaceful democratic nation nothing short of impossible. Suddenly immersed in the power vacuum that had descended after the fall of the Ottoman empire, groups such as the Kurds, Sunnis and Shias were thrown into conflict with one another; a state which was ironically only remedied by the oppressive and tyrannical rule of Saddam Hussein. The only responsible solution to Iraq's woes is partition, allowing self-determination and justice to finally become a potential reality. The people of this war-stricken country deserve nothing less.
Partition may be the wrong solution for Iraq, but the parallels Jonathan Steele draws with the Indian catastrophe of 1947 cast no light on the subject. Sir Cyril Radcliffe did indeed have only five weeks to draw the boundary line between India and Pakistan but it is wrong to suggest that "ethnic cleansing and killing accelerated as Hindus, Sikhs and Muslims tried to show they were a majority in every multicultural district". This makes it sound as though vigilantes killed in order to influence Radcliffe's deliberations. But no one in India imagined that Radcliffe would do a last-minute head count. He worked from a pre-existing census. There were many reasons for the increased rate of sectarian killing in the summer of 1947, but the desire to influence the shaping of the boundary line wasn't one of them.
Better parallels do exist between Iraq and 1947, though Steele as an anti-partitionist would no doubt gag at their implications. Barely the only thing that Punjabis - Indian and Pakistani - agree on today is that the scale of the killing in 1947 was hugely determined by the severe running down of British troops in India after the war. With the "neutral" force out of the way the mutual genocide could begin. Belatedly a Punjab Boundary Force was cobbled together but by then it was too late.
So if partition is to happen in Iraq, two lessons might be learned from 1947. Give the modern Radcliffe more than five weeks to deliberate. Keep coalition forces in place while it happens.