plus ça change

[rone]

Anthony de Boer quoted:

One proposal which Churchill put forward was for autonomy for the Kurds in northern Iraq. He favoured this because he feared an Iraqi ruler who would 'ignore Kurdish sentiment and oppress the Kurdish minority', but his advisers dismissed these fears, believing that Britain would always be able to exert a moderating influence in Baghdad.

-- Martin Gilbert, _Churchill:_A_Life_, p.434. Passage describes events in March 1921.