The Kurds live in Syria, Turkey, Iran, and Iraq but have no country to call their own. When they decided to create one for themselves inside Iraq, it didn’t go well.

After Iraq's Kurds held an independence referendum—which passed with more than 90 percent of the vote—Baghdad's armed forces moved fast. Its armies and allied Shi'ite militias took the city of Kirkuk and the surrounding oil fields. Within days, the Kurd’s economic engine was gone.

At the same time, Kurds in Syria captured Islamic State's capital, Raqqa. The United States, which has backed Kurds in both countries, had little to say about either event.

So what's really going on with this U.S. ally without a country?

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