Here's what I think is going to happen in Kurdistan

for background, read http://seventhchapterofdaniel.blogspot.com
but even if all this is wrong, most of what I am about to say is
based on patterns evident now.

KRG Kurdistan in northern Iraq (southern Kurdistan) is inherently at
odds with PYD Kurdistan  of Rojava canton in Syria (west Kurdistan).
These two systems cannot mix, and the KRG has its own tradition
based corruption and nepotism and culture problems, that the PYD
has escaped.  PYD is allied to and same ideology as the Turkish
or northern Kurdistan PKK which was originally Marxist but went
to democratic federalism after Ocalan read a book in prison.

Right now, KRG is asking PYD/PKK to leave Iraq and stop helping
them against ISIS, because Turkey is bombing southern Kurdistan
to get at its PKK helpers along with the restart of attacks on the PKk
inside Turkey. PKK is still listed as a terrorist organization (not
islamist quite the opposite, but separatist).

Seems under a treaty at the breakup of the Ottoman empire the Kurds
WERE given a chunk of southeast Turkey, which Kemal Ataturk
took back, apparently the reason for Urfa being renamed Sanliurfa
in honor of some war that gained freedom for Turks or some such
nonsense.

Putin, wise to the plan of Erdogan  to restart the Ottoman Caliphate
and be Caliph and his use of ISIS/ISIL to do this, has told him in
exactly these terms to "go to hell" and threatened to destroy his forces
in Syria (apparently Erdogan is moving troops across the border? or
plans to do so). the proposed safe zone for Turkey is actually not a
buffer against ISIS but would be a safe zone  continuing the supply
lines for them that the Kurds of PYD have almost entirely cut, which
supply ISIS from Turkey.

I think the attack on the PKK in Turkey was the excuse to bomb them
(and as a result all other anti ISIS forces as collateral damage) in
northern Iraq, while making a nearly one time show of bombing ISIS
because a couple of Turkish soldiers were somehow killed by ISIS.

So, I think that at some point Russia will have boots on the ground in
Syria to block Turkey, and support Assad, since Putin now realizes
that the anti Assad move is part of a larger picture of Turkish imperialism,
and will definitely be a risk to Russia, already a target of jihadis.

As long as Turkey is in NATO,  Russia can't attack it. But if Turkey
outrages USA/NATO enough to get kicked out, it will be another matter.
At that point, Russia will mop up the floor with Turkey, and perhaps
elder Paisios' prophecy that the Armenians and Kurds and I think one
other group will get their desired homelands, will be fulfilled.

Iraq is too fragmented to be restored as single nation, and the KRG
has already cut Baghdad out of the loop in oil sales. Syria will maybe
continue as a rump state, with the Kurdish section independent.

But  the PYD Kurds and the KRG Kurds might be at war with each
other at some point, nothing unusual in the past.

As for eastern Kurdistan, west Iran, I have no idea.

But I think what eventually will happen, is that there will be a Northwest
Kurdistan (Turkish and Syrian Kurdistan), and a South Kurdistan (Iraq)
and maybe an East Kurdistan (Iran) or maybe not. But I don't see how
the dream of a single united Kurdistan can operate except perhaps as
autonomous elements under an umbrella government.

Is Kurdistan (with its four centers of gravity) or China the fourheaded
leopard? I don't know. But I guess its China, because it seems the PRC
has direct rule over FOUR municipalities, incl. Beijing, which would
fit the four head picture.

I think that China will play a bigger role than Russia in Southern
Kurdistan's independence. Whether it would broker a deal with IRan
about eastern Kurdistan would depend on what it could gain from
this and what Iran could gain.

China's main interests in the Middle East are oil (and such business
ventures as they do in Africa and South America), and stopping jihad
(which is raising its head in China).

The typical moslem may not grow up to be a jihadi, because they are
not that trained in islam, or have more sensible alternative interpretations
such that for instance fornication is recognized for what it is, and not
redefined as some tiny category of fornication and the rest okay.
earlier peaceful verses in the Koran, abrogated by later more violent
ones, are assumed to be not abrogated and are convenient for  modern
life most like. The demand for four eye witnesses to convict on any
crime is not in play in a secular government mostly. The evils of
shariah are not experienced daily or heard of daily, so the romantic
vague notion of shariah as perfect justice gets some play, which is
itself dangerous.

BUT ANY CONVERT TO ISLAM IS A POTENTIAL JIHADI
BECAUSE THEY HAVE BEEN TRAINED IN THEIR FAITH.

The Kurds have those among them who take islam too seriously and
some went jihadi, and there is some minimal type of female genital
mutilation among some such, but it is being driven out. Mostly they
have a tradition of favoring their own practices over hardline islam,
so that the women always moved about freely and almost never
went veiled, before modern times, according to travelers in past
centuries. in the 1700s the Kurdish Zand tribe in Iran had woman
warriors. This goes back actually to traces of Median (as in Medes
and PErsians) culture, which had woman warriors routinely.