"While the Bush administration struggles to stabilize Baghdad, a major new threat is emerging in the Kurdish areas of northern Iraq. If it isn't defused, this crisis could further erode U.S. goals in Iraq -- drawing foreign military intervention, splintering the country further and undermining U.S. hopes for long-term military bases in Kurdistan.
The core issue is Kurdish nationalism, which worries Iraq's powerful northern neighbor, Turkey, which has a substantial Kurdish minority. The Bush administration has tried to finesse the problem, hoping to keep two friends happy: The Kurds have been America's most reliable partner in Iraq, while the Turks are a crucial ally in the region. But in recent weeks, this strategy has been breaking down.
As with so many aspects of Iraq, the Bush administration has wandered into a conflict that is encrusted with centuries of ethnic hatred. Iraqi Kurds push their politicians toward defiant assertions of independence; Turks are demanding that their leaders move to crush the Kurdish upstarts. Meanwhile, the American public is increasingly fed up with the fractious mess of Iraq and wants U.S. troops home yesterday.
The administration, realizing that it was drifting toward a confrontation over the Kurdish issue, last year appointed retired Air Force Gen. Joseph Ralston as a special emissary. His mission is to urge the Iraqis to crack down on the militant Kurdish political party known as the PKK, which uses Iraqi Kurdistan as a staging point. The Turks denounce the PKK as a terrorist group and threaten that if the United States doesn't take decisive action to suppress it, the Turkish army will.
Ralston is said to have warned top administration officials in December that the Turks might invade by the end of April unless the United States contained the PKK. Other knowledgeable officials are similarly worried, and one analyst has predicted that the Turks may seize a border strip about eight miles deep into Iraq. Ralston has tried his best to defuse the crisis, clearing a Kurdish refugee camp of suspected PKK members and talking regularly with both sides. But the time bomb continues to tick.
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A wild card in the Kurdish problem is Iran. Like the Turks, the Iranians have a restless Kurdish minority and would be tempted to intervene militarily against a militant group called PJAK that operates from Iraqi Kurdistan. Indeed, top Iranian military officers met in Ankara recently for discussions with the Turkish general staff about possible military contingencies in Iraq, according to one U.S. official.
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Iraqi Kurdistan has been a success story, one of the very few since the U.S. invasion four years ago. But its status as a haven and future American base against Iran and al-Qaeda is in jeopardy. Of bad news in Iraq, it seems, there is no end."
meanwhile, don't miss Laura's piece "Kurdistan’s Covert Back-Channels"
1 comment:
Ignatius is such a funny guy . . .
Funny how he failed to mention the whole Ralston/Lockheed connection.
Funny how he failed to mention the US/Turkish rejection of PKK's plan for a democratic, political solution (in accordance with EU accession criteria).
Funny how he propagandizes the Maxmur Camp issue.
Funny how he failed to mention that Ralston lied to Congress through his ass on the Maxmur Camp issue.
Funny how he ignored the fact that even the Turkish media wondered why the hell Ralston lied to Congress about the Maxmur Camp issue.
He's also pretty funny about the whole idea of Kurdish nationalism. For example, I would ask if Kurdish nationalism is when you offer a political solution that would ensure the current borders of Turkey (and for that matter, Iran)? Because that's what PKK offered last August, specifically:
We would like as a movement to emphasize once again that the right solution is a democratic autonomy within the borders of Turkey. We believe that a solution in the unity of Turkey will be for the benefit of firstly the Kurdish people and all the people of the region.
We call once again on all international and regional political forces and democratic circles to make an effort to start the democratic solution, to work for its success and to support the democratic resolution of the Kurdish question within the political borders of Turkey.
Now, PJAK, being a sister organization of PKK under Koma Komalên Kurdistan is going to have the same approach. This is the same approach the KDP and PUK have as regards Iraq, so what exactly does Ignatius mean by "Kurdish nationalism" being a problem or a worry for anyone . . . besides for the propagandists that are busily churning out this garbage?
So, yeah, David Ignatius is a scream. Hardy-har-har.
And the piece on Kurdistan's "back channels" is not bad and basically confirms much of the information that I'd heard earlier on the subject shortly after my last trip to Kurdistan.
Well, actually, even before that trip was when the Hersh propaganda on Israeli commandos in Kurdistan came out. A friend, who had worked with pêşmerge (a member of a tribe affiliated with the Barzanîs) and had just returned from Kurdistan, said that there were no Israeli commandos in Kurdistan and, if there were, he would have known. Additionally, friends that I stayed with in the South had heard nothing about it either (members of another tribe affiliated with the Barzanîs). One of these works in the KRG and his family has had a long history of government service in Baghdad as well--long before the Ba'ath.
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