|| I agree with Hakki on the extremely dubious foundations of the Iraqi
|| kurdistan experiment; it seems to me to be another illustration of aid, and
|| in particular food aid, wrecking an agricultural economy. Nevertheless, the
|| relative lack of violence and the toning down of factionalism _seem_
|| encouraging, but who knows? The whole thing is shrouded in so many layers of
|| propaganda.
The Iraqi Kurds are like the Afghans, tribes that appear to the outside world to be a nation because they share the same fashion sense. A Kurdish national identity would require serious funding and active first-world intervention. External enemies have proven insufficient to bind the various tribes into a national unity. But the real question is who needs a new nation? Does preserving Kurdish ethnicity require one? HADEP's current line that Kurdish ethnicity can be best preserved in a democratic Turkey integrated with the EU is a far more rational and productive option. Otherwise, you're speaking the same language as the fascists, who dream of a Turkish nation spreading out over central asia and so-called "kurdistan". Besides, there are many more ethnicities crying for attention in Turkey, so a global solution is required.
|| As for Hakki's point about drug money, this is certainly a problem, as are
|| diamonds and Coltan in Africa, and in a roundabout way the analogy could be
|| made to kidnappings in Colombia. Nevertheless, there has to be some way
|| genuine armed struggles to make money; I guess the problem is to then
|| resist the temptation to make money through armed struggle...
Actually the way the PKK drugs operation developed calls into question the "armed struggle". You can buy the "financing the struggle" line when they were hauling Syrian drugs to Turkey, handing them over to the Kurdish mafia, and using the proceeds to pay the Syrians for their "hospitality" and arms. It is still defensible at this point to say that the PKK were working primarily for their own interests and not for the Baath hoods. However when after Ozal's death the Ciller - Agar clique eliminated the Kurdish mafia and took over the Turkish part of the drugs route, you have PKK militants risking their necks to get the stuff to processing plants run by fascsists and Kurdish collaborators, providing Turkey with the hard cash it needed to prosecute the war. Does that make any national liberation sense to you?
In a broader sense, look at Ocalan's objective role: This guy is a Turk who eliminates all rival Kurdish liberationist movements, attacks the marxist left, and starts a war that invites heavy repression on the southeast, radicalising Kurds and pushing Turks towards the far right. The bottom line is that the whole adventure has done nothing but harm to the Kurdish peasants, the left as a whole, and to the Turkish people. And who has benefited? The Syrian Baath regime, which the US is cultivating as a promising client, and the Turkish fascists, both military and civilian.
Hakki