[lbo-talk] Northern Iraq’s Tangled Web

[Yoshie Furuhashi]

<http://www.fpif.org/fpiftxt/4310>
Northern Iraq's Tangled Web

Conn Hallinan | June 15, 2007

There are few areas in the world more entangled in historical deceit
and betrayal than northern Iraq, where the British, the Ottomans, and
the Americans have played a deadly game of political chess at the
expense of the local Kurds. And now, because of a volatile brew of
internal Iraqi and Turkish politics, coupled with the Bush
administration's clandestine war to destabilize and overthrow the
Iranian government, the region threatens to explode into a full-scale
regional war.

A series of bombings and attacks over the past year in Turkey touched
off the current crisis. The Turks attribute the violence to the
Iraq-based Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which fought a bitter war
against the Turks from 1984 through the 1990s. Ankara's campaign to
repress its Kurdish population during that period ended up killing
some 35,000 people, destroying 3,000 villages, and forcibly relocating
between 500,000 and 2 million Kurds. The Kurds make up about 20% of
Turkey and Iraq and have a significant presence in Syria and Iran.
With a population of between 25 and 30 million, the Kurds represent
one of the world's largest ethnic groups without a country, a status
that has long aggrieved them.

In May, the Turks declared martial law in three provinces that border
Iraq. They massed troops, armor, and artillery, and threatened to
invade if the United States and the Iraqi government of Prime Minister
Nouri al-Maliki did not suppress the PKK. It looked like a conflict
simply between the Turkish government and the Kurdish separatists. But
things are never quite what they appear in northern Iraq.

Independent Kurdistan?

While the Turks are indeed concerned about the activities of the PKK,
Ankara's real agenda is to block any possibility of an independent
Kurdish nation on its border. The Turkish Army is also whipping up
nationalism in an effort to influence the outcome of the July 22
Turkish elections.

Turkey is deeply worried that an upcoming plebiscite in Kirkuk could
make the oil-rich city, which the Kurds claim as their capital, a part
of Kurdistan. Ankara fears that if Kirkuk joins Kurdistan, the Kurds
will obtain the economic base they need to build a Kurdish state,
which will, in turn, stir up Turkey's restive Kurds to demand
independence or autonomy. The Turks charge that the Kurds are trying
to influence the outcome of the plebiscite by driving 200,000 Turkomen
and Arabs out of the city, and moving in 600,000 Kurds. This would
reverse the 1980s population shift when Saddam Hussein forced many
Kurds out of Kirkuk, moving in Arab families to take their place. To
keep the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) as an ally, the Maliki
government is backing the plebiscite and supporting a plan to remove
12,000 Arab families from Kirkuk and send them back to their original
homes in central and southern Iraq.

Ankara blames the United States for ignoring the issue of Kirkuk and
turning a blind eye to the PKK. "It is widely acknowledged," says
Syrian historian and journalist Sami Moubayed, "that the PKK cannot
operate out of northern Iraq without the full blessing of Maliki,
[Iraqi] President Jalal Talabani (a Kurd) and the United States."

Attacking Iran

Rather than suppressing the PKK, the United States is using its
offshoot, the Party for a Free Life in Kurdistan (PEJAK), to attack
Iran. According to a Financial Times investigation last year, U.S.
Marines are working with Iranian minorities to see if "Iran would be
prone to violent fragmentation along the same kind of fault lines that
are splitting Iraq."

Farsi speakers dominate Iran, but they make up only a slim majority of
the country. The rest of the population consists of Kurds, Arabs,
Azeris, and Baluchs. The United States is also supporting a violent
Baluch group, the Jundallah, which killed 11 Revolutionary Guard this
past February in southern Iran.

"I think everybody in the region knows that there is a proxy war
already afoot, with the United States supporting anti-Iranian elements
in the region as well as opposition groups in Iran," says Vali Nasr of
the Council on Foreign Relations. Investigative journalist Seymour
Hersh says that PRJAK is also receiving help from Israel, and that
there are some 1,200 Israeli intelligence agents in northern Iraq.
According to Meir Javedanfar, an Israeli expert on the Kurds, Israel
is using the Kurdish areas of Iraq "to undermine Iran's influence" and
"the Iranian government itself."

PKK's Usefulness

The Islamacist Maliki government, with its ties to extremist Shiite
militias and Iran, is no friend of the secular and socialist-minded
PKK. But Maliki needs Kurdish support in his battle with former Iraqi
Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, whose coalition of former Baathists,
Sunnis, secular Shiites, and disgruntled Kurds that has designs on
bringing down Maliki's government. And while the current Kurdistan
Regional Government (KRG) -- a coalition of the formerly warring
Patriotic Union of Kurdistan and the Kurdistan Democratic Party -- has
no great love for the PKK, the organization is tough and
battle-hardened and has become an invaluable ally against a rising
tide of Islamicism in the Kurdish region.

The United States is hoping the KRG will rein in the PKK. One
anonymous Iraqi official told The New York Sun, "The Americans want
the Kurds to make their lives easier. They need the Kurdish government
to show they are willing to tackle terrorism in the north… maybe alert
Turkey of a threat, act on intelligence, arrest some people, make an
effort."

However, the KRG has a problem with a growing wave of Islamicism in
Kurdistan. The PKK is strongly secular—it was formerly the Kurdish
Communist Party—and, in a fight with Islamic extremists it would be an
invaluable ally. On top of which, the PKK is widely respected for its
long struggle against the Turks, and if the KRG were to turn against
the PKK it might not go down well with the average Kurd. Even if the
KRG reins in the PKK, it might not be enough for Ankara, because
Turkey wants to roll back any movement that would create an
independent Kurdistan.

But that genie is already out of the lamp. The well-ordered and
relatively peaceful Kurdish region has a working parliament, several
universities, and Kurdish language radio and television. It has
essentially been a functioning country since 1992 when the Americans
and British established a "no fly" zone over the area following the
end of Gulf War I.

Whatever the Turks might want, Kurdistan is already a reality.

Inside Turkey

The current crisis is also a reflection of Turkey's internal politics.
Beating the anti-Kurdish drum is part of the Turkish army's strategy
to whip up nationalism in order to weaken the religious government of
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan before the July elections.

The major danger is that the tension between Turks and Kurds could
quickly get out of hand. For the past few weeks the Turkish Army has
been shelling Kurdish villages in Iraq and sending small units across
the border. A miscalculation by either side could quickly escalate,
which is exactly what the United States fears.

"Fighting between Turks and Kurds in Iraq could spread to Turkey
itself," says Henri J. Barkey, chair of international relations at
Lehigh University and widely considered to be the top U.S.-Turkish
scholar. This, he said, could lead to "a severe rupture in
U.S.-Turkish relations" and "deal a fatal blow" to U.S. efforts in
Iraq.

Northern Iraq has always been a complicated place, but the U.S. war
has sharpened the tensions that have plagued it for over a century.
Now those tensions have pushed the region to the brink of chaos.

Conn Hallinan is a Foreign Policy In Focus (www.fpif.org) columnist.

Recommended citation:
Conn Hallinan, "Northern Iraq's Tangled Web," (Washington, DC: Foreign
Policy In Focus, June 15, 2007).
-- 
Yoshie