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Turkey marches boldly into
Iraq
By K Gajendra Singh
As
expected, the Turkish parliament voted 358 votes to 183
Tuesday to authorize the dispatch of troops into Iraq.
The ruling Justice and Development party (AKP), with
Islamic antecedents, passed the motion at the request of
its NATO ally the United States.
Parliament did
not specify how many Turkish troops would be sent, but
in the past it was discussed that up to 10,000 soldiers
would be dispatched, which would make it the largest
contingent after the US and the British forces.
The US recently granted Turkey, which is
undergoing an economic crisis, a loan of US$8.5 billion,
but has made it clear that the loan is conditional on
cooperation over Iraq. In its motion seeking
parliamentary approval, the Turkish government made no
mention of persistent US demands for Turkish troops, and
stressed its own national interests lie in preventing
the establishment of an independent Kurdish state in
northern Iraq that could embolden its own Kurds - some
20 percent of the population. US counter-terrorism
experts met Turkish officials last week and agreed on
joint efforts to tackle the some 5,000 Kurdish rebels
believed to be holed up in the mountains in northern
Iraq.
In Baghdad, the US-appointed Iraqi
Governing Council declared its opposition to soldiers
from any neighboring country, including Turkey, coming
to Iraq. While the US governor of Iraq, L Paul Bremer,
has the final say on the policy, the council's position
muddies the situation for the US to persuade Iraqis to
accept Turkish soldiers.
"The Governing
Council's stand is against the presence of troops from
neighboring countries without exception, and Turkey is
one of these countries," said Nabeil al-Moussawi of the
Iraqi National Congress (INC), headed by leading council
member Ahmad Chalabi, a Shi'ite Iraqi who was in exile
since 1958. Chalabi is a Pentagon favorite and is still
wanted in Jordan on Petra Bank embezzlement charges.
A Kurdish member of Iraq's 25-member Governing
Council, Mahmoud Othman, said the council "is unanimous
in issuing a communique against the sending of Turkish
forces to Iraq". Barham Saleh of the Patriotic Union of
Kurdistan (PUK) , who is in Ankara to meet Turkish
officials to discuss economic aid and other matters,
said, "Turkish troops will face some difficulties if
they enter Iraq because the majority of Iraqi groups do
not want any military participation from any neighboring
country," he said. "The presence of foreign military
forces in Iraq will not guarantee security for the Iraqi
people but will be a factor for the deterioration in the
security situation."
Apart from the Kurds in
north Iraq, who have made their opposition to the
dispatch of Turkish troops clear ever since US planned
to invade Iraq, the PUK is even opposed to Turkish
troops passing through Kurdish Iraq. Turkey had invited
some tribal leaders from Iraq, but their response to the
presence of its troops in Iraq was not very positive.
Naturally, the US has welcomed the Turkish
decision and it has been working hard for months to get
troops from a major country culturally similar to Iraq.
Attempts were made to win troops from India and
Pakistan, but with elections announced on October 6 in
its five states, India has already declined and is
unlikely to change its position. Even the position of
sending troops from Pakistan remains a confusing enigma,
however with India's refusal Pakistan is unlikely to
agree as President General Pervez Musharraf has enough
problems to deal with in his own backyard.
On
October 6, three US soldiers were killed in Iraq and
Shi'ites demonstrated against the US troops on October
7. Since President George W Bush declared the end of
major hostilities on May 1, more US soldiers have been
killed than in the war itself.
With the disputes
between the US and NATO allies France and Germany still
raw and differences persisting over another UN
resolution on Iraq, even with Russia and China, there
appears to be little chance of other nations
contributing troops.
Even UN Secretary General
Kofi Annan was opposed to the the most recent draft
resolution because the US still wants to retain almost
full control in Iraq, without any timetable to hand over
power to the Iraqis. By the two-time bombing of the UN
headquarters in Baghdad, as well as the bombing of the
embassy of Jordan, police stations and the killing of
major pro-US Shi'ite cleric Ayatollah Baqir al-Hakim,
the emerging Iraqi resistance is making things hot for
everyone.
Turkish government spokesman Cemil
Cicek said on October 6, "Turkish soldiers will remain
there for one year, that is, the validity of the motion
we are sending to parliament has been limited to one
year." He added, "We will not remain there permanently.
Hopefully, peace and serenity will be restored [in Iraq]
as quickly as possible, thus allowing us to leave even
earlier."
The US government assured Turkey that
it will do more to combat Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK)
rebels, the Turkish separatist movement that has waged a
bloody decades-long struggle in Turkey. Prime Minister
Recep Tayyip Erdogan has argued that sending troops
would improve relations with the US and give Turkey a
say in the future of Iraq. Details of the deployment
will be decided by Erdogan and his ministers.
March 2003 vote
Even in March,
although the circumstances were quite different, a vote
in parliament over whether to allow the US to use
Turkish soil in the war against Iraq was lost only by
three votes, on technical grounds. In fact, the speaker
had declared the vote in favor of the motion, it was
only the opposition Republican People's Party which
pointed out that a majority of the total number of the
house, and not just of those present, was mandatory.
At the time, more than 90 percent of the
population was opposed to the dispatch of Turkish troops
and thousands massed in front of parliament and
elsewhere protesting against the vote. The role of the
armed forces, which are highly respected by the people,
was not clear as it did not indicate its preference,
which would have clinched the issue. It eventually did.
Matters were made worse by what the Turks felt was
American bullying during negotiations over the terms of
the proposed deal for aid and loans and its patronizing
and sometimes scurrilous coverage in the US media.
Washington had offered an aid package of $15 billion,
which could have been leveraged into loans worth $26
billion. But the terms and conditions were unclear and
the US attitude was brash.
After the surprise
vote, Erdogan did not ask for a second vote. Sensing the
mood of the country and in his party, he continued to
stall on a second vote even while the US continued with
its arm-twisting tactics, further annoying Turkish
leaders, media and public. On the whole, it was an
unappetizing show, with the US and the UK on one side
and France and Germany on the other. There was a lot of
confusion, acrimony and misunderstanding aired publicly,
even after a lesser agreement was passed in parliament
for the US to use Turkish air space.
Soon after
the sudden collapse of Iraqi resistance at the gates of
Baghdad on April 9, neo-conservatives embedded in the
Pentagon came down heavily on Turkey for its March
refusal. They recalled that US ships waiting to unload
military hardware at the Turkish Mediterranean port of
Iskendrun had to be re-routed to the Red Sea and the
Persian Gulf, a delay that had then appeared critical.
When US land forces became bogged down on the way to
Baghdad, neo-conservatives faced the flak back home,
with Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and deputy Paul
Wolfowitz getting most of it.
Soon after the
toppling of Saddam Hussein's statue in Firdaus square in
Baghdad in April, Wolfowitz gave Turkey a tongue
lashing. Then came the imprisonment of 11 Turkish
commandos in Kurdish northern Iraq.
But
Secretary of State Colin Powell had phone conversations
with Erdogan to bring him around. Expressions of regret
from the US over the "wrong" action against the
commandos following a joint inquiry by Turkish General
Koksal Karabay and General John Silvester of NATO calmed
twitchy nerves.
The US's relations with Turkey
(and others) had almost become a function of the ground
situation in Iraq and the undiplomatic and sometimes
abrasive interventions by Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz. So it
was left to the State Department and the Turkish Foreign
Ministry to clean up the mess, ease tempers and repair
the ruffled alliance.
Historical
claims
When Turkey's founder, Kemal Ataturk, in
1919 begun organizing a war of resistance for Turkey's
independence, then under the heels of World War I
victors led by Great Britain, his map of a sacred new
nation included, apart from the present-day boundaries
of Turkey, the Kurdish province of Mosul (with Kirkuk),
now in Iraq. Much of this area had been occupied by
British forces after the ceasefire in 1918, and was
later joined with the former Ottoman Arab
vilayets (provinces) of Baghdad and Basra to
create Iraq. But this divided the Kurdish homelands.
From Iraq, too, the sub-province of Kuwait under the
Kayakayam of Basra was detached to create a new emirate.
Oil was then, as it is now, the main driving force; not
the freedom or welfare of the people.
The Turks
feel that here is an opportunity to establish their
presence and to perhaps take back oil-rich Mosul and
Kirkuk. Almost all political leaders, including those
from the ruling AKP, media writers and others have
openly reiterated Turkey's claims on Kirkuk. Of course,
one of the official reasons given was to protect their
kinsmen the Turkomen and the latter's rights over the
reserves of oil around Kirkuk. This area is now under
the control of Sunni Arabs, but it was traditionally
claimed by the Kurds, who are in the majority in the
region, while Turkey's ethnic cousins, the Turkomen, had
a good presence in Kirkuk. The other major reason cited,
of course, is Turkish fears of Kurds declaring an
independent state, now that the Saddam regime has
collapsed. This could spur the separatists' war in
Turkey.
Turkey/US NATO alliance
During
the Cold War, Turkey, with its well-trained armed forces
of nearly 1 million, acted as NATO's aircraft carrier
against the USSR-led communist bloc and provided bases
for flights and a direct defense line against hostile
states such as Bulgaria, Georgia, Armenia and Romania.
The Incirlik air base in the south of Turkey,
important for the US and NATO war planes throughout the
Cold War and after the 1991 Gulf War, provided a
platform for US and British planes to patrol the "safe
haven" for the Kurds in northern Iraq and save them from
the excesses of Saddam's rule.
Even after the
fall of the Berlin wall, Turkey remained
geostrategically important for the US and Europe. It
borders Greece, Bulgaria and Romania in southeastern
Europe and is lapped by the Black Sea, the Aegean and
the Mediterranean in Asian Anatolia. It is at the
crossroads of Europe, Russia, the Caucasus and the
Caspian basin, the Arab world and Iran. Although 99
percent Muslim, it is a secular democratic republic and
a buffer between Europe and a Middle East in turmoil.
North Iraq and Turkey's Kurdish
problem
Turkey has serious problems with its own
Kurds, who form 20 percent of the population. A
rebellion since 1984 against the Turkish state led by
Abdullah Ocalan of the Marxist PKK has cost over 35,000
lives, including 5,000 soldiers. To control and
neutralize the rebellion, thousands of Kurdish villages
have been bombed, destroyed, abandoned or relocated.
Millions of Kurds have been moved to shanty towns in the
south and east or migrated westwards.
The
economy of the region lies shattered. With a third of
the Turkish army tied up in the southeast, the cost of
countering the insurgency at its height amounted to
between $6 billion and $8 billion a year. The rebellion
has died down due to the arrest and trial of Ocalan, in
1999, but has not been eradicated. After a court in
Turkey lessened the sentence to life imprisonment rather
than the death sentence passed on Ocalan in 2002, and
when parliament granted rights for the use of the
Kurdish language, some of the root causes of the Kurdish
rebellion have been removed.
But clashes still
occur, and the PKK - now also called Kadek - has shifted
almost 4,000 of its cadres to northern Iraq. They have
refused to lay down arms as required by a new
"repentance law", now under discussion in the Turkish
parliament. They have also ensconced themselves on the
border between Iraq and Iran. The US's priority to
disarm PKK cadres has not been very high. In fact, the
US wants to reward Iraqi Kurds, who have remained
peaceful while the rest of the country has not.
Iraqi Kurds have been ambivalent to the PKK,
helping them at times. Ankara has entered north Iraq
from time to time - despite protests - to attack PKK
bases and its cadres, and it keeps between 5,000 and
10,000 troops in the region. Ankara has also said that
it would regard an independent Kurdish entity as a cause
for war. It is opposed to the Kurds seizing the oil
centers of Kirkuk or Mosul, which would give them
financial autonomy, and this would also constitute a
reason for entry into north Iraq. However, neither has
happened so far, and after the quick collapse of
Saddam's forces, the Turks have muted their talk of such
"red lines", that is, seizure of oil fields or autonomy.
Kurds and the 1991 Gulf War
The
1990-91 Gulf crisis and war proved to be a watershed in
the violent explosion of the Kurdish rebellion in
Turkey. A nebulous and ambiguous situation emerged in
north Iraq when, at the end of the war, Bush Sr
encouraged the Kurds (and the hapless Shi'ites in the
south) to revolt against Saddam's Sunni Arab regime.
Turkey was dead against it, as a Kurdish state in the
north would give ideas to its own to Kurds.
Saudi Arabia and other Arab states in the Gulf
were totally opposed to a Shi'ite state in south Iraq.
The Iraqi Kurds and Shi'ites paid a heavy price.
Thousands were butchered. The international media's
coverage of the pitiable conditions, with more than half
a million Iraqi Kurds escaping towards the Turkish
border from Saddam's forces in March 1991, led to the
creation of a protected zone in north Iraq, later
patrolled by US and British war planes. The Iraqi Kurds
did elect a parliament, but it never functioned
properly. Kurdish leaders Massoud Barzani and Jalal
Talabani run almost autonomous administrations in their
areas. They make forced handshakes under US pressure.
This state of affairs has allowed the PKK a free run in
north Iraq.
After 1991, Turkey lost out instead
of gaining. The closure of Iraqi pipelines, economic
sanctions and the loss of trade with Iraq, which used to
pump billions of US dollars into the economy and provide
employment to hundreds of thousands, with thousands of
trucks roaring up and down to Iraq, further exacerbated
the economic and social problems in the Kurdish
heartland and the center of the rebellion. The 1980s war
between Iraq and resurgent Shi'ites in Iran helped the
PKK to establish itself in the lawless north Kurdish
Iraq territory. The PKK also helped itself with arms
freely available in the region during the eight-year
long war.
It has been a difficult decision for
the Turkish government, given particularly the Islamic
roots of the ruling party, to send troops into a Muslim
nation occupied by the US, and they will be the first
significant force from a Muslim nation.
And as
said, Kurd leaders in northern Iraq have made it clear
that they will not welcome Turkish troops. The Turkish
government has sent in a number of teams to assess the
kind of reception Turkish troops can expect. It is
seeking to pave the way by taking in health workers,
contractors to rebuild damaged mosques, and even pop
singers to sweeten the local population.
Whether
this is enough to win hearts and minds in Iraq is open
to question, but what cannot be disputed is that Ankara
has taken a bold decision that paves the way for Turkey
becoming a major player in the region. After all, it now
has the US on its side.
K Gajendra Singh,
Indian ambassador (retired), served as ambassador to
Turkey from August 1992 to April 1996. Prior to that, he
served terms as ambassador to Jordan, Romania and
Senegal. He is currently chairman of the Foundation for
Indo-Turkic Studies. (Copyright 2003 Asia Times
Online Co, Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact content@atimes.com for
information on our sales and syndication policies.)
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