Page 1 of
2 THE ROVING
EYE The Turks are
coming By Pepe Escobar
"We have no friends other than the
mountains." - Kurdish proverb
With
more than 100,000 troops and all those F-16s,
tanks and helicopter gunships massed on the
Turkish-Iraqi border, the new George W Bush
greater Middle East war - that is, the Turkish
invasion of Iraqi Kurdistan - is ready to roll.
This "war on terror" blockbuster spin-off
may screen against the
wishes of Hollywood, sorry,
Washington market gurus; anyway the fireworks are
unlikely to start before the crucial Washington
face-to-face on November 5 between Bush and
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyep Erdogan.
To say this is all part of a "structural
crisis" between Turkey and the US would be the
understatement of the century. Turkey is actually
deciding nothing less than its real geopolitical
position in a mesmerizing balancing act involving
Iran, Israel, the Arab world, Europe, Russia and
the US.
Washington has been endlessly
telegraphed about Ankara's intentions. Erdogan has
already told US Secretary of State Condoleezza
Rice there's only one way to prevent a Turkish
invasion: US special forces must grab the 150 or
so top Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) leaders
holed up in the Qandil mountains in Iraqi
Kurdistan and deliver them on a silver platter to
Ankara.
The US commander in Iraqi
Kurdistan, Major General Benjamin Mixon, has
already volunteered his answer to this request:
the US will do "absolutely nothing" about it. Thus
the rumors about the arsenal of alternative US
tactics - like "precision" cruise missile bombing
of PKK camps in the mountains, of course duly
authorized by the Kurdish Regional Government
(KRG) and the central government in Baghdad.
Behind the usual rhetorical fog of Turkey
"continuing to support the Iraqi people", as far
as Ankara is concerned the outcome is
predetermined: "We will launch an operation when
it will be necessary, without asking for anybody's
opinion," Erdogan said on Saturday.
General Yasar Buvukanit told NTV in Turkey
that the military is essentially just waiting for
Erdogan's green light. For all practical purposes,
the Turkish military has already invaded Iraqi
Kurdistan by a range of 12 kilometers, and Turkish
jets have already unleashed air strikes.
This time Iraqi Kurds definitely will not
betray their cousins, the Turkish Kurds - although
they did so, for instance, in 1992, when they
collaborated with the Turkish military in an
anti-PKK joint offensive. To expect that the
100,000 well-trained Kurdish peshmerga (the
KRG's military) will blockade the PKK's camps high
in the mountains is pure wishful thinking.
What Turkey can do is to bleed Iraqi
Kurdistan - via an economic embargo, already
approved by Turkey's National Security Council.
Iraqi Kurdistan depends on Turkey for 90% of its
imports (20% for Iraq as a whole). Turkey can
simply close Habur - its sole border crossing
point with Iraq - and reroute all cargo to Syria.
Iraqi Kurds will be deprived of everything from
foodstuffs to fridges and tires.
Electricity in Iraqi Kurdistan is also
provided by Turkey. The Turks are virtually
building everything - from Irbil airport to
Sulaymaniah University. But Turkish businesses
would also lose: there are more than 1,000
companies and 15,000 Turkish workers in Iraqi
Kurdistan. "Turkish" in this case means Turkish
Kurds from southeast Anatolia. In case of an
embargo, more than 200,000 Turkish Kurds would be
severely affected.
The two faces of
'terror' This mini-war transcends the PKK.
Ankara's ultimate nightmare is an independent
Kurdish state in northern Iraq, a virtual
certainty after the incorporation of oil-rich
Kirkuk through a referendum which should be held
next month - but which will be inexorably
postponed. Ankara regards this development as an
inevitable - for them horrifying - consequence of
the Bush administration's "vision" of a greater
Middle East. The "vision" in fact presupposes the
partition of Iraq.
Washington never paid
attention to the PKK factor. The Turks did. This
does not mean they know how to deal with it. The
PKK is very popular among Turkish Kurds because it
embodies resistance against non-stop Turkish
military repression of rural Kurds. But its
hardcore tactics have cost it local support in the
past few years, so the PKK had to relocate its
bases from southern Anatolia to northern Iraq.
For Turkey, this was as much a military as
a political victory. But starting in 2004, the PKK
was back on overdrive. Now Turkey's generals have
had enough and are itching to invade. They simply
cannot swallow a (soft) Islamist president,
Abdullah Gul; instead of plotting a coup, an
invasion is the ideal platform for them to let off
steam.
Politically, though, it will be a
disaster. Kurdish nationalism, on both sides of
the border, is bound to reach fever pitch. And the
PKK knows a Turkish invasion will torpedo Ankara's
relations with both the US and especially the
European Union (Turkey desperately wants to enter
the EU). Not to mention the Iraqi government in
Baghdad, the KRG and Erdogan's Turkish Kurd
voters.
Then there's the Iranian front.
According to the independent Ankara Anatolia news
agency, Gul and Iranian President Mahmud
Ahmadinejad have had a most interesting phone
conversation. Seemingly in sync, they agreed both
their countries are victims of terrorism. This is
essentially correct: as the PKK attacks Turkey,
its Iranian arm, the PJAK (Party of Free Life of
Kurdistan) attacks Iran.
What both
presidents left implied is even meatier: as
Washington manipulates the PJAK for attacks on
Iran, it has left the PKK to its own devices. The
Turks - faithful North Atlantic Treaty
Organization allies of the US - know very well how
Washington plays a double game, with intelligence
covert operations funding and arming the PJAK. The
PKK has made it to the extensive US list of
terrorist groups; the PJAK has not.
But
the PKK and PJAK have the same leaders, have the
same logistics base, and both pledge allegiance to
iconic Kurdish
Head
Office: Unit B, 16/F, Li Dong Building, No. 9 Li Yuen Street East,
Central, Hong Kong Thailand Bureau:
11/13 Petchkasem Road, Hua Hin, Prachuab Kirikhan, Thailand 77110
