Page 2 of 2 THE ROVING
EYE Double-crossing in
Kurdistan By Pepe Escobar
Turkey to spoil by attacking the
PKK in Iraqi Kurdistan. No wonder the Turkish
leadership - not to mention Turkish public opinion
- is fuming.
Chronicle of an invasion
foretold To compound this misery, the
much-touted Turkish invasion has been in the
making for months. As early as March, Bush
administration officials were promising the Turks
that US special
forces would dislodge the PKK
from the Qandil mountains. Nothing happened.
In April, Barzani was threatening "to take
responsibility for our response" if the Turks
interfered with a referendum on the integration of
oil-rich Kirkuk into Kurdistan. Also in April, the
US prohibited Turkish cross-border raids,
according to the Turkish daily Sabah. The massing
of Turkish soldiers at the Iraqi border started in
May.
Then in June, Turkish General Yasar
Buyukanit virtually spelled out in public what
this was all about, "There is not only the PKK in
northern Iraq. There is Massoud Barzani as well.
Turkey cannot afford an independent Kurdish state
headed by Barzani on its southern border." Barzani
- who for Turkish popular media is the country's
public enemy number one - answered back with a
startling concept; he said that if Turkey invaded,
"We would deal with it as an Iraqi issue."
So what kind of Kurdish "sovereignty" is
this? Iraqi Kurds detest, and ignore, the Baghdad
government like the plague, and prize their
independence; but as soon as they're threatened,
they instantly seek refuge under Baghdad's
(clipped) wings.
Kurdistan and its
mountainous 75,000 square kilometers is not really
Iraq. Baghdad is an entity far, far away. Iraqi
Kurdistan has its own constitution, parliament,
anthem, legal code, language, currency and media -
and most of all the well-trained peshmerga
army. A democracy it is not - because virtually
everything is subordinated to the two warlords
turned politicians, Barzani and Talabani.
The KRG has paid the price for Kurdistan
as a "model" of a functioning Iraq by
collaborating no-holds-barred with the US since
the early 1990s. In June, Barzani confirmed that
the PKK is an Iraqi problem, "A Turkish invasion
would be first of all an attack on Iraqi
sovereignty, and then an attack on the Kurds."
Following Barzani's logic, since Iraq is under
occupation, the Turks would be actually invading a
colonial possession of the US. Thus it should be
Petraeus to confront the Turks about what they're
up to. Washington in a way has proved its point:
Iraqi Kurdistan is a fragile entity that only
exists because it always depended on American
protection.
Turkey and Iran, united
Kurdistan's pull in Washington is
guaranteed thanks largely to Qubad Talabani, son
of President Jalal Talabani, also known in
Kurdistan as "Uncle Jalal". While dad sells
Kurdistan as an indisputable success story, son
lobbies furiously, to the extent that Frank Lavin,
US under secretary of commerce for international
trade, recently went to Kurdistan to promote it as
a gateway for US businesses in Iraq.
But
to believe that Ankara will tolerate an oil-rich,
water-rich Kurdish mini-state on its southeast
border, creating a magnet for Kurdish minorities
in Turkey, Iran and Syria, is to believe in
miracles. Not only Turkey and Iran are vehemently
against it, but also Saudi Arabia (the House of
Saud believing that a Kurdistan counterpart -
Shi'iteistan in southern Iraq - would be
subservient to Iran). What the Bush
administration's games have achieved so far is to
unite Turkey and Iran on the issue.
Turkey
regards the Kurds just like China regards Tibetans
and Uighurs; they are part of a unitary Turkish
state and have no right to autonomy. If Washington
condemns China for its repression of Tibetans and
Uighurs, it should behave the same way regarding
Turkey. Not only will this not happen, but now the
Americans need the Turks more than the Turks need
the Americans.
A true measure of White
House and neo-conservative desperation to
facilitate the relentless surge towards war on
Iran is whether it would be willing to plunge
Iraqi Kurdistan into war, compromise the
Turkish-Iraq corridor (through wich flows 70% of
US supplies to Iraq) and future US Big Oil
investments in Iraqi Kurdistan.
Barzani
keeps insisting he and Washington are in sync,
both wanting a peaceful solution for this royal
mess; but he always points out "we are a nation"
which will not accept Turkish threats.
US
plans for Iraqi Kurdistan, stretching back to that
1990 Israeli-devised Turkish plan, are in
jeopardy. And once again all because of the enemy
within.
Washington played the ethnic card
in Afghanistan, pitting Tajiks against Pashtuns;
the result, apart from a never-ending war in
Afghanistan, was that Pashtuns on both sides of
the border united and are now destabilizing even
further the US ally, Pakistan.
Washington
played the Kurd card to destabilize Saddam
Hussein's Iraq and as a beachhead for its control
of the country after the invasion. Not only Iraq
turned into a quagmire, Washington helped to
plunge Kurdistan into the line of (Turkish) fire.
There's no evidence these lessons have
been learned. No matter what happens in the
mountains of Iraqi Kurdistan, the Bush
administration will still insist on the ethnic
card to precipitate regime change in Iran.
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