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SULAYMANIYAH,
Kurdistan-Iraq — It’s a place of big skies, vast
mountain ranges and heart-breaking beauty; proud,
defiant people with their own language, fiercely
guarded identity and bold flag; enviable
agricultural and petrochemical resources; a history
of bloodshed, a protracted struggle for independence
and a headstrong, highly influential political
machine with players in the top levels of national
government, including the presidency.
Throw in a twang and a couple million pairs of
Wranglers, and it could be Texas.
But the five provinces that fall in part or in whole
into the Kurdish region of northern Iraq face an
identity struggle that could challenge the delicate
state of Iraqi unity.
Despite Kurds’ predilection to refer to “Kurdistan,”
no such political or geographic entity exists. On
one side, leaders faithfully maintain their
allegiance to Americans, whose national policy
leaves no room for an independent Kurdistan, while
balancing the people’s deep-seated desire for
complete autonomy.
It’s a struggle American soldiers in the region face
daily in their position as advisers and allies to
the Kurd-dominated Iraqi army in the area, and as
former allies with the Kurdish freedom fighters, the
Peshmerga, many of whom are joining the growing
Iraqi army.
“There’s times when they’ll say ‘Kurdistan,
Kurdistan, Kurdistan,’” said Lt. Col. Robert
Benjamin, deputy commander of the 1st Brigade Combat
Team, 101st Airborne Division, of Fort Campbell, Ky.
“I’ll say, ‘There is no Kurdistan. There is Iraq.’”
“They’re going to have to change,” he said. “They
want to have a lot of autonomy under the new
constitution and the new government, but I think
they’ll go along with it. They can become a good
part of this nation.”
It’s a hard shift for a region that has been
fighting for its independence for at least 80 years,
and which, during the Saddam Hussein era, had
American support in the push for independence. It’s
also a healing process for a population that
suffered through Saddam’s genocidal campaigns
against Kurds and which has lost trust in their
fellow countrymen.
“I will not say all the Arabs are bad,” said Iraqi
army Col. Kamal Mahmood, a former member of the
Peshmerga. “I will just say the majority.”
Local leaders unanimously expressed a wistful desire
for an independent Kurdistan. But they also profess
loyalty to another entity: the United States.
“All the Kurds need or want [independence],” said
Iraqi army Col. Jamal Hawez Mustafa, deputy
commander of 3rd Brigade, 4th Division, based in
Sulaymaniyah, a modern, bustling Kurdish city near
the Iranian border. “We’ve been fighting so long for
a separate Kurdistan. Now we’ve decided to let that
go. Because the Americans don’t want it, we don’t
want it. That’s the main reason, because we don’t
make any problems for the Americans.”
But Mustafa, who fought for the Peshmerga from 1980
until he joined the Iraqi army in 2004, said his
ultimate loyalty lies with his people.
“Right now,” he said, “we work for the Iraqi army
and do whatever the Ministry of Defense tells us.
Whenever those departments disappear, we’ll probably
go back to Peshmerga again.”
The Peshmerga Organization Center commander, who
only goes by one name, Gen. Jafar, said the region’s
people feel strongly that Kurdistan should be
independent.
“Why should we stay related to Iraq forever?” he
said. “We have our land, our nation, our language,
our history. … We are still related to Iraq. If the
time came up to be independent, everybody wants
that.”
Kurdish leader Ali N. Salhi, a member of the Kirkuk
Provincial Council who emigrated to South Dakota in
1975 after the failed Kurdish revolution, said he
has spent the last 30 years working in exile for the
Kurdish cause. He returned to Iraq in 2003.
Salhi, who is an American citizen, proposed a more
moderate solution to the cry for Kurdish
independence. He said he feels residents should be
able to vote whether to group themselves into a
Kurdish super-state — a region that would have
strong regional government, but still maintain
national ties. His model: powerful states in his
adopted nation.
“Most of the Kurds somehow are interested in being
part of the Kurdistan region,” he said in English.
“I don’t have any reason to be against the idea. I
believe the opportunity should be given to the
population. The sooner the better.”
But he doesn’t believe an independent Kurdistan is
the answer.
“That’s not the way to go,” he said. “Each state in
the U.S. has its own laws, its own government, but
still has a connection to the central government.”
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