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The Kurds worry they're in for more
betrayal
11.12.2006
By Henri J. Barkey - Opinion Articles |
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December 11, 2006
Following the Democratic victory in the mid-term
congressional elections and the Baker-Hamilton
Commission recommendations, the Bush administration
is under pressure to change its Iraq policy. Among
those most alarmed by the prospect of change,
especially if it involves a premature US withdrawal,
are the Iraqi Kurds.
Unlike any other group in Iraq, the Kurds bet
everything on Washington's success. They have been
the US' most enthusiastic supporters and theirs is
the only region where American soldiers do not
confront any hostility - in fact the Kurds are to a
person grateful to the US for overthrowing Saddam
Hussein.
History and the US have not been kind to the Kurds.
In the 1970s, the US and Iran backed a Kurdish
rebellion against the Iraqi Baathist regime. In
1975, the shah of Iran, having exploited Iraqi
Kurds' rebellion to extract a series of concessions
from Iraq, promptly cut off their supply and exit
routes. The Ford administration simply watched as a
superior Iraqi Army decimated its former allies.
In 1988, during Saddam's murderous Anfal campaign,
unable to utter the most mundane of criticisms, the
international community watched in silence as the
Iraqi military used chemical weapons against Kurdish
civilians. Finally, in 1991, following the first
Gulf war, then-President George H.W. Bush called on
all Iraqis to rebel and overthrow their dictator.
When the Shiites in the south and Kurds in north
followed through, Washington
once again was nowhere to be seen. Faced with a
relentless Iraqi assault, 1.5 million Kurds
abandoned their cities and villages to seek refuge
along the Turkish and Iranian borders.
To protect their future in the post-Saddam era, the
Kurds insisted on a federal constitution that
maximized their autonomy without seceding from Iraq.
Neither the Iraqi Sunnis nor even many Shiites
welcomed this arrangement. The neighbors, Syria,
Turkey and Iran, saw this as the first step toward
an independent Kurdistan that could also inspire and
galvanize their own Kurdish minorities.
Iraqi Kurds fear that, in its desperation, the US
administration will heed calls from the
Baker-Hamilton Commission to engage Syria and Iran.
In effect, this would not only be rewarding these
countries for their uncooperative behavior but would
also legitimize their role in Iraq.
There is no doubt that both Iran and Syria are
alarmed, perhaps not as openly as Turkey, at the
growing indirect influence of the Iraqi Kurdish
experiment in autonomy on their own Kurdish
populations. Iran has experienced increased clashes
with the offshoot of the Turkish-based Kurdish
insurgent group, the Kurdish Workers Party, or PKK,
and Syrian Kurds have time and again openly defied
the regime. As long as the American project in Iraq
had a chance of success, the neighbors' and others'
concerns could be pushed aside.
The current chaos, however, is pregnant to all kinds
of anti-Kurdish coalitions, ranging from an Arab
Sunni-Shiite one to any combination of the neighbors
intent on reversing Kurdish gains.
dailystar com.lb
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