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The Kurds' fight for freedom 20.10.2007
By Mike Green - The contents of this article reflect
the author's personal opinions |
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October
20, 2007
The Kurds have learned not to trust America.
Today, Turkey runs raids into Iraq, killing the
Kurds despite their alliance with the United States.
But it ought not come as a surprise to anyone except
the American public — which remains virtually
clueless about the extent of the relationship
between the U.S. and a people of the Middle East
whose country truly was "wiped off the map" by
western forces.
The Kurds are an estimated 40 million people still
fighting for the independence they lost when their
land, Kurdistan, was wiped off the map by the
British following WWI. After Britain carved up the
Middle East into artificial nations, the Kurds
awakened to find themselves living in Turkey, Syria,
Iraq and Iran.
Still, the Kurds retained their heritage as people
of Kurdistan.
Thus, began the Kurdish battle for independence —
the greater majority of which reside in Turkey and
Iraq. Their story ought to be of considerable
interest to the American public, since the fate of
the Kurds is a core issue in the complex quagmire
created by the Bush-Clinton-Bush cabal when it
sought to control Iraq by military means beginning
in 1990 and continuing to the present day.
Backstabbers
A few months prior to NATO's bombing of Yugoslavia
in 1999, U.S. intelligence was assisting Turkey in
the capture of the Kurdish rebel leader Abdullah
Ocalan. He was eventually taken into custody in
Kenya with the assistance of the United States.
Greece was infuriated. The Kurds have long enjoyed
support from the Greek Orthodox Church, which
sympathized with their plight. Greece, which is a
member of NATO, threatened to provide jamming codes
for NATO (U.S.) bombers to Russia.
Backlash
Months later, rescuers in Yugoslavia used shovels to
scoop up the remains of children in the aftermath of
a massive NATO bombing campaign gone awry. American
officials denied criticism that its bombing of
Yugoslavia created massive civilian casualties.
After the war, the U.S. military admitted that a
majority of its bombings failed to hit desired
targets. It also claimed that Greece did not provide
jamming codes to Russia.
Back to Iraq
Meanwhile, U.S. forces were using a Turkish air base
to launch bombing raids into Iraq. The criticism
regarding civilian casualties was again dismissed by
the U.S. military.
Iraq's northern sector, where the majority of Kurds
lived, has long been guarded by the U.S., acquired
during the invasion of Iraq in 1991. In return for
relative safety, the Kurds worked with the CIA and
the U.S. military to conduct operations against
Saddam Hussein throughout the 90s.
Two Kurdish leaders led separate rival factions.
Massoud Barzani was in charge of the Kurdistan
Democratic Party, while Jalal Talabani led the
Patriotic Union of Kurdistan. Talabani was appointed
as president of Iraq less than two years after U.S.
forces invaded in 2003.
Recent history
The massacre sustained by the Kurds in 1988 when
Saddam used chemical weapons — procured from the
United States — to gas a village of innocent
victims, was reminiscent of yet another time the
Kurds sustained a brutal massacre at the hands of
Saddam Hussein.
In the 1974 uprising of the Kurds against Saddam's
Kurdish Autonomy Law, it was the Iranian Shah's
support — at the behest of Henry Kissinger — that
helped the Kurds. But after Saddam agreed to sign
the Algiers accord with the Shah — moving the
boundary between the two nations giving Iran half of
a river necessary for transporting oil to the
Persian Gulf — Iranian support for the Kurds was
withdrawn and they were left to suffer their fate.
Turkey dilemma
Today, if the U.S. is successful in manipulating
political forces in Iraq into changing the Oil
Constitution to favor local geographic controls, the
Kurds may benefit from economic opportunities such
control brings — perhaps even a Kurdish state, which
will likely invoke war from Turkey.
Turkey is not pleased with the development of
greater autonomy for the Kurds in Iraq. Last
weekend, the Turkish military shelled areas of
northern Iraq. Most Americans have no idea why, nor
do they care.
But Americans should be concerned. Because the
reality is that it is the involvement of the U.S. in
the internal affairs of both Iran and Iraq since the
end of WWII that has helped to create the current
state of affairs that most Americans allege is
simply due to a mentality of religious fanaticism.
America has no business in the Middle East. And with
each passing day, our military presence causes the
complexities of the issues in the region to worsen.
In the end, those who side with America will find
that such an alliance is temporary and dangerous.
Just ask the Kurds.
dailytidings com
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