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Attack against Kurdish PKK rebels risks strategic
defeat, US says
30.4.2007 |
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April
30, 2007
Before its latest political crisis erupted, Turkey
had been pondering a military incursion into
Kurdistan (northern Iraq) to attack Kurdish rebel
bases just beyond its border. But the US has begun
warning Ankara to learn a lesson from what some
officials in Washington are starting to call
Israel's "strategic defeat" in Lebanon under similar
circumstances last summer.
When a ceasefire brokered by the United Nations took
effect in Lebanon last August, President George W.
Bush - who had backed Israel in the month-long war
against Hizbollah - declared: "Hizbollah attacked
Israel. Hizbollah started the crisis, and Hizbollah
suffered a defeat in this crisis".
But recently, in its effort to persuade Turkey not
to attack Kurdish militants based in Kurdistan
(northern Iraq), the Bush administration has been
presenting in private a different assessment of
Israel's experience. In lobbying Turkey to stay its
hand, US officials have described Israel's war
against the Shia militant group as a "strategic
defeat" that failed to achieve Israel's military
goals, brought widespread international condemnation
upon it, and destroyed the "myth of the
invincibility of the Israeli army".
Like Israel, Turkey faces a designated terrorist
group - the Kurdistan Workers party (PKK) - able to
mount cross-border raids while several thousand of
its fighters operate securely in territory beyond
the control of a weak central Iraqi government. As a
result, analysts suggest, Turkey finds itself in a
similar situation now to Israel last July, except
that Ankara, a long-standing Nato ally, is bereft of
US support for any move against the PKK, an aspect
that riles the Turkish public, politicians and
military.
Ankara's military response - should it ignore US
pleadings - could also be similar to Israel's,
relying primarily on air power and a limited ground
incursion to destroy PKK bases. Any occupation is
also likely to be limited - as are Turkey's chances
of a resounding success.
For the US, the main danger of a Turkish operation
is that it would deal a damaging blow to the fragile
Iraqi coalition government in which the Kurds play a
key role, and possibly to Iraq's integrity as a
single nation. General Yashar Buyukanit, chief of
the Turkish general staff, said two weeks ago the
military case for intervention by his forces was
clear, but that it needed political approval, which
had not yet been sought. A senior member of Turkey's
ruling Justice and Development party told the FT
that parliament would almost certainly authorise
military operations if the army sought it.
Washington appears to think the threat of
intervention is less serious than late last year,
although "we shouldn't be cavalier about it", a
senior official said.
Some senior analysts believe the Bush administration
must do more to rein in its ally Massoud Barzani,
the Iraqi Kurdistan president of the autonomous
north who has given sanctuary to the PKK and has
infuriated Turkey with his
own incendiary
warning.
"We have been taking it too lightly," says Lee
Hamilton, adviser to the Bush administration and
co-chair of the Iraq Study Group advisory panel.
Turkey "won't tolerate the PKK. I think we have to
pay a lot more attention to this".
Glenn Howard, president of the Jamestown Foundation,
a security think-tank, says: "The whole track record
of this administration is one of miscalculating
Turkey." He says there isa "very strong possibility"
that Turkey will mounta limited incursion into
Kurdistan (northern Iraq) by the end of May.
Erol Cebeci, one of six Turkish legislators to lobby
Washington last week, said that in invading Iraq the
US had ignored Turkish warnings that it would open a
Pandora's box of ethnic problems.
"No government would tolerate this," he said of the
PKK's cross-border attacks.
Sukru Elekdag, a senior member of the Turkish
opposition Republican People's party, who also
visited Washington, says repeated calls by Iraqi
Kurds forindependence, a planned referendum, opposed
by Turkey, on the future statusof the northern city
of Kirkuk, which is claimedby the Kurds, and the
silence of the Bush administration on supporting
Turkey, have led to sus-picions of US motives in the
region.
"Putting all this together we have come to the
conclusion that, for the sake of relations with the
Kurds, the US is willing to risk the alliance with
Turkey. This is not a superficial conclusion," he
says.
He indicated this was partly the result of the
Turkish parliament's vote in 2003 that denied
transit to US forces on their way to invade Iraq.
ft com
** The use of the term "Kurdistan" is vigorously
rejected due to its alleged political implications
by the Republic of Turkey, which does not recognize
the existence of a "Turkish Kurdistan" Southeast
Turkey.
Others estimate as many as 40 million Kurds live in
Big Kurdistan (Iraq, Turkey, Syria, Iran, Armenia),
which covers an area as big as France, about half of
all Kurds which estimate to 20 million live in
Turkey.
Turkey is home to some 20 million ethnic Kurds, some
of whom openly sympathise with the Kurdish PKK for a
Kurdish homeland in the country's mainly Kurdish
southeast of Turkey.
Before August 2002, the Turkish government placed
severe restrictions on the use of Kurdish language,
prohibiting the language in education and broadcast
media.
The Kurdish alphabet is still not recognized
in Turkey, and use of the Kurdish letters X, W, Q
which do not exist in the Turkish
alphabet has led to judicial persecution in 2000 and
2003
The Kurdish flag flown officially in Iraqi Kurdistan
but unofficially flown by Kurds in Armenia. The flag
is banned in Iran, Syria, and Turkey where flying it
is a criminal offence"
Southeastern Turkey:
North Kurdistan ( Kurdistan-Turkey)
wikipedia
**
Kirkuk city is a Kurdistani city and it lies just
south border of the Kurdistan autonomous region and
it is not under the full control of Kurdistan
Regional Government administration, its population
is a mix of majority Kurds and minority of Arabs,
Turkmen.
The former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein forced
about 250,000 Kurdish residents to give up their
homes to Arabs in the 1970s, to "Arabize" the city
and the region's oil industry.
The Iraqi Constitution mandates that a referendum on
control of Kirkuk must be held by the end of this
year to decide whether the oil-rich Kurdish province
should be annexed to the safe semiautonomous
Kurdistan region in Iraq's north.
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