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Time for Kurdish Realism
10.2.2008
By Michael O'Hanlon and Omer Taspinar
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February 10, 2008
Increasingly, Iraq's Kurds appear to be interfering
with efforts to foster political accommodation among
their country's major sectarian groups. Since Iraq's
future hinges on establishing such a spirit of
compromise, this trend has potentially grave
implications for Iraq, its neighbors and the United
States.
Two key issues stand out. First, Kurds are beginning
to develop oil fields on their territory with
foreign investors but with no role for Baghdad,
claiming cover under Iraq's 2005 constitution. But
the relevant sections of the Iraqi constitution
(articles 109 through 112, among others) state that
future oil wells will be developed by Iraq's
provinces and regions in conjunction with the
central government.
Second, Kurds want to reclaim the city of Kirkuk and
its surrounding oil fields, which may hold about 15
percent of Iraq's total reserves. Kurds claim, with
considerable justification, that many properties in
the city were taken from them under Saddam Hussein's
"Arabization" programs. Kurds want the homes back.
More broadly,www.ekurd.net
they want to control the
politics of Kirkuk and environs, up to and including
the possibility of Kirkuk and its oil joining the
region of Iraqi Kurdistan (which many Kurds hope
will ultimately become independent). Because of
these ambitions, it has been difficult to hold a
referendum on Kirkuk's future; a referendum was
supposed to have taken place by the end of 2007.
The Kurds are making a major mistake. They should
rethink their approach both out of fairness to the
United States, which has given them a chance to help
build a post-Hussein Iraq, and in the interests of
the Kurds and their neighbors. Baghdad needs a role
in developing future oil fields and sharing revenue;
Kirkuk needs to remain where it is in Iraq's
political system, or perhaps attain a special
status. It should not be muscled away into
Kurdistan.
It is hard to be sure, but the Kurds seem to believe
that if Iraq fails, they will be okay. Under this
theory, even if the country splits apart, the United
States will stand by its Kurdish friends, establish
military bases in Iraqi Kurdistan, and ultimately
ease the way toward its independence. Several
prominent Americans give occasional endorsement to
this dream, further convincing Kurds that it could
become reality.
We strongly doubt it. Kurdistan is an inland,
mountainous region within the broader Middle East.
Its neighbors are Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran. Two
of the four are nemeses of the United States; all
have their issues with Iraq's Kurds; none will be
eager to tolerate the kind of American military
overflights that would be needed to sustain bases in
Kurdistan if Iraq was breaking apart. Nor would they
necessarily let Iraq's Kurds export oil through
their territories and ports.
Why would the United States even want bases in
Kurdistan? If it ever goes to war against Iran,
numerous other countries are better positioned,www.ekurd.net
being adjacent to
international waterways and airspace. Those
countries may not all be as pro-American as Iraq's
Kurds, but if the threat posed by Iran grows, some
will probably make common cause with the United
States.
To be sure, many Americans admire the democratic,
prosperous, resilient Kurds. Americans also feel a
moral debt after allowing Hussein to oppress the
Kurds so many times in the past. But after
protecting the Kurds since 1991 and spending
hundreds of billions of dollars and thousands of
American lives in Iraq over the past five years,
that moral debt has been partially repaid. If the
Kurds will not now help the United States in
stabilizing Iraq, is there really a sense of common
purpose, and a set of shared interests, between the
two peoples?
Instead of pursuing a maximalist agenda in Kirkuk
and a dream of independence, the Kurds should opt
for realism. This means recognizing that if Iraq
falls apart, they will be on their own. It also
means recognizing that Turkey, with its 15 million
Kurds, is very nervous about Kurdish independence.
Yet the Kurds of Iraq should also know that a
Turkish-Kurdish war is not destiny. In fact, with
visionary leadership in Ankara and Irbil,
Turkish-Kurdish economic, political and military
cooperation -- starting with joint operations
against the terrorist Kurdish group, the PKK --
could lead to genuine friendship. After all, Turkey
is the most democratic, secular and pro-Western of
Iraq's neighbors, attributes that Iraqi Kurdistan
shares.
Iraq's Kurds have a remarkable future almost within
their grasp. But they face a crucial choice: They
can attain that future by compromising with their
fellow Iraqis, forming a partnership with Turkey and
strengthening their bond with the United States. Or
they can continue to pursue their own agenda in a
way that ultimately shatters their country and
destabilizes the broader region.
Michael O'Hanlon is a senior fellow at the Brookings
Institution. Omer Taspinar is a nonresident senior
fellow at Brookings and a professor at the National
War College. The views expressed here are their own.
washingtonpost com
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