OPERATION “TERMINATION OF TRAITORS”: THE IRAQI REGIME THROUGH ITS DOCUMENTS By Robert G. Rabil*
This article examines the Iraqi regime’s policy toward its Kurdish population during the Iran-Iraq War, which culminated in a military operation codenamed Termination of Traitors. Executed in a methodical and systematic fashion, this operation shows that the regime was not just trying to quell the Kurdish insurgency but had a plan for altering irreversibly the life of the Kurds in northern Iraq. Equally significant, this operation shows the regime’s views and methods in general as well as attitudes toward human rights.
This article, based on official Iraqi window into the regime’s inner workings, documents, examines the Iraqi regime’s policy nature and modus operandi. vis-à-vis its Kurdish population during the Iran- In its definitive study of the Anfal campaign, Iraq war (1980-1988).(1) The long, conflicted Human Rights Watch (HRW) concluded that Iraqi-Kurdish relationship led to the the Iraqi regime committed the crime of government’s decision to launch a major genocide. While seeing no master plan to campaign against the Kurds at the war’s end. exterminate the Kurds, HRW emphasized that Harsh methods were employed in an operation Anfal was the culmination of the Iraqi regime’s codenamed Termination of Traitors, personally “anti-Kurdish drive [which] dated back fifteen ordered by President Saddam Hussein and years or more, well before the outbreak of leading into the better-known Anfal campaign. hostilities between Iran and Iraq.”(2) Whether The three-phase effort was designed not only to or not this campaign will some day be deal a final blow to the Kurdish rebellion but to internationally recognized as genocide, the ensure no such uprising took place in the future. documentation shows that the regime’s effort to The campaign’s aim was also the conscious quell the Kurdish insurgency was based on a and deliberate murder of large numbers of deliberate plan to exterminate large numbers of Kurds regardless of their gender, age, or Kurds. civilian status. Even chemical weapons were to be used against them. A special bureaucracy BACKGROUND was created to carry out this operation and to Modern Kurdish history in Iraq cannot be meticulously detail every action taken. These separated from the Kurds’ struggle for activities spanned a gamut from independence or autonomy from government “collectivizing” the families of “saboteurs”, to control. In response, Baghdad tried to ensure its detaining them, creating dossiers on them, and power in the Kurdish regions and to suppress marking them for death. For this purpose, the periodic rebellions. This relationship was regime mobilized a wide range of officials from further exacerbated by the presence of vast oil the lowest- to highest-ranking. All this is reserves on the fringes of the Kurds’ ancestral sketched in minute detail in the mass of official land, mainly around the ethnically mixed areas documents examined by this research to open a of Kirkuk and Khaneqin. The Kurds repeatedly
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Operation “Termination of Traitors”: The Iraqi Regime Through its Documents challenged the central authorities for control of Moreover, following the manifesto, a these areas. significant number of Kurdish families were A pattern characterized Kurdish-Iraqi forcibly removed from their homes to reduce relations since 1958. Each Iraqi government their presence in several areas, especially that came to power at first pursued peace around Kirkuk. In September 1971, thousands negotiations with the Kurds only to fight them of Faili Kurds were expelled to Iran from at a later date when it felt secure about its rule border areas on the grounds that they were not over the country. Following the Free Officers Iraqis. In 1972, the Ba’th regime began to Revolution in 1958, the new regime, led by assert its nationalist credentials and went on to ‘Abd al-Karim Qasim, pursued cordial relations sign a friendship treaty with the Soviet Union with the Kurds. In fact, the Kurds helped the and nationalize the Iraq Petroleum Company. regime put down a coup d'etat and the KDP Following the 1973 Arab-Israeli war, Iraq’s oil was legalized in 1960. However, once it revenues soared and provided the regime with appeared that Qasim was not willing to grant the wherewithal to embark on huge projects and real autonomy to the Kurds, fighting between to strengthen its police state. the two parties broke out in 1961. When the In the meantime, the Kurdish leadership Ba’th-Nationalist alliance overthrew Qasim in began a process of rapprochement with Iran, 1963, negotiations between the new regime and Israel and the CIA, which were concerned with the Kurds resumed. Fighting broke out again Iraq’s assertive policies and evolving Soviet- when the Kurdish leadership realized that the Iraq relations. With Ba’th-Kurdish relations enthusiasm of the new regime for Kurdish intermittently hostile, the main Kurdish leader autonomy had been assumed for purely tactical Mustafa Barzani, head of the Kurdistan purposes. By 1964, the nationalists, led by Abd Democratic Party (KDP), laid formal claim to al-Salam ‘Arif, had pushed their Ba’thist the Kirkuk oil fields in June 1973. partners out of the coalition and negotiated a Baghdad was furious at what it considered cease-fire with the Kurds. The cease-fire lasted Barzani’s audacity on this point as well as his until April 1965 at which time the central collaboration with Iran, Israel and the CIA. government dispatched virtually the entire Iraqi Fighting broke out between the two sides. In army to the North in an attempt to reassert its March 1974, Baghdad unilaterally decreed an authority there. autonomy statute excluding the oil-rich areas of This same pattern continued when the Ba’th Kirkuk, Khaneqin and Jabal Sinjar from the party government assumed power following a Kurdish autonomous region, which would July 1968 coup. The new regime was pragmatic include only the three provinces (governates) of enough to seek political accommodations with Irbil, Sulaimaniya and Dohuk. In line with the the Kurds at a time it felt weak on account of new statute, the Ba’th regime undertook an contending domestic political forces. The administrative reform in which the country’s Revolutionary Command Council (RCC), the sixteen governates were renamed and some had highest authority in the land, issued a manifesto their boundaries altered. Of special importance, on March 11, 1970 essentially recognizing the the governate of Kirkuk was divided and the legitimacy of Kurdish nationalism and area around the capital city Kirkuk was guaranteeing Kurdish participation in renamed al-Ta’mim (nationalization) governate government. But it held out on defining the after its boundaries were redrawn to give an territorial extent of Kurdistan pending a new Arab majority. census. Since the next census was not schedule Meanwhile, despite its persistent offensives until 1977, the regime felt confident of that included air strikes on Kurdish positions, controlling events by then. Iraqi forces were bogged down by fierce resistance from Kurdish fighters, known as
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Robert G. Rabil peshmerga (those who face death). and control Kurdish political life had foundered Unexpectedly, in March 1975, in the course of after so many army units stationed in Iraqi an OPEC conference at Algiers, the shah of Kurdistan were sent to the front. The resurgent Iran and Iraq’s strongman, Saddam Hussein, peshmerga were quick to fill the security signed the Algiers agreement, which put a vacuum there and many villagers offered refuge temporary end to the conflict between the two to an increasing number of Kurdish deserters. countries. Iraq granted Iran shared access to the At first, the regime focused its attention on disputed Shatt al-Arab and in return Iran the KDP’s links to Iran, which increased its withheld its support from the Kurds. In less military and economic support for the Kurdish than a week, Barzani’s rebellion collapsed. He opposition party. This relationship entered a left for Iran, then for the United States where he new dangerous phase in the regime’s eyes when died in 1979. Consequently, the KDP split in Iran, with help from the KDP, seized the 1975 into two main factions, the KDP- important border garrison town of Hajj Omran Provisional Command led by Barzani’s sons in July 1983. The initial thrusts of the Iraqi Idris and Masoud, and the Patriotic Union of army into Iran had been parried by a successful Kurdistan (PUK), led by Jalal Talabani. Iranian counter-offensive. Now Iraq was on the Immediately following the rebellion’s defensive. The regime was furious with the collapse, the Iraqi regime embarked on a KDP and branded it a fifth column. campaign to Arabize the areas it had excluded At the same time, the regime maneuvered to from the autonomous region. Hundreds of deepen the rivalry between the KDP and the Kurdish families were uprooted and Arabs from PUK. Capitalizing on the PUK’s opposition to the south were lured to move to the north. the KDP’s role in facilitating the Iranian Subsequently, in 1977-1978 the regime began offensive on Hajj Omran, Saddam Hussein to clear a strip of land along its northern launched a diplomatic initiative centering on borders with Turkey and Iran, which was offering the PUK leader a renewed expanded several times until it was several few commitment of Kurdish autonomy. Talks miles wide. ensued between the PUK and Baghdad and Sharing a long mountainous border with continued inconclusively until their collapse in Iran, the governate of Sulaimaniya was deeply January 1985. Although a combination of affected. Hundreds of villages were destroyed reasons led to the collapse of talks, one key in this border clearance campaign and their issue was the regime’s rejection of the old residents forcibly relocated to mujamma’at Kurdish demand that the oil-rich regions of (complexes), crude resettlement camps, known Kirkuk and Khaneqin be considered part of also as “modern cities,” built near large towns autonomous Kurdistan. or main highways under the army’s complete This policy now pushed the PUK as well control. By the time Saddam became president into the Iran’s arms. Tehran was more than in 1979, Kurdish social and political life had happy to welcome this new ally in the midst of been very much affected by these measures. its war with Iraq. Within two years, Iranian- Army and intelligence units stationed PUK cooperation improved dramatically, throughout Iraqi Kurdistan continued to control culminating in a sweeping political, economic them and suppress their culture and identity. and military accord signed by the two parties in October 1986. They agreed to fight Saddam TAKING THE DECISION until he was toppled and to sign no unilateral With the onset of the Iraq-Iran war in deal with Baghdad. The Iraqi government’s September 1980, relations between Iraqi Kurds reaction was to ascribe officially the epithet of and Baghdad rose to new levels of enmity and Zumrat Umala’ Iran (Band of Iranian Agents) bitterness. Baghdad’s campaign to circumscribe to the PUK.(3)
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Operation “Termination of Traitors”: The Iraqi Regime Through its Documents
With both Kurdish groups helping Iran, General Military Intelligence Directorate and Baghdad lost control of the countryside in Iraqi had branches on the governate and district Kurdistan except for the main towns, cities and levels. connecting roads and highways. The regime --The Directorate of Security for the designated villages falling under the Autonomous Region which had branches on the peshmerga’s control or those where this militia governate, district and sub-district levels. It was active as prohibited for security reasons. reported to the General Directorate of Security. As Iraqi official documents show, it was at These apparatuses were part of the office of the this point, at the beginning of 1985, that the President. regime dropped its hitherto ad hoc --The intelligence units of the First and Fifth counterinsurgency measures and began to Corps. pursue a systematic state policy against the As illustrated by official documents, the Kurds aiming at destroying their political, barrage of decrees and orders began economic, social and military foundations. systematically on June 15, 1985 with telegram Building on its bureaucratic infrastructure in number 3488 ordering the deportation of the north of Iraq, the regime began to “women, children and elderly people who were bureaucratize and institutionalize its policy the relatives of saboteurs.” Any males who through a set of decrees and orders which might bear arms were to be arrested and streamlined executions and repressive detained.(4) Consequently, many families were measures. forcibly deported and many males arrested. For At the top of the bureaucratic hierarchy in example, in the Shaqlawa district most families Iraq Kurdistan was the Committee for Northern were forcibly removed to the Khoshnaw Affairs, established in 1979 and headed by region.(5) Those detained would only be Saddam, and the Northern Bureau of the Ba’th released if their peshmerga relatives party organization, the regime’s main office surrendered to the authorities.(6) there. The Committee for Northern Affairs was At the same time, the regime issued orders directly linked to the RCC, which wielded the to fire all saboteurs’ relatives from public real power in Iraq and was also presided over institutions; confiscate their properties; and by Saddam. Below these two bodies were remove their telephone lines. Certain villages security committees at the governate, district, would also lose access to electric power and and sub-district level. All these were supervised shipments of food to them would be blocked. by a central security committee. Finally there Dossiers were created on all the deported was the army, mainly the First and Fifth Corps, persons and the activities of suspects.(7) The and the pro-government Kurdish militias, food ration and identity card program would be informally called Jahsh (a pejorative name tightened. Anyone harboring any relative of an literally meaning mule), but known officially as oppositionist would be liable to prosecution.(8) the National Defense Battalions. In August 1985 an economic blockade was These groups were watched over by imposed on numerous villages, including Piro, intelligence and security agencies to be certain Totma, Khatay, Balisan, Sheikh Wasan, that the RCC’s instructions were implemented Balokawa, Bilawa—all in the district of through an intricate three-layer web: Shaqlawa.(9) --The Directorate of Military Intelligence for As will become apparent, these villages the Northern Region (Ninawa, Dohuk, Irbil), were destroyed later on and some of them based in Irbil, and the Directorate of Military attacked by chemical weapons. As a first step, Intelligence for the Eastern Region (al-Ta’mim, however, the economic blockade was to force Sulaimaniya, Diyala, Salahuddin), based in the surrender of the rebels whose families Kirkuk. These two Directorates reported to the would be faced by starvation. Further, by
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Robert G. Rabil deporting their relatives to these closed deemed prohibited for security reasons, cutting villages, the extent of the suffering would be off all government services and banning access accelerated and intensified.(10) to them. In addition to these measures, the regime In letter number 15076 issued on August 2, employed psychological warfare by trying to 1986, al-Zubeidi, head of both the Central sow mutual suspicion and conflict among the Committee for Security Coordination and Kurdish population. In September 1985, the Northern Bureau, circulated a directive from authorities decided to establish a committee to the office of the President numbered 28189, be headed by then secretary-general of the instructing all heads of the security committees Northern Bureau Muhammad Hamza al- in the governates to “continue the blockade and Zubeidi and to include prominent figures from tight control on the villages and areas that are Security and Military Intelligence. The plan prohibited for security reasons.” The directive was to exempt some Kurdish families and tribes added that “Foodstuffs and other provisions are from deportation to make others think these totally prohibited from reaching these villages groups were collaborating with the regime.(11) and areas.”(12) The Commands of the First and The measures imposed in the second half of Fifth Corps, all Commands of Northern Bureau 1985 and into early 1986, however, did not branches, and the Northern and Eastern break Kurdish morale. On the contrary, Regions’ Directorate of Intelligence were to Kurdish-Iranian collaboration intensified and participate in executing this directive. became even more dangerous to the regime. With the help of Kurdish insurgents, Iran OPERATION TERMINATION OF continued to launch offensives along the entire TRAITORS Iran-Iraq border. In September 1985, for Still, these measures did not stop the example, Iran was able to attack the northern Kurdish attacks and Iraq’s loss of territory to sector east of Rawanduz, while the KDP the insurgents. By the start of 1987, the claimed control over most of northern Iraqi situation in Iraqi Kurdistan had become critical territory almost to the Syrian border. for the regime which could not even guarantee The course of the war took a sharp turn in the situation in the main towns and cities. For February 1986. Iran launched back-to back- example on March 4, 1987, Iran launched an offensives, code-named respectively Wa al- offensive, codenamed Karbala-seven, which Fajr-Eight and Nine, on the southern and brought its forces to within a few miles of eastern sectors of the Iraqi border. In the first Rawanduz. Both KDP and PUK peshmerga offensive, Iran tried to capture Basra and the participated in the offensive. At this point, the Fao peninsula to cut off Iraq’s access to the regime began to consider measures powerful Gulf. In the second, Iran advanced into Iraqi enough both to quash the Kurdish insurgency Kurdistan to a line only 14 miles from and permanently destroy any basis for Kurdish Sulaimaniya, the capital city of Sulaimaniya resistance. governate. By March, despite Iraq’s attempts to The resulting plan was to carry out one halt the Iranian onslaught by using chemical sweeping operation, codenamed Termination of weapons, Iran captured the Fao peninsula. Traitors.(13) In line with the name’s These setbacks reinforced Iraq’s implication, that operation was designed to determination to implement a tough policy implement the highest possible level of against the Kurds, especially as both the KDP punishment and physical liquidation on both and PUK increased their attacks deep into Iraqi the Kurds and their villages. The method was to Kurdistan and even in the Kirkuk oilfield destroy villages and even towns, and then region. The regime was badly shaken by these forcibly deport their inhabitants to tightly events. It increased the number of villages supervised camps. The first step would be
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Operation “Termination of Traitors”: The Iraqi Regime Through its Documents against population centers in government- Immediately after his appointment, Majid controlled areas, followed by another phase to set about issuing orders increasing the arbitrary eliminate villages prohibited for security power of the heads of the security committees reasons wherever the army could reach or even and suspending all rights for residents of politically passive villages in areas where villages prohibited for security reasons. As guerrillas might operate. illustrated by the Northern Bureau’s letter In this way, most of rural Kurdistan was (confidential and personal) number 18/2397 of declared prohibited, and villages were marked April 6, 1987, he authorized the “heads of the for destruction regardless of whether the security committees in the northern governates villagers abetted, harbored, or supported the to confiscate the movable and immovable saboteurs. The first phase ran from April 20 to properties of the saboteurs, provided that their May 20 while the second was conducted from properties are liquidated within one month of May 21 to June 20. The final phase culminated the date of issuance of the confiscation in the Anfal campaign, characterized by the use decree.”(16) of chemical weapons against the Kurdish Prior to this decree only the central security population and lasting from February to committee had the power to issue and delegate September 1988. The word Anfal is mentioned orders concerning the saboteurs. With most of in the Koran (eighth sura) and literally means rural Iraqi Kurdistan considered prohibited for spoils. It is cited within the context of a hard security reasons, the heads of local security battle won by the first Muslims who perceived committees acquired significant personal it as vindication of their new faith. powers to do whatever they wanted. This, as The inauguration of operation Termination will be made clear below, was part of a larger of Traitors coincided with the appointment of policy aiming at loosening government restraint Ali Hasan al-Majid, the infamous cousin of on the behavior of Iraqi officers. Saddam, as Secretary-General of the Northern On April 20, operation Termination of Bureau of the Ba’th Organization. On March Traitors proceeded with a swift pace and wide 29, Saddam Hussein issued decree number 160 scope. As documents reveal, the regime aimed authorizing Majid to take charge of all military, at the elimination of villages located in an area security and civil affairs in northern Iraq.(14) extending from north Sulaimaniya to Zhako in Majid became the undisputed lord of northern northwestern Iraqi Kurdistan. This area, Iraq, including the Kurdish autonomous region. encompassing hundreds of villages, constituted This overarching decree was followed by roughly the middle, northeast and northwest of another issued by Saddam on April 20. Decree Iraqi Kurdistan. It ran from near the border of number 244 authorized Majid to discharge all the Ninawa governate south of the important missions of the Committee of Northern Affairs oil-field region of Mosul to the Iranian border for the purpose of executing decree 160.(15) and from north of Kirkuk to Zakho. All the The comprehensive nature of the operation villages considered prohibited for security and the swiftness with which it was executed reasons in this area were to be destroyed. But indicate that Majid was not necessarily its main villages not designated as prohibited could also architect. He was appointed to this position be destroyed with the approval of Majid.(17) because Saddam knew he would implement the Such a comprehensive operation required operation without reservation. His concerted efforts among the regime’s predecessors, Sa’di Mahdi Saleh and especially apparatuses, special equipment and a detailed Zubeidi had failed to bring the Kurds people to plan. The regime’s meticulous documentation their knees. Thanks to his brutality, al-Majid of the execution of the first two phases of the would succeed in doing so. operation in al-Gouli sub-district of Zhako district offered a full picture of how the
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Robert G. Rabil operation worked. Majid’s Northern Bureau in “collectivized”--to three complexes, Avegni, coordination with the central security Batofa and Bekova.(20) committee provided the names of villages to be Batofa complex, for example, had five mini- destroyed to the military, mainly the First and complexes, Tarwanch, Toler, Suria, Shilan and Fifth Corps, which in turn passed them on to Kosindar. Each household, sometimes the command of sectors, military outposts comprising more than one family, was assigned located in strategic and sensitive areas a house. The regime founded a committee to throughout Iraqi Kurdistan. The security every complex called the Committee to Resettle committee, which supervised the deportations, Deported Families.(21) On the surface, these generally included the heads of a district and/or committees were to accommodate and facilitate sub-district as well as high-ranking officials the relocation process. In reality, these from the General Directorate of Military committees were security organs created to Intelligence and the Northern Bureau. supervise, watch, and recruit agents among the As illustrated by the documents, (18) usually families. at 7:00 am, the armed forces of the sector, in Immediately after the arrival of the deported this case the sector of Batofa in al-Gouli sub- families to the complexes, every president of a district, accompanied by National Defense committee would write a morning and nightly Battalions, would storm the villages. report to the Directorate of Intelligence in his Depending on expected or actual resistance in sub-district containing the name of the father of the villages, these forces would ask for the deported family, number of family reinforcements from Emergency Forces, members, name of the village from which they Intelligence Detachments, Air Force and Tank were deported, and name of the complex in Battalions. For example in the case of the which he resided. According to official village of Ser Solaf in Batofa region, the Batofa documents, the villages destroyed in al-Gouli Military sector, along with National Defense were Gre, Khezafa, Khandak, Khol Gouli, battalions 38 (500 fighters) and 143 (150 Sirktuk, Kelkhwar, Berki, Merge, Akha fighters), attacked the city on April 22 and were Kharab, Avonak, Bahnuna and Avatoka.(22) At met by stiff peshmerga resistance. The sector one time, the population at Batofa complex thus called for air cover and reinforcements numbered 3,712 while that of Begova was including tanks. The village finally fell at 2:30 3,791. In another sub-district of Zhako, Sahl al- pm.(19) Iraqi forces then gathered all its Sindi, 27 villages were destroyed and the residents and destroyed it with bulldozers, complex there housed 4,021 individuals.(23) bombs, fire, or a combination of these methods. Although an exact number of destroyed The goal was to leave no trace of its existence villages cannot be currently provided, the scope so as to make it very hard for residents ever to and extent of this “collectivization” process return. was clear. At the same time the villages of the Following the destruction of villages, Iraqi Dohuk governate were eliminated, a similar and forces would deport the families to broader process was befalling the villages in government-built complexes situated next to Irbil governate. Hundreds of villages were main towns or highways under the complete destroyed and their residents relocated. In an control of the government. A complex included urgent and confidential telegram, number 456 within its confines mini-complexes each of April 17, 1987, the Security Lieutenant of containing shanty houses or tents. In al-Gouli Shaqlawa Directorate of Intelligence informed sub-district, according to the documents, the all intelligence branches in his governate about residents of the destroyed villages were the decision concerning where to relocate the relocated—in the regime’s parlance families deported from their areas. His telegram read as follows:
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Operation “Termination of Traitors”: The Iraqi Regime Through its Documents
April 16, shortly after PUK forces had captured The families in the sector of Koisinjaq the regime’s military posts in the area. and the sub-districts of Shoresh and Several official documents confirm the Tataq were to be relocated to the regime’s use of chemical weapons on Kurdish modern city of Darato; in the sectors of villages other than these two. Letter number al-Zibar, al-Sadeek, Shaqlawa, Choman 2396 of June 17, 1987, from the Shaqlawa and sub-districts of Diyana, Rawanduz, Directorate of Security reported, “On May 27 Mergeh Sur, Hareer, Khoshnaw and the villages of Malkan, Talitan, Kandour, Yali Khlefan to the modern city of Sibasarm; al-Ulya and Yali al-Sufla of Khlefan sub- in the city of Korkosak and the sector of district were attacked by Iraqi planes. As a Sahahuddin to Jaznikan; in the sector of result, a number of saboteurs were killed and Qoshtaba to Barhoshtar; in the sector of approximately 30 persons lost their the sub-district of Khabat and part of the eyesight.”(27) Blindness is a symptom sector of Qoshtaba sub-district to produced by chemical weapons. In the Tobzaw; in the sector of Ainkawa to meantime, Iran began providing protective Jaznikan; in the sector of al-Kuwair to masks to the Kurds and training them how to Tobzaw; and in the sector of Makhmur handle chemical attacks.(28) A more specific and the sub-districts of Qoraj and admission of the use of chemical weapons was Kandinaw to Faraj.(24) in telegram, number 159650 of May 25, 1987, from Military Intelligence which reported, The number of families deported, and by “Four chemical bombs were dropped but only implication the corresponding number of one detonated, inflicting four women with villages destroyed, had to be staggering given tearful eyes. They were taken to Belkchar the fact that the areas mentioned in this hospital for treatment.”(29) telegram covered a significant portion of Irbil Why did the regime use chemical weapons governate and north of Kirkuk. In fact, the on a few villages at this time? For example, it sheer quantity of the families to be deported dropped such weapons on Balisan and Sheikh from so many areas compelled the regime to Weisan on April 16 then went on to destroy the establish more committees for resettlement than villages on April 20. Why not destroy them in had originally been envisioned. For example, the first place without chemicals? The Irbil’s security committee established one documents suggest that the regime was central deportation committee and seven experimenting with the use of these weapons on deportation committees corresponding to the a purely practical basis to see whether they number of Irbil’s sectors.(25) would facilitate operation Termination of Several documents set the magnitude of this Traitors. If the chemical weapons made the “collectivization” process in sharp relief. villagers flee or killed them all, capturing these Responding to Irbil Security’s confidential and places would be easier and the task of urgent telegram number 1929 of April 29, deportation would be reduced. 1987, Shaqlawa Security officer listed the names of 32 villages eliminated, the names of THE PATH TO ANFAL their village chiefs, and the date of elimination. Even Operation Termination of Traitors, All villages, among which were Balisan and while energetically implemented, did not meet Sheikh Wasan, were destroyed in April and the regime’s goal. Peshmerga attacks on Iraqi May.(26) These two particular villages, located military posts and cooperation with Iran only south of the town of Rawanduz, had already continued to escalate. Now these forces were been the target of an Iraqi chemical attack on even hitting strategic positions near Sulaimaniya and Halabja as well as helping
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Robert G. Rabil
Iran launch offensives against towns near Taking all these directives together, a clear Dukan Lake such as Qala Diza. picture emerges. By creating a death zone while Against this background and given allowing Kurds there to move to towns or Saddam’s deadline to complete the mujamma’at under the strict control of the “collectivization” process by June 21, the armed forces, the regime was giving Kurds a authorities moved to the level of deliberate choice between death and submission. Creation murder to accelerate the depopulation of the of the death zone made sure no middle ground Kurdish areas. Majid issued two directives on existed for them. June 3 and 20 giving an order that Kurds should This plan became sharply defined by Majid be shot on sight in all areas prohibited for in a meeting held at the Northern Bureau on security reasons.(30) Clause five of the first September 6, 1987. As transcribed by an urgent directive instructed the armed forces to kill any and confidential letter dated September 15, human being or animal present in these rural 1987 and bearing reference number 4198, three areas. In much the same vein, the second important decisions were taken at that meeting: directive stressed that all the villages in which First, the security committees must submit a saboteurs were still to be found shall be survey of the families of the saboteurs within regarded as prohibited for security reasons and one week. Immediately after the survey’s required that all persons between the ages of 15 completion, these families would be deported to and 70 captured there must be executed. Clause the areas where the saboteurs were to be found, four instructed the corps commands to bombard except for the male members, age 12 to 50 the prohibited areas at all times in order to kill inclusive, who must be detained. All those so the largest number of persons there. It should deported could then be murdered since they be noted that bombardment of these areas had were present in the killing zone. been occurring on a regular but random basis Second, public meetings must be held to since the beginning of 1987.(31) emphasize the importance of the upcoming Equally significant, responding to a proposal census, which had been scheduled for October by the chiefs of staff, the Committee for 17. Those who would not participate in the Northern Affairs, through its letter number census, without a reasonable excuse, would 4151 of June 15, 1987, agreed that “the families lose their citizenship and be considered as army of saboteurs should be deported to their deserters, in which case RCC decree 677 would side.”(32) Although it had been applied apply to them, that is the death penalty. This previously, this measure acquired a far reaching meant that anyone who tried to evade deadly dimension this time because these government forces would be a legitimate target families were now being forced into villages for killing. where no human life was allowed. In other Finally, the saboteurs could return to the words, the regime not only no longer made a “national rank” between September 6 and difference between military and civilian targets October 17 on the condition they brought their but wanted to concentrate and murder the weapons with them.(34) It is noteworthy that maximum number of people. A glimpse of the throughout its history the regime issued brutal enormity of this new phase was revealed amnesties to insurgent Kurds. Those who took in a chilling rejoinder made by Majid to the advantage of the pardon were classified as First Corps in letter number 5083 of August 22, returnees to the national rank. However these 1987: “We do not object to the decapitation of people could be arrested and subsequently, in traitors. But it would have been preferable had the regime’s parlance, “disappear.”(35) you also sent them to Security for the purpose This meeting leaves no doubt that the of interrogating them [beforehand].”(33) regime was dividing the Kurds into those who accepted its domain and those who were
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Operation “Termination of Traitors”: The Iraqi Regime Through its Documents traitors. The census would define those two box of oil has increased from 30 to 120 groups.(36) Kurds in areas where government dinars.”(39) forces could not penetrate would face an economic blockade and would be killed if CONCLUSION possible. Examining the official Iraqi documents In a study prepared by Shaqlawa Directorate dealing with anti-Kurdish operations during the of Security and approved by Majid (attached to 1980s provides a first step in analyzing the letter number 10427 of November 27, 1987), history of these events and the government’s harsh measures were proposed to tighten the brutal campaign against civilians. An effort to economic blockade, among which were fight the Kurdish insurgency during the Iran- strengthening the control of complexes Iraq war expanded into a premeditated (presumably to prevent smuggling of food or extermination campaign to alter irreversibly other goods to the prohibited areas), stepping Kurdish political, social, economic and cultural up security on checkpoints, supervising life in northern Iraq workers who handle foodstuffs, and limiting the This campaign to exterminate a large amount of provisions supplied to owners of number of Kurds was comprehensively planned restaurants and bakeries.(37) at the highest levels of the Iraqi government Four months after the census, the regime and systematically implemented by its culminated its final phase of Operation institutions. The pressure was gradually Termination of Traitors with the Anfal escalated until reaching the mass murder campaign. Executed in eight stages, the operations of the Anfal campaign. On a military campaign lasted from February to September level, the goal was to end the rebellion by 1988. Seven of those stages were directed at destroying most villages in the Kurdish areas under the control of the PUK in central, countryside in order to deny them to the eastern and southeastern Kurdistan. The final opposition fighters and deprive the peshmerga stage was directed against the KDP-controlled of provisions. Yet it also had the longer-run area in the northwest. The Iraqi regime intention of forever ending any Kurdish glorified every stage of the campaign, challenge to the central authorities. portraying its advances as equivalent to In order to take the steps deemed necessary victories on the Iran-Iraq battlefront. Official for its survival, the regime recognized no limits documents described the campaign as heroic of morality, human rights, or legality. There and eternal, a campaign that brought about the was no sign of any debate over moral questions “collapse of the band of saboteurs.” (38) or future punishment at the hands of the Nevertheless, this was not a campaign international order. Barring the survival of the against an armed foe but a concerted program regime, nothing was sacred, forbidden or of deliberately murdering thousands of innocent inviolable. The full extent of the crimes civilians. Chemical weapons were again one of committed has still not been brought to light, the tools used. An urgent and confidential and the treatment of the Kurds during this telegram in July 1988 shows the villagers’ specific period gives a small example of the pitiful attempts to protect themselves: regime’s overall treatment of its citizens during “Information has been provided to the effect its entire reign. that oil (brake fluid) has been smuggled to the villages that are prohibited for security reasons *Dr. Rabil served with Red Cross in Lebanon, and to the saboteurs for use during chemical taught at Suffolk University and currently is the attacks because the oil protects the body after project manager of Iraq Research and exposure to chemical material. The oil has Documentation Project at the Iraq Foundation, disappeared from the market and the price of a Washington, DC. He is the author of the
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Robert G. Rabil forthcoming book Embattled Neighbors: 18. See documents cited in endnote number 12. Lebanon, Syria, Israel and the Elusive Peace by 19. IRDP-NIDS [641563]. Lynne Rienner Publishers. The author extends 20. IRDP-NIDS [641505, 641503-04, 641506, his thanks to IRDP research team. 641513-15, 641567, 641556-57, 641547, 641534]. NOTES 21. Ibid. 1. During the March 1991 uprising in Iraq, 22. Ibid. Kurdish opposition groups captured huge 23. IRDP-NIDS [641511-12]. quantities of Iraqi government documents 24. IRDP-NIDS [812146]. primarily belonging to Iraqi intelligence. 25. IRDP-NIDS [860012-14]. Thanks to efforts by Kanan Makiya and Human 26. IRDP-NIDS [862113-17]. Rights Watch, these documents were 27. IRDP-NIDS [856511-12]. transferred to the U.S., where the Senate 28. IRDP-NIDS [812015]. Foreign Relations Committee took charge of 29. IRDP-NIDS [645554]. them. Along with government officials, Human 30. Human Rights Watch/Middle East Rights Watch/Middle East first examined these translated the two documents containing the documents, which were subsequently given in directives. See Human Rights Watch, Iraq’s digital format to Iraq Research and Crime of Genocide, pp. 53-56. Documentation Project (IRDP). Supplementing 31. IRDP-NIDS [645717-18, 645685, 645674, documents possessed by Makiya, this collection 645571-3]. of documents numbering approximately 2.4 32. IRDP-NIDS [862090, 862236]. million pages is available at URL: 33. IRDP-NIDS [2379420].
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