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Kurdistandoff Kurdistandoff iHenri J. Barkey ORTHERN IRAQ has rep- thereby facilitating any future bid for resented the one success of independence. Renewed confrontations N the U.S. occupation of Iraq. with the PKK in Turkey with concomitant It is quiet and prosperous, and American increases in casualties have further soured troops are welcomed by the population the Turkish mood and have contributed there. This can all crumble in the next to the rise of xenophobic nationalism and six to nine months if Washington is not political instability in that country. careful. Neighboring Turkey, alarmed The Turks blame the Iraq War for at the emergence of a Kurdish state in creating the conditions that have given northern Iraq and the presence of the rise to a potential independent Kurdish Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) there, state. They also accuse the United States may throw caution to the wind by engag- of ignoring Turkish red lines on Kirkuk ing in a cross-border military operation. and federalism, and demands to take ac- Such an event is likely to pit Ankara, a tion against the PKK. In fact, Turks are NATO ally, against both the U.S. military convinced that the United States pre- and its Kurdish allies. Fighting between fers its newfound Kurdish allies to its old Turks and Kurds in Iraq could spread to NATO ally. A deputy leader in the main Turkey itself and, in the end, lead to a opposition party, Ali Topuz, went so far severe rupture in U.S.-Turkish relations. as to accuse the United States of using An unstable and violent northern Iraq the PKK as a weapon against Turkey. As would deal a fatal blow to the United a result, only 12 percent of the Turkish States’s Iraq project by accelerating, wid- public, according to a recent Pew poll, ening and deepening the current inter- holds a positive view of the United States. communal carnage. Widespread disaffection with the United Turkey, which has a sizeable and res- States—exacerbated by politicians, pun- tive Kurdish minority of its own, is fearful dits and generals—has translated into of the demonstration effect of the gains increasing public pressure for a unilateral achieved by Iraqi Kurds. It has tried to Turkish move into Iraq. resist not only Kurdish independence but Since the end of major combat opera- also Kurdish attempts at incorporating tions, the United States has been distract- the oil-rich city of Kirkuk into their area, ed by the rising insurgency in the rest of Iraq. With too few troops to protect Henri J. Barkey is the Cohen Professor of Inter- the entirety of the territory, the United national Relations at Lehigh University and a States has been thankful for the relative public policy scholar at the Woodrow Wilson tranquility in the north, where the Kurds Center in Washington, DC. have established a functioning adminis- The National Interest—Jul./Aug. 2007 51 trative government. In fact, security in Kirkuk into the Kurdistan Regional Gov- the north is almost completely in Kurdish ernment (KRG) through a referendum hands. Although the United States con- mandated by the Iraqi constitution to siders the PKK a terrorist organization, take place by the end of 2007. CENTCOM, the U.S. military command In August 2006, with Turkish patience in charge of Iraq, has demurred in fight- waning, a Turkish move into northern ing the widely dispersed PKK camps along Iraq was averted by last-minute diplo- the Turkish border and in its mountain- macy and the appointment of a special ous hideouts in Qandil, deep inside Iraqi- U.S. negotiator, retired General Joseph Kurdish territory. The United States and Ralston, to work with the Turks on the Turkey have not succeeded in persuading PKK. Although both the United States Iraqi Kurds to take on the PKK. A half- and Turkey are well-aware of the stakes hearted attempt at dislodging the PKK involved, the fact remains that the con- risks the possibility of wider conflict with tinued stalemate is hostage to a flare-up the group at a time when CENTCOM feels of violence, a miscalculation or even an it already has its share of local enemies. accident, especially now that Turkey will Residual bad blood, arising when, in be beset with uncertainty as it struggles March 2003, the Turkish parliament de- with its constitutional crisis following the clined permission to the United States to failed May presidential election. send a mechanized division from the north Washington is reportedly taking a to Baghdad, has not helped matters much. more serious look at the PKK problem. Even more damaging, on July 4, 2003, There is, however, a serious risk of all the U.S. troops arrested a number of Turk- different dynamics converging to fun- ish Special Forces troops on suspicion of damentally alter the conditions in Iraq planning to assassinate the governor of and the region. Is there a strategic ap- Kirkuk province. The arrested Turks were proach that the United States can adopt then hooded and transported to Bagh- to generate a more energetic and effec- dad. The image of Turkish troops being tive way of managing this problem? The subjected to the Al-Qaeda treatment was United States should take a proactive a humiliating blow seared into the Turk- role in shaping on-the-ground events: ish psyche, and this event became em- Instead of waiting for the situation to get blematic of Turkish-American relations. out of hand, it should construct a “grand Paradoxically, few in Turkey noticed that bargain” that encompasses Turks, Iraqis, the Turkish General Staff quietly retired Iraqi Kurds and the United States. or dismissed the three generals in com- mand of special forces in Iraq, perhaps URKEY AND the United in an indirect admission that theirs was a States share the same basic rogue operation not sanctioned by higher T medium- and long-term goals echelons in Ankara. More than three years on Iraq. They both would like to see the later, this event continues to cast its long re-emergence of a strong and secular Iraqi shadow over Turkish-American relations. state capable of holding the center and Ankara has also stepped up its attacks balancing Iran. They differ on the internal on the approach of Iraqi Kurds to Kirkuk, arrangements that would underpin this accusing Iraqi Kurds of forcibly changing new Iraqi state. The Americans have con- the demographics of the city and mis- cluded that only a federal state can keep treating the Turkmen population, with all the different nationalities and sectarian whom Turkey has cultivated ties. It wants groups together, while Ankara still believes the United States to use its influence to and hopes that the Iraqi state should be as prevent Iraqi Kurds from incorporating centralized as before, ending the expecta- 52 The National Interest—Jul./Aug. 2007 tion of Iraqi Kurdish autonomy. But if ties and deepen the integration between current trends hold, Iraq’s future will be the two economies. There are some 1,200 determined by the separation of its three Turkish companies operating in northern communities—whether this is within a Iraq, mostly engaged in construction, but loose federation or through three inde- also in oil exploration and other services, pendent states. No amount of threats will which have generated some $2 billion alter a final outcome that may not be to in business. Some Turkish businessmen the liking of either Washington or Ankara. even expect that they will get as much as Ankara’s options are quite limited. $10 billion of a total of $15 billion worth Turkey can actively align itself with Iran of contracts the KRG will issue in the next and Syria, two other neighboring coun- three years. tries with sizable and restless Kurdish Turkey, as a hedge against Kurdish populations of their own, to prevent the ambitions in Kirkuk, has developed its Kurds from achieving their goals. Such Turkmen card. It not only championed an alignment, however, would seriously Turkmen rights but created and actively undermine Iraq’s already tenuous future supported the Iraqi Turkmen Front (ITF). and run afoul of the United States and The ITF has not succeeded in making the Europeans. A large anti-PKK cross- itself the voice of the Turkish-speaking border military intervention risks em- Iraqi Turkmen; it failed miserably in the broiling the Turks in a guerrilla campaign 2005 elections as the Turkmen cast their with Iraqi Kurds which, as the Americans votes for the dominant Shi‘a coalition in have discovered, they cannot win. Such Baghdad, and many even chose the Kurd- an action would have extremely serious ish alliance (50 percent of the Turkmen ramifications for Ankara’s standing with are Shi‘a and tend to vote along sectar- the United States and the EU. Moreover, ian lines). The ITF proved completely Turkey’s Kurdish regions would erupt incompetent and incapable of distancing in violence were the Turks to intervene itself from its Turkish military patrons. It against their Iraqi brethren. Finally, An- polled a meager 0.87 percent of the votes, kara has also closed the door on prospec- leading to a serious re-evaluation of pol- tive amnesty for PKK fighters, other than icy by the Turkish ministry of foreign the leadership cadres, for fear of appear- affairs. Turkey, having exaggerated its ing irresolute. alarm regarding the fate of the Turkmen On the other hand, Ankara has much population, finds itself not only without to gain from a grand bargain with Iraq, an effective card to play—except perhaps Iraqi Kurds and the United States that rhetorically—but also in a bind because aims to peacefully and cooperatively the ITF has become a cause célèbre of sorts resolve outstanding issues.
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