Turkish press article on Irak, Kurdistan: Now HERE'S a twist!!
Turkish province of Sirnak, bordering Iraq.
Photo: REUTERS" src="http://www.sofiaecho.com/showimage.php?img=soldier_turkey_iraq.jpg" align="left" border="0">
road surrounded by the rugged mountains in the south-eastern
Turkish province of Sirnak, bordering Iraq.
Photo: REUTERS
In the vernacular of an unresolved regional conflict, there is much room for hypothesising. This is all the more true when the number of parties to a conflict increases and when there is a lack of clarity about the interests at play – and when these interests are rapidly changing and evolving.
The Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) is a prime example of the multi-outcome gaming theory in play and to give a timeline for the resolution of this problem would be a hard task to handle.
Looking only at the tip of the iceberg, the answer seems all too simple: the PKK is a terrorist organisation. [According to who?????] The separatists, whose 23-year combat for autonomous rule in south-east Turkey [1984 ONLY?? C'mon!!] has resulted in a 32 000 death toll, have been slammed as a terrorist organisation by the US, the EU and naturally Turkey, which in the past month alone lost 40 soldiers. As a result, the natural solution would to root out this organisation through a hunt right to its bases in the Qandil Mountains, northern Iraq.
Turkey’s call
With this goal, Turkish prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan visited Washington on November 5. Even though international reports described his talks with US president George Bush as positive, yielding a “real-time intelligence sharing” agreement and a military incursion of Turkey’s into northern Iraq dubbed by Bush as “a hypothetical” question, Erdogan seems to have emerged from these talks with not what he was looking for. [Nope, Bush don't follow the Bilderberger PLAN!! He's a loose cannon in the world's ruling elite, as he loves to play nuclear COWBOY ...]
In a speech the same day at public policy think-tank the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), Erdogan said, “
It is not the time to keep the ball in the midfield. It is time to score a goal [...] and in solidarity with our friend [the US].”
If for the mere reason that the attacks
“tried the patience of the Turkish public sentiment”.
“No country would like to see itself threatened by a terrorist organisation just beyond its border, which targets its territorial integrity and security,” Erdogan said. “No country can turn a blind eye to such a situation.”
His resolve appears to be as firm as it was in late October, when the Turkish parliament vested the military and executive with a sweeping authorisation for diplomatic, military, economic measures against the rebels.
And action is concerted. Turkish president Abdullah Gul, who said on November 6 that a military option – though a last-resort – remained on the drawing board, and said that the visit of Erdogan sought to inform the US that Turkey is ready to act and had already chosen the means. Gul would not elaborate on the means to be used.
Yet how far can Turkey go?
In his speech at the CSIS, however, Erdogan said that Turkey’s objective was never a war against Iraq, nor was a call against the Kurds as an ethnic group, be they in Turkey – where Turks and Kurds enjoy peaceful cohabitation, Iraq, Syria or Iran. The goal, Erdogan underlined, is an operation – not another lasting war – against a guerrilla caucus, because no country in the region, especially its neighbours, is interested in an insecure Iraq.
Many pieces in the puzzle
Turkey’s stance, recalling a similar situation in the mid-1990s, comes within a different – and a much more complicated – regional set-up. And one that in the past few months has been undergoing a hectic metamorphosis.
This makes the solution that Turkey is offering – crackdown on the PKK as the cure-all solution – a time bomb with the potential to further rip apart a conflict-torn region, where peace hangs on a thread.
The circumlocutory language of a key player in the region, the US, is indicative of the level of complexity of the answer and of the extent to which the Middle East fulcrum has been on the rebalancing.
Where the US stands [Okay, you ready for THIS!! ...]
From the point of view of the strategic goals of the US, Washington has hinted that it is seeking withdrawal from Iraq. The local and international communities are growingly inclined to depict the US Iraqi operation as a flawed chapter in the US operations’ record. As a result, the US is trying to orchestrate a swift troop pull-out from Iraq while leaving it in a relatively stable condition to muffle the negative outcry. [WoW! Is this double talk for having LOST ... or what ..!!! I mean, they really went and stopped the use of WMD's eh, while having used TONS Of them themselves . and they sure as shite did NOT capture Osama bin Laden, did they? So the POINT was .. well, the empire is left with ONLY Isreal and Pakistan as allies .. the Turks are sort of TIRED of being played .. what would constitute STABILITY .. Kurdistan with the Chinese and India getting OIL??? Or ...???]
The US is busy re-deploying its positions in Iraq. On the one hand, it is sporting the allies-in-conflict dilemma. With the Kurdish administration in northern Iraq being the stronghold of peace and economic stability in the region, any sort of military intervention in Iraq, be it from a long-standing ally such as Turkey, is out of line with its revamped strategy for the region. [And this sort of "begs the question" on the other hand side, doesn't it .. ?? Read ON!]
For this reason, it has attempted to avert any – even if isolated – attempts to subvert the stability in this region, Turkey’s attempts for a forceful PKK crackdown in Iraq included.
Hence, the US U-turn from a previously staunch support of Turkey’s huntdown of PKK rebels to a complete denial of Turkish military intervention whatsoever in October. In the same situation in the mid-1990s, the US had given Turkey its unequivocal backing.
The strain between the US and Turkey reached its peak in October, when an unfettered verbal spat between the US and Turkey appeared to have reached the deadlock on military intervention in Iraq.
Turkey, with public pressure [in plain parlance this is known as AGITPROP, as this blog has incessantly pointed out] for PKK crackdown growing by the day, used its own diplomatic means to pressure an elusive US in retreat. Through alternation of threats and secessions, however, Turkey succeeded in obtaining November 5 the tacit US approval on Iraq. [and what does THAT mean ..???]
The carrot-and-the-stick strategy of Turkey’s set out with an October warning it would head for the military intervention in Iraq with or without the approval of the international community, and even at the expense of its diplomatic relations with the US and EU. [and be rewarded LATER, when it displays this outright MERCY for the Kurds, catapalting it into the record books as some great Islamic merciful state. Praise be!!]
Turkey then toned its statements down with Erdogan’s recent statements that a military intervention would be restricted to an “operation” and that most likely it would be targeted military air strikes and not a cross-border offensive. [Two points - air initiatives NEVER EVER work, and two, like that's gonna stop this type of guerilla warfare in the MOUNTAINS? Did anyone ever really take MODERN WARFARE 101??? This stuff is PURE bafflegab ...]
Yet to keep the pressure going in the region, Turkey has increased the number of its troops from 60 000 to 100 000 and has the tanks, artillery and aircraft in stock. [Perhaps that has something to do with "containing IRAN" .. hmmm? MAY BE??? That's a lot of troops!!]
Kurds live not only in Iraq
With the subtle peep-out for the new equilibrium ongoing, the main actors in this intricate interplay are cognisant of the chain reaction a rough approach on the PKK issue could produce. If the Turkish cause spills from its focus of crackdown of a terrorist formation onto a clampdown of the PKK ultimate objective for Kurdish self-rule, the identity sensitivity of the Kurdish communities residing in Iraq, Iran, Syria could sharpen to the point of brothers-in-arms unrest and give birth to a series of independence revolts. [Perhaps we have something that just might pass as Home Truth, finally.]
Signs to this effect have been articulated by a number of international experts. [Like WHO exactly ...? This is supposedly an article about the discussions with the Centre for International and Strategic Affairs. Who is WRITING this stuff anyway ..??? And who is paying for it??]
An insecure Iraq is in no one’s interest, Erdogan told the CSIS November 5. All the more – the shake-out of an entire region, the definite effect of the pan-Kurdish unrest. [But nothing to do with the "how do we steal Iranian oil?" endeavor?? Give me a loving break!! The amount of oil it takes to "feed" them US and Israeli fighters is huge, simply HUGE! Must . have .. that .. OIL!! It the PKK gets in the way .. OFF WITH THEIR HEADS!! The US can plainly see it only, and I mean ONLY, has the Isreali allies on one end of the region and the Pakistanis on the other. It's a bit late to get "choosey" about friends and allies; too little, too late.]
Therefore, it is in everyone’s interest to keep the PKK issue within confines. This is the known end to the crux it poses as the reverse outcome – a cross-border conflict – is known and undesirable by all parties involved.
All-out action unlikely
In view of the regional setup as is now, one could surmise that Turkey would hardly transform the verbal tug-of-war into anything like all-out action. Last week, Turkish ambassador to the US Nabi Sensoy was quoted by Reuters news agency as saying his government expected concrete action on three fronts:
shutting down five active PKK bases in Iraq,
cutting logistics and support lines that continue to supply PKK fighters in Iraq, and
blocking movement of PKK members and their political affiliates in northern Iraq.
This week, Turkey was more likely to carry out an airstrike only. As Turkey cools down from an October anger-driven streak of statements, it might reduce the PKK fight to the admonition that its 100 000-strong troops pose. [oh, yeah! Now that they are SO close to having the money and PRESTIGE necessary to rebuild its nation, shat on since 1911, it's gonna just be intimidated by Turkish appeasement of the US ...? Hardly likely ....]
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