2004 Year in Review

The Kurds Will Find a Way

The Kurds have been fairly independent since the first Gulf War and supported by the United States. Unlike most of the rest of Iraq, the Kurds are not ethnic Arabs, although they are 75% Muslim. Also, there are many Kurds living in Syria, Iran and Turkey.

Recently, when a new interim President was appointed in Iraq and a resolution supporting the turnover of sovereignty from the US to Iraq, a controversy erupted involving the Kurds. Due to Shiite cleric Sistani's insistence the interim constitution for Iraq, which was agreed upon a few months ago, was abandoned.

The Kurds were very upset by this since the interim constitution guaranteed relative independence for a Kurdish province. The Kurds immediately threatened to declare their independence from the new Iraqi state.

Seymour Hersch reports that the Israeli government is aligning itself with this Kurdish group. Among other things, the Israelis believe that the US occupation is doomed to failure:

Ehud Barak, the former Israeli Prime Minister, who supported the Bush Administration's invasion of Iraq, took it upon himself at this point to privately warn Vice-President Dick Cheney that America had lost in Iraq; according to an American close to Barak, he said that Israel "had learned that there's no way to win an occupation." The only issue, Barak told Cheney, "was choosing the size of your humiliation." Cheney did not respond to Barak's assessment. (Cheney's office declined to comment.)

The article goes on to quote sources that state that an independent Kurdish state would be a disaster for the area, leading to endless violence. Turkey is opposed to an independent state, since there is a large, rebellious minority of Kurds living within the country::

Turkish sources confidentially report that the Turks are increasingly concerned by the expanding Israeli presence in Kurdistan and alleged encouragement of Kurdish ambitions to create an independent state. . . . The Turks note that the large Israeli intelligence operations in Northern Iraq incorporate anti-Syrian and anti-Iranian activity, including support to Iranian and Syrian Kurds who are in opposition to their respective governments.

In the years since the first Gulf War, Iraq's Kurds, aided by an internationally enforced no-fly zone and by a U.N. mandate providing them with a share of the country's oil revenues, have managed to achieve a large measure of independence in three northern Iraqi provinces. As far as most Kurds are concerned, however, historic "Kurdistan" extends well beyond Iraq's borders, encompassing parts of Iran, Syria, and Turkey. All three countries fear that Kurdistan, despite public pledges to the contrary, will declare its independence from the interim Iraqi government if conditions don't improve after June 30th.

My opinion is that the most important principle in guiding the formation of nations is self-determination. The modern country of Iraq was cobbled together by the British after World War I from three provinces of the Ottomon Empire. Britain's goal was not to create a strong Iraq - it meant to create a weak Iraq. That's was the primary reason for the creation of Kuwait - it weakened Iraq by narrowing its access to the Persian Gulf.

This disregard of self-determination, championed by US President Woodrow Wilson after World War II, has not helped create a stable mideast.

It seems to me that the Kurds are enough different from the rest of Iraq that in the long run the United States would be better off promoting and protecting an independent Kurdish state, despite Turkey's objections. One potential problem with this will be the repatriation of lands by the Kurds from Arabs who were placed there by Saddam Hussein in the past 30 years. This could lead to ethnic cleansing, although it has been relatively peaceful so far.

One benefit of an independent Kurdish state would be that it is likely that a Kurdish state would be both stable than the rest of Iraq and pro-American. The traditional Kurdish area of Iraq, particularly around the city of Kirkuk, is a significant source of oil and isn't that what this war is all about?

Would we be interested in Iraqi's freedom and democracy if there wasn't a lot of oil there?

by John Legler, Guest Columnist
June 22, 2004