News Shooting in Iraq
posted by on October 29 at 10:43 AM
Fresh from the AP:
Report: 15 Kurds Dead in Turkey Clashes
And Reuters:
Turkish youths target Kurdish property in Berlin
And etc.:
Kurds ‘head for hills’ in face of Turkish attack
All these headlines about Turks, Kurds, and the PKK recall me of the opening paragraphs of this feature, written by a filmmaker named Bill Cody, that we ran back in August.
On my third week in Iraq, we drive to Duhok, a city in the north, where the Turkish army shells the mountains every few weeks, trying to kill Kurdish guerrillas.
The Turks want to invade Kurdistan in the worst way. You can see it in Valley of the Wolves, a hit movie from 2006, produced by the Turkish military. It’s their version of Rambo—Turkish commandos killing U.S. and Kurdish soldiers and breaking up an organ-harvesting racket run by an evil Jewish-American doctor played by, of all people, Gary Busey.
But we aren’t thinking about the Turks or the guerrillas today. We’re thinking about actresses. And how hard it is to find them.
The story is a sad, episodic stroll through what used to be the most stable part of Iraq—shell-shocked students who’ve run away from Baghdad, glum State department officials drinking in karaoke bars, and a shady Chinese businessman and would-be pimp named Arrow. (It’s hard to find actresses because most actresses are also prostitutes and prohibitively expensive.)
But that’s just preamble—this morning, Bill forwarded an email from a friend, an Army Lieutenant who apparently works special ops in Ramadi and Baghdad.
I was actually going to mail you today. It seems that Turkey and Kurdistan will be at war within the month. Turkey has already started shelling, but they have promised not to invade until speaking with Pres. Bush.
I think the U.S. is behind in the chess game here. The Russian and Ottoman Empires are on the rise and it is a shame that the Kurds may be the first to fall. PKK is obviously all over the border on both sides, but the newest development is the deployment of the Kurdish Army to the border. I wonder if they are there to attempt to curb the PKK or to oppose the Turks.
I’d like to hope that they are there with the U.S. support to curtail the PKK, but I fear that this conflict will drive northern Iraq into a full scale insurgent war. The Kurds fighting off the Turks, the U.S. fighting the PKK, Al Qaeda launching guerrilla attacks to keep it going, and the Turks searching out the PKK, or anyone else that defends Kurdistan. Once you launch an invasion of Kurdistan, it becomes impossible to distinguish between the PKK and Kurdi militia defending their homeland.
It’s going to be a disaster. The Turks will win the immediate war, but the PKK will grow the way al qaeda did in Iraq, and both Turkey and the U.S. will have yet another faction of insurgence.
This is fucked up.
Bomb the shit out of them all.
As long as it happens 10,000 miles away, they are free to blow each other apart because God tells them it's his will to make the world Holy.
Ah, the usual Slog subtlety. All middle eastern people are Islamic fanatics, blow them all up.
Except they aren't. The Kurds are our friends, and are still the most pro-American people on the face of the earth. They're pro-freedom, pro-business, religiously moderate, and have nothing to do with the burqas, suicide bombs and clit-chopping of some of their more insane coreligionists.
This despite the fact that we fucked them over in the 80s and the 90s and are about to fuck them over in the 00s too.
On the other side is Turkey, who despite that business with the Armenians a million years ago are by far the most progressive majority-Islam country in the world. They are under a great deal of Islamification pressure, but are still for the most part a liberal democracy.
Neither of these places has anything to do with Sargon's "God's will" kook slur. We've managed to start a war between the two people who support our aims the most. It takes a special kind of genius to do that.
I guess I'm wondering how committed the US will be to fighting the PKK since Blackwater mercs were selling weapons to the PKK.
Judah, you don't understand the new American paradigm. Turning on and fighting groups we have just armed is what we do best. Endless war is the important thing; it doesn't matter if it makes strategic or political sense; in fact it's better if it doesn't make any.
So, I forget, why are our US taxes going to this civil war that has nothing to do with 9-11?
Oh, right, to feed GWB's cronies pockets with no-bid contracts and bribes.
Never mind.
@2 You obviously haven't been paying attention. The Kurds are secular. PKK is a Kurdish acronym for "Kurdish Workers Party." They're Communists, so they're not exactly big on spreading holy war.
And their opponents, the government of Turkey? They're actively anti-religious, and hold to an ideology of secularism far, far more rigid and extreme than the worst fantasies of reactionary Christianists in the US. Religious girls and women are not allowed to wear headscarves in schools, universities, or government jobs. The military has carried out three coups when a government has appeared to threaten secularism, and it wasn't illegal to do so. It was constitutionally mandated.
So, before you start talking out your ass, you might wanna do a wee bit of research, at least if you don't wanna sound like Dick Cheney.
Turkey is a major player in the region, and is in fact our most important ally in the fight against terror. Thanks to our genius president, they now hate us unreservedly -- down to 10% approval in a recent poll. They are not only threatening war with the Kurds but are making rumbling noises about allying with their (and our) traditional enemies Syria and Iran.
Heckuva job, George.
uf, bey. Inanmiyorum. Bush dunyayi mal oluyor.
MaF oluyor, yani.
Hmmm..... What does the Bible say about the post-Armaggeddon price of oil?
Wait a minute, this has all been a game of chess? I thought we were playing Othello!
Wasn't one of the reasons we got involved in this quagmire supposed to be that Hussein was bad because he gassed the Kurds? Now here we are propping up the Turks to come in and slaughter them.
bush is a fucking idiot, but even he doesn't want hostilities between the turks & the kurds.
i don't mean the PKK. this will spill over into the Peshmerga real quick.
someone (the Peshmerga) need to reign the PKK in right fucking now.
No one could have forseen that destabilizing the entire Middle East could conceivably lead to the destabilization of the entire Middle East.
Just as a point of order, the Kurds are an excellent example of "secular but still shitty." They're horrifyingly xenophobic, racist, and sexist. They carry out nice secular honor killings in Kurdish Iraq and around the world. They're a culture of assholes.
Also? Their claim on Turkish Kurdistan? Very similar in its broad strokes to the Palestinian claims on Israel; the Kurds fought for the Allies during World War I and were implicitly promised their independence as payment -- only to be fucked over during the armistice process. They've been pissed off about it ever since. And, very much like the PLO, Kurdish communism was only ever a facade to get material support from the Soviet Union.
@16 Agreed that they're shitty, and agreed that it needs to be pointed out that there are secular assholes too.
"On the other side is Turkey, who despite that business with the Armenians a million years ago..."
Jesus Christ, Fnarf, you are an asshole. Would you say the same thing about the Jewish Holocaust?
Turkey is a big bully country ("if you don't do what we like we will go to the Soviets, Saddam Hussein, Islamic Fundamentalists" pick an era and pick your threat.)
They will continue to commit atrocity after atrocity unless they are held accountable for the ones they have committed and are committing (Armenians, Greeks, Cyprus, the Kurds- pick an era and choose your mass killing)
Also, contrary to your post, there are plenty of Muslim countries in much better shape than Turkey- look in Asia for a start.
We do not need to be Turkey's friend.
I find you offensive and ignorant sir. Read a book before posting in the future please.
I, for one, would absolutely say the same thing -- if we were using it as a tool for judging the actions of the current German government.
As for the rest of your comment, all I can say is that I, for one, am an American. My country was built on the genocide -- in some cases through the intentional use of biological weapons -- of the Native Americans, the slavery of African Americans, and acquisition of territory through conquest and occupation of a large chunk of Northern Mexico. No foreign power has, as far as I'm aware, seen fit to hold my current government "accountable" for any of those things and yet, my government is the main player in all global dramas. Maybe we can afford to let Turkey out of the box.
We don't need to be anyone's friend. But the payoff for being Turkey's friend would be substantial.
Comments Closed
In order to combat spam, we are no longer accepting comments on this post (or any post more than 14 days old).