A recent article in the Washington Post entitled “Time for Kurdish Realism” by
Michael O’Hanlon and Omer Taspinar presents Kurdish autonomy and the inclusion
of the Kirkuk Referendum in the Iraqi Constitution as some sort of sectarian
move for power by the Kurdish nation and its peoples. The first sentence of the
article presents its view that Kurds are merely a factional dispute among the
Iraqis. The fact is that the Kurdish nation is the only one that defines its
interests as a nation and not as a religious faction of Islam. Although the
Kurds are predominately Sunni, they never identified with the political parties
of the Baathists and they endured the brutality at the hands of Saddam Hussein’s
regime. After the Ottoman Empire was defeated in World War 1 Kurds were promised
a referendum which the imperial occupiers in their own scheme for divide and
conquer reneged on. Iraq as a nation with no cohesive national identity was
preferable to the British than nations that were forged historically and
presented a common culture and territory. So the nations of Turkey, Iraq, Syria
and Iran had boundaries established by the British that divided the Kurds in
those newly created states and prevented them from their right to national
sovereignty.
Since then the Kurds were subjected to numerous mass murder campaigns by the
political leaders, such as Ayatollah Khomeini and Saddam Hussein, of the states
into which they were partitioned. Poison gas was used against them at Halabja
and they were forced out of Kirkuk in an “Arabization” campaign by Hussein. The
authors admit to this but presume that the reason for the delay in the Kirkuk
referendum has been their demand for independence. The Kurdish Regional
Government has worked with the central government in Baghdad with an
understanding of their vulnerability as a people in the region and has exercised
judgment in regards to how to protect its people and establish a workable
political solution in the context of the current US occupation. They also
confront the historical record of aggression on their people by the other states
in the region and the record of attempts to forcibly assimilate them by Turkey
resulting in the deaths of tens of thousands of Kurds.
The writers of the article suggest just the opposite that: “the Kurds seem to
believe that if Iraq fails, they will be okay.” In fact, just the opposite is
the case that concerns them. They are really taking the measures they need to
now to protect the people in the event of the dissolution of Iraq after the US
occupation ends and proposing that any future with Iraq be based on the
recognition of their autonomy. There is no record that anyone can present that
establishes their safety will be assured by any of its neighbors or any new
regime in Baghdad. There is no guarantee that a centralized regime will protect
the Kurdish people. In fact, the record indicates that they are already
considered hostile to Sunni and Shi’a political leadership not because of any
military engagement against them by the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG).
Rather leaders such as Muqtada al-Sadr have actively sought to deny the
political rights of the Kurds within Iraq.
The attempt to make oil the primary focus denies the historical record of
Kurdish peoples and attempts to present the Kurds as ungrateful to US occupiers
in Iraq. The gratitude of Kurds for the overthrow of Saddam Hussein should not
be confused with their necessity to establish their own armed forces for their
own defense and the need to rectify the historical injustice of the denial of
Kurdish national rights. The U.S. does not have the right, as an occupier, to
prevent the political leadership of the KRG from acting in a manner guaranteed
under the current Iraqi Constitution. The Kirkuk Referendum is embedded in that
Constitution. They already accepted a six-month delay to it from the deadline
established in the Iraqi Constitution. Imagine their unreasonableness! Even in
the face of hundreds of thousands of Turkish troops massed on the border, they
agree to a delay.
“Kurdish realism” is based not on a short-term US invasion but on the
recognition that the future must be prepared for under the present
circumstances. This means the Kurdish nation must be prepared to confront any
and all eventualities. For the Kurdish nation making a mistake now will be paid
for in the future in the lives of Kurdish peoples. If the government in Baghdad
delays the referendum, then they are totally within their rights to work around
it and work towards the development of resources within existing boundaries to
provide economic security for their people. If the suggestion is they should be
silent and submissive when the government in Iraq delays and stalls the
implementation of the Kirkuk referendum that is simply a prescription for
national disaster.
The Turkish government has still refused to recognize the Kurdistan Regional
Government and has in the past invaded them. Turkey is not a disinterested party
in regards to the territory of southern Kurdistan that it once occupied under
the Ottoman Empire and has its own motives in seeking to expand beyond its
current borders. Likewise, it has its own motives for attempting to present the
PKK as it exists today as a threat. Within Turkey it has continued its
persecution of Kurdish political parties, such as the Democratic Society Party
(DTP). In the face of these assaults a non-violent march in Turkey against the
planned Turkish invasion was sent off with 20,000 supporters demonstrating on
February 6 in Diyarbakir. Is it unreasonable for Turkey to cease its attacks on
sovereign territory or allow the political representatives within its own nation
to represent their people without the threat of retaliation?
Who is being unreasonable here? Is it the Kurds who defend their political and
national rights or the Turkish government and military that bombs Iraqi citizens
and persecutes Kurds within its own nation? Who is being unrealistic here? Is it
the Kurds who confront the power of the largest military states of Turkey and
Iran in the region that have demonstrated a hostile intent towards Kurdish
people or the KRG that acts to establish the needed economic, political and
military infrastructure that can build for the future without the shadow of
genocide looming over them?
