The following is a report written last March for an American Foreign Policy course at Ripon College (Ripon, WI) taught by Professor Lamont Colucci. The assignment was simply to argue for one foreign policy which the student feels the United States should employ toward any country, or countries, on the planet. Originally, I did not wish to choose Iraq, but an idea came to me which was not worth running from. I will not venture to say that all the ideas that follow are mine alone, but I believe I have tied certain ones together in a logical, practical, and original fashion. It is my hope that this paper's thesis--that the United States should support an independent Kurdish state in northern Iraq to achieve all of its long-term goals--will become a widespread topic of discussion in American society and, hopefully, somehow take root in real-world American foreign policy.
Indeed, the time seems better now than ever. We have a president in office who is rapidly approaching lame-duck status and is not only worried about his legacy, but of the future of his party in both the upcoming mid-term congressional elections and the general elections just over two years from now. A fool-proof plan for leaving Iraq before his term expires would no doubt medicate such deepening wounds. Also, the people of the United States and many soldiers (I have recently spoken at length to a return soldier from Iraq) are becoming increasingly frustrated. Will democracy ever succeed in Iraq? Is it our job to make it? Outside the high hopes of the president, the reactions are generally negative. They form the foundation of my argument that the United States should support an independent Iraqi Kurdistan so that it may feel once more that it's reaching for something positive, tangible, and not amid the yearnings of one man.
Adam Candler
Sophomore, Ripon College
March 9, 2006
Since the United States engaged in Iraq three years ago, 2,304 U.S. troops have been killed there. The War on Terror has hardly needed fighting at home, as intended, but losses abroad are becoming more than the American people are willing to bear. A change is needed in how the United States fights this new kind of war. The battlefield ought not to be Iraq, and the traditional military establishment ought not to be the favored method of enforcement, as in previous wars; rather, the United States must move on from Iraq to fight terrorism in new places with new weapons and ideas. Thus, the foreign policy of the United States toward Iraq should be to call for a two-year timetable before the onset of a gradual withdrawal of troops, provided that the Iraqi government is able to establish peace within its borders. If they are unsuccessful in obeying this demand, then the United States has one last card to play before moving on to the next deal: unwavering support for the first-ever independent Kurdish state.
Before justifying Iraqi Kurds’ quest for a homeland, the question of premature withdrawal from other parts of Iraq must first be addressed. Indeed, under the auspices of the proposal at hand, the United States would not be pulling out soon by the stretch of any sane person’s imagination. Having already established a working government—albeit a distrustful one—with certified elections and a majority of the public’s support, the choice for U.S. military departure is entirely up to the Iraqis; a pullout could occur at any time. Further, the troops themselves who support a pullout think that two years is far too distant a time, as compared to too soon. John Zogby reports, for example, that “an overwhelming majority of 72%”—yes, an astounding 72 percent—“of American troops serving in Iraq think the U.S. should leave Iraq ‘immediately,” while another 22% said they should leave in the next six months.” It has not even been reiterated that the withdrawal after two years is only gradual, not immediate. Clearly two years is not too long to spot the Iraqi government before the U.S. military turns its attention to matters outside of Iraq.
But won’t Iraq fall into civil war without a U.S. military presence in its midst? What about the prospects of a Saddam Hussein-wannabe rising to power out of such conditions? The answers to these questions, respectively, are no and, “Oh well.” Nir Rosen, who reported on the March 2003 invasion, writes that civil war won’t manifest itself in Iraq beyond what it already has. He was proven wrong, of course, in light of the mosque bombings two weeks ago; but the fact that tensions did not heighten beyond a few retaliatory strikes from both Sunnis and Shiites adds credence to the following: The longer the United States stays (in Iraq), the more it fuels Sunni hostility toward Shiite “collaborators.” Were America not in Iraq, Sunni leaders could negotiate and participate without fear that they themselves would be branded traitors and collaborators by their constituents. Sunni leaders have said this in official public statements; leaders of the resistance have told me the same thing in private. The Iraqi government, which is currently dominated by Shiites, would lose its quisling stigma. Iraq’s security forces, also primarily Shiite, would no longer be working on behalf of foreign infidels against fellow Iraqis, but would be able to function independently and recruit Sunnis to a truly national force. The mere announcement of an intended U.S. withdrawal would allow Sunnis to come to the table and participate in defining the new Iraq.
It can be argued now that the Sunnis have come to the table, allying themselves with the Kurds to remove Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari from office on account of his weak handling of the Iraqi insurgency. The Kurds will be discussed in more detail soon, but for now it must be settled what to do with the foremost hopeful in Iraq to succeed Saddam Hussein as murderous dictator, even if for different religious and political reasons. He is the same man who recently preserved al-Jaafari’s seat of power, angering Sunni Arabs and Kurds alike: the al-Mahdi militia leader Muktada al-Sadr. This whimpering imam has been a nuisance since the beginning of the second Gulf War. After the U.S. shutdown of his propagandist newspaper in the spring of 2004, al-Sadr has led two revolts against U.S. forces with his militia and has somehow escaped alive. Rather than allow him to participate in politics and continue to poison the hearts of his already-over-the-top mentally ill ministry, the United States should follow the policy presented by many two years ago when al-Sadr holed himself up in Najaf: Kill him. Who cares if there’s an uprising? At least then he’s dead. The question of any Saddam Hussein-like figure rising to power in Iraq was responded to earlier with a casual, “Oh well.” In fact, this kind of response should be deemed acceptable to anybody except for Muktada al-Sadr.
Indeed, the possibility of a Saddam Hussein-like figure rising to power after the departure of the United States military is clearly recognized. This thought is not to be dwelled on, however. If such a man were to come to power in Iraq during the time of a U.S.-crafted democracy, it having already been blessed with a three-year grace period, then the U.S. goal of supplanting democracy there was never to be realized in the first place. It would be a loss which the U.S. government would have to admit, a mistake they would have to live with. For future matters, however, a stable Iraq—regardless of the price paid, or the government in place—would provide a desirable counterweight to Iran and a strategic buffer state between them and the Saudi oil fields. Contrary to widespread beliefs that Iraqi Shiites already plan to ally themselves with their neighbors to the east, Iraqis remain “fiercely nationalist—even the country’s Shiites resent Iranian meddling.” Iraqis would hardly let the Iranians consume them, and so the U.S. foreign policy in question is unlikely to be capitalized on by the most eligible (and dangerous) nation in the region, Iran.
It has thus been shown how a United States withdrawal from Iraq, if allowed enough time to prove itself practical, is neither vitally dangerous to U.S. interests in the Middle East or to the lives of Iraqis who, presumably, have no place for which to flee. In the event of a complete Iraqi failure to rein in insurgents, however, the proposal at hand has a way of making itself more sure-fire and secure. As alluded to earlier, a breakdown in the transition from a U.S. to all-Iraqi peacekeeping force calls for unwavering U.S. support for the first-ever independent Kurdish state in northern Iraq. But the long-term benefits are not only available to Iraqi Kurds; the abandoned Iraqi Arabs too can redeem themselves, as will be shown shortly. Further, the United States would allow itself under these circumstances reentry to the arena of fighting global terror, using the latest weapons, technology, and ideas to the world’s content.
To institute this policy, as was stated before, the current Iraqi government—of which the Kurds are a part—must fail. This is likely to happen. First off, the insurgency doesn’t seem to be backing down or leaving anytime soon. A poll entitled “What the Iraqi Public Wants,” carried out and completed by WorldPublicOpinion.org, concludes that “overall, 47% (of Iraqis) say they approve of “attacks on US-led forces (23% strongly).” Further, “90% believes that the US plans to have bases in Iraq permanently and 87% assume that the US would refuse to leave even if asked to by the new Iraqi government.” If Kurdish opinion toward the United States wasn’t so favorable, these numbers would be even more lob-sided. Insurgents don’t buy that the United States is occupying their country to play nicely, nor do they expect the United States to pack up and go home without being forced to. Thus, the insurgents have committed themselves to the attacking business for the long haul. To reinforce this latter point and also one made earlier, “The most common answer (given by Iraqis when asked why the United States ought to withdraw its troops) is ‘It is offensive to me to have foreign forces in my country…. The second most common answer is: ‘The presence of US forces attracts more violent attacks and makes things worse.’”
Why, then, should the Kurds be direct beneficiaries of pan-Iraqi misfortune? Why should they steal away with their own country while the other two-thirds of Iraq, as its borders currently lie, drag on in chaos? Quite frankly, the United States owes a homeland to the Kurds. In the aftermath of the first Gulf War, for example, the entire nation of Iraqi Kurds rallied to the words of President George H.W. Bush, encouraging them to overthrow their oppressive and once-defeated ruler Saddam Hussein and establish an independent state for themselves. The result was Bay of Pigs all over again, but without a military massacre: No U.S. support as promised, no air for which to breathe. Four-thousand Iraqi Kurds were forced to endure across the snowy mountains hiding the Turkish border—to a country that has a significant Kurdish population all its own, but, in accordance with its nationalist history, didn’t prefer any more. (Turkey will later be discussed in further detail.) Many more Iraqi Kurds traveled to Iran during this time of fright and abandonment, but the conditions there were not much more consoling. The deaths from starvation and poor living conditions were many.
Why did the United States government allow this awful ethnic condition to fall upon the Kurds of Iraq, a large portion of the people who seem never to have had a friend or ally in the entire world? It’s hard to say for sure. Indeed, the Ottomans, the Turks, the Iranians, the Arab Iraqis, the Russians, and the Americans again, on a separate occasion during the Nixon administration, have all betrayed the Kurds when another ally—albeit less trustworthy and deserving—promised more fruitful incentives. The U.S. abandonment of Iraqi Kurds after the first Gulf War is only the most recent example of a world power betraying the most faithful people on the face of the earth.
Having been battered about so often their history, it is not surprising that the Kurds have never before maintained an independent state for themselves (unless one is willing to include the short-lived Kurdish Republic of Mahabad, which existed for 11 months in Iran in 1945-46). As a result, the “Kurdish people have the unfortunate distinction of being probably the only community of over 15 million persons which has not achieved some form of national statehood, despite a struggle extending back over several decades.” The closest they have come is what has taken place over the past dozen years: a de facto Kurdish state in northern Iraq protected by a mainly U.S.-instituted “no-fly zone.” No doubt the United States felt guilty for its prior abandonment of the Kurds and did the most that it could to make amends.
The action paid off for both the United States and Iraqi Kurds. After overcoming a long struggle between themselves, the Kurds of Iraq were able to establish a working democracy and a strong military force which was able to attack alongside U.S. forces at the beginning of the second Gulf War. This military force is called the peshmerga, “those who stare death in the face,” and they are noted also for helping to wipe out Ansar al-Islam, an admittedly Kurdish terror group which served as the only connection between Iraq and Al Qaeda. It must be mentioned also that a northern front to the war would not have been possible if not for the prior successes of Kurdish leadership and tribal cooperation. A dozen years ago the United States offered the northern third of Iraq to the Kurds for their collective relief, but the United States too ended up reaping benefits. Now that the second Gulf War is over the United States should recommit that part of Iraq known as Kurdistan to the people who have always lived there, the Kurds, and should offer them more than what was given last time on account of Kurdish loyalty to the United States.
What is meant by the “more” stated above is not only self-determination, as opposed to provincial status within a federalized Iraq, but that the United States should also offer the Iraq Kurds the oil-rich city of Kirkuk as part of their earnings. Kirkuk is a controversial topic for discussion to all Iraqis, but the Shiites and Kurds are the only ones with any leverage in the debate—the Shiites because they hold 150 of 275 total seats in the Iraqi Parliament, and the Kurds because they hold legitimate ethnic claim to the city itself. Kurdish ethnic claim is opposed only by the “Turkmen” (a minute ethnic group living in Kirkuk with apparent relations to the Turks of Turkey) and remainders of Saddam Hussein’s “Anfal,” or “Spoils of War” Arabization campaign which he instituted during the 1980s, evicting thousands of Kurds and Turkmen from their native homes. Indeed, the
last serious census in Iraq took place in 1957, when the Turkmens constituted the largest group in the city (Kirkuk) (37.6%) while Kurds represented the largest group in the surrounding province (49%). Nowadays, however, the numbers are completely unknown…. [For example,]…when the city fell to the Kurdish peshmergas, almost the first act of the liberators was to loot the government offices, destroying or removing land records, population statistics and title deeds.
The question at this point, however, is not who lives in Kirkuk, but why each of the Shiites, Kurds, and Saddam Hussein (a Sunni) want, or wanted, it. Simply put, Kirkuk, which “purportedly sits on 10% of Iraq’s overall proven oil reserves of about 112 billion barrels” is “perhaps the richest city on earth”. Iraqi Kurds want it as their capital; other Shiites—namely, Muktada al-Sadr—stress that no Iraqi can claim the city before all other Iraqis (an unsurprising statement coming from someone who has no ethnic ties to the city itself, but wants its riches anyway); and even the Turks, through the Turkmen, maintain a hopeful interest. In the end, however, under the circumstances of a failed Iraqi government, the city should be granted to the Kurds because they have earned it and have proven their trustworthiness. Further, the city would serve as a perfect bargaining chip in both establishing a relationship between the new Iraqi government and providing an incentive for the Iraqis to continue to strive for peace and a working democracy within its borders. These are the available benefits, mentioned earlier, for the Iraqi people who will be left behind at the pullout of the U.S. military. The Iraqis will not run from this incentive. While many oil fields lie in the southern Shiite provinces of Iraq, for example, the economic prosperity of Iraq continues to lie in the Mosul oil fields surrounding Kirkuk, as King Faysal, the first ruler of Iraq, had declared almost a century ago.
To declare the awarding of Kirkuk to the Kurds in accordance with the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq after two years, the United States should also take the action of redeploying its entire military personnel south of Kirkuk in defense of the city and the new Kurdish state which would lie beyond. In this way the United States can maintain a safe troop presence in the region with which to provide a check on the rogue nation of Iran for many years to come. Continued U.S. presence in the region will also most likely inspire nearby Iranian Kurds to disavow their government (if they haven’t already) and further ally themselves with the Kurds of what is now Iraq. In addition, Iraqi Kurds will surely allow U.S. bases to be built for their own benefit and for that of the United States. The bases in Turkey, such as Incurlik, will no longer be needed, a desirable effect when considering Turkey’s plight to join the European Union and high disapproval of U.S. foreign policy. The United States will also be able to diminish troop levels from Kurdistan with as much liberty as it prefers once the southern border is secure from a small number of angry, overzealous Iraqi fighters who are sure to emerge. U.S. troops, of course, will be as safe and secure as they could ever be within the Middle East, as Iraqi Kurdistan has had no need for any coalition occupying troops since the onset of the war. As for the Turkish border to the north, that is for the famed Kurdish peshmerga to man as a first assignment in service to their new independent country. They will surely be up to the task.
Turkey is unlikely to invade Kurdistan at anytime in the near future, of course, but the possibility must not be ruled out. Though the history of Turkey and its own Kurdish problem is beyond the scope of this report, the standard train of thought from a Turkish point of view is that unprecedented freedom granted to one Kurdish people in the bordering region of Iraq will surely spur the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK; now called KADEK), a Kurdish terror group in Turkey, to actions beyond what it had taken before. This position is ridiculous. First off, the circumstances and conditions surrounding each people are completely different from one another: The Kurds in Turkey know that they can’t achieve statehood the way that the Iraqi Kurds ought to. If there is one thing which the Turkish government has made clear to its Kurdish minority (besides the former’s own malice), it is certainly that. The truth is that Turkey enjoys a de facto control over its bordering regions, and doesn’t intend to lose that kind of power.
The Turkmens provide testament to the latter point about Turkey’s grasp to maintain its limited amount of control in the region. The Iraqi Turkmen Front (ITF), for example, a Turkmen “political party backed by Ankara…estimates their numbers at some 2 to 3 million, or 8-11 percent of the Iraqi population,” while “independent scholars put the population share at no more than 2-3 percent.” Regardless, Turkey not only constructs the Turkmens as a people larger, more deserving, and closer related to Turks than they actually are; they also accuse Iraqi Kurds of discriminating against Turkmens the way other powers had traditionally done unto their own people. Can there be any greater insult? In essence, Turkey “has tied itself in knots by marrying itself to the Iraqi Turkmen community and using it as a wedge with which it can justify a Turkish intervention in northern Iraq” —and it’s ridiculous. Turkey has no business caring what the United States has planned for a forgotten people persecuted for far too long. It is actually quite disturbing how, after 70 years of denying the Kurdish population within their own borders (“Turks who forgot their language” they called them), the Turks would jump to the cause of the most miniscule of all ethnic groups to continue to inhibit Kurdish progress.
Speaking of the Kurdish population in Turkey, the PKK ought to quickly be brought into the conversation. Indeed, they alone redirect this tangent back to its original trajectory. To provide a brief background, then, the PKK—which, yes, is considered a terror group by the United States—began its first set of attacks in 1984 after its foundation by Abdullah Ocalan, a college student. The group continued to engage in terrorist activity for the next 15 years, instigating the deaths of approximately 30,000 people in southeastern Turkey, until 1999 when Ocalan was captured (with help from the United States). The group responded to their leader’s capture by declaring a unilateral ceasefire, which lasted for the next five years but is now dead in the water. Originally a secular and Marxist group, the PKK has reinvented itself over the years, transitioning from a party that once killed women and children to openly admitting such mistakes and limiting their targets; from one that had sought an independent Kurdish state to resigning itself to federal autonomy and political freedom; and, finally, from one which had disavowed religion to recognizing its importance to the lives of the people it contended to represent and, therefore, embracing it—but not in a fundamental, Osama bin Laden-sort of way. Consequently, the PKK, which remains on the United States list of foreign terror groups, maintains support from the people whom it claims to fight for—in a secular country poised for entry into the European Union, of all places.
The reason for incorporating the PKK into this discussion is to demonstrate the variety of terror groups found across the world. The PKK, for example, is quite different from the likes of Al Qaeda. Born during the Cold War, members of the PKK now seem willing to change, but are not provided opportunities to take the necessary steps toward becoming, for example, an active political party. Turkey simply won’t allow it. (At this rate, they’ll never be allowed into the European Union.) Here is where the United States can step in, determined to save the world in a new way from what it has embarked upon in Iraq. If the United States can provide some assurances in the new Iraqi Kurdish constitution, for example, that protect the rights of Iraqi Turkmen—but, more importantly, also of Turkish Kurds who wish to gain entry, so long as they disavow terrorism—then maybe Turkey will allow the United States to negotiate with the PKK, and maybe the PKK will listen. Further, “should conditions improve significantly (in Iraq), the U.S. will be able to make a more concrete gesture toward the Turks first and foremost, perhaps by issuing an ultimatum to the PKK forces in Iraq to give themselves up to the new Iraqi (Kurdish) authorities.” The PKK, after all, seems tired and perhaps both ready and willing to be removed from the U.S. list of foreign terror groups. Talking surely seems less painful and costly than fighting.
To reiterate the best foreign policy which the United States can (and should) pursue toward Iraq, the United States ought first call for a two-year timetable before the beginning of a gradual withdrawal of troops, and then hope for success of the Iraqi government to legitimize itself and establish peace within its borders. This feat is unlikely, for reasons already provided. Faced with this reality, the United States must redeploy its entire military force south of Kirkuk in defense of the first-ever independent Kurdistan, and proceed to withdraw its troops from there, all the while moderating dialogue between the Kurds and Iraqis on the partition of Kirkuk and its oil wealth. Next, a Kurdish constitution must faithfully be written so that it offends not the Turks or Turkmens and cuts a break to those long-suppressed Kurds living in Turkey, so long as they vow not to sour relations in any way with their native country’s government. Lastly, the United States must re-instigate, renew, and redefine the War on Terror, beginning with a diplomatic strategy toward the PKK of Turkey and proceeding with whatever weapons, technology, and ideas necessary to win the next fight thereafter. Surely, there will always be another fight.
1. Barkley, Henri J. “Turkey and Iraq: The Perils (and Prospects) of Proximity.” United States Institute of Peace, http://www.usip.org (July 2005): 7.
2. Chailand, Gerard. A People without a Country: The Kurds and Kurdistan. Brooklyn, NY: Olive Branch Press, 1993.
3. Gorvett, John. “Turkmen Trouble Causes Anxiety in Ankara.” Middle East: 350 November 2004.
4. Katzman, Kenneth, and Prados, Alfred B. “The Kurds in Post-Saddam Iraq,” CRS Report for Congress (Updated May 5, 2005).
5. Le Moyne College and Zogby International. “U.S. Troops in Iraq: 72% Say End War in 2006.” http://www.zogby.com/Soundbites/ReadClips.dbm?ID=1075 (28 February 2006).
6. Program on International Policy Attitudes. “What the Iraqi Public Wants.” http://www.WorldPublicOpinion.org (31 January 2006).
7. Rosen, Nir. “If America Left Iraq: The Case for Cutting and Running.” The Atlantic Monthly December 2005.
Copyright 2006 Adam Candler. All rights reserved.