Wednesday, June 09, 2004
Kurdish Secession
The euphoria produced by the unanimous acceptance of the Security Council resolution on Iraq was soured by the announcement that the Kurdish leaders were seriously thinking of abandoning the effort to make a federalist Iraq, taking their troops and loyalties back to the hills. In a letter from their two top leaders to President Bush they gave an ultimatum. Either you guarantee that the new government in Iraq will not undercut the provisional constitution that gives us a special right to veto any attempt to curtail our autonomy or we will no longer take part. Their major complaints are two-fold. First, in the resolution they did not get the guarantee they sought that the federal system would not be altered and second they felt that the United States had failed them by not giving a Kurd one of the top four positions in the new government. In effect we sent a special representative, Blackwill, to tell them what was going to happen, a mission that also did not sit well with them. Our change of position, what they see as yet another sellout, was occasioned by our focus on attaining and keeping the support of the Ayatollah Sistani, who has not been bashful in asserting the new Iraq must be a unified state under Shiite control (albeit through the ballot box).
We face an almost insurmountable problem. We feel we must keep the support of the Shiites, and the Shiite leaders, including Sistani himself, feel that to maintaining their control over their followers (and fend off the Sadrists) they must stick to a hard line guaranteeing Shiite supremacy. The Kurdish leaders face a similar need within their ranks. They have not achieved their positions by caving in to outside pressures Thus while we must work hard to resolve the problem, at the end of the day we may have to accept a divided Iraq.
Nevertheless, we must make the effort to mediate the problem. For one thing, the international community and the Arab world are looking to us to hold the country together. It may be that the apparent intransigence of the Kurdish leaders is just an act. After all, a large part of the Kurdish population of Iraq, especially the best educated and well off, live in Baghdad and other major cities outside the Kurdish area. If it is, then, mostly a bluff, then we have a chance. But the report is that city offices are being closed, Kurds are on the move, it does not look promising.
If we fail at mediation, then in the long run we should plan to help both sides economically and culturally, but we should avoid the use or threat of military force. The Kurds have already said they want our military protection (protection we offered by air under Saddam). However, for the immediate future the Kurds will have stronger non-coalition forces along their regional borders than the other Iraqis. If the Kurds then try to extend their ethnic borders (and they are not all that well defined), they may well end up attacking non-Kurds who might in turn ask for our assistance. In both cases, we should concentrate on mediation of such conflicts to reduce the chance that Americans die either for a unified Iraq or for an independent Kurdistan.
If the breakup occurs, we would be well advised to help make the parts work as separate units. This is certainly what we did in Yugoslavia. The separate units all have done better democratically and economically than Serbia, the heart of the country. We have been willing within Serbia to support with international forces and agreements what is in essence a secessionist Albania, a state that only formally is denied independent status and will surely have it one day. It does not seem to me that Iraq is any more a state than Yugoslavia was. It might be best for it to stay unified, but if the parts do not want that we should not make a great effort to force them to stay together.
I also agree with William Safire (a rare occurrence) that we have a responsibility to the Kurds. They have fought our battles on many occasions. They now have a secular government closer to a democracy than the rest of the country. They helped us in our invasion, much as the Northern Alliance helped our efforts in Afghanistan. I also agree that while Turkey and Iran, with their own Kurdish secessionist movements might not be happy with this outcome, they are unlikely to interfere with it violently.
The euphoria produced by the unanimous acceptance of the Security Council resolution on Iraq was soured by the announcement that the Kurdish leaders were seriously thinking of abandoning the effort to make a federalist Iraq, taking their troops and loyalties back to the hills. In a letter from their two top leaders to President Bush they gave an ultimatum. Either you guarantee that the new government in Iraq will not undercut the provisional constitution that gives us a special right to veto any attempt to curtail our autonomy or we will no longer take part. Their major complaints are two-fold. First, in the resolution they did not get the guarantee they sought that the federal system would not be altered and second they felt that the United States had failed them by not giving a Kurd one of the top four positions in the new government. In effect we sent a special representative, Blackwill, to tell them what was going to happen, a mission that also did not sit well with them. Our change of position, what they see as yet another sellout, was occasioned by our focus on attaining and keeping the support of the Ayatollah Sistani, who has not been bashful in asserting the new Iraq must be a unified state under Shiite control (albeit through the ballot box).
We face an almost insurmountable problem. We feel we must keep the support of the Shiites, and the Shiite leaders, including Sistani himself, feel that to maintaining their control over their followers (and fend off the Sadrists) they must stick to a hard line guaranteeing Shiite supremacy. The Kurdish leaders face a similar need within their ranks. They have not achieved their positions by caving in to outside pressures Thus while we must work hard to resolve the problem, at the end of the day we may have to accept a divided Iraq.
Nevertheless, we must make the effort to mediate the problem. For one thing, the international community and the Arab world are looking to us to hold the country together. It may be that the apparent intransigence of the Kurdish leaders is just an act. After all, a large part of the Kurdish population of Iraq, especially the best educated and well off, live in Baghdad and other major cities outside the Kurdish area. If it is, then, mostly a bluff, then we have a chance. But the report is that city offices are being closed, Kurds are on the move, it does not look promising.
If we fail at mediation, then in the long run we should plan to help both sides economically and culturally, but we should avoid the use or threat of military force. The Kurds have already said they want our military protection (protection we offered by air under Saddam). However, for the immediate future the Kurds will have stronger non-coalition forces along their regional borders than the other Iraqis. If the Kurds then try to extend their ethnic borders (and they are not all that well defined), they may well end up attacking non-Kurds who might in turn ask for our assistance. In both cases, we should concentrate on mediation of such conflicts to reduce the chance that Americans die either for a unified Iraq or for an independent Kurdistan.
If the breakup occurs, we would be well advised to help make the parts work as separate units. This is certainly what we did in Yugoslavia. The separate units all have done better democratically and economically than Serbia, the heart of the country. We have been willing within Serbia to support with international forces and agreements what is in essence a secessionist Albania, a state that only formally is denied independent status and will surely have it one day. It does not seem to me that Iraq is any more a state than Yugoslavia was. It might be best for it to stay unified, but if the parts do not want that we should not make a great effort to force them to stay together.
I also agree with William Safire (a rare occurrence) that we have a responsibility to the Kurds. They have fought our battles on many occasions. They now have a secular government closer to a democracy than the rest of the country. They helped us in our invasion, much as the Northern Alliance helped our efforts in Afghanistan. I also agree that while Turkey and Iran, with their own Kurdish secessionist movements might not be happy with this outcome, they are unlikely to interfere with it violently.
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