Iraq Govt. Warns Turkey

By Cernig

Hooooo boy, things are getting "interesting" - as in the old Chinese curse style of "interesting".

Maliki government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh is in Cairo ahead of his boss's meeting with President Mubarak on Sunday, and has stated that any Turkish incursion aimed at PKK terrorists in Kurdish Iraq would be met by a united Iraq.

``Iraq is a sovereign country and Turkey or any other country has no right to enter Iraq, but if this happens, it will be confronted by all sides in the Iraqi government, and the whole Iraqi people will confront the Turkish intervention,'' al-Dabbagh told reporters.

Mind you, he also said that ``Iraq does not allow any group or organization to threaten the neighboring countries,'' which is patently untrue.

Still, many analysts and observers have said, since last year, that it's more a case of "when" than "if" Turkey will attack PKK bases and assets inside Iraqi territory.

That's going to put US forces right in the middle, between the large, well-equipped army and air force of a major NATO ally and an Iraqi military which is really a paramilitary internal security force rather than a serious deterrent to an external aggressor but could be a real bitch for the US forces in Iraq if it became as hostile as the insurgent groups already are.

The US can't really afford to be for or against either side. If only the Bush administration had realised months ago it would come to this - all the signs were already there - and had bitten the bullet of taking action against the PKK. But they had to preserve the spin that Kurdish Iraq was a capitalist-loving, US-approving haven of peace and tranquility...nothing to do with any kind of war against terrorism, oh no.

Update Of course, it may be that the US has already picked a side, in its attempts to destabilize Iran.

U.S. officials ignored the presence of the militant Kurdistan Workers Party in northern Iraq to encourage the PKK to launch attacks in Iran, a report said.

The New Anatolian, an English-language Turkish newspaper, said the Bush administration actively courted PKK leaders and Iranian opposition groups based in Iraq to stir up trouble inside Iran. The Kurdistan Workers Party is a designated terrorist group in Turkey, and Ankara has pressured the United States and Iraq to crack down on its bases in Iraq's northern Kandil Mountains, the report said.