Signs Of Turkish Front Heating Back Up

By Cernig

As if US and Iraqi government forces didn't have enough troubles in Southern Iraq, there are signs that the Northern border may be heating up again.

After Turkish crackdowns on Kurdish protesters recently, the PKK have vowed to retaliate. And now there are signs that the Turkish military are gearing up to mount a major offensive after the Spring thaw, following up on their reconnaissance in force in February:

A convoy of 250 Turkish military trucks and civilian buses is headed toward the border with Iraq, nearly a month after a Turkish cross-border operation against Kurdish rebels, a news agency reported Thursday.

The vehicles approached the border village of Derecik in Hakkari province on Wednesday evening, Dogan news agency said. The vehicles traveled with their headlights off, according to a news agency reporter who saw the convoy.

Helicopters also ferried dozens of troops to the border from the town of Semdinli on Thursday morning, Dogan said.

It was the largest reported activity by the Turkish military near the Iraqi border since Turkey ended an eight-day incursion into Iraq on Feb. 29.

PKK Makes $700 Million Yearly From Drugs, Smuggling

By Cernig

The Turkish government has said that the banned Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) terror group has a yearly income of 400-500 million euros (up to $750 million) obtained from drug dealing, human trafficking, smuggling and donations.

Speaking on the second day of an international conference on terrorism organized by the Turkish military at the Centre of Excellence -- Defense against Terrorism (COE-DAT) in Ankara on March 10 and 11, Saygun said: “It is obvious that the PKK is a terrorist organization and, with its mafia-like structure, it is also an organized criminal organization. This fact has been proven by several international reports. The terrorists’ organization obtains its income mainly from drug dealing, in addition to arms smuggling, money laundering, racketeering and other illegal means.”
He said the PKK obtains 200-250 million euros from drug dealing, 100-150 million from its various smuggling activities and 15-20 million from donations.

Saygun indicated that the PKK provides arms not only to its members but also to the terrorists of other organizations. He said this shows how the PKK has become an international criminal organization and that it underlines the need to fight the PKK’s crimes internationally. “The mentality that supports the terrorist organization should not forget that this organization controls 80 percent of the drug dealing in Europe and poisons the European public.”

At the conference Saygun said reports from the UN and other esteemed international organizations indicate that the PKK kidnaps children -- including girls -- in Europe to give them training in arms and ideology.

He complained that even though Turkey has been sensitive to make a distinction among groups and not to label everybody terrorists, some Europeans do not show the same understanding. “Some in Europe wrongly identify everybody of Kurdish origin with the PKK,” he said.

Speaking about the harm caused by terrorist organizations in general, Saygun said: “Terrorist organizations claim they represent ethnic groups or great belief groups. So they carry out their activities in the name of the ideologies of Islam, people’s independence, minority rights, Jihad, democratic rights and freedoms, thereby seeking legitimacy for their activities. We should not fall into this trap.”

Not just terrorists responsible for over 60,000 deaths but a massive criminal organistation which has done untold damage to lives throughout the Middle east and Europe. Yet the Bush administration has consistently soft-stepped and fence sat when it comes to the PKK, willing to trade their presence and activities for a quiet Kurdish North in Iraq these last five years.

One offshoot of this group - the PJK - is one that rightwing American extremists like Ken Timmerman cozy up to simply because it is seen as fighting the current Iranian regime. Timmerman isn't just the reporter who wrote a puff piece on the PJK, he's also executive director of the Foundation for Democracy in Iran, which he founded with neocon Bush administration insider Peter Rodeman.

But both Bush administration and neocons alike should be careful about their allies. "The enemy of my enemy is my friend" may well be the way the Right like to run foreign policy but it's just as true that "if you lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas."

Rove's Math is faulty again

One of the M.O.'s of George W. Bush's political and business careers is the ability and willingness to create an 'after me, the deluge' so don't replace me situations. Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt is created so that although Bush and his associates have created a bad situation, the FUD keeps people from being willing to switch to other management for the fear of the higher associated costs of cleaning up after Bush. This was best captured by the Economist [h/t Unqualified Offerings]

In 2000 he beat an incumbent vice-president after eight years of peace and prosperity: the wry slogan among his inner circle was: “Things have never been better. Vote for change.” Four years later, with the economy stalled and Iraq in flames, he won again. This time, the backstage slogan was: “Things have never been worse. Stay the course.”

And we are getting the same playbook in Iraq. It is a clusterf*ck, the state has been delegitimatized to a ridiculous Nth Degree, the US is funding both the insurgency, and the counterinsurgency efforts (usually the same people), Iran's President was welcomed with flowers and chocalate while President Bush, Sec. State Rice and Sec. Def Gates have to make nighttime unnanounced visits and the success that is being trumpeted is returning to violence levels of 2005 when Iraq had already become a failed state. Oh yeah, two major US allies (Turks and Iraqi Kurds) are setting themselves up for a multi-division slug-fest once the ground dries out in the spring.

And yet, Bush allies are arguing that doing more of what Bush is doing with the same management team is the course with the lowest cost of action. Karl Rove is arguing that pulling out of Iraq would send oil to $200 a barrel. This after seeing the price of oil triple in the past five years, and ignoring either a static or dynamic analysis of the situation.

If we were to give up Iraq with the third largest oil reserves in the world to the control of an Al Qaida regime or to the control of Iran, don’t you think $200 a barrel oil would have a cost to the American economy?

This is wrong on several levels. First, Al-Quaida as the right's talking points like to trumpet this week, is not that strong in Iraq. It never has been until it was a convienent bogeyman. Instead the primary combatants shooting at the US in Iraq have been native-born Iraqis, Sunni Arab nationalists/revanchists/Ba'athists, [at least one, usually two, sometimes all three], Sadr's Mahdi Army which is overwhelmingly urban Shi'ites, and criminal/smuggling operations. The foreign fighters have been at times extremely useful idiots, but always idiots in the eyes of the Sunni Arabs. Al-Queada can't take over the central government; their best objective is hollowing out the central government.

Secondly, the economics don't work out. Iraq is exported in 2007 an average of 1.6 million barrels per day. More recently Iraqi oil exports were roughly 1.9 million barrels per day out of total production of about 2.4 million barrels. Global oil and oil near substitute production in January 2008 was 87.2 million barrels. Iraq produces 2.7% of global crude in January 2008.

If we were to assume for the argument that complete US withdrawal would lead to a complete shutdown of Iraqi oil production and exports and thus lead to a doubling in spot prices, this implies an elasticity of demand of less than .03 in the short run. Elasticity of demand is an economic concept that estimates how much prices would change in response to a percentage change in supply. For instance an elasticity of demand of 1.0 would have prices increase 1% for every 1% of a good that is no longer available. An elasticity of demand of .5 would have prices increase by 2% for every 1% of supply removed from the market etc.

The best short run estimates of the elasticity of demand for crude oil range from .10 to .16. Over the longer run, these elasticities increase, but in the short run using the lowest accepted estimate, removing all Iraqi oil from market would lead to a price increase of 27% +/- a bit, and using the .16, removing all Iraqi oil from market would lead to a price increase of 17% +/- a bit.

And these estimates assume all Iraqi oil comes off the market when we have proven history that there is a good deal of capacity for limited Iraqi production no matter how many people are being shot and pipelines being blown up.

And this is just the simple static counter-argument against Rove. If one wants to get a little more complex and attribute at least a portion of the nominal dollar price increases in oil over the past five or six years to a weakening US dollar, and low US interest rates, we can construct an interesting counterfactual. Right now the entire Iraq expenditure is being placed on the US credit card. Iraq is costing in cash terms about $200 billion per year right now. Removing a significant amount of that cost from our ongoing and recurring expenses will reduce US debt loads, and marginally reduce the downward pressure on the dollar. A strong US dollar means US consumers pay less per gallon/barrel than in a scenario with a weaker US dollar.

This part of the argument that Joseph Stiglitz has been making recently. The Federal Reserve failed in 2003/2004 to counteract the massive fiscal stiumulas of war spending by tightening monetary policy. This led to a bubble, and the subsequent credit crunch.

The war has fed into the weakness of the wider economy, he said, adding, "To cover that up, the Fed and the regulators flooded the economy with liquidity - giving cheap money to anybody this side of a life support system."

He said there was a direct correlation between the extent of the current crisis in financial markets and the cost of the conflict.

So in this counterfactual, the US dollar is a little stronger and oil is a little cheaper. Rove is factually wrong, but he is throwing out a marker of blame against anyone advocating that they want to clean up George W. Bush's failures. Par for the course.

Turkey Pulls Back Troops From Iraq

By Cernig

After saying no-one was going to dictate timetables to them, the Turks have gone ahead and pulled back their forces from Iraq, where they've been hunting Kurdish PKK terrorists.

A statement by Turkey's armed forces General Staff denied any foreign influence on the decision, which came a day after U.S President George W. Bush urged a swift end to the offensive.

"There was no question of completely liquidating the terrorist organisation, but Turkey has shown the organisation that northern Iraq is not a safe haven for them," the General Staff said.

Turkey sent thousands of soldiers into mountainous northern Iraq on February 21 to crush rebels of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) who use the region as a base for attacks on Turkish territory.

"It was determined that the aims set at the start of the operation had been achieved," the General Staff said in its statement. "Our units returned to their bases (in Turkey) on the morning of February 29."

Announcing the withdrawal ahead of the General Staff, Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari welcomed the decision to leave.

But Turkey's Justice Minister Mehmet Ali Sahin, quoted by TV networks, said Ankara reserved the right to send troops again into Iraq if needed. A parliamentary mandate allowing the army to stage cross-border operations only expires in October.

The assumption is going to be that Bush and Gates managed to bend Turkey to their will - but I've a feeling it was far more about a hasty decision based on weather forecasts and reports of the Kurdish regional government mobilizing two brigades of peshmerga. And the General Staff statement is probably correct in at least this much - this was always a reconnaisance in force as preparation for a far larger Spring offensive. This one isn't over yet.

Turks - "No Timetable"

By Cernig

U.S SecDef Gates has joined the Iraqi government in calling for Turkey to keep its incursion into Iraq short.

"It's very important that the Turks make this operation as short as possible and then leave," Gates said before departing India. "They have to be mindful of Iraqi sovereignty. I measure quick in terms of days, a week or two, something like that, not months."

However, the Turkish military seems to have no intention of letting either American or Iraqi pressure dictate its operations in Kurdish Iraq. There are reports of more troops being sent to the area of fighting and the Turks have bluntly said:

"Our objective is clear, our mission is clear and there is no timetable until ... those terrorist bases are eliminated," senior Turkish envoy Ahmet Davutoglu said after talks with Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari.

It must really put a bug up the Bush administration's ass to hear its own "War On Terror" rhetoric used against it in this way, but it really only has itself to blame. Washington has turned a mostly blind eye to PKK attacks from Iraqi safe havens for years, in return for a mostly quiet North as the primary long-term bright spot of the Iraqi misadventure. They sat on the fence between a Kurdish ally that enabled terrorist groups (which co-incidentally also carry out attacks inside Iran) and their NATO ally - and now they have splinters.

But the current incursion is both a warning and a preamble. Turkey is sending a very unsubtle message. "Get off the fence and reign in these Kurdish groups before the Spring thaw in late-March or April or we'll be over the border in real force and you can kiss goodbye to peace in Northern Iraq. We've proven we can and we've proven you can't do anything about it short of breaking up NATO and starting up an actual war with the most moderate Islamic-majority nation in the region." The unrest which will come from the US and Iraq cracking down on the PKK and PJK will be nothing compared to what would hit the fan then.

At present, as far as I can see, Turkey holds all the cards.

Update Via Tim F at Balloon Juice, Ken Silverstein reports that the Iraqi Kurdish regional government may be planning to mount a resistance to the Turkish incursion:

A former U.S. official who works in northern Iraq emailed me to say:

"The United States is being skillfully handled by the Turks, who are dragging the U.S. into a policy disaster in Kurdistan. The Kurds have moved a lot of fighters and equipment quietly into the area, and are prepared to strike the Turks. Massoud [Barzani, the Iraqi Kurdish leader] has issued all the press comments he can to publicly warn that Kurdish patience is gone. The United States is either ignoring the signals or missing them…The Kurds can and will bloody the Turks badly in a fight."

This former official is close to Kurdish officials and hence an interested party, but his previous reports from the ground have been well-informed.

The Kurds couldn't possibly hope to defeat the Turkish military - they're utterly outclassed in terms of both manpower and equipment. But that's not to say they couldn't mount a very effective Hezboullah-style defense that could make the Turks pay a price. If Silverstein's source is correct then the entire Iraqi issue is about to explode. I think it's highly unlikely that the Kurdish regional authorities and their peshmerga could get involved in fighting Turkey while the Iraqi government sat on the sidelines. And if the Iraqi central government gets involved then the US occupation will have to get off the fence or be pushed off.

Let me reiterate here - these upcoming "interesting times" in Iraq are not the kind of mess that, in White House speak, "couldn't have been anticipated". Way back in August 2006 there were reports that diplomats were saying that it was a case of when, not if, Turkey would cross the border unless the US forced Iraq to deal with the PKK. Since then, the signs haven't been difficult to miss.

Turkey Launches Islamic Reformation

By Cernig

A report from the BBC today should get far more coverage than it has been given so far - the Turkish government is trying to hurry through a radical re-interpretation of some Islamic core texts in an effort to refrom Islam:

The country's powerful Department of Religious Affairs has commissioned a team of theologians at Ankara University to carry out a fundamental revision of the Hadith, the second most sacred text in Islam after the Koran.

The Hadith is a collection of thousands of sayings reputed to come from the Prophet Muhammad. As such, it is the principal guide for Muslims in interpreting the Koran and the source of the vast majority of Islamic law, or Sharia.

But the Turkish state has come to see the Hadith as having an often negative influence on a society it is in a hurry to modernise, and believes it responsible for obscuring the original values of Islam.

The ambitious project, based out of Ankara University's School of Theology, aims to provide an interpretation of the Hadith free of later revisions by mainly conservative groupings - revisions aimed at bolstering their own social control of their populace. The project aims to "sweep away" those accretions.

Prof Mehmet Gormez, a senior official in the Department of Religious Affairs and an expert on the Hadith, gives a telling example.

"There are some messages that ban women from travelling for three days or more without their husband's permission and they are genuine.

"But this isn't a religious ban. It came about because in the Prophet's time it simply wasn't safe for a woman to travel alone like that. But as time has passed, people have made permanent what was only supposed to be a temporary ban for safety reasons."

The project justifies such bold interference in the 1,400-year-old content of the Hadith by rigorous academic research.

Prof Gormez points out that in another speech, the Prophet said "he longed for the day when a woman might travel long distances alone".

So, he argues, it is clear what the Prophet's goal was.

Significantly, one of the main thrusts of Turkey's new project is the empowering of women as theologians. (I've long argued that the Islamic Enlightenment would have breasts - and maybe a burkha or two.)

As part of its aggressive programme of renewal, Turkey has given theological training to 450 women, and appointed them as senior imams called "vaizes".

They have been given the task of explaining the original spirit of Islam to remote communities in Turkey's vast interior.

One of the women, Hulya Koc, looked out over a sea of headscarves at a town meeting in central Turkey and told the women of the equality, justice and human rights guaranteed by an accurate interpretation of the Koran - one guided and confirmed by the revised Hadith.

The end result?

According to Fadi Hakura, an expert on Turkey from Chatham House in London, Turkey is doing nothing less than recreating Islam - changing it from a religion whose rules must be obeyed, to one designed to serve the needs of people in a modern secular democracy.

He says that to achieve it, the state is fashioning a new Islam.

"This is kind of akin to the Christian Reformation," he says.

"Not exactly the same, but if you think, it's changing the theological foundations of [the] religion. "

Fadi Hakura believes that until now secularist Turkey has been intent on creating a new politics for Islam.

Now, he says, "they are trying to fashion a new Islam."

..."You have to see them as a whole," says Fadi Hakura.

"You can't say, for example, that the verses of violence override the verses of peace. This is used a lot in the Middle East, this kind of ideology.

"I cannot impress enough how fundamental [this change] is."

I fully expect that this Turkish project will grow and spread over time. I recall that the Christian reformation wasn't exactly a painless affair and isn't even over as yet - as certain religious Right haters continue to prove - but there's no doubt it had a long-term positive effect and this new Islamic reformation will have too. Reports of a clash of civilisations appear to have been vastly over-rated.

Turks in Northern Iraq (again)

The Voice of America is reporting that most of a Turkish division or equivalent has crossed the Turkish-Kurdistan border for some type of significant ground operation. Turkey has long had a small number of special operations units in northern Iraq and Kurdistan, and has launched smaller battalion and brigade size raids. This is one of the larger raids since the US began occupying Iraq:

The Turkish military says it has launched a land offensive across the border into northern Iraq to attack suspected Kurdish rebels...

Turkish television reports say 10,000 troops were taking part in the operation. Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari said his government was not aware of any Turkish ground offensive into Iraq....

Reuters is adding some more details confirming that this is a limited duration raid but that ""Thousands of troops have crossed the border and thousands more are waiting at the border to join them if necessary."

The two major Kurdish parties don't have a massive amount of love for the PKK, but they are fierce defenders of the territory and concept of a de-facto quasi-sovereign sub-state of Kurdistan, so this is not what they want/need. If the raid lasts for more than a couple of days, there will be significant pressure for the peshmerga to begin active guerrilla operations against the large Turkish force if that force presses too far south.

Update By Cernig

Could this be what kicked off the current operation? McClatchy is reporting that Kurdish Peshmerga troops yesterday surrounded a Turkish military base, one of five they've had on Iraqi soil since 1997, after Turkish tanks there moved to control neighbouring roads.

Kurdish soldiers from the peshmerga militia, which is loyal to the Kurdish Regional Government, moved to stop them. For an hour and a half, the two sides faced off before the Turkish soldiers retreated to their base, which is about 27 miles northeast of the city of Dahuk. The peshmerga surrounded the base and remained there as of late Thursday.

The Turkish troop movement was accompanied by artillery and airstrikes that targeted mountain areas held by rebels from the Kurdistan Workers’Party, which is known by its initials as the PKK. A spokesman for the peshmerga, Jabar Yawar, said the shelling began at about 11 a.m. and continued past midnight.

“This is a matter of the sovereignty of Iraq and the unity of Iraq,” said Falah Bakir, the head of the foreign relations department of the regional government. “We hope that there will be no clashes – the Kurdistan Regional Government has done enough to show our goodwill to Turkey.”

Bakir said the regional government has tightened security at checkpoints, airports and hospitals to stop PKK movements, but that the Turkish military has continued its buildup. He called for the Iraqi central government and U.S. military to step in to stop what he called Turkey’s “abnormal movements.”

In Baghdad, Iraqi government officials held tense meetings with American officials to stem the crisis in one of the only peaceful areas of Iraq.

“We have to do something,”said a senior Iraqi official, who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the issue. “We cannot keep quiet and keep digging our heads in the sand.”

One word. Powderkeg.

Meanwhile, the Bush administration seems, at least, very aware of the potential for disaster.

Reflecting the depth of U.S. concern about the incursion, said to involve thousands of Turkish troops, spokesmen for the White House, the Pentagon and the State Department all made statements calling on Turkey to limit the scope of its operation.

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said U.S. Ambassador to Turkey Ross Wilson voiced concern directly to authorities in Ankara.

"Our strong counsel to the Turkish government is to conclude, as quickly as possible, these operations, to limit them strictly and solely to PKK targets, and to work directly with the Iraqi government - this includes the Kurdish Regional Government, on any long-term solution to the threat of the PKK," he said. "Everybody agrees - we, the Turkish government and others - that the PKK is a terrorist organization and a threat that needs to be dealt with."

The United States has recently stepped up intelligence cooperation with Turkey over the PKK, which has staged several lethal attacks into Turkey in recent months from mountain camps in northern Iraq.

McCormack, however, said Turkey planned and executed the current operation on its own. At the White House, spokesman Scott Stanzel said the United States was notified in advance of the Turkish action and said he understood Iraqi authorities were informed as well.

I bet Kurdish regional authorities weren't though - and that the central government apparently was and didn't move to stop a division-sized invasion will seriously piss them off.

If the situation weren't so dangerously volatile, I'd enjoy watching the Bushies cack their flannels over this - after all, they created this situation by sticking their heads in the sand in a deliberate quid-pro-quo with Kurdish groups in exchange for a quite North these last few years. Now they're reaping the rewards of that cynical move, which allowed terror attack to continue on a NATO ally.

Gasp! Kurdish Non-Democracy!

By Cernig

It looks to me like Talibani's son needs to get around to the Corner's offices P.D.Q. with a barrow-load of that Kurdish lobbyist cash.

Backsliding on Democracy in Iraqi Kurdistan [Michael Rubin]
Iraqi Kurdish leader Masoud Barzani rejects a new press law on the grounds that any criticism should be constructive. That which he decides is not constructive, for example, articles that question the opacity of Barzani's financial practices, may saddle newspapers, editors, and journalists with large fines. Under Barzani's current practice, abuses such as this occur.

I mean, if conservatives start accepting that Kurdish Iraq isn't the bright and shining paragon of democracy and free enterprise they've always held it up to be - well, where might it end? The Bush administration might stop protecting Kurdish enablers of terrorism from the Turks, for one thing.

Kurds Protest Latest Failure Of U.S. Protection

By Cernig

Sunday's tacit approval of Turkish bombers in Iraqi airspace may have partly blown apart fragile U.S. hopes of Iraqi reconcilliation. The Bush administration provided targetting intelligence, de-conflicted airspace to let the Turks have a free run and didn't bother telling their Iraqi charges...but deny they officially approved the bombings. The Kurds are very pissed at their American "friends".

The head of Iraq's Kurdish regional government has refused to meet the US secretary of state because of the US position on Turkish cross-border raids.
Massoud Barzani had been scheduled to meet Condoleezza Rice in Baghdad, but withdrew "as a sign of protest" after several villages were bombed on Sunday.

...Speaking to reporters in the northern Iraqi city of Irbil, the prime minister of the Kurdistan Regional Government, Nechirvan Barzani, said its president had refused to meet Ms Rice because of Washington's tolerance of the recent Turkish raids.

"It was decided that Massoud Barzani would go to Baghdad to take part in a meeting with Condoleezza Rice and other officials, but he will not go now as a sign of protest against the American position on the bombings by Turkey," he said.

"It is unacceptable that the United States, in charge of monitoring our airspace, authorised Turkey to bomb our villages," he added.

Rice was in Iraq to yet again push the administration's pleas for the Iraqi government to use Bush's Surge as a breathing space for national reconcilliation. Instead, the various Iraqi factions have mostly used it as a space to entrench and rearm.

Barzani's absence at this time is a crucial one, in my opinion. Recall that President Talibani and Iraq's Foreign Minister are also Kurds and that Talibani's son is Barzani's main lobbyist in Washington, where he has showered Kurdish wealth by the million on largely neo-conservative beneficiaries. That largesse had two main purposes - to bribe D.C.'s elite conservative foreign policy opinion-makers into backing Kurdish independence and to ensure that those same Very Serious People pressured the Bush administration to keep the Kurds safe from both Turks and Iranians. The Kurds would be justified in thinking that the Bush administration's think-tank buddies don't stay bought or don't work hard enough for their money. And it isn't as if this is the first time the Kurds have found themselves unprotected by a promised American air-defense umbrella. U.S. complicity in Turkish attacks will, I have no doubt, put a severe dent in Kurdish amenability to American wishes.

The neocon answer, as it is to everything of late as their academic sandcastles fall to real world tides, is to blame their most hated enemy - liberals.

As Michael at PoliGazette notes today, John Bolton's latest insanity is to get busy telling all and sundry that Condi Rice is "the dominant voice, indeed, almost the only voice on foreign policy in this administration" and that she has become a closet liberal under influence of secret State Department mind control machinery:

Rice is channeling the views of the liberal career bureaucrats in the State Department. The president is focusing all his attention on Iraq and, by doing so, has allowed the secretary to become captured by the State Department. He is not adequately supervising her. It is a mistake.

Bush's foreign policy, Bolton says, is a threat to national security. (At least Bolton and I agree on something, if not on how we reach our conclusions.)

In this Bolton is echoing other neocons, Norman Podhoretz among them, on the latest NIE on Iran, on North Korea, on Iraq, on just about everything the neocons ever tainted with their presence. That Gates (primarily) and Rice seem to have convinced Bush to ignore Cheney's rabble nowadays is something we should all be thankful for.

It's just another variant on the Scooby-Doo Villain Excuse.

"Our neocon master plan would have worked if it wasn't for those pesky...liberals who undermined us/propaganda defeats that were probably faked/lilly-livered politicians/cowardly generals who wouldn't be cruel enough/terr'ists who wouldn't fight the way we wanted them to." (Delete as applicable)

You'd think by now they would've worked some kind of solution to the "peskies" into their master plan. After all, they've failed to carry through on their promises in Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, Lebanon...

You know, like a sitting President teamed with a massive congressional majority and a tame media who swallowed all the crappy reasons for war wholesale, at least for the first three years...oh, wait.

But, as Michael pointed out when he brought my attention to his post, wasn't Bolton one of those who thought criticising the President's policies in wartime was dangerous - even perhaps tantamount to treason? Obviously that only applies when the right policies are being criticised.

Iraq's Air Belongs To America

By Cernig

US officials have confirmed that the U.S. military opened Iraqi airspace to Turkish jets so that they could bomb Kurdish PKK positions yesterday, and that Washington knew.

Yet no-one thought to tell the Iraqis, a supposedly sovereign state.

In Turkey, a U.S. Embassy official in Ankara said Washington was informed about the operation.

``It was a Turkish operation, it was a Turkish decision. We were informed,'' the official told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity, as the official was not authorized to speak to the media.

The Iraqi parliament condemned the bombing, calling it an ``outrageous'' violation of Iraq's sovereignty that killed innocent civilians.

Iraq's Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said the Iraqi government thought Turkey would coordinate with it before striking the rebels from the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, inside Iraq on Sunday. He also indicated that the fact Iraqi civilians were killed showed Turkey had not hit the right target.

...The attack came a month after the U.S. promised to share intelligence with Turkey to help combat the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK and Turkey's military chief, Gen. Yasar Buyukanit, said U.S. intelligence was used Sunday.

``America gave intelligence,'' Kanal D television quoted Buyukanit as saying. ``But more importantly, America last night opened (the Iraqi) airspace to us. By opening the airspace, America gave its approval to this operation.''

In Washington, a Pentagon official said that the U.S. military has been sharing intelligence with the Turks, but that he did not know exactly what information was given to aid with the airstrikes or when it might have been given.

Another defense official said the U.S. had made sure Turkey would have clear use of the skies to enable the strikes.

They both spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak on the record.

Defense Department spokesman Bryan Whitman said only that; ``The U.S. continues to assist with information to the Turkish government that will help them deal with the insurgent situation that they have up there.''

Jamal Abdullah, a spokesman for the regional Kurdistan government, said the air raids were ``a violation of Iraq's sovereignty.''

As the British quit Basra and plans are made for handing over more US-controlled areas, at least in name, to the Iraqi security forces it's worth remembering that Iraqi operations are still dependent on U.S. goodwill for logistics, fire support and communications - and cannot happen without U.S. approval. Likewise, as has been shown yesterday, everything above treetop height belongs to America and will for the forseeable future.

A sovereign nation which has no control over its own territory without foreign approval and isn't even told before that foreign power lets another power's air force trespass into its airspace isn't a sovereign nation at all. That should be an important realisation - that the Bush administration's talk of iraqi self-determination is today conclusively proven as sheerest spin - yet few (if any) American pundits have taken any notice at all.

Turks Bomb The Myth Of Iraqi Sovereignty

By Cernig

Dozens of Turkish aircraft have carried out airstrikes on Kurdish PKK terror groups in Northern Iraq. Up to fifty planes bombed targets which the Turks said were PKK camps and the local Kurdish authorities said were innocent villagers.

A Turkish general told reporters that the US, by opening Iraqi airspace to the airstrikes, "gave its approval to the operation."

However, both the Kurdish PM and Iraqi central government have protested the Turdish infringement of Iraq's supposedly sovereign airspace.

Iraq Kurdistan Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani on Sunday called upon the US to protect the Iraqi airspace and rein in what he called "the Turkish military." Barzani held the Turkey's bombing of Kurdish villages north of Iraq a flagrant violation of Iraq's sovereignty and the international laws.

The Turkish aggression has to be denounced by the international community, among them the Security Council, Barzani told KUNA.

The Kurdish Premier lays the responsibility of the aggression on the US which he said is in charge of protecting Iraq's airspace, urging it "to take a political stand that could rein in the Turkish military so that such violation of our sovereignty would not be repeated under whatever pretext.

He asserted that "Protecting states' borders and curbing terrorism cannot be realized through violating others' sovereignty and borders." Meanwhile, the Iraqi Foreign Ministry had summoned the Turkish ambassador in Baghdad Derya Kanbay and handed him a written protest on the Turkish bombing of Kurdish villages north of Iraq.

A Foreign Ministry statement said the raids had killed a woman, destroyed a medical unit and a school in addition to causing damage to bridges and forcing several families to flee their houses.

An interesting volte-face by the Kurdish leader there, given that the Kurds were just fine with the US invasion of Saddam's Iraq as part of the War on Terror. However, hypocrisy aside, he has a point.

Turkey is asserting its right to follow the American example by attacking terrorist camps in Iraq but that example is itself one of an illegal aggression under international law. In the Spring, when many analysts expect Turkey to conduct massive ground operations across the border, that question of illegal aggresion and what actions the U.S. takes to defend Iraqi sovereignty against a NATO ally are going to become crucial.

Worse, as we've seen time and again in Lebanon, Iraq and Afghanistan, airstrikes are entirely counterproductive as a counter-terrorism tactic. All they really succeed in doing is to create ill-will and propaganda opportunities which in turn produce far more potential recruits and sympathisers for terror groups than airstrikes ever kill. By Spring, opinions are going to be very polarised and if Turkey goes across the border in force the various polite fictions being maintained are going to explode.

That America itself has asserted that Iraq is a sovereign state and then acted continually to contradict that claim will not improve matters. Both the Kurds and the Iraqi central government have until now calculated that their need for American protection against internal foes outweighed their own needs for self-determination and have been willing to accept America's fiction of Iraqi independence from rule by their occupiers. That's helped the Bush administration keep a lid on the various simmering civil wars in a classic colonialist "divide and rule" ploy. But Turkey's intervention would upset the facade of self-rule and the various alliances of convenience which have enabled U.S. commanders to claim that Iraq is turning away from violence.

On the other hand, if the U.S. says it will oppose Turkish attacks with force, or even says it will allow the Iraqi government to do so (something the Iraqis have already said they will do if Turkey mounts a ground invasion) then it might mean the end of NATO. Turkey - with the largest and best equipped military of any Muslim nation - would certainly leave the alliance and probably fall into the Syrian/Iranian sphere in short order. If that were to occur, Bush's legacy as the man who undid the greatest American accomplishments of the post-war years would be assured.

The Bush administration, which looked the other way on PKK and PJAK activities in return for Kurdish quiet, has only itself to blame that it now finds itself in a lose-lose situation.

Getting to 184 92 Yays

Spencer Ackerman at TPMMuckraker is digging a little bit deeper into the initial announcement on the Bush Legacy/Maliki self-preservation plans to establish permanent US bases and a small corps sized presence in Iraq for preserving the Maliki government after Bush is officially a dead duck and raises the ratification problem.

the Iraqi constitution stipulates that Iraq's parliament has to ratify any such agreement. And the Iraqi parliament is a lot more hostile to the idea of hosting U.S. troops indefinitely than the U.S. Senate is.

Take a look at Article 58, Section 4 of the Iraqi constitution. It stipulates that the Iraqi parliament shall ratify "international treaties and agreements by a two-thirds majority." ( UPDATE Cernig "just checked the Iraqi Constitution and I see no such provision. As far as I can tell, Maliki needs the support of a full 2/3rds of a simple quorum (1/2 of members actually in attendance)before the Parliament can approve Talibani to ratify a treaty. Then Talibani and both VPs (The Presidential Council) have to agree to do so. Maybe Maliki can convince the Sadrists and Sunnis to stay home that day..." So a combination of increased targetted violence, and inconvienent roadblocks would work) Whether or not President Bush and Prime Minister Maliki can finagle the deal so that it's not a treaty -- as Lute suggested yesterday -- it most certainly is an "agreement."

There is a legal, and customary way of avoiding the 2/3rds Senate ratification requirement for treaties, and that is by casting this agreement as an executive agreement. That just requires a 50%+1 majority in the House and Senate; C-SPAN illustrates the mechanics here:

An international agreement entered into by the President, outside of the treaty ratification process. To be implemented, it requires a simple majority vote of the House and Senate. Many agreements require subsequent implementing bills passed by both chambers before they can take force. Congress can express its opposition to any particular executive agreement by withholding the necessary implementing legislation....Recent examples of executive agreements include trade agreements, like NAFTA and GATT.

The relevant question is how does Maliki get to 184 "yays" if he wants to maintain the pretense of being a follower of the Iraqi constitution. The snarky question is how does he find less than 184 nay's.

The projected force of 50,000 to 80,000 US soldiers is there as both a tripwire force against any significant non-Turkish foreign incursions as the Iraqi Army remains designed to be a satrapy force, and as a counter-coup force. The five to ten US brigades would be the only politically loyal, reliable, and competent forces that Maliki can count on.

The Maliki government is currently being supported by a weak and disparate coalition of Kurdish parties, and the Shi'ite Dawa Party and SIIC/BADR Organization. The Kurdish parties are happy with an extraordinarily weak central government that does not have a monopoly on force as that allows the Kurds to possess de facto indepedence with a well organized and motivated militia force in the peshmerga. Badr seems to be losing in confrontations with the Sadrist JAM/Mahdi Army.

The US has done very little overtly to stop Turkish demonstrations against the Kurdish PKK, so I could see some Kurdish votes peeling off from Maliki's bare majority government right there. Both Sunni Arab nationalists, a/k/a the 'concerned local citizens' of the Anbar Awakening and the increasingly well organized Sadrist movement are strongly anti-US/anti-occupation. Since the entire point of permanent bases from the point of view of the weak Maliki government is to have a large US counterweight to the political/military power of both the Sadrists and Sunni Arabs, there are no votes for this proposal. So between some Kurds potentially peeling off, and the Sunni Arabs and Sadrists voting NO en bloc, that is the minimum blocking coalition before you start looking at other members of the 138 to 144 timeline for withdrawal bloc.

Even if this is seen as a fait accompli it won't accomplish much if one wants to believe the fiction that Iraq is a sovereign and constitutional nation

Is Turkish Invasion About To Begin?

By Cernig

Some ominous words from a Turkish general:

Turkey is "in the process of implementing" a cross-border operation against Kurdish guerrillas who use northern Iraq as a base to launch attacks, a senior Turkish general said on Thursday.

But there were no immediate signs of increased military activity along Turkey's mountainous border with Iraq on Thursday evening, Reuters reporters in the region said, suggesting any offensive was only in the preparatory stages.

"We are in the process of implementing the cross-border operation," General Ilker Basbug, head of the land forces and the second most powerful man in the armed forces, told reporters at a diplomatic reception in the Turkish capital.

Basbug did not spell out exactly what he meant.

Turkey's parliament approved last month a government request to be able to launch cross-border operations into northern Iraq.

"When or how the motion (on a cross-border operation) will be implemented is another issue," Basbug said, according to state-run Anatolian news agency.

Turkey has amassed as many as 100,000 troops, backed by warplanes, helicopters and tanks, for a possible cross-border incursion to root out the separatist rebels, blamed by Ankara for a series of attacks on its security personnel.

A senior Iraqi border guards officer said there were no signs Turkey had launched a cross-border operation into Iraq.

Its probable that the general is being judicious with his words, trying to put a scare into the PKK, and only means special forces ops. However, Jane's Defense recently assessed that the Turks had to go for the "full Monty" this month or wait until March at the earliest, due to the onset of winter.

No Turkish Invasion Until March '08

By Cernig

Today's meeting with Bush will have left Turkey's Tayyip Erdogan with a sour taste. He wants concrete action - troops on the ground kind of concrete action - and all he's getting is intel assistance.

"The PKK is a terrorist organization. They're an enemy of Turkey, they're an enemy of Iraq and they're an enemy of the United States," Bush told reporters after his meeting with Erdogan.

"We talked about the need to have better intelligence sharing," Bush said. "In order to chase down people who murder people, you need good intelligence. We talked about the need for our militaries to stay in constant contact."

He added that Erdogan had strongly urged the United States to work with Iraqi leaders to cut off money flows to the Kurdish rebel group.

So far, Ankara has been disappointed by U.S. offers of assistance, saying they did not go far enough.

However, Jane's Defense is saying that bush has stalled long enough to buy some time:

The Turkish military will view these measures as a useful start, but Ankara will continue to maintain the pressure for more extensive action. As far as the Turks are concerned, only the imminent threat of Turkish military action appears to have yielded results from Baghdad and Washington. Nevertheless, Turkey is reluctant to commence ground operations during the winter months - although air and special forces operations may well be undertaken - therefore, these measures, coupled with the maintenance of concerted diplomatic, military and economic pressure from Ankara, should at least forestall the threat of large-scale Turkish military operations until the snows begin to melt in March 2008.

At which point, the whole song and dance will start all over again, because Bush has no intention of fighting the War On Terror (TM) in Kurdish Iraq - he needs the Kurds too much. Erdogan now knows how Karzai feels about Musharraf's game-playing on the Afghan border.

Promises, Promises

By Cernig

You would think that at least the Iraqis would bother to get their story straight before promising Turkey the moon.

Reuters:

Iraq said on Saturday it was ready to hunt down and arrest Kurdish guerrilla leaders responsible for cross-border raids into Turkey in an effort to avert a major incursion by the Turkish military.

..."The prime minister renewed the willingness of the Iraqi government to take steps to isolate the terrorist PKK, prevent any help reaching its members, chase and arrest them, and put them in front of the Iraqi judiciary because of their terrorist activities," Maliki's office said in a statement.

That was Satureday afternoon. That same morning, the Iraqi spokesman at the conference told the Associated Press:

Iraq warned that no one can stop Kurdish rebels in Iraq's remote northern border region from attacking Turkey, as tensions over the assaults overshadowed a major international meeting on Iraq's future.

``It's not in our capacity'' to capture the rebels, Iraqi government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said. ``It's not even in the capacity of Turkey.''

So which statement is the real deal? Well, Reuters continues:

But the government in Baghdad has little influence over the semi-autonomous Kurdish regions in the north and the success of any measures against PKK militants would depend on the cooperation of Kurdish authorities. Iraqi Kurdish leader Masoud Barzani has so far refused to arrest PKK members.

Meanwhile, Kurdish printing presses are rolling out maps of an independent Kurdistan that stretches from the Mediterranean to the Persian Sea and annexes large chunks of Iraq, Turkey, Iran and Syria thereby. These maps are selling like hot cakes in Kurdish markets. Draw your own conclusions about Maliki's promises.

Condi's Committment

By Cernig

The AP reports that Condoleezza Rice has been working overtime to head off a major Turkish incursion of Iraqi territory.

Faced with the prospect of another front opening in the already difficult Iraq war, the United States struggled Friday to persuade Turkey not to send its Army across the Iraq border to attack guerrillas who use the remote terrain to launch terror attacks inside Turkey.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice urged calm and cooperation in a string of meetings with top Turkish leaders fed up with rebel attacks and insistent that Turkey will do what it must to stop them.

She was making a similar argument later Friday in a separate meeting with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, whose government has said it will not stand for any cross-border assault.

Foreign Minister Ali Babacan sounded impatient, and he offered her no public promise of the restraint Washington seeks.

``We have great expectations from the United States,'' Babacan said at a news conference following his meeting with Rice. ``We are at the point where words have been exhausted and where there is need for action.''

Ankara has said Turkey wants to hear specifics about what the United States is prepared to do to counter the rebel Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, or Turkey will launch an attack. Rebel attacks against Turkish positions over the last month have left 47 dead, including 35 soldiers, according to government and media reports.

Washington worries that a cross-border attack would bring instability to what has been the calmest part of Iraq, and could set a precedent for other countries, like Iran, that also have conflicts with Kurdish rebels. Babacan just returned from a trip to Iran last week, lobbying for support for the Turkish side and underscoring that Turkey will act as it sees fit, regardless of U.S. pressure.

``We all need to redouble our efforts and the United States is committed to redoubling our efforts,'' Rice said. ``No one should doubt the commitment of the United States in this situation.''

Doubling and redoubling committment - fine words if they didn't sound as if they were delivered from the ragged edge of desperation. Condi has been scurrying around to extra meetings in Turkey trying to soothe Turkish feathers - but it's unlikely the Turks believe her.

After all, Rice was the one who in April last year visited Ankara to tell the Turks that the U.S. was "committed" to helping them against the PKK - and that Turkey should wait until a new Iraqi government was formed to address cross-border terrorism by the PKK. Fat lot of good that did.

Even the neocon AEI's Michael Rubin, usually a staunch Bush cheerleader, is aware of how badly the new Iraqi government sold America's NATO ally down the river. In March this year he wrote:

Just as Arafat transformed the Palestinian Authority into a safe haven for terrorists, so too does Barzani. His administration provides safe haven and supplies to Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) terrorists who have been responsible for approximately 30,000 deaths in Turkey since 1984. The Turkish government accuses the Iraqi Kurdistan Regional Government of furnishing passports to PKK terrorists on Turkey's most wanted list. Turkish officials complain there are six PKK bases operating in territory controlled by Barzani's party. Just as weapons supplied by the Clinton administration to Palestinian security forces ended up in the hands of terrorists, so too have arms supplied by the U.S. government to Kurdish fighters, the peshmerga, found their way into PKK hands.

Barzani places little restriction on PKK travel within northern Iraq. In October 2006, two PKK leaders received treatment in an Erbil hospital; three months later they were photographed in an Erbil restaurant. Meanwhile, the PKK continues to smuggle explosives and carry out attacks in Turkey. Barzani refuses to stop weapons trafficking across the border with his own peshmerga militia, and refuses the Iraqi army permission to do so.

The Bush administration's own level of committment is in doubt too. In February 2005 Rice told the world that the US is "fully committed" to achieving a "unified Iraq". In February 2007, Ruben notes, in front of the Senate Appropriations Committee she referred to the Iraqi-Turkish frontier as "the border between Turkey and Kurdistan." Even the envoy Bush appointed to handle the U.S.' "committment" to Turkey, retired Air Force Gen. Joseph Ralston, resigned very quietly a couple of months ago in frustration.

Despite being aware of the consequences of failing in their committments - which include their duty as the occupying power under a UN mandate - the Bush administration have sat on their hands over the PKK issue for four years now. If the Turks continue to believe that their words are worthless noise, who could blame them?

Turkey Uses "For Us Or Against Us" Argument

By Cernig

Turkey will choose its own moment for an invasion of Iraq:

The news that Ankara will strike regardless of the international community came after crisis talks with an Iraqi delegation failed.

Turkey's prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, said: "We are in the middle of a process and within this process we are having ... consultations.

"We will launch an operation when it will be necessary, without asking for anybody's opinion," it was reported.

(Notice that's "when", not "if".)

But what is really rich is that Bush and others who parroted his rhetoric are now hoist by their own petard:

Earlier Erdogan took a swipe at western countries for not cracking down on PKK members.

He told a conference in Istanbul, that calling the group a terrorist organisation, as the United States and European Union do, was not enough.

"We want action, and if you can't show action, you fail the sincerity test," he said. "Those who overlook terrorism are in cooperation with terrorism."

Erdogan had also claimed that the country is in a "constant state of alert" and warned that "those who support terrorists and even those who turn a blind eye to them, are partners in crime.

"They share the responsibility for bloodshed and killings."

Remember this from 2001?

"A coalition partner must do more than just express sympathy, a coalition partner must perform," Bush said. "That means different things for different nations. Some nations don't want to contribute troops and we understand that. Other nations can contribute intelligence-sharing. ... But all nations, if they want to fight terror, must do something."

Bush said he would not point out any specific countries in his speech.

"Over time it's going to be important for nations to know they will be held accountable for inactivity," he said. "You're either with us or against us in the fight against terror."

It turns out Dubya was "against us" all along. Color me surprised...

US General plans to do "absolutely nothing" about PKK

By Cernig

Not that it's any surprise, but this won't improve Turkish tempers any:

The top U.S. military commander in northern Iraq said Friday he plans to do ``absolutely nothing'' to counter Kurdish rebels operating from the region and staging deadly cross-border attacks into Turkey.

...But amid feverish diplomatic efforts to forestall an incursion, Maj. Gen. Benjamin Mixon said it's not the U.S. military's responsibility to act. He said that he's sent no additional U.S. troops to the area and he's not tracking hiding places or logistics activities of the PKK rebels.

He also has not seen Kurdish authorities move against the rebels either, Mixon told Pentagon reporters by videoconference from a U.S. base near Tikrit in northern Iraq.

``I have not seen any overt action (by Kurdish authorities) ... But those are the types of activities that are managed and coordinated at higher levels than my own,'' he said.

Mixon also revealed that his command doesn't even bother to develop intelligence on PKK movements and supply lines.

This confirms what critics have been saying all along - it isn't just inability but unwillingness to deal with the PKK terror group that has caused the Bush administration to stick its collective head in the sand for a year and more. Mixon made it clear he has no instructions at all regarding the PKK or even regarding a possible Turkish invasion.

Mixon would not even talk in general about the PKK's fighting abilities. He was asked why such a small group of some 3,500 guerrillas is considered so effective, tenacious and threatening to Turkey.

"I have no idea," he said. "You'll have to ask somebody in the Turkish government."

Asked if he is planning any action against the rebels, Mixon said:

"Absolutely nothing."

Does he think he has any responsibility to try to avoid a Turkish incursion into the north? "I have not been given any requirements or any responsibility for that," he said.

But if terrorists are operating in his region, came another question, why not get involved?

"Let me put it to you very clearly," he answered. The provincial Kurdish authorities have their own Peshmerga militia, Mixon and, "it's their responsibility" in three northern provinces of Iraq.

He said no one has specifically told him to ignore the rebel problem, "But I hadn't been given instructions to do anything about it, either."

If he were ordered to do something, would he have enough U.S. troops?

"That's a hypothetical question," Mixon replied. "I haven't studied it.

"I haven't been given any instructions that would even vaguely resemble what you just mentioned," the general said. "So I don't see any sense in talking about it."

Meanwhile, Turkey is showing - it seems to me - extraordinary patience with its supposed NATO ally and its supposedly friendly neighbour. It has even given Iraq a very diplomatic chance to actually say something that isn't just platitudinous.

Turkey demanded the extradition of Kurdish rebel leaders based in Iraq's north on Friday, Turkish deputy prime minister said Friday after meeting with an Iraqi delegation.

...``We gave a list of PKK leaders and asked for help from Iraq,'' Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Cemil Cicek told CNN-Turk television.

CNN-Turk television, citing unnamed Iraqi officials, said Turkey asked for the extradition of 153 PKK members.

If Iraq would only say publicly that these 153 terrorists were at least arrestable and extraditable, it would be more than the say-nothing pleasantries the Iraqi government has employed so far. To date, they've asked the PKK to cease fire and said they'll ask again if the PKK don't. Maybe in green pen.

Given the circumstances, it is not at all surprising that Turkey is taking a "belt and braces" approach - entertaining diplomatic discussions while at the same time building up its 100,000 strong invasion force on the Iraqi border and conducting cross-border probes.

Update The latest round of talks lasted just 90 minutes.

ANKARA (Thomson Financial) - Talks here between Turkish and Iraqi ministers to avoid military action by Ankara in northern Iraq were interrupted after an hour and a half.

It was not immediately known if and when they would resume, an Iraqi embassy official said.

Sounds to me like the Turks walked out in disgust.

Turkish Paper - "Let The Americans Try To Stop Us"

By Cernig

There's been a fair bit of coverage of the brewing storm between Turkey and the Kurds over the last couple of weeks, as the US mainstream media finally notices that this could become the finale for Bush's misadventure in Iraq. With the surge in pundits talking about it, I've had less fresh and new to say that hasn't already been said - but I still read the informed opinions of those who have been watching the developing crisis for a year or so now - people like Dave Schuler and Michael van der Galien.

The latter points today to an editorial in the Turkish newspaper Hurriyet, which Michael notes is read mainly by Kemalist and nationalist foreign policy hawks. Their Chief Editor has this to say on the subject of recent PKK attacks on military and civilians along with the taking hostage of Turkish soldiers:

All I had in my mind was this one question: at the point at which we have arrived, who is it that we are supposed to address our anger toward? I think I've found the answer: it's the person who protects the PKK [Kurdish Workers' Party], who provides them their swamp to sleep in and the person who guides them: Barzani.

Yes, we must now address Massoud Barzani, leader of the Kurdish regional authority in northern Iraq. We need to deliver this final message to him in the strongest fashion possible: "You have two paths before you. Either you will be our neighbor, or our target."

The decision lies with the Iraqi Kurds. It's their business if they decide to trust in the United States and choose the path to being our enemies.

But if this is the case though, our rifle targets must swivel to Barzani. Our targets will be on Barzani's military and economic targets. Our goal will be to transform the "Kurdish dream" into a "Turkish nightmare."

If Barzani's plan involves using the PKK to create a new " powerful Kurdish nation," we need to show him a new map.

Either that, or we need to show him that the price for that nation, built by using the PKK as a tool, will be too high for them to pay.

We need to explain: A handful of F-16s from the Turkish Air Force carrying out 30 or 40 sorties would result in a northern Iraq that just went backwards 20 years.

What if American F-16s come in front of us to block us? Let them try, that's their business.

But the United States shouldn't forget that such a course will involve Iran, Syria, and attach Russia, too. In fact, what they'll see is a geography that stretches all the way to Afghanistan. Oh, and let Washington remember to add nations in its old backyard to the mix, those Latin American countries that now hate the United States. And then there's always neutral Europe. Yes, these are all things that not only we, but America, lying 14,000 kilometers away from us, needs to think about. If the calculations and bills are being made there, the scale is over here. And on one side of the scale lies northern Iraq, while on the other side lays Turkey.

Turkey has come to the point of making some historical and global decisions. And what has brought us to this point? What lies behind the caprices of the northern Iraqi government is a super state's (U.S.) super-caprice. This is the only conclusion I can reach after three hours of meditation trying to calm my feelings of anger.

I think Bush administration officials and American pundits who, replete with the concept of American exceptionalism, have blithely pronounced that Turkey won't go agaisnt U.S. wishes may have a shock coming. The Turks are sending more troops and heavy weapons to join the thousands already massing on the Iraqi border while Kurdish political leadership - up to and including president talibani - are whitewashing the political situation in Iraqi Kurdistan while not actually doing anything concrete.

Today, Michael writes:

Of course, these Turks are right. The PKK has gained (in) strength after the US brought down the Saddam regime. Once they did so, they should’ve focused not just on Baghdad and southern Iraq, but also on the north. The Kurds have a history of causing trouble there, today’s problems should’ve been anticipated. That they weren’t once again shows that many within the Bush administration had little to no idea what they were doing when they decided to attack Iraq.

The leader of the Kurds in northern Iraq Barzani but also Iraq’s President Jalal Talibani show themselves of their worst side at this moment. One gets the impression that they don’t just believe that they can’t do much about the PKK, but that they wouldn’t do so even if they could. Whether that’s true or not, nobody can say, but giving the Turks that impression now is most certainly not wise.

I’ve thought about the situation for weeks, and I believe that time is running out. The Turkish government should act immediately. What the US wants is irrelevant. If the US decides to give Turkey less aid, so be it. Some would say that Turkey has become too dependent on other countries and international organizations as it is, and that now is the right time to cut at least some of the ties. No country in the world should accept what Turkey has accepted for months.

I strongly suspect that, after a short period of grace to give Bush and Maliki a final chance to pull this chestnut out of the fire, the Turkish leadership will agree with him and the army will roll.

At that point, the consequences - which have been all too predictable for months while the Bush administration stuck its collective head in the sand - are best described by this cartoon from the UK's Telegraph:

Update Michael has a follow-on post up which is well worth a read. Among other matters, he notes that the NY Times has finally caught up with the PJAK angle in all this I blogged about back in mid-September. They're another Kurdish terror group, joined at the hip to the PKK, and claim to have covert US backing for their attacks inside Iran.

Kurdish Systems Disruption Limited?

The new report of a PKK ambush of a Turkish Army column resulting in at least twelve dead Turkish soldiers and seven or eight prisoners is showing that the PKK is not willing to let the Turkish Army conduct a set piece, mechanized attack against their base camps in northern Iraqi Kurdistan. Instead cross border raids, ambushes and strikes are the preferred PKK tactic. However, I do not think that the PKK will conduct signficant energy transportation infrastructure destruction and sabotage despite the threat that they would consider this action in August.

Here is the problem from my perspective --- Turkey produces very little oil and in the grand scheme of accounting, receives little moeny from the major pipelines that run through its territory. Knocking out the pipelines, either the Kirkuk-Ceyhan or the Baku-Ceyhan pipeline does not significantly disrupt the Turkish economy, or more importantly, the government's ability to mobilize funds. There will be mild price increases on all petroleum products worldwide due to marginally decreased supply, but this is a second and third order impact on the Turkish government's ability to exercise force or mobilize its population.

We have seen successful oil interdiction and system sabotage in Iraq and Nigeria that have been successful as the governments heavily rely on oil export revenue to produce an overwhelming majority of both hard currency and government funds. Without either, people do not get paid, services do not get provided, and the incentive structure towards more bunkering, destruction and fragmentation strengthens. This is one of the worse case scenarios for Mexico also. Turkey really does not have this networked system/financial stability center of gravity that can be successfully hammered.