"Iraq" Falls Apart The Turkish Invasion

[seemslikeadream]

http://www.counterpunch.org/patrick02282008.html

February 28, 2008

The Turkish Invasion
"Iraq" Falls Apart
By PATRICK COCKBURN

Iraq is disintegrating faster than ever. The Turkish army invaded the north of the country last week and is still there. Iraqi Kurdistan is becoming like Gaza where the Israel can send in its tanks and helicopters at will. The US, so sensitive to any threat to Iraqi sovereignty from Iran or Syria, has blandly consented to the Turkish attack on the one part of Iraq which was at peace.

The Turkish government piously claims that its army is in pursuit of PKK Turkish Kurd guerrillas, but it is unlikely to inflict serious damage on them as they hide in long-prepared bunkers and deep ravines of the Kurdish mountains. What the Turkish incursion is doing is weakening the Kurdistan Regional Government, the autonomous Kurdish zone, the creation of which is one of the few concrete achievements of the US and British invasion of Iraq five years ago.

One of the most extraordinary developments in the Iraqi war has been the success with which the White House has been able to persuade so much of the political and media establishment in the US that, by means of 'the Surge', an extra 30,000 US troops, it is on the verge of political and military success in Iraq. All that is needed now, US generals argue, is political reconciliation between the Iraqi communities.

Few demands could be more hypocritical. American success in reducing the level of violence over the last year has happened precisely because Iraqis are so divided. The Sunni Arabs of Iraq were the heart of the rebellion against the American occupation since 2003. In fighting the US forces they were highly successful.