Insanity Compounded by Insanity: Bush Offers to Bomb Iraqi Kurds

The Herald Sun. Posted October 25, 2007.

A few things to consider when reading this story. First, PKK guerrillas are believed to be holed up in highly-protected mountain redoubts and it's doubtful that airstrikes would have much of a long-term effect on their operational capabilities. Second, while the Iraqi Kurdish leadership has been taking a cautious approach to the escalating conflict, "Kurdistan" president Massoud Barzani has twice promised that the powerful Peshmerga militia -- estimated at more than 100,000 strong and arguably the most effective ground forces in Iraq -- would join PKK fighters in the case of a Turkish ground incursion. The Iraqi Kurdish leadership would be hard-pressed to make that move, but might not have a choice given their own domestic political calculus. Lastly, PKK fighters' cross-border attacks are seasonal; they slow during the winter when the mountainous border area where they operate becomes too difficult to negotiate. During the "off-season," they mover deeper into Iraqi Kurdistan, where the job of finding clean targets for airstrikes and/ or shelling becomes much more difficult. That means that if the U.S. did strike PKK camps, most of the fighters would likely to dissolve into the population and be ready to return next spring.

The Bush Administration is considering air strikes, including cruise missiles, against the Kurdish rebel group PKK in northern Iraq.

The move would be an attempt to stave off a Turkish invasion of that country to fight the rebels.

President George Bush spoke with Turkish President Abdullah Gul by phone yesterday in an effort to ease the crisis.

And Prime Minister John Howard says the tensions on the Turkey-Iraq border will not help the west's battle for democracy in Iraq.

Mr Howard said there was some recent evidence that US forces were making headway in their battle against al-Qaeda in Iraq following the US troop surge.

"There is some evidence in recent weeks that the surge has been more successful than many of its critics wanted it to be or believe it would be," Mr Howard told an army land warfare conference in Adelaide today.

But he hoped the temperature between Turkey and the Kurds was kept as low as possible.

"It is in a strategic sense a complicating factor at a time when evidence is emerging of slow but nonetheless some progress being made in improving the security position in Iraq," he said.

"The message I would give to Turkey and Iraq is, like everybody else, just keep it as cool and at a lower temperature as possible," Mr Howard said.

According to an official familiar with the conversation, Mr Bush assured the Turkish President that the US was seriously looking into options beyond diplomacy to stop the attacks coming from Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq.

"It's not 'Kumbaya' time any more - just talking about trilateral talks is not going to be enough," the official said.

"Something has to be done."

While the use of US soldiers on the ground to root out the PKK would be the last resort, the US would be willing to launch air strikes on PKK targets, the official said, and has discussed the use of cruise missiles.

But air strikes using manned aircraft may be an easier option because the US controls the air space over Iraq.

Another option would be to persuade the Kurdistan Regional Government, which runs that part of Iraq, to order its Peshmerga forces to form a cordon preventing the movement of the PKK beyond its mountain camps.

"In the past, there has been reluctance to engage in direct US military action against the PKK, either through air strikes or some kind of Special Forces action," said the official familiar with the Bush-Gul conversation, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

"But the red line was always, if the Turks were going to come over the border, it could be so destabilising that it might be less risky for us to do something ourselves.

"Now the Turks are at the end of their rope, and our risk calculus is changing."

Meanwhile, Iraq said today it would shut down the operations of Kurdish rebels based on its soil, hoping to head off the threatened invasion by Turkish troops massed on the border.

"The PKK is a terrorist organisation and we have taken a decision to shut down their offices and not allow them to operate on Iraqi soil," Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said.

"We will also work on limiting their terrorist activities which are threatening Iraq and Turkey," Maliki said after crisis talks in Baghdad with Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan.

He gave no details on how the rebels could be prevented from launching attacks from their remote mountain bases. Analysts say military action would have to involve US forces in Iraq.

Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said Ankara was giving diplomacy a chance, but reminded Iraq that Turkey's parliament had given the go-ahead for a military incursion at any time.

And the publication of photographs said to show eight Turkish soldiers captured by the rebels increased pressure on Turkey's government to take swift action.

"Right now we are in a waiting stance but Iraq should know we can use the mandate for a cross-border operation at any time," Erdogan told a joint news conference in London after talks with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

He later ratcheted up pressure by telling an investors' conference that Turkey might impose sanctions on exports to Iraq. Turkish exports to Iraq were worth $US2.6 billion ($A2.94 billion) in 2006.

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