No War of Liberation

You've heard of national liberation, women's liberation and even animal liberation -- but what about accidental liberation?

This is a theory doing the rounds among some liberal commentators feeling guilty about their support for war with Iraq. It holds that, however bloody, barbaric and American the war will be, at least it will have the godsent side-effect of liberating Iraqis from oppression.

According to Johann Hari of the UK Independent, "This war is going to be terrible -- but leaving Saddam in place would be even more terrible.... The difference is the deaths at the hands of Saddam will shore up Ba'athist national socialism, while deaths in war would at least clear the way for a free and democratic Iraq" (1).

Guardian loudmouth Julie Burchill puts it more bluntly: "If you really think it's better for more people to die over decades under a tyrannical regime than for fewer people to die during a brief attack by an outside power, [then] you're really weird…." (2)

The idea that the coming war will accidentally liberate Iraqis betrays a breathtaking naivete about the consequences of Western intervention. Outside interference in Iraq has already exacerbated local tensions, and military intervention can only further unravel the fragile Iraqi state. The internationalisation of Iraq's local conflicts threatens to divide Iraqis further and store up conflict for the future, rather than herald anything like a new era of freedom.

By turning Iraq into an international issue, America and Britain have paved the way for a carve-up. Local players like Turkey, Iran and Saudi Arabia all want a piece of postwar Iraq, while the big powers -- including the supposedly anti-war French and Germans -- have their own plans for postwar occupation. And if you think such intervention will bring democracy to Iraq, then you're really weird.

On the ground, the divvying up of Iraq between different powers has already started. As part of its deal to allow US forces to use Turkish territory to launch attacks on Iraq, Turkey has been given the green light to double the number of its troops in northern Iraq from 6000 to 12,000 in recent weeks (3). Northern Iraq is territory that the United Nations designated as a "safe haven" for Kurds following the first Gulf War in 1991, taking the area out of Baghdad's control and granting limited self-government to Kurdish groups.

Turkish forces are fortifying a 25-mile buffer zone between Turkey and northern Iraq -- though according to Newsweek magazine, Turkish forces are keen to go even further into Iraqi territory. "Turkey is demanding that it send 60,000 to 80,000 of its own troops into northern Iraq to establish "strategic positions" across a "security arc" as much as 140 to 170 miles deep in Iraq", reports Newsweek. "That would take Turkish troops almost halfway to Baghdad." (4)

The Bush administration claims that it is allowing Turkish forces into northern Iraq for "humanitarian reasons only" (5), to assist with the flood of refugees that the war in Iraq will no doubt create. In truth, with America's blessing, Turkey is pursuing nobody's interests but its own in northern Iraq.

Turkey is demanding free rein in northern Iraq. It wants to be in charge of "supervising the armament and disarmament of Kurdish groups" and of "restricting the movement" of Kurdish forces where necessary (6). Under the guise of a humanitarian effort, Turkey's intervention in northern Iraq is about keeping a check on Kurdish demands for independence, to ensure that such demands do not impact on Turkey's own volatile Kurdish population.

Since 1984, Turkey has been at war with the Kurdistan Workers' Party, which fought for Kurdish independence within Turkish territory. Turkey refuses to recognise the "ethnicity" of its Kurdish population and continues to ban the Kurdish language. Now, Turkey sees intervention in northern Iraq as the latest front in its war against the Kurds. As Turkish foreign minister Yasar Yakis said when asked about postwar Iraq: "A Kurdistan should not be set up." (7)