Another Tragic Flaw in U.S. Foreign Policy

Analysis by Webster Brooks III, Editor USIP

The United States should cut its hypocritical rhetoric about “supporting democracy” and complaining that Iraq’s leaders won’t make the “tough decisions”, and support the parliament’s decision to hold a referendum on the status of Kirkuk in 2007. Few issues in Iraq and the Persian Gulf are more explosive than this referendum that will likely result in the highly contested oil rich city of Kirkuk joining Kurdistan’s burgeoning autonomous region. Despite the Iraqi constitution’s explicit language in Article 140, calling for the referendum to be held this year, President Bush, all 535 congressional members and every 2008 presidential candidate has refused to support holding the referendum as scheduled—a truly bi-partisan display of cowardice and sophomoric foreign policy acumen.

The controversial decision on Kirkuk was announced on Saturday March 31, by Iraq’s Sunni justice minister Hashem al-Shibli. The next day, al-Shibli resigned. The referendum to determine whether the city of Kirkuk in Northern Iraq, should join the Kurdish autonomous region was mandated to be held before the end of 2007. In accordance with the new Iraqi Constitution, a resettlement process must be administered in the run-up to the referendum, to reverse the policy of forced “arabization” of Kirkuk carried out by Saddam Hussein in the 1980′s. Under that policy, thousands of Kurdish citizens were displaced from Kirkuk and sent to Baghdad and other regions in Iraq. The agreement provides that thousands of Arabs who had settled in Kirkuk would be compensated with $15,000 and land if they return to their original homes. Kurdish citizens who were displaced would be granted the right of return, and the right to participate in the referendum. Kirkuk’s local authorities will begin distributing forms to Arab families to assess who is eligible for resettlement, which will be done on a voluntary basis. Preliminary estimates indicate that as many as 70,000 to 90,000 Arab citizens could be resettled. Article 140 also calls for redrawing of boundaries of the Kirkuk province and conducting a new census. Because the census will be a controversial issue, The U.S. Iran Peace Project has recommended that the Iraqi government and the Kurdistan Regional Government call for impartial observers to be present during its administration, and during the referendum as well.

For the Kurds, who participated in two national elections to help form the Iraqi government, respected the rights of its Christian, Sunni, Turkmen, Chaldean and Assyrian minorities in Kurdistan’s election, and ended violence in its autonomous region, the actions of the United States border on outright treachery. President Bush has called for an indefinite delay of the referendum. The Iraq-Study Group report counseled against the referendum, although the group never bothered to visit Kurdistan. Iraqi President Jalal Talabani (born in Kirkuk), the Kurdish Regional Government and virtually every Kurdish organization has denounced the Iraq Study Group reports recommendations as a sham. But as the United States is discovering, the Kurds are not going to be denied. The Kurdistan Observer (On-line) reported that at a recent meeting in Kirkuk, parliament member Mulla Bakhtiar of the Iraqi Kurdistan Patriotic Party (PUK) threatened to annex Kirkuk, saying that if the referendum was not held in November 2007 “then we will take over Kirkuk and it will be part of Kurdistan.” In mid-March, Kurdish leaders threatened to quit the government in Baghdad, unless the cabinet of Nuri al-Maliki stopped dragging its feet on the referendum. Knowing his government cannot survive without maintaining the ongoing Shiia-Kurdish alliance, Maliki acquiesced and an agreement was reached.

Iraq’s Sunni community has denounced the referendum and the policy of reversing Saddam Hussein’s forced “arabization” of Kirkuk. Ironically, most of the Arabs that were re-settled in Kirkuk were Shiia from Southern Iraq. Nassar al-Rubaie, head of the radical Shi’ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr’s parliamentary bloc also announced their opposition to the plan. Al-Rubaie issued a statement saying they would lead a campaign to collect signatures to delay the referendum. As the U.S. Iran Peace Project reported in a previous article, al-Sadr’s bloc opposed an earlier legislative measure by rival SCIRI-led forces to establish a Shiite dominated super-autonomous region in southern Iraq. Apparently, al-Sadr will align his forces with anyone to prevent the weakening of the Iraq’s central government in Baghdad, which he still seeks to dominate with his Mahdi Army. In addition, al-Sadr is feverishly maneuvering to forestall any efforts that would strengthen Shiite or Kurdish autonomous regional claims to oil revenue, to the exclusion of Baghdad. The new legislation before the Iraqi parliament that proposes to equally share oil revenues between Iraq’s different regions has yet to go into effect.

Outside of Iraq, formidable opposition to the Kirkuk referendum exist as well. Saudi Arabian officials expressed grave concern that the referendum will lead to increased violence between Iraq’s ethnic and religious groups. This is a bizarre position coming from the House of Saud that has been financing Sunni terrorists since the inception of the Iraq War. In February, the Saudis even threatened to increase aid to the insurgency if the U.S. doesn’t contain Iranian influence in Iraq. The Jordanians and Egyptians have been doing the same, although President Bush and the U.S. Congress remain conspicuously silent on this point. Unable to stop the Kurds drive to hold the referendum, newspapers in Baghdad are now reporting that the Saudis offered Kurdistan Regional Government President Massoud Barzani $2 billion to give up demands that the oil-rich city of Kirkuk be named as the capital of Kurdistan. Further, the Saudis asked the Kurdish leaders to put a 10-year freeze on any plans to incorporate Kirkuk into Kurdistan’s autonomous region. Barzani is reported to have rejected the elegant set of shackles offered by Saudi. The Saudis seem incapable of grasping the concept that that Kurdish freedom and dignity is not for sale.

Leading the camp of opposition to the Kirkuk referendum are the Democratic and Republican party apologists in the United States. They fear the economic clout and political independence Kurdistan would gain by adding an oil-rich Kirkuk to its region will push Iraq dangerously close to a partitioned state. U.S. policy makers are in a state of denial. Iraq is virtually partitioned now, and the central government control’s little outside of the Green Zone in Baghdad. Bush and the Republicans still entertain illusions that the U.S. will have more leverage over the Kurds, Sunni and Shiia as long as Iraq remains a unitary state. A weak central government with strong autonomous regions means factions will exercise more independence and the Iranians and others will have greater freedom to fish in troubled waters. The Democrats could care less about Kurdistan or Iraq’s future. They just want to get U.S. troops out of Iraq. Democrats think the Kirkuk referendum is too messy, complicated and divisive. God forbid, a small thing like freedom for the world’s largest ethnic group without a homeland should interfere with their precious timetable for troop withdrawals.

The hysteria mongers among Kurdistan’s detractors insist that the Kirkuk referendum could unleash Turkey to invade Kurdistan. The chances that Turkey will invade Kurdistan are extremely remote. Turkey can pound its chest, but if they invade Kurdistan they will be met with the most determined resisitance of the Pesh Merga, the Iraqi Kurdish population, and most likely a dangerous rearguard action by Turkish Kurds. Turkey’s drive to gain membership in the European Union would be dead in the water. Turkey has no historical claim to Kirkuk’s oil fields, nor any role as a military protectorate of Kurdistan’s Turkman community which is being treated with respect and dignity. Indeed, Seyfin Demirci, Chairman of the Turkmen Democratic Union Party is supporting the referendum for Kirkuk in 2007. Turkey has substantial and growing and investments in Kurdistan, particularly in the oil sector; the most reliable indicator that they are slowly coming to terms with the reality that an emerging Kurdistan is an idea whose time has come.

The failure of the U.S. to guarantee Kurdistan’s security in the event of a Turkish invasion is further evidence that the U.S. adamently opposes a strong Kurdish autonomous region. Moreover, the U.S. still refuses to officially recognize the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG). Instead of crying about how the Kirkuk referendum threatens stability in Iraq, Republicans and Democrats should be supporting the referendum and offering support for a security plan for the Kirkuk elections. The U.S. should also offer technical and logistical support for conducting the census. It’s not going to happen. By standing off on the sidelines, the U.S. is creating an opening for other powers, particularly Iran to fill Kurdistan’s economic and security deficit. Kurdistan needs vital economic assistance and development capital. Iran has maintained good relations with Kurdistan and have longstanding ties with both Jalal Talabani and KRG President Barzani’s family. The border that Iran shares with Kurdistan gives the Iranians a decisive advantage in building a strategic relationship with Kurdistan. Tehran’s relationship with its own large Kurdish population is a serious internal strategic consideration that is also driving Iran’s clerical leaders to cultivate deeper ties with Irbil. In a neighborhood in which Iran has few friends, non-Arab Kurdistan represents the potential to continue it’s break-out from the isolation the west seeks to impose on Tehran. Conversely, Kurdistan’s drive to expand its autonomy is meeting with stiff international resistance, and stands to benefit from good relations with Iran.

The spring descending on Irbil is an appropriate metaphor for Kurdistan as it enters a most decisive showdown on the Kirkuk referendum. The road to the Kirkuk referendum will be full of twist and turns. The Kurds should be under no illusions that the United States will support the Kirkuk referendum. Lamentably, it’s not going to happen. There will be increased violence and more political intrigue to come, as the forces of reaction mobilize to sabatage the referendum. But the winds of change are with the Kurds, who have been demanding, fighting and dying in the hundreds of thousands for national autonomy since the early 1800′s. They have waited long enough. The Kurds have a saying that “we have no friends but the mountains.” To that we might add, the mountains and the Pesh Merga.