US TO JOIN TURKEY IN COVERT WAR

A Bush administration plan to join Turkey in a covert war to eliminate leaders of a Kurdish rebel group in Iraq was exposed after a former Dick Cheney aide briefed lawmakers on Capitol Hill.
Within days of the visit to the Hill by Eric Edelman, under secretary of defense for policy, the columnist, Robert Novak got wind of the plan and made it public. It transpired that Edelman boasted that the plan was to use US Special forces help their Turkish counterparts “behead” the leadership of the Kurdish guerilla group the PKK – Kurdistan Workers Party – in its hideout in mountains bordering northern Iraq and Turkey. When lawmakers questioned the wisdom of the US getting caught up in yet another low intensity conflict, Edelman assured them it would be a success. The US role would be hidden and vigorously denied if made public. Some members of Congress thought the strategy was risky, especially at a time when the US was bogged down in Iraq and Afghanistan and had special operations commitments in other parts of the world, including countries like the Philippines. Edelman’s response was that the plan was a slam dunk and would not take long to accomplish. Some lawmakers might have been concerned that doing Turkey’s dirty work could have unforeseen consequences and could only add to further isolation of the US within Europe.
The Turks have long argued that the PKK, which wants Kurds within Turkey to be granted autonomy, has been aided by Iraqi Kurds who have been staunch American allies. Iraqi Kurds have no love for Turkey but deny involvement with the PKK. Nevertheless, they will not look kindly on US involvement in a campaign against fellow Kurds. Several months ago, Turkey, which is a NATO member, alarmed the EU and the US by massing large numbers of troops on the border. At the time, Turkish generals talked openly of invading Iraq with 200,000 troops.
The reaction from the Iraqi parliament, as well as from the regional Kurdish government in northern Iraq, was swift. They warned an invasion by Turkey would not only be a breach of Iraqi sovereignty but would be repulsed. It now seems the US has encouraged Turkey to jettison its invasion plans in return for a joint US-Turkey Special Forces war against the PPK, using US air power and hi-tech surveillance.
The PKK is regarded as a terrorist group by many western nations and has been a thorn in Turkey’s side because it has caused unrest among Turkey’s large Kurdish minority by demanding autonomy so that part of Turkey could be annexed with northern Iraq and a small part of Iran to form a united Kurdish state. Turkey is not without blame when one looks at the deaths of perhaps 30,000 ethnic Kurds during several decades of fighting between the PKK and the Turkish military. The Turks have been guilty of assassination, brutality, rape and the disappearances of large numbers of its Kurdish nationals. During the Cold War the PKK’s Marxist-Leninist leanings made it an enemy of the West and the US, mainly through the CIA, trained some of the assassination squads and brutal right wing militias that the Turkish military used to track down PKK members and sympathizers. The US involvement in that secret war is rarely discussed but lawmakers who may be aware of it would certainly not wish a repeat of American participation in what could turn out to be a similar venture. Turkey's human rights record leaves a lot to be desired and it would hurt the US internationally if it became tainted with excesses by Turkish military or paramilitary forces.
There is yet another aspect to the Bush plan that may concern some on the Hill. Turkey has its own agenda in respect of how it would like to see the Iraq conflict resolved. The Turks have never been happy about America’s closeness to the Kurds who helped the US bring down Sadamm Hussein. But, they are most concerned that Iraqi Kurds are sitting on huge oil reserves around Kirkuk. Therefore, if Iraq descended into all-out civil war, Kurdistan in northern Iraq could become a totally separate and very rich entity on Turkey’s border.
But the problem is even more complicated than that. Israel is supportive of Iraqi Kurds and has gone out of its way to train militias under the control of the Kurdish regional government. Israel may well see the Kurds as an ideal bulwark against fundamentalist Iran and a Turkey with the potential to move in the future from a secular to a state controlled by Islamic radicals. As for the US, its relations with the Kurds goes back to when the Kurds helped the US military overthrow Saddam but there is a more troubling connection between the US and the PKK. The PKK no longer sees itself as a Marxist-Leninist organization and accuses Turkey of denying Kurds within its borders the same human rights as the rest of the Turkish population. The PKK’s opposition to Turkey is matched only by its hatred of Iran because of Iran’s treatment of Kurds within its borders. In the past year, evidence has mounted that the CIA and the Israelis have been encouraging, if not supporting PKK attacks within Iran in an effort to destabilize that regime.
Taking all that into consideration it may be no wonder some lawmakers are jittery about the Cheney-Bush tendency to think foreign policy is best served by covert military action. As the Iraq war has shown, this administration’s tendency to favor action over diplomacy can lead to terrifying consequences.
When new broke about the covert war plan outlined by Edelman, the Pentagon confirmed that the US, in keeping with its war on terror, was working closely with its NATO ally, Turkey, to crush Kurdish guerillas operating from bases in northern Iraq. As Edelman predicted to lawmakers, the Pentagon denied any US covert involvement with Turkish special operations inside Iraq.