Ruffling feathers - will Turkey invade northern Iraq?

[seemslikeadream]

http://www.janes.com/news/security/jir/jir070817_1_n.shtml

Ruffling feathers - will Turkey invade northern Iraq?
By Graeme Wood
17 August 2007

Turkey is once again undergoing preparations for a possible invasion of northern Iraq to disrupt the activities of the Workers' Party of Kurdistan (Partiya Karkaren Kurdistan: PKK). On 7 August, Iraqi and Turkish Prime Ministers Nouri al-Maliki and Recep Tayyip Erdogan signed a Memorandum of Understanding to jointly work towards ending the PKK presence in Iraq. The decision followed Turkey's July general election, won by the ruling Justice and Development Party (Adalet ve Kalkinma Partisi: AKP), which saw the opposition parties, the Republican People's Party and the National Action Party, running on nationalist platforms.

Such a cross-border operation against the PKK would not be unprecendented. Turkish soldiers have been fighting the PKK in Iraqi Kurdish regions since the mid-1990s, usually just across the border from Turkey. Every few years the fight against the guerrilla movement reaches a minor crescendo, with the Turkish military weighing the option of swooping into the Kandil mountains to completely destroy the PKK's camps. Four significant incursions were launched in the 1990s and 2001.

So far, Turkish deployments inside Iraq have been modest. Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani (nephew of KRG President Massoud Barzani) confirmed in early August that Turkish troops had already begun operating in Iraqi territory. However, their main activity has consisted of preparatory work on the Turkish side of the border, in particular the establishment of 'temporary security zones' in the border provinces of Hakkari, Siirt, and Sirnak. These zones involve tighter controls on civilian movement and could be a prelude to cross-border action.

As these zones and the election demonstrate, attacking the PKK camps is once again being considered seriously in Ankara. Perhaps the most significant reason for this is that the PKK's insurgency has shown surprising resilience by sustaining itself since ending its unilateral ceasefire in May 2004, and there are signs it has taken lethal new tactical turns. In addition, given the PKK's strategic reliance on static camps, the military is confident that it could deal a substantial blow to the organisation in a cross-border operation.

[OlderButWiser]

1. That's one way to end the problem...

...let turkey invade from the north, Iran from the east and Saudi Arabia and Jordan from the west.
Then, at least, we are done with it.

[seemslikeadream]

2. it is likely to occur in 2008 or 2009

more


Given these competing factors, the probability of a Turkish invasion of Iraq is not yet assured. Nonetheless, the Turkish military has pressed forward at the Iraqi border and sent in mine clearance and special forces teams. In August, in the run-up to the Maliki-Erdogan meeting, Iraqi Kurdish media reported intense Turkish shelling and a 1 km incursion into the KRG area in Iraq's Zakho district. These events and the discourse in Ankara suggest that the likelihood of an invasion is at its greatest since 2001. Even if it does not take place in 2007, it is likely to occur in 2008 or 2009.

....

Forecast
The possibility of military operations against the PKK in the Kandil mountains is significant. The Turkish military is eager for the fight and it has good reason to believe well-placed air strikes will destroy guerrilla assets - not enough to end the military movement, but certainly enough to set it back years. For more than a year, the PKK campaign in southeastern Turkey has sustained itself and showed no signs of abating. The Turkish military will refuse to watch it profit from a haven in northern Iraq where the guerillas can learn to make roadside bombs with comfort and impunity. Politically, the domestic forces that might encourage the PKK show no sign of letting up, and the nationalist-Kemalist politicians and military leaders favouring intervention in Iraq are in a position to ask indulgence from the AKP leadership. While the AKP and Kurdish parliamentary representation is a limiting factor, they are currently not strong enough to outweigh the more substantial pro-incursion group.

Turkey may yet be dissuaded from intervention should Baghdad or the KRG persuade Ankara that the PKK will be handled by a domestic counter-insurgency operation. However, this seems unlikely as the central Iraqi government is more concerned with Sunni and Shia militancy, and the KRG has proven unwilling to undertake unilateral operations against a Kurdish organisation.

The question is, therefore, not whether Turkey would countenance military action, but whether Turkey is able to persuade the US and Iraqi Kurds of the benefits, what form the intervention takes and when such action might occur. Neither Washington nor the KRG are likely to support a large-scale invasion, but could be persuaded that air strikes and special forces operations in the Kandil mountains are beneficial. In such a scenario, winter may prove the most suitable time as it will be easier to identify and target PKK living areas, while troops will benefit from tracking in the snow.

However, should Turkey not persuade its allies that such operations should go ahead, then the possibility of a Turkish invasion in 2008 grows. While opprobrium from Turkey's allies would be unwelcome in such a scenario, Ankara will not sit idly while the PKK insurgency gathers pace after early 2008 and will, therefore, risk damaging its relations with the KRG, the US and Iraq to disrupt the PKK. n