Turkey May Request Incursion Into Iraq
ANKARA - Turkey’s prime minister will ask parliament next week to authorize a military push into north Iraq to fight Kurdish rebels amid Turkish anger on Thursday at a U.S. vote branding Ottoman Turk killings of Armenians genocide.
Analysts say a large Turkish cross-border incursion remains unlikely, but Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan’s government will seek authorization for it after a public holiday which ends on Sunday, a ruling party member told Reuters.
Washington fears an offensive could destabilize Iraq’s most peaceful area and potentially the wider region, but Erdogan has been under mounting pressure to act after Wednesday’s vote on the highly sensitive issue of the killings in 1915 of Armenians.
The U.S. House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee approved a resolution branding the killings genocide — a charge Turkey hotly denies. The resolution was proposed by a politician with many Armenian-Americans in his district.
The United States relies on Turkish bases to supply its war effort in Iraq. Any Turkish offensive into northern Iraq would seriously strain ties with Washington and possibly hurt Turkey’s European Union accession bid.
European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana warned Turkey against a possible incursion. “Any possibility of complicating even more the security situation in Iraq should not be welcome and therefore that’s the message that we passed to our Turkish friends,” he said.
Ankara says 3,000 rebels from the outlawed separatist Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) are based in northern Iraq from where they stage deadly attacks into Turkey.
“The resolution won’t go to parliament today. It will be sent to parliament after Bayram (public holiday),” the senior ruling AK Party politician, who declined to be named, told Reuters. The holiday begins on Friday and ends on Sunday.
The Turkish government cautioned that relations with its NATO ally would be harmed by the U.S. committee’s decision. The non-binding resolution now goes to the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives, where Democratic leaders say there will be a vote by mid-November.
Ankara will lobby Congress to prevent the bill from being approved. Erdogan is due to travel to Washington in early November for talks with U.S. President George W. Bush.
The Bush administration on Wednesday urged Turkey not to take any “concrete” action after the congressional committee angered Ankara by passing the Armenia genocide resolution.
“The problem that we have is that this is clearly a very sensitive subject for one of our closest allies and an ally that is incredibly important to the United States in terms of our operations in Iraq,” U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates told reporters in London on Thursday.
Potential moves could include blocking U.S. access to the Incirlik air base, cancelling procurement contracts, downscaling bilateral visits and joint military exercises, diplomats say.
CROSS-BORDER OFFENSIVE
The committee’s decision on Wednesday is expected to weaken U.S. influence over Turkey, which has NATO’s second-largest army, at a time when the government ponders whether to push for the military operation into mainly Kurdish northern Iraq.
“Unfortunately there is a linkage between the bill and a Turkish incursion into northern Iraq because the Turkish public will be much angered towards the United States and the government will feel so as well,” Faruk Logoglu, an influential former Turkish ambassador to Washington, told Reuters.
“However I think the madness of the Armenian bill wouldn’t be a green light for an incursion into northern Iraq. On the contrary the U.S. should, and may, do something against the PKK to please the Turkish state and its people,” he said.
Turkey’s military has frequently called on the government to give them the green light to pursue the PKK — which is considered a terrorist organization by the United States, Turkey and the EU — into Iraq.
Parliament, where Erdogan’s ruling centre-right AK Party has a big majority, would have to grant permission for troops to cross the border into Iraq. Passing the measure would not automatically mean troops going into northern Iraq.
Big incursions by Turkey in 1995 and 1997, involving an estimated 35,000 and 50,000 troops respectively, failed to dislodge the rebels.
A senior Turkish diplomat told Reuters Ankara was disappointed with what he said was U.S. and Iraqi failure so far to stop the PKK. He said the government was still holding out that their counterparts would deal with the rebels.
(Additional reporting by Evren Mesci in Ankara, Emma Ross-Thomas in Istanbul, Sue Pleming in Washington and David Brunnstrom in Brussels)
© 2007 Reuters
If you are a Turk and mention the Armenian genocide, you go to jail for years. Seems to be something that strikes a Turkish nerve.
Since this might get in the way of our using Turkey as a staging base, I’m sure Cheney/Bush will break out some of the blackmail material in Cheney’s safe on key figures, then have them in for a “talk.” This will be followed by an abject apology to the Turkish government by the Congress and all will once again be quiet on the “Eastern Front.”
The Congressman who introduced the bill will be able to shrug his shoulders to his Armenian constituents and say, “I tried.” Then all will be well on his “home front,” too
Was there a genocide against Armenians? I’m not saying that there wasn’t. Having said that, I do have a problem condemning Turkey for something that happened during the time of the Ottoman Empire. The state of Turkey wasn’t established until the early twenties. That’s like asking the French Republic to condemn something that happened under Bourbon France. If you want to say that it was the Ottoman Empire that committed the atrocities against the Armenians, then that would be accurate, but why should Turkey take responsibility for something that happened before it’s time of nationhood?
I don’t understand, Turkey is upset that their genocide of the Armenians is being called what it is, so now they want to blow off some steam by going into Iraq and murdering some Kurds? What the fuck?
brother against brother,the kurds are just turks..long ago they got split off by the borders…apparently it is touchy..america should keep its big mouth shut,until the time that america is willing to label iraq’genocide’..how did this happen ?the americans have nearly completed the genocide of iraq,with the exception of the kurds,who also just happen to be the faction that helped america time after time and was promised a lion’s share of the oil and sovreignty for their time and troubles.it makes me suspicious…did america somehow persuade the turks to attack their once removed brothers ?or is this just another deadly squabble over oil ???
Why is the Turkish republic so opposed to leabeling Ottoman atrocities as genocide? They’re not alone in denying their past. We criticize the Japanese regularly for not fessing up to their WWII crimes, but we have not admitted to our crimes against native Americans and blacks.
“Let he who is without sin….”
foxtrader - Did I miss something? To my knowledge the resolution does not condemn modern Turkey, it condemns the genocide of Armenians (yes it is historical fact) by the Ottoman empire just before it’s demise in WWI. I understood that it is the modern Turkish government who identifies this as a problem for them, does the resolution really call for modern Turkey to take responsibility for this beyond admitting it happened? Perhaps the modern Turkish government still identifies greatly with the ancient glory of the Ottoman empire, perhaps they jsut don’t want the Armenian turks to get all riled up and ask for some land of their own or some such, I don’t know. I have read that there are many modern Turks who acknowledge this event in sorrow, but if they do so publicly they are indeed jailed.
As for an incursion into Northern Iraq, what the hell, the Turks are just looking for an excuse to put down the idea of Kurdish statehood once and for all, again trouble for them, because of all the Kurds in Turkey who would get all riled up, and want some land.
Oh what a mess our nefarious leaders have started for us.
thomas j hussey - If you really think about how F’d up the modern world is as a result of European expansionism, the genocide of non-Caucasian peoples on a Global scale, and the use of Christianity to thoroughly enslave the remaining decedents. It makes me sick to think about it. But even as a person of purely European decent, who recognizes this, I see no way taking responsibility for the sins of my fathers. None the less you are spot on that the modern USA owes a great debt to the Native Americans and people. Our European forefathers really started a heck of a mess.
i think,mr.hussey,they are objecting to the massmurdering genocidal united states of america,trying to slap the label on them…i think that might piss me off,too…were i a turk !!
This is crazy. At a time of heightened anger at US policies in the Muslim world, the US choses to vote on a resolution that alienates the only democratic Muslim ally…and one whose population is already teetering on the edge of anti-Americanism.
Do you think the House should proceed with this resolution? http://youpolls.com/details.asp?pid=689
Dear libertas,
So far nobody has server jail time for insulting Turkishness. Some extreme nationalists and their armies of lawyers has tried to take advantage of the vague wording of the legislation #301. All the cases has been dropped, and hopefully it is going to be change in the new constitution that’s being revised currently.
If I were a Turkish MP, I’d sponsor a resolution calling on America to recognize its own war crimes–perpetrated in Iraq–against Muslims.
If the Turks want to be taken seriously they will have get down on their knees and request. Guess who is paying the bills for Turkey’s defense?