Kurds are the world’s largest remaining ethnic group without a homeland. Being neither Iraqi or Iranian, Turkish or Syrian, Arab or Persian, the Kurds are a distinct and separate ethnic group that occupies a substantial geographic area situated within all four of those countries. In Iraq they have even established their own government in the quasi autonomous Kurdish region carved out of the oil rich north-central reaches of the country, with their capital located in Erbil. The Kurds have proven to be a resilient and stable culture that has endured more than one thousand years of setbacks, betrayals and deprivation. They deserve a nation of their own.
The region known historically as Greater Kurdistan is one of oldest continuously inhabited areas in the world and sits at the crossroads of several important ancient trading routes that have been the scenes of many bloody military and political battles dating back at least 2,300 years to the time of Alexander the Great. Although the initial flames of the modern Kurdish independence movement were ignited in the late 19th century, the Kurds have been aggressively fighting for self-rule ever since the end of the Ottoman Empire after World War I. Many of these fights have been costly. In 1920 with the signing of the Treaty of Sevres by the British, the Kurds thought they were finally assured of a permanent homeland. However, after Kamal Ataturk came to power in post Ottoman Turkey, that treaty was abandoned and the Kurdish dream of an independent Kurdistan was again dashed. Decades of political infighting and violent clashes followed.
Saddam Hussein alone is estimated to have killed over 182,000 Kurds while putting down their bid for independence. Among the more inhumane atrocities perpetrated by Saddam was his use of chemical weapons against Kurdish civilians, such as those used in destroying the northern Iraqi village of Halabja in 1988 that is estimated to have killed more than 5,000 Kurdish men, women and children, one of more than 4,500 Kurdish villages razed by Saddam during his brutal reign of terror. The UN has officially deemed this action a crime against humanity. In 2003 my U.S. Army tactical human intelligence team (THT) found some of the actual left over chemical aerial bombs used in the Halabja massacre in a weapons storage site at Balad Air Base, Iraq. I could never get over the feeling that the ghosts of the Halabja victims were present with me in that weapons storage bunker, urging me to tell the world of the indescribable tragedy that destroyed their village and all life within a 3 km radius. On some days I can still feel their sad and haunting presence.
Of course, Saddam and the Iraqi government have not been the only ones committed to preventing Kurdish independence. Turkey has long acted against any notion of an independent Kurdistan, either on or near Turkish territory. They have gone so far as to declare one of the leading Kurdish militia organizations, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party or PKK, a terrorist organization, a designation they successfully lobbied the United States and European Union to also adopt. It is a deeply ingrained attitude among all Turkish regimes since 1923 that an independent Kurdistan located in or near the Turkish homeland would destroy the founding idea of the modern Turkish state as established by Ataturk. That attitude is certainly carried on by the current president Erdogan. Despite the fact that PKK fighters in Syria are tactically and philosophically aligned with Turkey in their fight against the repressive regime of President Bashar Hafez al-Assad, Ankara refuses to grant them any special status or dispensation from their terrorist designation. This has led to more then a few tense confrontations with U.S. forces in Syria who (until their recent pull out) are aligned with the PKK and provided them with tactical and logistical support and protection.
A relatively unknown fact is that there actually was a short-lived independent Kurdish state within Iran in 1946. This nation was called the Mahabad Republic and was formed within the existing Kurdish occupied areas in northwestern Iran. Funded by the Soviet government as a bulwark against the U.S. aligned Iranian regime, the Mahabad Republic existed only from January to December of 1946 when Soviet support evaporated. That was as close as the Kurds have ever gotten to achieving nationhood.
So what has the Middle-East, indeed, what has the world gained by repeatedly denying this ancient people an independent nation in a region of the world that they have occupied since at least the Bronze Age? They have gained a region that has been embroiled in a constant state of instability and violence that has, by conservative estimates, cost the lives of over a quarter of million Kurdish men, women and children, as well as an untold number of Arabs, Persians, Turks and others. The world has gained the dishonor of sentencing an entire people numbering more than 35 million, to an endless life of homelessness, of being nomads in their own land, labeled as terrorists and shot or jailed on sight, of having entire villages destroyed and erased from memory.
There is another way.
For far too long the Middle-East and the world has been denied a stable, sophisticated, passionate and highly educated ally with which many of the regional conflicts might be solved, or at least mitigated by enlisting the services of an independent and powerful Kurdistan. The rich oil fields around Kirkuk could be used by an independent Kurdistan not only to establish a new and stronger Kurdish culture, but also to assist their regional neighbors like Iran to overcome the severe financial difficulties that country has faced and will face in the near future. Turning an historic enemy into a valuable ally and friend does not have to be difficult. Simply by acknowledging the right of Kurdistan to exist side by side with it’s Middle-East neighbors, all of which also have a long and shared history, would almost assuredly result in a much different Middle-East landscape. No, it will not by itself solve the Israeli-Palestinian issue or the historic schism between the Sunni and Shia, but it might go a long way to paving the road to the eventual solution to those problems as well.The simple fact is that it is way past time for an independent Kurdistan. The positive outcome of establishing a stable and strong Kurdish nation far outweighs any possible downside, if all parties, most of all, Turkey, agree to negotiate in good faith for the good off all. The Middle-East and the world have nothing to lose in trying to make this historic agreement work and a sizable amount to gain.
