U.S. Would Limit Action By Kurds in Postwar Iraq
Vow to Turkey Is Part of Deal on Troops
By Philip P. Pan and Daniel Williams
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, February 27, 2003; Page A01
ANKARA, Turkey, Feb. 26 -- The United States has
promised to prevent Kurds from imposing a
federation-style government in postwar Iraq that would
ensure their continued autonomy and agreed to allow
Turkish troops to enter northern Iraq and observe the
disarmament of Kurdish militias once fighting has
stopped, Turkish officials said today.
The deal, designed to persuade Turkey to allow U.S.
troops to use its bases for an attack on Iraq,
foresees that Turkish troops will cross the 218-mile
Turkish-Iraqi border along with U.S. troops and
proceed at least 121/2 miles into the rugged
Kurdish-inhabited hills to prevent a flow of refugees
into Turkey and maintain stability and security in the
region, the officials said.
Turkish officials said they requested the guarantees,
as a condition for opening their territory to U.S.
forces, to ensure that an independent Kurdish state --
or even an autonomous Kurdish entity within an Iraqi
federation -- does not emerge along Turkey's borders
if a widely expected U.S. attack destroys President
Saddam Hussein's central government. U.S. and Turkish
negotiators reached consensus today on almost all
details of the deal, officials from both sides said,
and the Turkish government said a parliamentary vote
-- the final step -- was likely Thursday.
The plans to allow Turkish forces into Iraq already
have provoked anger and concern among the 3.5 million
Iraqi Kurds who since the 1991 Persian Gulf War have
enjoyed a flourishing self-rule in northern Iraq under
the protection of U.S. and British air patrols that
keep out Hussein's military. A Bush administration
envoy, Zalmay Khalilzad, addressed Kurdish and other
anti-Hussein Iraqi leaders in northern Iraq today,
seeking to reassure them that Washington does not plan
to sell them out.
Khalilzad was on a mission to Salahuddin, just north
of Irbil in northern Iraq , where the U.S.-sponsored
opposition groups opened a long-delayed meeting just
20 miles from territory under control of Hussein's
troops. The meeting, the first all-opposition
gathering on Iraqi soil in 11 years, was called to
discuss the future of Iraq after Hussein's expected
removal. But it quickly focused on the bargain with
Turkey and widely discussed U.S. plans to run postwar
Iraq with a military government.
In a speech to 54 opposition delegates, Khalilzad said
that it was up to Iraqis to choose their leaders and
that the U.S. military occupation would last only
until a democratic government could be organized and
take power. But he made no pledges to turn the
government over to the Kurdish militias and exile
groups whose leaders have campaigned tirelessly
against Hussein, with U.S. encouragement, and had
hoped to be the logical U.S. choice for Iraq's next
leadership.
"None of us want Saddamism without Saddam," Khalilzad
declared, seeking to allay opposition fears that the
Bush administration is looking for another strongman
to replace Hussein.
Khalilzad did not address Turkish intervention
directly in his speech. But in a briefing for
reporters afterward, he said Turkish troops would
enter Iraq in "coordination" with invading U.S. forces
and leave when they do. "We are opposed to a
unilateral Turkish move here," he told reporters after
his speech.
Massoud Barzani, who heads the Kurdistan Democratic
Party, one of two Kurdish movements that run the
autonomous north, said in a speech that the Iraqi
opposition rejects intervention by any "regional
power," clearly alluding to Turkey. The Kurds, who
constitute the most numerous and best armed element of
the U.S.-supported opposition, harbor centuries-old
resentment of the Turks and have expressed strong
opposition to an occupation.
The leader of an Iranian-based Iraqi opposition
militia, embracing principally members of Iraq's
Shiite Muslim majority, warned against U.S. domination
of Iraq and cautioned that a prolonged occupation
could provoke "the sensitivities of religious and
patriotic societies."
"One of the greatest dangers we face is the imposition
of foreign hegemony over Iraq and its resources," said
the leader, Mohammed Bakir Hakim of the Supreme
Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq.
U.S. and Turkish officials here in Ankara, the Turkish
capital, continued to tweak the agreement on northern
Iraq, but officials familiar with the talks said
almost all disputes have been settled. The leader of
Turkey's governing Justice and Development Party,
Recep Tayyip Erdogan, predicted parliament will vote
Thursday to approve the U.S. deployment and allow the
U.S. military to proceed with its preparations.
Officials involved in the talks said it became clear a
deal would be reached after Turkey agreed to accept
some of the spending limits that U.S. officials had
insisted on attaching to $6 billion in grants and
billions more in expected loans, and after the United
States addressed Turkish concerns about the Kurds.
The Turkish government fears that a Kurdish state in
northern Iraq would encourage separatist sentiment
among the estimated 12 million Kurds who live in
Turkey. For much of the past two decades, the Turkish
military has battled Kurdish separatists, who
sometimes used northern Iraq as a base for attacks in
Turkey.
Erdogan said the government plans to send as many as
40,000 troops across the border. He said the Turkish
troops would be under Turkish command, but stay behind
the U.S. forces. Pressed, he added, "You never know,
they may go further."
Armagan Kuloglu, a retired Turkish general with the
Center for Eurasian Strategic Studies, said the
mission of the Turkish military would be to prevent
refugees from entering Turkey and to stop Iraqi Kurds
from seizing oil fields near Kirkuk and Mosul that
would give them economic power to establish an
autonomous state. He said the military would also seek
to protect the interests of Turkmen residents in Iraq,
a population he estimated at nearly 3 million.
He said the Turkish military would stay back and see
if U.S. troops follow through on U.S. promises, but
would not hesitate to move beyond the 121/2-mile limit
to protect Turkey's interests if it believed the
United States was not doing so.
"We're talking about Turkey's security. We can't
entrust our security entirely to another party. We
have to be ready to take steps ourselves if
necessary," he said. "The mission would be to control
northern Iraq, temporarily."
A senior member of the Turkish government said Turkey
would not oppose a federation government in Iraq "if
it is decided by the Iraqi people themselves. What
we're saying is, one element of Iraq should not impose
its model on the whole country."
The deal on U.S. deployment -- as many as 62,000 U.S.
troops and 310 military aircraft using Turkish bases
-- would allow the Army's 4th Infantry Division to
push forward with long-delayed preparations for a
cross-border attack. At least five U.S. ships have
been waiting offshore to begin unloading tanks and
other equipment, and dozens more are on the way.
According to reports in the Turkish press, U.S. troops
would arrive at the ports of Iskenderun and Mersin on
the Mediterranean coast, then establish six tent
cities in the southeastern provinces of Gaziantep,
Malatya, Diyarbakir, Mardin and Batman, and in Silopi
district of Sirnak province, near the border with
northern Iraq. Air bases at Incirlik and Diyarbakir
would be used for raids on Iraq, while at least three
other airports would be used for cargo and fuel
transport.
Williams reported from Salahuddin.
� 2003 The Washington Post Company
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John D. Giorgis - [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Tonight I have a message for the brave and oppressed people of Iraq:
Your enemy is not surrounding your country � your enemy is ruling your
country. And the day he and his regime are removed from power will be
the day of your liberation." -George W. Bush 1/29/03
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