Turkey's decision to launch the largest military operation in a decade against Kurdish rebels strains Ankara's relations with both Iraq and the US and further remilitarises the country's decades-old Kurdish problem, writes Gareth Jenkins Iraqi President and leader of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) Jalal Talabani last week warned Ankara to respect internationally-recognised borders as the Turkish military continued a massive military operation against militants from the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) in the mountains along Turkey's borders with Iran and Iraq. The Turkish operation was launched at the end of last month as the melting of the winter snows freed up movement through the mountains in southeast Turkey. It is believed to involve over 200,000 troops, including both those already stationed in the region and reinforcements from elsewhere in Turkey. The official reason for the operation is to conduct a sweep for PKK militants and choke off the organisation's supply lines to Turkey from its main camps in northern Iraq. But the launch of the Turkish operation also coincided with a series of attacks by the Iranian military on PKK units based in Iran. Although there is no evidence of operational cooperation, the Turkish military appears to have calculated that PKK militants fleeing the Iranian assault would cross into Turkey, either to take refuge in the mountains on the Turkish side or to try to transit Turkish territory en route to PKK camps in northern Iraq. The Iranian military operation represents a dramatic turnaround from the mid-1990s, when Turkey often accused Iran of sheltering PKK militants on its territory. "When I served close to the border in the 1990s, we could see PKK units on the other side through our binoculars," said one retired officer. "But whenever we complained to the Iranians they did nothing about it. I don't think they were supplying or controlling the PKK, but they were definitely providing them with medical facilities and allowing to organise and train on their territory." Privately, sources close to the Turkish military speculate that one of the main reasons for the shift in Tehran's attitude is the fear of a United States-led military strike in order to try to force Iran to abandon its nuclear programme. "To be honest, I don't know whether the Americans could succeed with a military operation even with broad international support," said one. "But the feeling is that the Iranians believe that the Americans are going to ask for Turkey's support and the Iranians are trying to demonstrate good neighbourly relations." But if Turkey has recently began to move closer to Iran, the same could be said of its relations with Iraq, particularly the Kurds in the north of the country. Ankara has long demanded that the Iraqi Kurds and the US military in Iraq should either move against the PKK camps in the mountains along the Turkish-Iraqi border or allow Ankara to do so. In an interview on local television Talabani on Sunday claimed that Washington had already warned Ankara that it would not tolerate any cross border military operations into Iraq. In practice, it is an open secret that Turkish forces are already in northern Iraq. The Turkish military has deployed a brigade just across the border in northern Iraq since the mid-1990s, mainly to serve as buffer against PKK infiltration into Turkey. However, the brigade has also been used as a platform for special forces operations against the PKK and for intelligence gathering against both the PKK and the Iraqi Kurds. In late April Turkish Chief of Staff General Hilmi Ozkok repeated what he claimed was Turkey's right to defend itself against attack, including striking at the PKK in northern Iraq. However, a major Turkish incursion into northern Iraq would not only strain Ankara's political relations with Washington but could trigger, whether by accident or design, a military confrontation with US forces in the region. But the difference in attitudes towards the PKK of Iran and the US has not been lost on either the Turkish military or the civilian government in Ankara. Even though Washington has included the PKK on its list of terrorist organisation, in the same category as groups as Al-Qaeda, it has made no attempt to move against the PKK camps in northern Iraq and has consistently rebuffed Turkish proposals to launch joint operations. Yet, even if it reinforces the visible shift in Ankara's foreign policy over the last few years away from a transatlantic alliance towards closer ties with the region, the ongoing military operation is unlikely to lead either to the defeat of the PKK or make a contribution towards solving Turkey's decades-old Kurdish problem. No figures have yet been released for the results of the military operation, although sources in the region suggest that it has yet to yield any substantive results. If the Turkish military's desire to strike at an organisation which continues to launch attacks on both military and civilian targets is understandable, the launch of such a massive operation appears set to remilitarise the Turkish state's relationship with its Kurdish minority and further encourage those who are unwilling to accept that the Kurdish problem is a complex combination of social, economic, cultural, demographic and political factors, of which violence is only a part.
