Pity the Kurds

Largely ignored in the current coverage of the crisis in Iraq is the continuing plight of the Kurdish people. The slaughter of Saddam’s gas attacks in the late 1980’s stands out in the public consciousness, yet few have a historical perspective broad enough to truly understand the duration and severity of the oppression that has been foisted upon the Kurds.

It’s no exaggeration to say that the Kurds are victims of one of history’s greatest ongoing tragedies; they’ve been consistently tortured, killed, oppressed and forcibly unsettled for well over a century. And while there are certain similarities between the mistreatments of the Kurds and the repression of other minorities—the Armenians and the Jews come immediately to mind—the Kurds are unique in that they have no state of their own. They were promised a state in the Treaty of Sevres in the aftermath of the First World War, but Kemal Ataturk’s ascension to power in Turkey prevented this from happening.

A sizeable presence in the Middle East, the Kurds number roughly 20 million and reside in a broad swathe from Southeastern Turkey, to Northern Iraq and Western Iran. The largest concentration of Kurds in the region—around 10 million—resides in Turkey and comprises upwards of 20 percent of the country’s population.

For being such a substantial minority in Turkey, the Kurds enjoy little in the way of representation or freedom. The Turkish government severely repressed Kurdish culture to such an extent that children couldn’t even be given Kurdish names until as little as a decade ago. But because of its desire to join the European Union, the Turkish government has begun publicly imploring the acceptance of the Kurds residing within its borders. These efforts though, for the most part, disguise the ongoing draconian regulation of the Kurds. Just this past July, several Kurdish activists were charged by Turkish police for speaking in their native tongue at a political rally. While the trumped-up charges were later dropped because of massive international outcry, the fact that they were levied at all demonstrates clearly that Kurds still have a long road to full equality.

The terrible suffering of the Kurds continues apace in the cauldron of postwar Iraq, as the recent massive car bombing in the unofficial Kurdish capital of Kirkuk and the beheading of three Kurds by insurgents have gruesomely illustrated. These two vile acts are merely small additions to the long list of outrages suffered since the removal of Saddam Hussein. Kurds stand out as targets not only because of their ethnicity and language, but also because of their staunchly pro-American actions. The Kurds are deeply grateful for America’s creation of the “no fly zone,” which enabled them to enjoy at least some sense of autonomy after the First Gulf War ended. The Kurd’s famed peshmerga militias played a significant part in Operation Iraqi Freedom and continue to battle against the terrorists waging a guerilla campaign.

While our policing of the no-fly zone allowed the creation of a nominally independent Kurdish nation, we owe the Kurds a far greater historical debt. This is primarily because they are one of the few reliable allies we have in the region; the proto self-government centered on Kirkuk has been resolutely and nearly unflinchingly pro-American over the past decade. However, our reasons for further helping the Kurds are not limited to their current assistance to our cause. Twice in the past century the Kurdish people have responded to the calls of American presidents to overthrow their oppressors, only to rise up and be slaughtered by the thousands. While the Kurds heeded Woodrow Wilson and George H.W. Bush, if the only outcome of following American desires is mass slaughter they would be wary of aiding us in the future; and the Kurds occupy too strategically important an area to risk loosing as allies.

Virtually every other people that have suffered as greatly as the Kurds have come out of the experience possessing a nation of their own, but the Kurds remain stateless. No country that lies within the traditional Kurdish homeland grants full freedom or protection—as of today there is still no nation where the Kurds can truly be Kurdish. If we can salvage little from our invasion of Iraq, a true Kurdish homeland where the Kurds can live in peace and with dignity should be at the top of the list.

Mark A. Adomanis ’07, a Crimson editorial editor, is a government concentrator living in Eliot House.