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Question is, does the leadership of the US agree?

The short answer in my opinion, is yes. As my example I will use the Isreali/Palestinain issue.

Over the past two years public statement from the White House have been equally critical of both sides--so much so that conservatives lambasted him for being soft on terrorism and of undermining Isreal's right to defend itself. However, in every U.N. vote we were solidly behind Isreal and when the chips were down stood behind all of their self-defense decisions. The seeming cognitive dis-connect was simply the administration be carefull not to say anything that could be used as anti-US propaganda in the muslim press.

Today in Iraq we face, I think, a similar situation (as I mentioned earlier my daughter is in Iraq assigned to a Military Intelligence unit). As far as I know we support the PUK not the PKK. But the latter is a major and formidable force to be reckoned with.

Right now the PKK is not actively attacking U.S. forces (as far as I know), but Syrian backed Sunni bathists and Iranian backed Shiites are. Our policy at the moment (near as I can tell based on what I've read and been told), is not to provoke the PKK until until we get a handle on things in the south.

In the meantime we are negotiating re-integration of Kurds into areas like Kirkuk where Saddam's efforts at "arabization" ran Kurds out of that city and others. The area is a powder-keg and we are doing our best to keep a lid on things with limited forces.

Also remember that PKK gets significant support from Syria as well as Iran (as stated in the article). When the new Iraqi interim president told Iran and Syria to stop sending foreign fighters and helping terrorists in Iraq (or else!), that meant the PKK as well I would have to assume. So, for now, the battle against the PKK is being fought through their main backers (Iran and Syria), while trying, I told, to get them to re-integrate into society.

Eventually, however, if they persist in terrorism, they will be gone after by U.S. and Iraqi security forces once those forces have been trained and equipped or cn be shifted from areas where the internal threat is more immediate.

I do not believe Bush will tolerate them continuing with terrorism. Unfortunately, we do not have the manpower to handle everything at once. But I think I can assure you that they are on the list. One thing you can say about presdident Bush--He means what he says. And he has said that he will fight terrorism whereever it exists. I believe him.