I can see us avoiding a fight with Turkey over this but Iran we should be picking them off as they cross the boarder.
It didn’t thicken. It just hit the proverbial fan.
Turkey effectively just removed itself from NATO during their panicky (re)denial of the genocide they’ve been denying for decades.
Or they just triggered courage in America’s tenuous allies who were waiting for a big dog to jump the fence before following.
Will Islamic radicalism take over this most resistant yet Islamic-tolerant country? Will Russia freak out and move to support its interests there? Tune in next week to hear Turkey’s nominal leader ask “Is that big scimitar as sharp as you can hone it?”
Meanwhile, crossing the oceanic expanse from China to Taiwan...
So, this is breaking? Turkey is attacking Iraq?
That seems a tad serious.
Bush’s weakness emboldens our enemies.
I like it.
It's easier to spell than "The Peloponnesian War".
Leni
Someone should alert Rush about the whole story BEFORE he gets his thong in a Pelosi twist.
This Turkey action has the potential to really bust wide open sooner than later as the Newsmax report of Turkey-Iranian alliance is very Byzantine.
The Israeli’s have been training/aiding the Kurds for at least a year+ (posted in FR to) in heavy artillery use and forward spotting.
The Armenians are just waiting to get into this even though they have historical ties to Russia.
Armenia has a vested interest in breaking up Turkey (a likely desired outcome given that EU membership for Turkey is dead and gone) to get their historical lands back.
Georgia and Romania and Hungary have ground troops (4500+ together) in Iraq. All this action is becoming like Spain/1936 - good field training for their next “Russian experiment”.
And all this together is why Syria has kept quiet about what Israel just did to them. IMHO, Syria is more worried about invasion than Iran is because it would be such a “final solution” to the “Damascus Q”.
Someone should alert Rush about the whole story BEFORE he gets his thong in a Pelosi twist.
Thanks, Madame Speaker. Do you have any more colossally stupid things that you wish to do?
I would look for this as an opportunity to simply establish Kurdish autonomy in the region.
Here’s my usual post regarding this area.
Maybe my tagline will come true.
We should withdraw from Iraq — through Tehran. Here’s how I think we should “pull out of Iraq.” Add one more front to the scenario below, which would be a classic amphibious beach landing from the south in Iran, and it becomes a “strategic withdrawal” from Iraq. And I think the guy who would pull it off is Duncan Hunter.
How to Stand Up to Iran
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1808220/posts?page=36#36
Posted by Kevmo to TomasUSMC
On News/Activism 03/28/2007 7:11:08 PM PDT · 36 of 36
Split Iraq up and get out
***The bold military move would be to mobilize FROM Iraq into Iran through Kurdistan and then sweep downward, meeting up with the forces that we pull FROM Afghanistan in a 2-pronged offensive. We would be destroying nuke facilities and building concrete fences along geo-political lines, separating warring tribes physically. At the end, we take our boys into Kurdistan, set up a couple of big military bases and stay awhile. We could invite the French, Swiss, Italians, Mozambiqans, Argentinians, Koreans, whoever is willing to be the police forces for the regions that we move through, and if the area gets too hot for these peacekeeper weenies we send in military units. Basically, it would be learning the lesson of Iraq and applying it.
15 rules for understanding the Middle East
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1774248/posts
Rule 8: Civil wars in the Arab world are rarely about ideas — like liberalism vs. communism. They are about which tribe gets to rule. So, yes, Iraq is having a civil war as we once did. But there is no Abe Lincoln in this war. It’s the South vs. the South.
Rule 10: Mideast civil wars end in one of three ways: a) like the U.S. civil war, with one side vanquishing the other; b) like the Cyprus civil war, with a hard partition and a wall dividing the parties; or c) like the Lebanon civil war, with a soft partition under an iron fist (Syria) that keeps everyone in line. Saddam used to be the iron fist in Iraq. Now it is us. If we don’t want to play that role, Iraq’s civil war will end with A or B.
Let’s say my scenario above is what happens. Would that military mobilization qualify as a “withdrawal” from Iraq as well as Afghanistan? Then, when we’re all done and we set up bases in Kurdistan, it wouldn’t really be Iraq, would it? It would be Kurdistan.
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I have posted in the past that I think the key to the strategy in the middle east is to start with an independent Kurdistan. If we engaged Iran in such a manner we might earn back the support of these windvane politicians and wussie voters who don’t mind seeing a quick & victorious fight but hate seeing endless police action battles that don’t secure a country.
I thought it would be cool for us to set up security for the Kurds on their southern border with Iraq, rewarding them for their bravery in defying Saddam Hussein. We put in some military bases there for, say, 20 years as part of the occupation of Iraq in their transition to democracy. We guarantee the autonomy of Iraqi Kurdistan as long as they don’t engage with Turkey. But that doesn’t say anything about engaging with Iranian Kurdistan. Within those 20 years the Kurds could have a secure and independent nation with expanding borders into Iran. After we close down the US bases, Kurdistan is on her own. But at least Kurdistan would be an independent nation with about half its territory carved out of Persia. If Turkey doesn’t relinquish her claim on Turkish Kurdistan after that, it isn’t our problem, it’s 2 of our allies fighting each other, one for independence and the other for regional primacy. I support democratic independence over a bullying arrogant minority.
The kurds are the closest thing we have to friends in that area. They fought against Saddam (got nerve-gassed), they’re fighting against Iran, they squabble with our so-called ally Turkey (who didn’t allow Americans to operate in the north of Iraq this time around).
It’s time for them to have their own country. They deserve it. They carve Kurdistan out of northern Iraq, northern Iran, and try to achieve some kind of autonomy in eastern Turkey. If Turkey gets angry, we let them know that there are consequences to turning your back on your “friend” when they need you. If the Turks want trouble, they can invade the Iraqi or Persian state of Kurdistan and kill americans to make their point. It wouldn’t be a wise move for them, they’d get their backsides handed to them and have eastern Turkey carved out of their country as a result.
If such an act of betrayal to an ally means they get a thorn in their side, I would be happy with it. It’s time for people who call themselves our allies to put up or shut up. The Kurds have been putting up and deserve to be rewarded with an autonomous and sovereign Kurdistan, borne out of the blood of their own patriots.
Should Turkey decide to make trouble with their Kurdish population, we would stay out of it, other than to guarantee sovereignty in the formerly Iranian and Iraqi portions of Kurdistan. When one of our allies wants to fight another of our allies, it’s a messy situation. If Turkey goes “into the war on Iran’s side” then they ain’t really our allies and that’s the end of that.
I agree that it’s hard on troops and their families. We won the war 4 years ago. This aftermath is the nation builders and peacekeeper weenies realizing that they need to understand things like the “15 rules for understanding the Middle East”
This was the strategic error that GWB committed. It was another brilliant military campaign but the followup should have been 4X as big. All those countries that don’t agree with sending troups to fight a war should have been willing to send in policemen and nurses to set up infrastructure and repair the country.
What do you think we should do with Iraq?
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1752311/posts
Posted by Kevmo to Blue Scourge
On News/Activism 12/12/2006 9:17:33 AM PST · 23 of 105
My original contention was that we should have approached the reluctant “allies” like the French to send in Police forces for the occupation after battle, since they were so unwilling to engage in the fighting. It was easy to see that we’d need as many folks in police and nurse’s uniforms as we would in US Army unitorms in order to establish a democracy in the middle east. But, since we didn’t follow that line of approach, we now have a civil war on our hands. If we were to set our sights again on the police/nurse approach, we might still be able to pull this one off. I think we won the war in Iraq; we just haven’t won the peace.
I also think we should simply divide the country. The Kurds deserve their own country, they’ve proven to be good allies. We could work with them to carve out a section of Iraq, set their sights on carving some territory out of Iran, and then when they’re done with that, we can help “negotiate” with our other “allies”, the Turks, to secure Kurdish autonomy in what presently eastern Turkey.
That leaves the Sunnis and Shiites to divide up what’s left. We would occupy the areas between the two warring factions. Also, the UN/US should occupy the oil-producing regions and parcel out the revenue according to whatever plan they come up with. That gives all the sides something to argue about rather than shooting at us.
That leaves Damascus for round II. The whole deal could be circumvented by Syria if they simply allow real inspections of the WOMD sites. And when I say “real”, I mean real — the inspectors would have a small armor division that they could call on whenever they get held up by some local yocal who didn’t get this month’s bribe. Hussein was an idiot to dismantle all of his WOMDs and then not let the inspectors in. If he had done so, he’d still be in power, pulling Bush’s chain.
Yet more evidence that Ron Paul is right to disentangle us from the crazy Middle East.
What this administration cannot accomplish, the Democrat controlled hill seems more than willing to follow up on.
Way to go, Washington et al.
Turkey and Iran have been talking about that for years, but Bush was able to keep Turkey cool.
Now they have screwed it up by forcing an alliance between Turkey and Iran that might never have come.
Idiots.
"Our principle as the government of the Kurdish province and the government of Iraq, we are agreed ... that the territory of Iraqi Kurdistan or Iraq should not be used for any attacks on neighbouring countries, whether Iran or Turkey or any other country," he said.
"We are agreed on this principle and we will make efforts to prevent our territory from being used for any assault on Iran."
"Nechirvan Barzani, Prime Minister of Iraq's Kurdistan Regional Government, told Al Jazeera Television the problem of attacks by the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), whose rebels use northern Iraq as a base, could not be resolved militarily.
"'We, as the government of the province of Kurdistan, will not allow our land or the land of Iraq to be used for assaults on any neighbouring state,' he said in comments aired on Sunday.
"'The PKK is not just a problem for Turkey but has caused us problems in the past .... It is not true that we are benefiting from the problem of the PKK, but our view is that since this issue cannot be solved through war we should seek a political solution,' he added in comments dubbed into Arabic."
An alliance between Turkey and Iran eh? Well looks like Brazani (leader of the province of Kurdistan) has joined in. Now we got Turkey, Iran, and Kurdistan going after PKK and PJAK.
Wait! "Barzani . . . criticised the central government in Baghdad for failing to consult the regional Kurdish government before signing an anti-terrorism deal with Turkey in September, which targeted Kurdish rebels based in northern Iraq."
Add Baghdad to that. That makes four of 'em going after PKK and PJAK.
To think that the Democrats in congress have such an ignoramus leading them is beyond belief.
If Hellary and her Clinton Machine Brown Shirts get the goverment reins expect the USA to lose more than a little respect as she disassembles our military might.
The Democrats are traitors to their own country and I don’t care who knows that I think that way.
Democrats are not, I repeat ARE NOT Patriots when it comes to protecting America.
I will work with all heart, soul and what little money I can spare to see that no Democrat takes control of my country.
Probably the most important thread I’ve read (and need to digest) since the years of x-42 .. bump
"The goal of the Iranians is to drive us from the border area," rebel leader Biryar Gabar told Newsmax. "They want to turn this area into a no-man's land, so they can use it to smuggle weapons and Islamist guerillas into Iraq to fight the Americans."