World War 3-Turkey invaded Iraq
2023.01.31 08:53
World War 3-Turkey invaded Iraq
By Tiffany Smith
Budrigannews.com – As part of an incursion that forced Sararo, a deserted village in northern Iraq, to flee after days of shelling, three Turkish military outposts break the skyline.
As Turkey intensifies its decades-long offensive against Kurdish militants sheltered in the remote and rugged region, the outposts are just one example of the dozens of new military bases it has established on Iraqi soil in the past two years.
During a December visit to the village, where shell casings and shrapnel still abound, Sararo’s mayor Abdulrahman Hussein Rashid stated, “When Turkey first came to the area, they set up small portable tents, but in the spring, they set up outposts with bricks and cement.”
“They operate cameras and drones around the clock. As drones flew overhead in the mountainous terrain 5 kilometers from the frontier, he told, “They know everything that’s going on.”
Analysts say the escalation risks further destabilizing a region where foreign powers have intervened without impunity, but Turkey’s advances across the increasingly depopulated border of Iraqi Kurdistan attract little global attention in comparison to its incursions into Syria or the battle against Islamic State.
Kurdish officials say that Turkey’s growing presence in Iraq may also encourage Iran to expand military action in Iraq against groups it accuses of fomenting domestic unrest. If Turkey’s new bases in Iraq come under sustained attack, Turkey could become even more involved.
Jabar Manda, a former Kurdish Peshmerga secretary general, stated that Turkey had 29 outposts in Iraq as of 2019, but that number has increased as Ankara tries to stop the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) from attacking its own territory.
He stated:
“Year after year the outposts have been increasing after the escalation of battles between Turkish forces and the PKK,”
Estimating that there are currently 87 of them, the majority of which are located in a border region that is approximately 150 kilometers (95 miles) long and 30 kilometers deep.
Manda, who is currently employed as a security analyst in Sulaimaniya, stated, “There are tanks and armoured vehicles in those outposts.” The outposts are supplied daily by helicopters.”
Additionally, according to an unidentified Kurdish official, Turkey now has approximately 80 outposts in Iraq. Turkey’s presence was becoming more permanent, according to another Kurdish official, and at least 50 buildings had been constructed within the past two years.
When questioned about its bases in Iraq, Turkey’s defense ministry stated that the country’s operations were in accordance with Article 51 of the United Nations Charter, which guarantees member states the right to self-defense in the event of an attack.
The ministry issued a statement that stated, “Our fight against terrorism in northern Iraq is carried out in coordination and close cooperation with the Iraqi authorities,” but it did not address questions regarding the figures that Kurdish officials had cited.
Since the 1990s, when former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein permitted Turkish forces to advance 5 kilometers into the country to combat the PKK, Turkey has been present in northern Iraq, which has been outside of the direct control of the Baghdad government.
Turkey has since established a significant presence, including a base 80 kilometers inside of Iraq at Bashiqa, where it claims Turkish troops were part of an international mission to train and equip Iraqi forces for the fight against Islamic State.
Through coordination with Iraqi authorities, Turkey said it worked to avoid civilian casualties.
End Cross-Border Bombing, a coalition of NGOs’ report, was released in August. It stated that at least 98 civilians had been killed between 2015 and 2021. The International Crisis Group reported 1,180 PKK militants killed between 2015 and 2023, giving a comparable civilian death toll.
An official with the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Iraq says that the conflict has also destroyed at least 800 villages since 2015, when a ceasefire between Turkey and the PKK broke down and thousands of people were forced to leave their homes.
Kurdish officials say that Turkey’s incursion risks widening the conflict beyond its humanitarian impact by giving regional rival Iran carte blanche to increase intelligence operations inside Iraq and take its own military action.
Tehran has already displaced hundreds of Iranian Kurds and killed some of them by firing missiles at the bases of Kurdish groups it accuses of participating in protests against its restrictions on women.
According to analysts, pro-Iranian militias in Iraq also have a reason to respond to Turkey’s presence, raising the possibility of an escalation between Turkish troops and groups other than the PKK.
According to Hamdi Malik, a Washington Institute specialist on Iraqi Shi’ite militias, pro-Iranian groups like Ahrar Sinjar (Free People of Sinjar) and Liwa Ahrar al-Iraq (Free People of Iraq Brigade) rebranded themselves as the resistance against the Turkish presence last year.
Attacks on Turkish military facilities in Iraq increased from an average of 1.5 per month at the beginning of 2022 to seven in April, according to a Washington Institute report.
According to Mustafa Gurbuz, a non-resident fellow at the Arab Center Washington, stepping up operations by the groups, which are extremely hostile to Washington, would also undermine the influence of the United States and its 2,000 troops in Iraq.
Sajad Jiyad, a Baghdad-based analyst for The Century Foundation, a U.S. think-tank, stated, “Turkey is underestimating the strength of opposition and the fact that these facilities will become targets in the future and more so as hostilities increase.”
Because of the fragmented politics in northern Iraq, neither the KRG regional authority nor the federal government in Baghdad are strong enough to challenge Turkey’s presence or achieve Ankara’s goal of containing the PKK.
The Baghdad government has complained about Ankara’s incursions, but it lacks authority in the predominantly Kurdish north, and the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), which is in charge of the region and views the PKK as a potent and populist rival, lacks the firepower to challenge the PKK.
The KDP has worked with Turkey in the past, but it has little power over a neighbor with more military and economic power.
Jotiar Adil, a spokesman for the Kurdistan Regional Government, stated:
“We ask all foreign military groups, including the PKK, to not drag the Kurdistan Region into any kind of conflicts or tensions.”
“The PKK are the primary factor that compelled Turkey to enter our Kurdistan Region territories. As a result, we believe that the PKK ought to leave,” he stated. We are not participating in this ongoing conflict and have no plans to do so.
Iraqi Kurdish Prime Minister Masrour Barzani, the conflict between Turkey and the PKK is a concern, but it is less important than the Islamic State threat.
According to Hariam Mahmoud, a leading figure in the Kurdistan Liberation Movement, a civilian opposition group in Iraq inspired by the ideas of jailed PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan, they will continue to resist no matter how much Turkey squeezes them.
Mahmoud, who lives in the Garmiyan district south of Sulaimaniya, stated, “In our opinion, this is an occupation and fighting resistance is a legitimate right.”
In 2021, 72-year-old Ramzan Ali heard a massive explosion while irrigating his field in Hirure, a few kilometers from Sararo. He immediately recalls being covered in blood on the ground.
He claimed that his property had been struck by an artillery shell fired by Turkish troops in response to PKK attacks.
Ali said in the town of Zakho, where he is still recovering from his shrapnel wounds, “I watched my life flash before my eyes.” Turkey and the PKK make me mad. Both of them have mistreated us.”
