Has anyone else noticed the nationalism re-emerging in Turkey? There is more to it these days than denying the Armenian Genocide and getting puffy about Cyprus. The Turks are getting downright hysterical about a new bill the French have passed making it a crime to deny the Armenian Genocide. The French parliament passed their law in response to a Turkish bill making it illegal to acknowledge the Armenian Genocide in Turkey. (I want to spank them both and tell them to knock it the hell off and send them to their rooms with no dessert until they can admit their wrongs and promise to act responsibly in the future.) You know that the situation has achieved surreal when the leftist opposition candidate is to the right of the sitting centrist Prime Minister in condemning the actions of the French parliament.
The re-emerging strong ethnic identity goes beyond nationalism. It runs deeper than that. There is a re-emergence of the Turkmen identity. This is fueled by the threat of a de facto independent Kurdistan on their border with Iraq. What sounds innocuous enough to westerners is anathema to the Turks. It is something they simply can not, will not, abide. It is a threat to their very sovereignty. They have been the recipients of seventy years of brutal terrorism at the hands of the PPK. The Turks feel about an independent Kurdistan on their border the same way the US would feel about a Republic of al Qae'da where South Carolina sits today.
Turkey is our NATO ally, and a key ally at that, sharing borders with a couple of former Soviet Republics and Iran, as well as Syria and Iraq. The NATO countries owe a deep intel debt to our alliance with Turkey. They should consider Turkey's position on this before they persist with pushing partition down the worlds throat, and especially down Turkey's throat. (Sorry the map key isn't legible - the Kurdish area is purple.)
Assyrian Christians would suffer horribly if a fully autonomous, independent Kurdistan came to power in Iraq. This would complicate things further, and needs to be considered. Assyrians have been victms of a genocide or two themselves.
Turkey is very interesting to observe these days. While Turkey is still on the whole a secular middle eastern democracy, there is a strong undercurrent of emerging Islamism. They have problems with their own religious fundamentalist trying to influence policy just like we do. It is not in our best interest to risk alienating the Turks and strengthening the stature of the emerging political philosophy that can accurately be compared to our own Neo-cons.
I keep harping about the long view. We need to take it here - and take that long view 360-degrees. The Turks are a key ally and they are facing social upheaval that threatens to compromize that relationship with the west. That relationship is at least as important to the US as it is to the Turks. Probably more so. How we proceed is tantamount to United States standing in the middle east for the next century; especially given the loss we are accumulating in Iraq. (That secures Turkey's status as a key ally.)
We need to inform ourselves of the relationship between Turks and Kurds before we go flogging a plan to partition Iraq into three autonomous regions with a de facto independent Kurdistan on Turkey's border. You don't stick a thumb in your allies eye like that.
