A REGULAR KURDISH ARMY

"I prefer liberty with danger to peace with slavery." ~ Author Unknown.

A quick item. . .

Yusuf Kanli over at TDN has his panties in a knot over the fact that Serok Barzanî has instructed Neçirvan Barzanî and Omer Fatah of the need to form a regular Kurdish army.

Kudos to Kak Masûd, if the news is true. At the moment I have doubts because Kak Masûd is referred to in this opinion as the leader of the PUK. I wonder if anyone's told Mam Celal yet?

Yusuf presents a tiny argument in support of a regular Kurdish army, saying that "such an army will not allow the separatist Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) to operate in the area under its control."

Oh, think again, Yusuf, old boy. Like the vast majority of Turks, you are living in the 1990's, meanwhile the dynamics have changed on you, leaving you in the lurch with your wishful thinking. I guess you missed what Kak Masûd said about not being able to order anyone to fire on PKK, because Kurds won't fire on Kurds. You missed Kak Masûd telling everyone, with ears to hear, that the situation is different today.

In fact, with the belligerent TSK at the border and firing artillery into South Kurdistan on a regular basis, it looks instead like the tables have turned. Cuma has said that PKK will help defend Kerkuk, so why shouldn't Kak Masûd also look to able-bodied and armed Kurdish gerîlas to help a "regular Kurdish army" fight the Turkish predator? In fact, I would suggest that anyone who thinks such a thing is impossible, go read Mao's On Guerrilla Warfare to see just how effectively a combination of Chinese gerîlas and Chinese regular troops defeated the hated Japanese invaders. My copy of Mao even has an introduction and some analysis by a USMC brigadier general, who concurs with the utter effectiveness and lethality of the conventional/unconventional combination in modern warfare.

Yusuf remembers the USMC. They're the guys who are johnny-on-the-spot with those burlap bags that accessorize so well with Turkish-made civilian clothes favored by Ozel Timler when they're on assassination duty in South Kurdistan.

But none of this is the part that gets me, because it's all a hypothetical argument by Yusuf to set us up for the punchline, which is:

Naturally no one should expect us to indulge in a racial hatred rhetoric, but Barzani's remarks must be taken very seriously as an indication of trouble in the offing.

Excuse me?! Did I read that correctly, or do my eyes deceive me?! Au contraire, we expect nothing less of the glorious, racist, Kemalist state but racial hatred rhetoric, and nowhere in this glorified whine does Yusuf Kanli disappoint. Oh, yeah, baby! Turkey's worst nightmare, a regular Kurdish army, has become a shining glimmer in Kak Masûd's eyes.

Meanwhile, Yusuf Kanli whines on about the threat to regional stability that a Kurdish army will pose. Hello? Is anyone awake out there? Repeat after me: There is no regional stability in the Middle East.

Here we have the regional bully complaining about how dangerous it will be if the Kurds are "permitted" to have an army with which to defend themselves and their interests, and all of this comes down to the hard and painful fact of future Kurdish independence. This is what Turkey fears the most, an independence that should be the beginning of the international recognition of Kurds as a people, a group of human beings who have their own political aspirations and territory and, therefore, the right to self-determination.

FDR said, "In the truest sense, freedom cannot be bestowed; it must be achieved," and I cannot think of a moment in history when freedom was ever achieved easily or cheaply. In fact, history tends to prove that freedom is neither easy nor cheap. On the other hand, history also tells me that Kurds will remain forever restless without freedom.

There is definitely a need for a regular Kurdish army and the time appears to be ripe from all quarters.

Carpe Diem!