per Iraqi Foreign Minister.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19676021/

This can be interesting.

7/9/2007 10:13:04 AM

so whats up with the turks and kurds?

about a year ago i heard that the shiite/sunni areas of iraq were the ones doing shitty while the kurds were autonomous and running ok...whats their beef with the kurds?

7/9/2007 10:16:38 AM

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkish_Kurdistan

7/9/2007 10:21:59 AM

^^^ Yeah, about a month ago there was premature reporting of the Turks having crossed the border into Iraq. They have been massing for a while and are arguing that Kurdish resistance groups within Turkey constitute terrorist organizations and justify a retaliatory strike.

^^ Briefly the Kurds have been shit on by the Turks, Arabs, and Persians for hundreds of years and would like to have an autonomous country of their own, but none of the other countries are interested because the Kurds occupy a fairly oil rich piece of property. Control the Kurds, control their oil.

And yes, from what I saw 3 years ago, the Kurds have their shit together. They stop at stoplights, there isn't trash on the street, and their territory is largely violence free. You don't fuck with the Peshmerga.

[Edited on July 9, 2007 at 10:34 AM. Reason : ^]

7/9/2007 10:32:34 AM

And also some of the Iraqi Kurds take potshots at the Turks from time to time. In this brave new world, a government can easily construe such as terrorism. The Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), a party sitting in the Iraqi Parliament, is a listed terrorist organization and recently sent death threats to candidates in the upcoming Turkish general election.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PKK#2006_-_to_date

[Edited on July 9, 2007 at 10:45 AM. Reason : .]

7/9/2007 10:37:42 AM

North Korea takes pot-shots at American Soldiers on the NK / SK border all the time as well.

Actually, there are groups in Turkey that are like a Turkish version of the IRA. I mean, they conduct activities that are legitimately terrorist. Perhaps justifiable, perhaps not, but their intent is to use fear as a weapon. I wouldn't go so far as to call this a majority of the Turks, not by any stretch, but enough of a pretense for the Turks effendi.

[Edited on July 9, 2007 at 10:42 AM. Reason : .]

7/9/2007 10:40:46 AM

Quote :

"so whats up with the turks and kurds?"

turds?

7/9/2007 11:18:27 AM

^ case in point

7/9/2007 12:32:14 PM

^^ are they just having a pissing contest or something?

[Edited on July 9, 2007 at 1:08 PM. Reason : ]

7/9/2007 1:08:32 PM

Turkey is a beautiful country, and has a lot to offer in terms of history, sights, food (GREAT FOOD), nice people, etc.

But the Turkish people are on odd lot. They are very VERY proud of their "Turkishness", whatever "Turkishness" means. They refuse to admit the Armenian Genocide they caused, and any attempt to admit it is met with violence or resistance.

A newspaper editor who acknowledged it was gunned down recently by a 17 YEAR OLD. Any attempt by writers, thinkers, and intellectuals to criticize any Turkish institution is met by a jail term. Insulting "Turkishness" is a punishable crime. Any attempt to publicly say "the Kurds should have rights" is also met by jail terms, which is also a punishable crime.

And they are famous for their brutality and torture in their jails. The people, though generally nice, are quite crude and unpolished, save for the fashionable ones in Istanbul.

Going back to the Turkish people, as I said, they are very proud. But the worst is that they are very hot tempered, kinda like Arabs. If you are a tourist there (as I was last year with my girl), they would be all nice to you, inviting you to their houses (in villages) for tea (to sell you their handmade crafts), which is fine... everybody has to survive, so they try to sell you their WAREZ. BUT, if you do go and look at the WAREZ but decide not to buy for whatever reason, they get angry and start cursing, even the elderly women!!!

So now, if Kurdistan becomes an independent country, their assholes are itching to try to stop that. They don't want an idependend Kurdistan out of Iraq, as this would make the Kurds in Turkey a bit more vocal again about their freedom.

I jut don't see what the problem is... Kurds live in Syria, Turkey, and Iraq, in the tips of those countries which meet, in a triangular fashion. Why not just give them their own country carved out of bits of those 3? That would solve so many problems and save so many lives.

7/9/2007 2:07:59 PM

Turkey is...how can I put this politely...not my favorite country in the world.

7/9/2007 2:38:44 PM

Quote :

"I jut don't see what the problem is... Kurds live in Syria, Turkey, and Iraq, in the tips of those countries which meet, in a triangular fashion. Why not just give them their own country carved out of bits of those 3? That would solve so many problems and save so many lives."

Lets just give everyone their own damn country, that would solve all problems.

Quote :

"Insulting "Turkishness" is a punishable crime."

I heard pissin the bed was one too.

7/9/2007 2:41:22 PM

Quote :

"But the worst is that they are very hot tempered"

when I was in Paris, a group of students there told us to make sure and never piss off the turkish immigrants, and they were dead serious.

7/9/2007 2:46:17 PM

Quote :

"Lets just give everyone their own damn country, that would solve all problems. "

Don't you rednecks want your own country too?

Quote :

"I heard pissin the bed was one too."

Perhaps you would like to be suspended again, and then have half the world's redneck population in feedback threatening mods to free you?

7/9/2007 3:51:12 PM

If anyone deserves a country of their own, the Kurds rank up there. But so do the the Tibetans, and Uighurs, and countless other populations who have been divided by poorly drawn national borders. The fact of the matter is, though, that the Kurdish lands have oil; oil that the Iranians, Turks, and Arab Iraqis want. Since no-one is inclined to let go of the oil, and no one is inclined (or capable) of standing up for the Kurds, they're pretty much screwed for the moment.

7/9/2007 4:19:31 PM

1) Turkey has no oil, so arguing that the Turks are interested in oil is a farce. If you argued that Ataturk thought that since Turkomen lived in what is now the autonomous Kurdish part of Iraq that the border of Turkey should include Mosul, then you'd have a greater argument in discussing oil, but as it stands, Turks are only transporters and not drillers of oil.

2) The Kurds aren't an innocent people. They formed a guerrilla group in the 1980s that led to the death of an estimated 30,000 people. Did they do all the killing? No. The Turkish military is also largely responsible for the size of the casualties, but it would be incorrect to say that the PKK hasn't committed terrorist activities.

3) There are very few Turkish immigrants in France. Most of the Muslim population is Algerian. However, in the European conscious, even to this day (except in maybe the UK), Muslim and Turk are synonymous. Therefore, it's very common to associate the poor, Muslim communities with the "evil" image of Turks, which is based on the misinformation of the 17th and 18th centuries.

4) In an effort to join the EU, Turkey has gone above and beyond what the Nationalists were ever willing to concede to allow Kurds rights. Kurdish can now be taught in schools, and radio programs can be broadcast in Kurdish as well. However, as a people, the Kurds have had a very difficult time. In Syria to speak Kurdish or name your child by a Kurdish name is punishable, and I think that the Kurds were innocent victims on the Iranian and Iraqi side of the Iraq-Iran War.

5) JCashFan, I'd be interested to know who your IRA groups are? We have the KKK, Black Panthers, etc. in the US who think that they're acting in the best interest of this country. In Turkey, we have nationalists, Islamists, secularists, all trying to do what they think is best for the country. My question to you is why you're calling it terrorism and not the growing pains of democracy? It's not what the US went through in the 1800s, but I think it's a semi-successful attempt to be a "democratic" country. Are they a democracy? No. But they're trying.

6) 0EPII1, I don't think it's fair to look at Penal Code 301 and use that to judge Turkey as a nation. Nor is it fair to say that the only "polished" folks in the nation are from Istanbul. Are the only "polished" folks in the US the ones who have college degrees? Being blue collar isn't being crude. Backwards, probably, but crude, no. Penal Code 301 is a relic of a past time, but Freedom of Speech is a very scary right. A young democracy, or even a democracy going through a mid-life crisis like Turkey is now, is bound to be afraid of being too truthful about itself. So they hang on to a relic law. Is it appropriate? No. But it's their safety net, and it's becoming more and more difficult to enforce.

7) The 17 year old was brain washed by Nationalists. No different than Rudolph blowing up abortion clinics in the US, and if you're using Midnight Express as your basis of brutality and torture in Turkish prisons even the makers of the film and the individual on who the story is based have admitted that it was over dramatized. We don't have a flawless human rights record, but don't tell me that any country in the Middle East has a flawless human rights record.

I'm Turkish, born in the States, but brought up in a family where we speak Turkish at home. Maybe some of what I said is biased, but I'm pretty comfortable talking about this stuff without too much emotion getting involved. On the issue of the border massing, it's much more an issue of Islamist gov't vs. Secularist military. A nation at a crossroads has a huge decision to make, and there aren't enough educated people to make democracy work. I think the first of August will show the world the direction in which Turkey will move.

7/11/2007 7:07:31 AM

^ nice post. will reply later.

here is something VERY relevant to the thread:

http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=70656

read the whoel thing, but here are the last 2 paragraphs:

Quote :

"I ask Acar about the reaction here if Turkey would make a cross-border operation directed at the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). He replies, “No one would be able to sleep here. There would be a very big repercussion. After 2003 the Kurdish nation adopted a unified approach here. The period of being nourished with violence and bloodshed is finished. Turkey cannot make an operation without agreement from Kurdish leaders and the United States.” Here 1,200 Turkish companies, from restaurants to contracting firms, have been set up; employment was created for 13,780 people from Turkey. There is economic “reconciliation!” "

7/13/2007 7:17:46 PM

And with all that said, Turkey is still the least crazy middle east country.

7/13/2007 11:12:21 PM

Quote :

"1) Turkey has no oil, so arguing that the Turks are interested in oil is a farce. If you argued that Ataturk thought that since Turkomen lived in what is now the autonomous Kurdish part of Iraq that the border of Turkey should include Mosul, then you'd have a greater argument in discussing oil, but as it stands, Turks are only transporters and not drillers of oil."

This doesn't make sense. Turkey doesn't want an oil producing region because it doesn't currently produce oil? Worst logic ever.

Quote :

"3) There are very few Turkish immigrants in France. Most of the Muslim population is Algerian. However, in the European conscious, even to this day (except in maybe the UK), Muslim and Turk are synonymous. Therefore, it's very common to associate the poor, Muslim communities with the "evil" image of Turks, which is based on the misinformation of the 17th and 18th centuries."

Misinformation, like them aggressively conquering all of South East Europe? Taking young Christian boys forcibly from their homes to serve as soldiers/slaves? ... yep I can't see why bad images of Turks would become ingrained in the European psyche. Not to mention the Armenia Genocide.. oh wait that never happened right?

[Edited on July 13, 2007 at 11:28 PM. Reason : .]

7/13/2007 11:28:21 PM

Quote :

"JCashFan, I'd be interested to know who your IRA groups are?"

I looked back at my original post and realized my syntax was poor. I was comparing the Kurdish groups (PKK and KKP) to the IRA, not individual Turkish groups (which could be better compared to the Red Hand for this purpose). My intent wasn't to paint one group as evil or one group as saintly, rather to point out parallels that TWWers might appreciate.

Otherwise, good post.

Quote :

"A nation at a crossroads has a huge decision to make, and there aren't enough educated people to make democracy work."

Sometimes I think that is the case here.

7/14/2007 9:12:22 AM

Quote :

"This doesn't make sense. Turkey doesn't want an oil producing region because it doesn't currently produce oil? Worst logic ever."

I apologize. What I meant to say here was that currently arguing that Turks are involved in the same politics of the region as the Arabs and Persians is improper. The US interest in Turkey was as an ally against Russia giving the US a jumping point into the Middle East during the Cold War. US missiles pointed at Russia from Eastern Turkey attributed to the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Quote :

"Misinformation, like them aggressively conquering all of South East Europe? Taking young Christian boys forcibly from their homes to serve as soldiers/slaves? ... yep I can't see why bad images of Turks would become ingrained in the European psyche. Not to mention the Armenia Genocide.. oh wait that never happened right?"

Is this a logical discussion, or an emotional, nationalistic argument? If this is a logical discussion, then let's discuss how highly touted the colonization methods of the Belgians (20 Million Congolese dead), British (entire Native American tribes wiped out), and Spanish (Have you ever met an Incan or Aztec?) were during the colonization periods. What's often forgotten in your emotional diatribe is that the Janissary Corps, built purely out of non-Turkish members, gave non-Muslims a position in the Empire. I don't remember reading about any local cultures getting high ranking roles in Western European colonizations (and don't tell me that Pochantas counts). Before the Spanish could wipe Judaism off the map, Sultan Beyazit II sent mercy ships to save the Jews and Muslims who were victims of the Inquisition. Jews were an integral element of Ottoman society. It's backwards, and short-sighted to say that the Ottoman Empire wasn't one of the most tolerant Empires at its height. As an empire crumbles more terrible, less complementary things happen (note the rising documentation of pogroms in Russia as the feudal system collapsed in that empire). Is the human rights record of Ottoman Turkey perfect, no, but I'll address this more in the next paragraph.

On the issue of the Armenian Genocide, there's a lot of emotion there. I have Armenian friends, and we've never discussed it. 1.5 Million in the Eastern Ottoman Empire died during a war. Were there some targeted deaths? Yes. Was it as full blown as the NYT and Armenian "survivors" claim? I don't know. I'm not going to make fact what to me is an ugly situation with little fact and lots of emotion. The issue now isn't about arguing over lost life, but trying to understand how to save life. The inability of these two governments to work on that issue is what's most pathetic in this situation. Also, one Turk admitting that a genocide happened (which I'm not doing, but I'm willing to listen) isn't going to change history, and that's a tough lesson that Armenians need to come to grips with.

[Edited on July 15, 2007 at 8:18 PM. Reason : added commentary on Turkish Jews]

7/15/2007 8:15:01 PM

The point that the Ottoman empire was sometimes a more tolerant dictatorship than some European empires is irrelevant to the point that Europeans have good historical reasons to mistrust Turks.

The point that Europeans have good historical reasons to mistrust Turks is irrelevant to the point that Europeans have bad reasons to mistrust Turks today.

[Edited on July 15, 2007 at 8:42 PM. Reason : As always in the soap box, arguments get diverted over a niggling detail.]

7/15/2007 8:41:34 PM