The Kurdish model
For Iraq’s “Day After”
By Andrew Apostolou
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Executive Summary
Supporters of regime change in Iraq are often asked to describe the kind of nation that would replace Saddam Hussein’s Baathist regime. But the model for such a state doesn’t need to be imagined – it already exists and it exists within Iraq’s borders.
In recent years, protected by US and British war planes, the Kurdish-controlled areas of northern Iraq have developed into a remarkably free, open and prosperous society. Iraqi Kurdistan can and should serve as the model for a new Iraq -- one that would be free and democratic, with substantial autonomy for each of Iraq’s important ethnic groups. Such a federal -- and pro-Western -- Iraq also would have a significant impact on the future of the Middle East.
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Largely unnoticed, an experiment in liberalization and free expression has been taking place in the Kurdish-controlled areas of northern Iraq. The "Kurdish Spring", as some have called it, is the most impressive recent attempt to create a free society in the Middle East. Under the cover of British and American war planes, a free press has flourished. Ethnic minorities can publish and broadcast in their own languages, a right unheard of in most of the Middle East.
The Kurdish achievement is both a model and a warning for the future of Iraq. The way in which free debate and a free media have begun to emerge under western military protection is precisely what will be needed in a post-Saddam Iraq. There is no need to create a costly US military government of the kind installed in Germany and Japan in 1945, a proposal that plays into the hands of those who oppose a war to oust Saddam Hussein because it might involve a long-term and intricately involved US commitment. Rather, by providing military protection for a fledgling democracy, the US can help to shield a liberated Iraq from its interfering neighbours and the possible follies of its post-Saddam leaders.
During the last ten years, the Kurds have managed to build schools and educate their young people to a historically unprecedented extent. According to the Kurds, the number of schools has been trebled from 804 in 1991 to over 2,700. There are now three universities where before there was just one. The Kurds claim that a remarkable 100,000 students have been educated in these universities. The number of doctors has also more than trebled, but at just 1,870 is pitifully low for a population of 4 million. While infant mortality has reportedly soared in areas under Saddam's control, it has fallen in the Kurdish areas. The Kurds are also rebuilding most of the villages that were destroyed in the genocidal Anfal campaign during which the Iraqi army murdered as many as 182,000 Kurds in 1988.
There are now scores of independent publications which dare to criticise the local leaders. Not only are there broadcasts in Kurdish, but Aramaic, the language of the Assyrian Christian minority, is also on the airwaves, as is Turkoman, a language closely related to Turkish. Those who manage to travel to northern Iraq from the area controlled by Saddam Hussein are taken aback by the contrast between the grinding repression of Baghdad and the free flowing conversations of Suleymaniyeh.
As impressive, is the fact that all of this has been achieved without "democracy building" programmes or the usual legion of overly earnest international do-gooders. Rather international non-governmental organizations and even human rights groups have largely shunned the Kurds. There also has been little money on offer, the UN "oil for food" programme having consistently short changed the Kurds to the benefit of Baghdad.
The "Kurdish Spring" is also a warning because it sprang from a series of disasters and betrayals. The American and British air cover which has allowed the Kurds to begin their experiment with freedom is a result of the betrayal of 1991. The Kurds, like the Shi'a Arabs of southern Iraq, rose up against the Saddam after the Iraqi army had been driven out of Kuwait by the US and its allies. Although the US encouraged the revolt, it did not in the end support it. As a result, tens of thousands of Iraqis were killed by the Iraqi army. Over a million Kurds fled into Turkey. Fearful of the effect that the Iraqi Kurdish refugees might have on its own restless Kurdish minority, the Turkish government sent the refugees back with British and American military assistance, creating the "safe haven" that still exists today.
Free from Saddam and protected by American and British warplanes, the Kurds held elections and started building institutions from scratch. The first hopeful sign was the decision to assign five reserved seats in the 105 member parliament to the Assyrian Christian minority, a group that has suffered repeated persecution at the hands of the Ottoman Empire, the Iraqi government and the Kurds themselves.
The attempt to run the "safe haven" as a single Kurdish enclave failed when clashes between the two main Kurdish groups, the Kurdish Democratic Party (KDP) and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), turned into a civil war that lasted intermittently from 1994 to 1998. The Kurds had been deliberately isolated. The neighbouring countries had closed the borders, making the Kurdish economy dependent on aid and smuggling. Competing for scarce resources, the two Kurdish leaders, Masoud Barzani of the KDP and Jalal Talabani of the PUK, decided to settle their squabbles by force. To make matters worse, they brought outsiders into their squabble. Talabani, a secularist with a left-wing background, turned for support to the Islamic Republic of Iran. An even stranger alliance was formed by his rival, Masoud Barzani, who in 1996 received direct support from the Iraqi government. Barzani's alliance with Baghdad was as shameful as it was foolish. In 1983, the Iraqi government had "disappeared" around 8,000 Barzani tribesmen.
The shabby civil war cost around 3,000 lives and dented the credibility of the Kurdish leadership. The US, which did little to stop Iraqi troops from invading the "safe haven" in 1996 and destroying the opposition network, did play a key role in arranging a ceasefire and drawing up a peace agreement, the Washington agreement of September 1998. Although many of the provisions of the Washington agreement have not been implemented—the KDP and PUK still argue over sharing revenues from transit trade—the US-brokered peace helped set the scene for greater freedoms to develop. Above all the peace agreement and the resulting liberalisation helped to stem the prestige, and halt the rising activity, of Islamist groups which portrayed themselves as a principled alternative to the squabbling of Barzani and Talabani.
The inhabitants of northern Iraq have now had a small taste of freedom and they like it. They also know that there is still much to be done. There are very few political prisoners. There is no religious persecution, but some KDP members have abused their powers to occasionally harass Assyrians. There are around 20 political parties in northern Iraq—all but one of whom is backed by an armed militia. The leadership is getting used to being criticised, but has not held elections since 1992.
Importantly, Kurdish political leaders have swapped their previous recklessness for extreme caution. Some Kurdish politicians have done something unheard of in most Middle Eastern countries—they have apologised for their mistakes. The Kurds are now committed to a pragmatic future in a federal Iraq instead of aiming for impossible independence. Indeed, there is a striking contrast between the moderation and openness of the Kurds and what passes for Palestinian leadership.
There is no reason why what the Kurds have achieved cannot be repeated in the rest of Iraq – among the Shi'a community in the southern part of the country, and among the Sunni Muslims in the central region. There is no reason to believe that those groups would not like to emulate the success of the Kurds and enjoy a similar level of freedom, self-government and cultural autonomy, while coming together within a federal system to decide questions of national policy.
The impact that a free, democratic, prosperous and pro-Western would have on the region – on Turkey, on other Arab countries and on progress toward resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict -- can only be imagined.
It is worth remembering that the Kurds started in a worse position than the remainder of Iraq is likely to find itself – even after a war to oust Saddam Hussein. A largely rural and poorly educated society, the Kurds had suffered hundreds of thousands of dead and years of being constantly uprooted and resettled on the orders of Saddam's regime. Furthermore, Iraq is not Afghanistan. There is a functioning administration in areas under Saddam's control, even if it suffers from corruption caused by Iraqi government manipulation of the sanctions regime.
There are certainly rivalries, ethnic, regional and tribal, that will always divide Iraqis, rivalries that Saddam encouraged and manipulated. The Kurdish civil war was a perfect example of how Iraqis can still be manipulated, whether by Saddam or by their neighbours. Yet with Saddam gone and the protective shield of western military power covering the whole of Iraq, there will be less scope for the country's meddlesome neighbours to stir the pot.
Protecting Iraq from the rest of the Middle East so as to foster a fairer and more democratic system of government will not be cheap or easy, but it is a lesser burden than a full-scale and long-term occupation. Above all, having already invested so much in protecting the Kurds, it would be foolish not to build on the successes already achieved, both for the Kurds and for their fellow Iraqis.
Andrew Apostolou, an historian who has taught at St. Antony’s College, Oxford and a frequent contributor to the Economist Intelligence Unit, is a Senior Fellow of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. |
