Iran and Turkey's disturbing alliance

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Bush handed Iraq to the Obama Administration on a silver platter in spite of them kicking and screaming while he implemented the surge before he left office.

Now after dithering for more than two years we find between Iraq and Afghanistan the mortality rate has gone up 5 fold and yet Obama is about to pull all but 3000 troops out of Iraq.

The Obama Administration's Arab Spring has resulted in more radical Islamic regimes emerging as new leadership out of Egypt and Libya while Turkey has become more adversarial toward Israel.

The region maybe headed for difficult times ahead.

February 22, 2011
Obama Retreats, Ahmadinejad Advances

By James Lewis

When Saddam Hussein's tank battalions brutally invaded Kuwait in 1990, the United States was able to knock Saddam's Air Force out of the sky in a matter of days. In the subsequent tank battles the United States ruled the air. After kicking Saddam out of Kuwait we maintained a no-fly zone over half of Iraq for the next six years, thereby stabilizing the Gulf on both sides. Where the USAF and USN ruled the skies Saddam could not launch a single plane or missile. The world's oil supply was protected, allowing European leftists to drive their cars at reasonable gas prices to noisy demonstrations to scream and rage at us, all because Uncle Sam was the good cop and kept them free.

Being the good cop has been our role for sixty years, ever since World War II; it's the single biggest reason we haven't had a World War III. Yet.

But Obama is now stopping the United States from being the good cop to keep the peace in the Middle East. Pax Americana is in retreat, step by step, and truly barbaric regimes are rearing their ugly heads all the way from Myanmar to the tip of South America. This administration is either grossly incompetent in foreign affairs, or it is genuinely self-destructive; it doesn't matter which. In the case of the mob-staged coup d'etat against Mubarak, Obama seemed more malevolent than ignorant, but the result is still the same. Egypt's reactionary Muslim Brotherhood is even now picking up all the chips Obama has lost in the latest farce. In Tahrir Square the new Ayatollah Khomeini of Egypt just came back from exile and addressed a million shouting supporters. Google's little twitter mobber Ghonim was kept off the stage. Only the US press was assaulted. The next time will be worse.

We are witnessing an exact copy of Jimmy Carter's abandonment of a pro-Western and fairly enlightened Iran in 1979. Carter allowed the first radical Islamist power to consolidate in the Middle East; more than a million people died in the war that followed. Jimmy still maintains his innocence, just as he's telling us now there's nothing to fear from the Muslim Bros, in spite of their famous five Rules for Islamic Radicals. They make Alinsky look like a guppy next to a Great White shark.

Obama has now pushing our thirty-year ally Hosni Mubarak out of power, letting the biggest country in the Middle East be radicalized. Meanwhile Turkey has fallen to another offshoot the Muslim Brotherhood. Gaza is under the thumb of Hamas after Israel gave in to US pressure to retreat, Lebanon is now run by Hezbollah, and Syria is allied with Ahmadinejad. No wonder all the bad guys are celebrating.

Every time Obama retreats, Ahmadinejad advances, step by step, like a chess master playing against a panicked rookie. You can see checkmate coming way ahead of time.

The United States still has overwhelming military and political power, but under Obama we have retreated from the Gulf, leaving the Saudis in a panic, ready to import nukes from Pakistan; we have retreated from our promise to defend Europe against Iranian and Russian missiles, and now we have allowed the biggest Arab power, Egypt, to be overthrown by what looks to be another Islamist radical fanatic, who will place Egypt on a war footing with Israel and the West.

In the last two years of Obama we given up five strategic bottlenecks, count ‘em:

1. The Strait of Hormuz, through which 40 percent of the world's oil flows. The Iranians have dug in very deep with ship-targeting missiles on their side of the Strait, and it will be like Iwo Jima to get them out of there. They can close the Strait any time they feel like it.

2. The Suez Canal, thereby putting pressure on the Mediterranean.

3. Somalia and the Atlantic bulge of Africa, where Somali pirates (protected by the Islamist forces in Somalia) are still free to blackmail world shipping.

4. Israel and its more peaceful Arab neighbors --- Lebanon, Egypt, and soon, perhaps, Jordan.

5. The missile flight routes from Iran to Europe.

At the same time the Obama administration has blocked and sabotaged domestic oil production.

This is a chess game in which we are simultaneously being threatened in five different places on the board, and we keep sacrificing our own pieces for no net gain.

After dithering for a week, the Egyptians are now allowing two Iranian warships to transit the Suez Canal into the Mediterranean. There they can link up with Turkey and Syria, two big military powers controlled by radical Muslim ideologies. Or they can fire ship-borne missiles at Israeli vessels the next time Turkey stages another Mavi Marmara provocation. Or, for that matter, they can threaten US naval fleets that have protected free trade in the Med since the end of World War Two. All it takes is a single suicide attack against a US carrier, and the Iranians have carried out numerous suicide attacks in their war against Saddam. Or just a single dirty bomb on a freighter, to create worldwide panic and plunge the world into an economic freeze.

If Obama has any rational strategy, I assume it is to pressure Israel into a "peace agreement' with major territorial concessions. If Obama can time that just before the next election he may get enough media glorification to win a second term.

The trouble is that America has now abandoned three major Middle East powers to the radicals: Iran, Turkey, and Egypt. How much can you trust a superpower that will walk away from a 30 year ally like Mubarak? Only until Obama figures out another way to screw an ally -- maybe Taiwan as a favor to China. Why would the Israelis and Jordanians trust Obama's peace agreement if the US voluntarily weakens its control? Why would Europe trust in American defenses of their oil supply, even though they keep disarming themselves?

The Israelis are left with two unpalatable choices. One is to strike Iran, as the center of aggression in the Middle East today. The trouble with that is that without full American cooperation, Turkey and Egypt may sabotage an Israel strike, with their powerful armed forces that may soon be in the hands of radicals. Israel can also explode a nuclear bomb as a warning, which it is bound to do if Iran explodes a bomb (now predicted for 2012-2015). But those are last-resort measures.

The second option is to hold tight and wait, hoping that Obama will lose the next election and that a better US government will follow. There is little doubt that cyberwarfare is constantly going on in secret, with Stuxnet 2.0 and 3.0 being launched. There are no doubt Iranian counter-attacks, maybe with the help of China and North Korea. We may never know that.

Wars are dynamic, and what's going on right now is the first cyberwar in history, with a hot war to follow if Iran threatens to go nuclear. So far we have seen no indication that Obama is an effective defender of American and Western values. In public he has seemed comfortable with the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and Turkey, and with Ahmadinejad in Iran. This administration makes a specialty of proclaiming American weakness and moral inferiority.

That seems objectively insane, but that's what we see. Obama has indicated no real concern about our long-time allies. You can be very sure that the Chinese, North Koreans, Japanese, Russians, Iranians, and now the Sunni radicals in Turkey and Pakistan are taking careful notice. Obama just announced negotiations with the Taliban, who gave Al Qaida safe haven in Afghanistan to kill Americans on 9/11. Al Qaida is proclaiming victory in Egypt.

The United States is in retreat, step by step. Ahmadinejad has surrounded our ally Israel on almost all sides (Syria, Lebanon, Gaza, perhaps Egypt) as well as in the Mediterranean with the Turkish armed forces and Iranian war ships transiting the Suez Canal.

Obama is clearly letting it all happen, as no other American president has ever done. Europe has weakened itself immensely, and cannot defend itself. It lacks the will to do so, and increasingly, it lacks the military power. If they can't rely on us, they will look to Russia to be their new imperial master.

This is the biggest Western gamble since the Hitler appeasement policy of the 1930s. I don't know where the first major aggression will explode, but we are inviting attack on multiple fronts. We are playing the Weak Horse in Osama bin Laden's famous phrase. There is no need to do so, because we still have the raw military and political power. But we are signaling retreat and weakness all over the world, and the wolves and vultures are circling closer and closer.

76 Comments on "Obama Retreats, Ahmadinejad Advances"

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Companion Post:

• Thousands of Iranian Troops crossed over into Iraq Attacking Kurdish bases

Report: Iranians seize Kurdish bases in Iraq


TEHRAN, Iran (AP) -- Iranian Revolutionary Guard forces have taken control of three bases of an Iranian Kurdish opposition group in neighboring Iraq, the state news agency reported Monday.

IRNA quoted Colonel Delavar Ranjbarzadeh, a local commander of the powerful Revolutionary Guard, as saying "a large number" of members of the Iranian Kurdish opposition group PEJAK have been killed in fierce clashes over the past two days. The clashes are still ongoing.

"Three bases in Iraqi territory were providing assistance to the terrorists. ... All the bases have fallen into the hands of the (Iranian) forces," IRNA quoted Ranjbarzadeh as saying. He said PEJAK rebels have sustained a "heavy and historic defeat."

PEJAK rebels say Iranian forces entered Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdish region to fight them. They claim that rebels have killed 53 Iranian soldiers and wounded 43 while only two PEJAK members were killed and seven wounded in clashes.

Iran threatened last week to attack PEJAK bases in Iraqi Kurdistan after accusing the president of the regional government, Massoud Barzani, of providing bases to the group without informing the central government in Baghdad.

PEJAK, which stands in Kurdish for the "Party of Free Life of Kurdistan," has been involved in sporadic armed clashes with Iranian forces in recent years. The rebels say they are fighting for greater rights for their minority community.

Iran has accused the U.S., Britain and Israel of seeking to incite tension on Iran's borders to undermine the government in Tehran, charges those countries have denied.

Iran has sporadically bombed PEJAK bases deep inside Iraqi Kurdistan.

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Iraq, Iran issue border demands after clashes


A Kurdish rebel from Party of Free Life of Kurdistan inspects a crater left behind by an alleged Iranian artillery attack near a mountain encampment in Qandil in northern Iraq in 2008. Iran must respect its borders with Iraq, authorities in Iraqi Kurdistan said on Tuesday, after Tehran's forces clashed with Iranian Kurdish rebels, leaving several people dead.

AFP - Iran must respect its borders with Iraq, authorities in Iraqi Kurdistan said on Tuesday, after Tehran's forces clashed with Iranian Kurdish rebels, leaving several people dead.

Iran said it had taken "full control" of three camps belonging to the Party of Free Life of Kurdistan (PJAK) in Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region, a claim disputed by Baghdad.

"We demand Iran respect the sovereignty of the Kurdistan region as part of the sovereignty of Iraq," Kurdistan regional government spokesman Qawa Mahmud told AFP.

"There was Iranian infiltration along the Iraqi border. If there is any border problem, the best way to resolve it is through negotiations and peace, not by bombing civilians."

In Tehran, a senior officer in Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards demanded on Tuesday that the Baghdad government and Kurdish authorities in Iraq prevent Kurdish rebels from attacking Iran from Iraqi territory.

"We are waiting for the Iraqi government and the Kurdish authorities in Iraq to stick to their commitments and prevent PJAK (Party of Free Life of Kurdistan) rebels from acting against Iran from Iraqi territory," General Mohammad Pakpour said during an interview with Arabic-language television channel Al-Alam.

The fighting, which began on Saturday and appears to have ceased, left at least one Revolutionary Guards member dead and three wounded, according to security officials in Tehran.

PJAK, meanwhile, says two of its fighters were killed and four wounded.

"Over the past 72 hours, the rebels have taken heavy losses in the Al-Watan region," said General Pakpour, head of the guards' ground forces. He added that "PJAK camps in the region of Jassukan had been destroyed and that journalists could go there to see."

He also denied any shelling of Kurdish villagers, saying that the target area "is uninhabited."

On July 11, Iran's official news agency IRNA quoted a senior Iranian army official as saying Tehran reserves the right to attack PJAK bases within Iraq.

"The terrorists will not be allowed to take sanctuary in Iraq's territory and attack Iran with the support of America and the Zionist regime," the official said. "Action will be taken against these terrorists."

Iranian forces regularly shell border districts of Iraq's Kurdish region, targeting PJAK bases.

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Sources: Obama Administration to Drop Troop Levels in Iraq to 3,000

Published September 06, 2011
| FoxNews.com



The Obama administration has decided to drop the number of U.S. troops in Iraq at the end of the year down to 3,000, marking a major downgrade in force strength, multiple sources familiar with the inner workings and decisions on U.S. troop movements in Iraq told Fox News.

Senior commanders are said to be livid at the decision, which has already been signed off by Defense Secretary Leon Panetta.


Aug. 15: Iraqis inspect the site of a bombing in Kirkuk, Iraq.

Panetta, touring sites Tuesday in advance of the Sept. 11 10th commemoration, insisted "no decision has been made" on the number of troops to stay in Iraq.

"That obviously will be the subject of negotiations with the Iraqis and as a result of those negotiations. As I said no decision has been made of what the number will be," he said.

Currently, about 45,000 U.S. troops are stationed in Iraq. The generals on the ground had requested a reduced number of troops remaining in Iraq at the end of the year, but there was major pushback about "the cost and the political optics" of keeping that many in Iraq. The military's troop-level request was then reduced to 10,000.

Commanders said they could possibly make that work "in extremis," in other words, meaning they would be pushing it to make that number work security-wise and manpower-wise.

Now, sources confirm that the administration has pushed the Pentagon to cut the number even lower, and commanders are concerned for the safety of the U.S. troops who would remain there.

"We can't secure everybody with only 3,000 on the ground nor can we do what we need to with the Iraqis," one source said. Another source said the actual total could be as high as 5,000 when additional support personnel are included.

A senior military official said by reducing the number of troops to 3,000, the White House has effectively reduced the mission to training only.

"There is almost no room for security operations in that number; it will be almost purely a training mission," this official said. The official added that a very small number of troops within that 3,000 will be dedicated to counter-terrorism efforts, but that's not nearly what Gen. Lloyd Austin, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, wanted.

This shift is seen by various people as a cost-saving measure and a political measure. White House spokesman Jay Carney said Tuesday that the U.S. has operated responsibly to meet the year-end deadline to remove troops from Iraq, per a 2008 Status of Forces Agreement.

He added that negotiations with the Iraqis will determine the outcome, and while costs are a factor in every decision, the administration makes decisions on what is best for the United States.

The only administration official fighting for at least 10,000 forces to stay in Iraq at the end of the year was Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, sources said. But she has lost the battle.

Responding to the news, Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., who has traveled to Iraq many times, said that in all the conversations he has had on force strength, he has "never heard a number as low as 3,000 troops to secure the gains Iraqis have won over the years."

Lieberman said his first question for the administration is whether the number is one Iraqis had requested or if it was chosen according to other criteria.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said reducing the troop presence to 3,000 "would put at risk all the United States has fought for in Iraq."

"The biggest winner of a U.S. decision to move to 3,000 troops in Iraq would the Iranian regime. The ayatollahs would rejoice," he said.

Any of the plans will require Iraqi approval, and on that front, the Pentagon recently secured a commitment from the Iraqis to start negotiations, but they have not agreed to any number.

"Discussions with the Iraqis on our post-2011 strategic relationship are ongoing, and no decisions on troop levels have been made," said Panetta spokesman George Little. "We continue to proceed with troop withdrawals as directed by the president."

On Tuesday, the head of the three-province Kurdish autonomous region in the north of Iraq, warned that if American troops leave sectarian violence might resurface. Massoud Barzani urged the central Iraqi government to sign an agreement with the U.S. to keep forces in the country.

Fox News' Bret Baier contributed to this report.

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Iran kills Kurdish rebel deputy military chief

By Abdel Hamid Zebari | AFP – Wed, Sep 7, 2011

See latest photos »

• 12 photos - Fri, Sep 9, 2011

Iranian shelling has killed the deputy military leader of The Party of Free Life of Kurdistan (PJAK), a north Iraq-based Kurdish separatist group, it said in an online statement.

"Majid Kawian, known as Comrade Samkou, deputy commander general of the forces of eastern Kurdistan in the Party of Free Life of Kurdistan, was killed ... in heavy Iranian shelling" on Saturday, said the statement posted on PJAK's website late on Tuesday.

Kawian was born in 1982 in Iran and has been a member of PJAK since 1999, the statement said.

The Iranian Revolutionary Guards had earlier said on their website Sapahnews that Kawian had been killed, citing the PJAK statement.

Kawian had been engaged in "terrorist operations inside Iran" since 2003, according to the Guards.

In July, Iran launched a major offensive against PJAK rebels, shelling districts near Iraq's border for weeks, but halted it during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan to give the rebels a chance to withdraw from border areas.

The Guards resumed the offensive on Friday, with their operations officer Colonel Hamid Ahmadi saying the fighting would "continue until all counter-revolutionaries, rebels and terrorists have been cleared away."

According to the Guards, more than 30 PJAK rebels have been killed and 40 wounded in the second wave of attacks, while Iran has suffered two casualties.

On Monday, PJAK declared a truce and called on Iran to reciprocate in order to prevent further bloodshed.

Iran responded a day later, saying Iraq's Kurdish autonomous government, which is acting as a mediator, must clarify the details of the truce.

"Since the content of the unilateral ceasefire announced by the PJAK terrorist group is not clear-cut, the government of the autonomous (Iraqi) Kurdistan region which mediated this act, should clarify the intention of the ceasefire as soon as possible," the Guards said.

PJAK rebels have engaged in numerous clashes with Iranian forces in recent years, and Iran has often then bombed their rear-bases in mountainous border districts of Iraqi Kurdistan.

In mid-August, Turkey began its own campaign of shelling and air raids against bases of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) in Kurdistan, which has ties with the PJAK.

Tehran has accused neighbouring Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan region of creating a safe haven for terrorists, and has rejected criticism from Baghdad that Iran should stop the border shelling.

On Tuesday, the president of Iraq's Kurdistan region, Massud Barzani, called on Kurdish fighters seek their goals through diplomacy.

"We are in a difficult situation because there are two countries (Iran and Turkey) telling us to control our borders so there will be no problems," Barzani said in Arbil.

But "we are afraid to send forces to the borders for fear of a Kurdish-Kurdish war," he said.

"I call on the two sides to stop the idea of getting their rights through military means."

Human Rights Watch meanwhile has criticised Iran over its military operation, saying it had evidence its forces may have deliberately targeted civilians.

It also accused Turkey of failing to take adequate precautions to protect civilians in its campaign of shelling and air raids against suspected bases of PKK rebels in northern Iraq.

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Iran's Reshaping of Persian Gulf Politics

July 19, 2011 | 0853 GMT



By Reva Bhalla

Something extraordinary, albeit not unexpected, is happening in the Persian Gulf region. The United States, lacking a coherent strategy to deal with Iran and too distracted to develop one, is struggling to navigate Iraq’s fractious political landscape in search of a deal that would allow Washington to keep a meaningful military presence in the country beyond the end-of-2011 deadline stipulated by the current Status of Forces Agreement. At the same time, Saudi Arabia, dubious of U.S. capabilities and intentions toward Iran, appears to be inching reluctantly toward an accommodation with its Persian adversary.

Iran clearly stands to gain from this dynamic in the short term as it seeks to reshape the balance of power in the world’s most active energy arteries. But Iranian power is neither deep nor absolute. Instead, Tehran finds itself racing against a timetable that hinges not only on the U.S. ability to shift its attention from its ongoing wars in the Middle East but also on Turkey’s ability to grow into its historic regional role.

The Iranian Position

Iranian Defense Minister Ahmad Vahidi said something last week that caught our attention. Speaking at Iran’s first Strategic Naval Conference in Tehran on July 13, Vahidi said the United States is “making endeavors to drive a wedge between regional countries with the aim of preventing the establishment of an indigenized security arrangement in the region, but those attempts are rooted in misanalyses and will not succeed.” The effect Vahidi spoke of refers to the Iranian redefinition of Persian Gulf power dynamics, one that in Iran’s ideal world ultimately would transform the local political, business, military and religious affairs of the Gulf states to favor the Shia and their patrons in Iran.

From Iran’s point of view, this is a natural evolution, and one worth waiting centuries for. It would see power concentrated among the Shia in Mesopotamia, eastern Arabia and the Levant at the expense of the Sunnis who have dominated this land since the 16th century, when the Safavid Empire lost Iraq to the Ottomans. Ironically, Iran owes its thanks for this historic opportunity to its two main adversaries — the Wahhabi Sunnis of al Qaeda who carried out the 9/11 attacks and the “Great Satan” that brought down Saddam Hussein. Should Iran succeed in filling a major power void in Iraq, a country that touches six Middle Eastern powers and demographically favors the Shia, Iran would theoretically have its western flank secured as well as an oil-rich outlet with which to further project its influence.

So far, Iran’s plan is on track. Unless the United States permanently can station substantial military forces in the region, Iran replaces the United States as the most powerful military force in the Persian Gulf region. In particular, Iran has the military ability to threaten the Strait of Hormuz and has a clandestine network of operatives spread across the region. Through its deep penetration of the Iraqi government, Iran is also in the best position to influence Iraqi decision-making. Washington’s obvious struggle in trying to negotiate an extension of the U.S. deployment in Iraq is perhaps one of the clearest illustrations of Iranian resolve to secure its western flank. The Iranian nuclear issue, as we have long argued, is largely a sideshow; a nuclear deterrent, if actually achieved, would certainly enhance Iranian security, but the most immediate imperative for Iran is to consolidate its position in Iraq. And as this weekend’s Iranian incursion into northern Iraq — ostensibly to fight Kurdish militants — shows, Iran is willing to make measured, periodic shows of force to convey that message.

While Iran already is well on its way to accomplishing its goals in Iraq, it needs two other key pieces to complete Tehran’s picture of a regional “indigenized security arrangement” that Vahidi spoke of. The first is an understanding with its main military challenger in the region, the United States. Such an understanding would entail everything from ensuring Iraqi Sunni military impotence to expanding Iranian energy rights beyond its borders to placing limits on U.S. military activity in the region, all in return for the guaranteed flow of oil through the Strait of Hormuz and an Iranian pledge to stay clear of Saudi oil fields.

The second piece is an understanding with its main regional adversary, Saudi Arabia. Iran’s reshaping of Persian Gulf politics entails convincing its Sunni neighbors that resisting Iran is not worth the cost, especially when the United States does not seem to have the time or the resources to come to their aid at present. No matter how much money the Saudis throw at Western defense contractors, any military threat by the Saudi-led Gulf Cooperation Council states against Iran will be hollow without an active U.S. military commitment. Iran’s goal, therefore, is to coerce the major Sunni powers into recognizing an expanded Iranian sphere of influence at a time when U.S. security guarantees in the region are starting to erode.

Of course, there is always a gap between intent and capability, especially in the Iranian case. Both negotiating tracks are charged with distrust, and meaningful progress is by no means guaranteed. That said, a number of signals have surfaced in recent weeks leading us to examine the potential for a Saudi-Iranian accommodation, however brief that may be.

The Saudi Position

Not surprisingly, Saudi Arabia is greatly unnerved by the political evolution in Iraq. The Saudis increasingly will rely on regional powers such as Turkey in trying to maintain a Sunni bulwark against Iran in Iraq, but Riyadh has largely resigned itself to the idea that Iraq, for now, is in Tehran’s hands. This is an uncomfortable reality for the Saudi royals to cope with, but what is amplifying Saudi Arabia’s concerns in the region right now — and apparently nudging Riyadh toward the negotiating table with Tehran — is the current situation in Bahrain.

When Shiite-led protests erupted in Bahrain in the spring, we did not view the demonstrations simply as a natural outgrowth of the so-called Arab Spring. There were certainly overlapping factors, but there was little hiding the fact that Iran had seized an opportunity to pose a nightmare scenario for the Saudi royals: an Iranian-backed Shiite uprising spreading from the isles of Bahrain to the Shiite-concentrated, oil-rich Eastern Province of the Saudi kingdom.

This explains Saudi Arabia’s hasty response to the Bahraini unrest, during which it led a rare military intervention of GCC forces in Bahrain at the invitation of Manama to stymie a broader Iranian destabilization campaign. The demonstrations in Bahrain are far calmer now than they were in mid-March at the peak of the crisis, but the concerns of the GCC states have not subsided, and for good reason. Halfhearted attempts at national dialogues aside, Shiite dissent in this part of the region is likely to endure, and this is a reality that Iran can exploit in the long term through its developing covert capabilities.

When we saw in late June that Saudi Arabia was willingly drawing down its military presence in Bahrain at the same time the Iranians were putting out feelers in the local press on an almost daily basis regarding negotiations with Riyadh, we discovered through our sources that the pieces were beginning to fall into place for Saudi-Iranian negotiations. To understand why, we have to examine the Saudi perception of the current U.S. position in the region.

The Saudis cannot fully trust U.S. intentions at this point. The U.S. position in Iraq is tenuous at best, and Riyadh cannot rule out the possibility of Washington entering its own accommodation with Iran and thus leaving Saudi Arabia in the lurch. The United States has three basic interests: to maintain the flow of oil through the Strait of Hormuz, to reduce drastically the number of forces it has devoted to fighting wars with Sunni Islamist militants (who are also by definition at war with Iran), and to try to reconstruct a balance of power in the region that ultimately prevents any one state — whether Arab or Persian — from controlling all the oil in the Persian Gulf. The U.S. position in this regard is flexible, and while developing an understanding with Iran is a trying process, nothing fundamentally binds the United States to Saudi Arabia. If the United States comes to the conclusion that it does not have any good options in the near term for dealing with Iran, a U.S.-Iranian accommodation — however jarring on the surface — is not out of the question.

More immediately, the main point of negotiation between the United States and Iran is the status of U.S. forces in Iraq. Iran would prefer to see U.S. troops completely removed from its western flank, but it has already seen dramatic reductions. The question for both sides moving forward concerns not only the size but also the disposition and orientation of those remaining forces and the question of how rapidly they can be reoriented from a more vulnerable residual advisory and assistance role to a blocking force against Iran. It also must take into account how inherently vulnerable a U.S. military presence in Iraq (not to mention the remaining diplomatic presence) is to Iranian conventional and unconventional means.

The United States may be willing to recognize Iranian demands when it comes to Iran’s designs for the Iraqi government or oil concessions in the Shiite south, but it also wants to ensure that Iran does not try to overstep its bounds and threaten Saudi Arabia’s oil wealth. To reinforce a potential accommodation with Iran, the United States needs to maintain a blocking force against Iran, and this is where the U.S.-Iranian negotiation appears to be deadlocked.

The threat of a double-cross is a real one for all sides to this conflict. Iran cannot trust that the United States, once freed up, will not engage in military action against Iran down the line. The Americans cannot trust that the Iranians will not make a bid for Saudi Arabia’s oil wealth (though the military logistics required for such a move are likely beyond Iran’s capabilities at this point). Finally, the Saudis can’t trust that the United States will defend it in a time of need, especially if the United States is preoccupied with other matters and/or has developed a relationship with Iran that it feels the need to maintain.

When all this is taken together — the threat illustrated by Shiite unrest in Bahrain, the tenuous U.S. position in Iraq and the potential for Washington to strike its own deal with Tehran — Riyadh may be seeing little choice but to search out a truce with Iran, at least until it can get a clearer sense of U.S. intentions. This does not mean that the Saudis would place more trust in a relationship with their historical rivals, the Persians, than they would in a relationship with the United States. Saudi-Iranian animosity is embedded in a deep history of political, religious and economic competition between the two main powerhouses of the Persian Gulf, and it is not going to vanish with the scratch of a pen and a handshake. Instead, this would be a truce driven by short-term, tactical constraints. Such a truce would primarily aim to arrest Iranian covert activity linked to Shiite dissidents in the GCC states, giving the Sunni monarchist regimes a temporary sense of relief while they continue their efforts in trying to build up an Arab resistance to Iran.

But Iran would view such a preliminary understanding as the path toward a broader accommodation, one that would bestow recognition on Iran as the pre-eminent power of the Persian Gulf. Iran can thus be expected to make a variety of demands, all revolving around the idea of Sunni recognition of an expanded Iranian sphere of influence — a very difficult idea for Saudi Arabia to swallow.

This is where things get especially complicated. The United States theoretically might strike an accommodation with Iran, but it would do so only with the knowledge that it could rely on the traditional Sunni heavyweights in the region eventually to rebuild a relative balance of power.

If the major Sunni powers reach their own accommodation with Iran, independent of the United States, the U.S. position in the region becomes all the more questionable. What would be the limits of a Saudi-Iranian negotiation? Could the United States ensure, for example, that Saudi Arabia would not bargain away U.S. military installations in a negotiation with Iran?

The Iranian defense minister broached this very idea during his speech last week when he said, “the United States has failed to establish a sustainable security system in the Persian Gulf region, and it is not possible that many vessels will maintain a permanent presence in the region.” Vahidi was seeking to convey to fellow Iranians and trying to convince the Sunni Arab powers that a U.S. security guarantee in the region does not hold as much weight as it used to, and that with Iran now filling the void, the United States may well face a much more difficult time trying to maintain its existing military installations.

The question that naturally arises from Vahidi’s statement is the future status of the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet in Bahrain, and whether Iran can instill just the right amount of fear in the minds of its Arab neighbors to shake the foundations of the U.S. military presence in the region. For now, Iran does not appear to have the military clout to threaten the GCC states to the point of forcing them to negotiate away their U.S. security guarantees in exchange for Iranian restraint. This is a threat, however, that Iran will continue to let slip and even one that Saudi Arabia quietly could use to capture Washington’s attention in the hopes of reinforcing U.S. support for the Sunni Arabs against Iran.

The Long-Term Scenario

The current dynamic places Iran in a prime position. Its political investment is paying off in Iraq, and it is positioning itself for negotiation with both the Saudis and the Americans that it hopes will fill out the contours of Iran’s regional sphere of influence. But Iranian power is not that durable in the long term.

Iran is well endowed with energy resources, but it is populous and mountainous. The cost of internal development means that while Iran can get by economically, it cannot prosper like many of its Arab competitors.

Add to that a troubling demographic profile in which ethnic Persians constitute only a little more than half of the country’s population and developing challenges to the clerical establishment, and Iran clearly has a great deal going on internally distracting it from opportunities abroad.

The long-term regional picture also is not in Iran’s favor. Unlike Iran, Turkey is an ascendant country with the deep military, economic and political power to influence events in the Middle East — all under a Sunni banner that fits more naturally with the region’s religious landscape. Turkey also is the historical, indigenous check on Persian power. Though it will take time for Turkey to return to this role, strong hints of this dynamic already are coming to light.

In Iraq, Turkish influence can be felt across the political, business, security and cultural spheres as Ankara is working quietly and fastidiously to maintain a Sunni bulwark in the country and steep Turkish influence in the Arab world. And in Syria, though the Alawite regime led by the al Assads is not at a breakpoint, there is no doubt a confrontation building between Iran and Turkey over the future of the Syrian state. Turkey has an interest in building up a viable Sunni political force in Syria that can eventually displace the Alawites, while Iran has every interest in preserving the current regime so as to maintain a strategic foothold in the Levant.

For now, the Turks are not looking for a confrontation with Iran, nor are they necessarily ready for one. Regional forces are accelerating Turkey’s rise, but it will take experience and additional pressures for Turkey to translate rhetoric into action when it comes to meaningful power projection. This is yet another factor that is likely driving the Saudis to enter their own dialogue with Iran at this time.

The Iranians are thus in a race against time. It may be a matter of a few short years before the United States frees up its attention span and is able to re-examine the power dynamics in the Persian Gulf with fresh vigor.

Within that time, we would also expect Turkey to come into its own and assume its role as the region’s natural counterbalance to Iran. By then, the Iranians hope to have the structures and agreements in place to hold their ground against the prevailing regional forces, but that level of long-term security depends on Tehran’s ability to cut its way through two very thorny sets of negotiations with the Saudis and the Americans while it still has the upper hand.

[vector7]

What started out in the hunt for Bin Laden and Al Qaeda after 9/11 followed by the Taliban then evolved into a possible pincher move to contain Iran with occupation in Iraq and Afghanistan on either side. The Left has undermined Bush's middle east foreign policy and is replacing pro-western dictators in the region for Islamic radicals in Egypt and Libya.

[vector7]

Companion Thread: Turkey is no longer a dependable strategic ally of Israel ‘Turkey may launch ground offensive into Iraq at any time’

13 September 2011, Tuesday / TODAY’S ZAMAN, İSTANBUL

Turkish tanks and armored vehicles are seen near the southeastern Turkish town of Silopi, near the Iraqi border in this Feb. 22, 200 file photo. (Photo: Reuters)

Turkey said on Tuesday that its military may launch a ground offensive against terrorist Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) targets in northern Iraq at any time in accordance with ongoing talks with Iraqi Kurdish officials as part of cooperation against the PKK.

Interior Minister İdris Naim Şahin said in response to questions from reporters as to whether Turkey is pondering a ground operation in northern Iraq that talks with the Kurdish regional administration in northern Iraq are still under way and that a cross-border ground offensive could be launched at any time just like aerial strikes. In August, the Turkish military launched aerial attacks on PKK targets in northern Iraq, killing up to 160 terrorists. The PKK uses its bases in northern Iraq to launch attacks on Turkey. Its Iranian wing, the Party for a Free Life in Kurdistan (PJAK), is also involved in clashes with Iranian forces. Last week, Foreign Ministry Undersecretary Feridun Sinirlioğlu travelled to Iraq and discussed the issue of the fight against terrorism, as well as bilateral and regional issues, with Iraqi Kurdish officials. Sinirlioğlu’s visit to Iraq comes amid a surge in PKK attacks on Turkish troops. Dozens of troops were killed in PKK attacks over the past couple of months. Last Thursday, opposition Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahçeli called on the government to authorize a ground offensive against PKK targets in northern Iraq before winter, saying “no stone should be left unturned” in the Kandil Mountains where the PKK has bases. Turkish Chief of General Staff Gen. Necdet Özel and other top commanders inspected troops in southeastern Anatolia last week, raising speculations that the military might be preparing for a ground offensive in northern Iraq. A security summit was also held at the Prime Ministry on Monday before Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan left the country for a visit to Egypt. Turkey has launched several cross-border air and ground operations in northern Iraq during a conflict that first erupted in the 1980s. The last major incursion was in early 2008, when Turkey sent 10,000 troops, backed by air power, into northern Iraq. Meanwhile, Deputy Prime Minister Beşir Atalay has said that the government has been working on a comprehensive project in order to fight against the PKK. He said the PKK will not be able to move freely in the Kandil Mountains. “There will be more security around Kandil and Arbil. We talked about cooperating with [Massoud] Barzani in that regard and he agreed with us, so we’re working on it,” he said. Atalay also said intelligence sharing among the National Intelligence Organization (MİT), the gendarmerie and the police is going well with regard to the fight against the PKK. Asked by journalists about an Iranian offer to cooperate in the fight against the PKK, Atalay said they will not cooperate in the military area but will do so in intelligence. Atalay also added that the security aspect is important in fighting the PKK but that the government’s democratic initiative is continuing with regard to the Kurdish issue. Reminded by reporters about possible Israeli assistance to the PKK, Atalay said Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman’s denial of a report suggesting that he offered to hold meetings with leaders of the PKK in retaliation for Turkey’s sanctions on Israel was not sincere. Yedioth Ahronoth, an Israeli daily, reported on Friday that the hawkish Israeli foreign minister had been planning to meet with PKK leaders in Europe to discuss cooperation with the terrorist group in every possible way. Lieberman has been planning a series of measures to retaliate against Turkey over an apology row, including providing military aid to the outlawed PKK, the daily said. A statement delivered by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office on Friday did not deny or confirm the plan, but called for restraint with regard to statements concerning Turkey, the Israeli Haaretz daily reported. On Monday, speaking on a land operation against the PKK, Deputy Prime Minister Bülent Arınç said the timing of the operation is not certain and that “those things are not announced beforehand.” Arınç also said Turkey’s Foreign Ministry is working on the issue of obtaining unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) from the United States. Reports surfaced following Prime Minister Erdoğan’s complaint last week that Israel had delayed the delivery of Heron drones Turkey sent to the country for maintenance that Turkey has been wrangling with Israel over the maintenance matter for a long time.

[vector7]

Turkey “may act with Iran against PKK in Iraq”

(Reuters)
16 September 2011



ISTANBUL - Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan has signalled that Turkey could launch a joint operation with Iran against Kurdish militants’ main base in northern Iraq, according to reports in Turkish newspapers on Friday.

In August, Turkey carried out a series of air and artillery strikes against Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) rebels in northern Iraq and the interior minister said this week a ground operation could be launched any time against the guerrillas there, depending on the result of talks with Iraq.

The military action was triggered by an increase in PKK attacks in southeast Turkey in which dozens of security personnel were killed.

Speaking to reporters while travelling to Tunisia on a north African tour, Erdogan said the minister’s comment had been a slip of the tongue that had been corrected, and that there would be no forewarning of any such operation.

“Things like this are not said, they are done,” the Hurriyet daily quoted the prime minister as saying. The same comments were reported by other newspapers.

“The chief of the general staff has completed assessments in the region (southeast Turkey) together with force commanders,” he said.

There was no immediate official comment from Iraq.

Speculation about a ground offensive was fuelled when Erdogan met military chiefs before his trip to north Africa.

Erdogan was also asked in Tunisia about relations with Iran and cooperation against the PKK and he said: “It’s going well. We may act together at Qandil.”

The Qandil mountains are on the Iraq-Iran border and the main PKK bases are believed to be located in the mountains, a part of Iraq’s autonomous Kurdish region around 80-100 km south of the Turkish border.

Iran, Turkey’s southeastern neighbour, said this month its troops had killed or wounded 30 members of the PJAK (Party of Free Life of Kurdistan), an offshoot of the PKK that is reported to have launched ambushes and sabotaged pipelines on the Iranian side of the border.

The Turkish military has said its strikes against the PKK in Iraq in August killed 145 to 160 militants. The PKK has only referred to a few casualties and the figures could not be independently confirmed.

A senior Turkish diplomat has been in Iraq for talks with the government this week as Ankara seeks more cooperation against the PKK from Iraq, whose large Kurdish minority, concentrated in the north, is politically influential.

Turkey has launched several cross-border air and ground operations in northern Iraq in a conflict that first erupted in the 1980s. The PKK is fighting for greater autonomy and Kurdish rights, having earlier sought a separate state.

More than 40,000 people have died in the conflict and fighting has escalated over this summer. The last major incursion was in early 2008, when Turkey sent 10,000 troops, backed by air power, into northern Iraq.

Erdogan’s comments to reporters also indicated a tougher approach on the Kurdish issue generally after government efforts to negotiate a solution failed to yield a result.

“The separatist terrorist group and its political offshoots should not expect goodwill and understanding from us as in the past,” Erdogan said.

This week, recordings have been posted on the Internet of apparent talks in recent years between top Turkish intelligence officials and leading PKK members with the aim of ending the conflict.

Erdogan said investigations were continuing on how the recordings were leaked. He has said previously that the state has held talks with the PKK.

[BRVoice]

vector7 I want to ask a question. I posted this article "The Turkey-Iran Pact" in the 'Turkey is no longer a dependable strategic ally of Israel' thread. I want to know if I can transfer that post to this thread?

[vector7]

If you would like, it looks like it has information in it for both threads.

[BRVoice]

If you would like, it looks like it has information in it for both threads.

Oh... I will let the article there. Thanks for your help

[BRVoice]

Turks hit 152 targets in northern Iraq


Published: Sept. 21, 2011 at 10:18 AM

ANKARA, Turkey, Sept. 21 (UPI) -- Turkey's military said Wednesday it has hit 152 targets of the Kurdistan Workers' Party in northern Iraq since launching an air offensive Aug. 17.
A statement released by the Turkish General Staff said airstrikes against the terrorist group will continue once new targets have been selected, Today's Zaman reported.
Turkey charges the PKK -- the Kurdish language acronym for the Kurdistan Workers' Party -- is using the mountains of northern Iraq to launch attacks on southeastern Turkey.
Earlier the Turkish General Staff released images of the military's offensive showing laser-guided bombs hitting PKK targets such as depots, hiding places and anti-aircraft stations.
The PKK has been fighting against Turkey for an autonomous Kurdistan since 1984.
The United States and the European Union have designated the PKK as a terrorist organization.
© 2011 United Press International, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Any reproduction, republication, redistribution and/or modification of any UPI content is expressly prohibited without UPI's prior written consent.

[American Patriot]

I think we should HELP the Turks.... Socialists attacking Turkey? Kill 'em.

[vector7]

Turkey strikes more Kurdish rebel targets in Iraq

Turkey's military said on Wednesday its war planes had struck 152 Kurdish guerrilla targets in northern Iraq over the past month and that the air strikes would continue, despite opposition from Iraq's regional Kurdish government.


Residents hold Kurdish flags as they protest against Turkish shelling on northern Iraq, outside the Turkish consulate in Arbil Photo: REUTERS

11:36PM BST 21 Sep 2011
Comments

Turkey has stepped up air and artillery operations on suspected Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) rebels in northern Iraq over the past months in retaliation for an increase in PKK attacks on Turkish security forces inside Turkey.

The raids have fuelled tensions between Turkey and the semi-autonomous Kurdish region in Iraq and have triggered protests in the capital Arbil and other towns. Iraqi Kurdish government officials have called for the issue to be resolved through diplomatic means.

"Since August 17, 2011, 58 air sorties have been carried out in northern Iraq against hideouts, control points and weapons depots belonging to the separatist terror organisation," Turkey's general staff said in a statement on its website.

After analysing aerial photographs of the target areas, it said, 152 targets had been hit.

"The activities of the separatist terror organisation in northern Iraq will be closely monitored and as targets are determined, air operations will continue," it said.

Related Articles

• Turkey warplanes attack Kurdish guerrillas in Iraq
  18 Aug 2011

The new wave of Turkish strikes, which began in August, are the first in more than a year on suspected PKK rebel bases in Iraq and mark an escalation of the conflict that has spanned nearly three decades.

More than 40,000 people have been killed in the conflict since the PKK took up arms for Kurdish self-rule in 1984. Since mid-June alone, 110 people have been killed in clashes, according to an International Crisis Group report this week.

The PKK is listed as a terrorist organisation by Turkey, the United States and the European Union.

In a statement carried by a website that has contacts with the PKK, the group denied any responsibility for a car bomb which killed three people in Ankara on Tuesday.

Security experts say PKK splinter groups in urban areas are sometimes behind bomb attacks that the PKK leadership in the mountains of Iraq has disavowed.

Adding to regional tensions has been an increase in rhetoric by Turkey of a potential cross-border land operation into northern Iraq, possibly in co-operation with Iran, which is locked in its own conflict with an offshoot of the PKK.

The Iraqi Kurdish regional government has said it has not given any approval for a Turkish military operation in northern Iraq, saying military operations "would not solve the problems".

Turkey has launched several cross-border air and ground operations in northern Iraq in the past, the last major incursion being in early 2008, when Turkey sent in 10,000 troops, backed by air power.

Iraq says Turkey still has 1,300 troops in Iraqi territory at small observation posts set up in the 1990s with the permission of Baghdad.

Turkey is also in talks with the United states to house a fleet of spy drones, currently based in Iraq, to carry out surveillance of suspected PKK hideouts in northern Iraq.

[vector7]

Turkey's war against Kurds could widen


Published: Sept. 21, 2011 at 12:33 PM

• Turkish military ready for attack
• Turks hit 152 targets in northern Iraq
• Ankara attack is PKK suicide, Gul
  
• saysIran vows to wipe out PJAK

IRBIL, Iraq, Sept. 21 (UPI) -- Turkey is reported to be considering an intelligence alliance with Iran and Iraq to combat Kurdish separatists who have their main sanctuary in northern Iraq.

Turkey may even mount a ground offensive in a bid to crush the separatist movement.

The Turkish air force has been bombing bases of the Kurdish Workers' Party, known as the PKK, for several weeks, killing around 200 people in scores of raids.

But this hasn't stopped raids by the militants into southeastern Turkey, where nearly 50 soldiers have been killed.

Ankara's escalating assault on the outlawed PKK since June, when a de facto cease-fire expired, has coincided with an Iranian ground offensive against Iranian Kurds who are holed up in the Qandil Mountains of Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdistan region.

These moves by Turkey and Iran have once again thrust Iraq's Kurdish enclave into the maelstrom of ancient regional rivalries at a time when the Middle East is in turmoil.

The United States is a staunch supporter of Iraq's Kurds, who in 2003 helped topple Saddam Hussein's hated regime which had conducted a genocidal campaign against them. So the Americans could be dragged into this decades-old conflict.

As the Dec. 31 deadline for completion of the U.S. military withdrawal from Iraq looms closer, U.S. officials are reported to be considering a Turkish offer to redeploy unmanned aerial vehicles now in Iraq to Turkey to increase surveillance of PKK forces.

The Americans already provide surveillance data on the PKK, listed as a terrorist organization by Washington, to Ankara, a NATO ally, gathered by Predator UAVs that are scheduled to be withdrawn from Iraq under the U.S. pullout.

The Turks have been heavily dependent on data about PKK movements gathered by the Predators. But employing U.S. drones for this purpose could create geopolitical complications.

Classified diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks reveal that Turkey has repeatedly pressed Washington to escalate U.S. involvement against the PKK and to eliminate the organization before the U.S. withdrawal is completed, involving the Americans in yet another Middle Eastern conflict.

Also, a Turkish offensive would have "a strategic component in that it would allow Turkey to gradually build up its military presence in northern Iraq, which Iran -- as a long-term competitor for influence in Iraq -- views with serious concern," observed U.S. global security think-tank Stratfor.

Iraq's minority Kurds have the nearest thing to an independent Kurdish state among the Kurdish population of 30 million that is spread over the three countries and Syria to the northwest.

Their ultimate ambition is to transform their enclave, which has its own semi-autonomous government, Parliament and military forces, into a full-blown independent state.

Tehran, Ankara and Damascus, not to mention Baghdad, are all dead set against that and have been known to set aside their differences to prevent the emergence of a Kurdish homeland.

At present Iran and Turkey are vying to become the paramount power in the turbulent region but crushing Kurdish aspirations could produce a temporary alliance.

The PKK launched their insurgency for an autonomous state for Turkey's 14 million Kurds, its largest minority, in 1984. Since then more than 40,000 people have been killed.

Turkey's recent airstrikes indicate a significant shift by the ruling Justice and Development Party away from diplomacy to end the Kurdish insurgency to using the country's military to crush the separatists.

Israel, too, could be drawn into the conflict. Israel's intelligence establishment has frequently supported the Kurds over the years, against the Baghdad regime or against neighboring Iran.

With relations between one-time allies Turkey and Israel becoming increasingly combative, there have been suggestions that the Mossad, Israel's foreign intelligence service, could throw its support behind the PKK to hit back at Israel's current nemesis, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Helping the Kurds establish an independent homeland would also be a blow to Iran, whose nuclear program the Israelis consider an existential threat, and old enemy Syria.

"With a bit of luck and political wisdom … the entire Kurdish people could take advantage of the ongoing Arab Spring and prepare the ground for a long-anticipated independent Kurdistan, linking up with Iraq's ongoing autonomy, the Iranian Kurdish enclave and perhaps even the Syrian Kurdish minority," Israeli defense specialist David Eshel wrote in a blog Aug. 12.

[vector7]

Iraq needs U.S. trainers after troops leave: Zebari



Iraq's Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari speaks to Reuters during an interview in Baghdad August 25, 2011.
Credit: Reuters/Mohammed Ameen

By Alistair Lyon
NEW YORK | Wed Sep 21, 2011 5:26pm EDT

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Iraq will need U.S. military trainers even after American combat troops leave this year, ending a mission that began with the 2003 invasion to topple Saddam Hussein, Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari said.

He ruled out any renewal or extension of a 2008 agreement under which the remaining 43,000 U.S. troops are due to withdraw from Iraq by the end of 2011.

"The discussions are on whether there is a need for a training agreement between Iraq and the U.S. especially as Iraq is planning to buy American weapons, F-16s, other armaments," Zebari told the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.

"Definitely we as a country need these trainers and experts to help and support the Iraqi security capabilities," he said.

U.S. requirements for legal protections for any future military presence would need approval by Iraq's parliament, a politically delicate problem for Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki.

"At the end of this year, America's military operation in Iraq will be over," U.S. President Barack Obama told the United Nations on Wednesday.

"We will have a normal relationship with a sovereign nation. ... That equal partnership will be strengthened by our support for Iraq -- for its government and security forces, for its people and their aspirations."

Zebari, speaking on Tuesday night, said: "Every country in the region is watching this with interest and concern."

He said Turkey and Iran had stepped up military attacks on Kurdish rebels operating from Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region. "That's another reason the Iraqi government needs this continued (U.S.) support at least to deter this regional intervention," added Zebari, who is himself a Kurd.

He said sustained Iranian and Turkish air strikes were not commensurate with any threat from the groups they targeted, and were perhaps meant to test U.S. and Iraqi reactions. "It has something to do with the broader regional politics of Iraq in the aftermath of the American withdrawal," he suggested.

SHI'ITE CLERIC

Iraqi Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, whose powerful faction serves in Maliki's government, fiercely opposes any foreign troop presence in Iraq, a stance shared publicly by Iran.

But Zebari said Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had suggested to him in a discussion of the issue that Tehran would not be averse to a continued U.S. role.

"They have built this tree, they should water it, they should nourish it, they should not just pack and go," Zebari quoted Ahmadinejad as saying.

In addition to training for air and naval defenses, he said, Iraqi security forces still need the stills to face down Sunni and Shi'ite militants still capable of carrying out lethal attacks.

Zebari, visiting New York for the U.N. General Assembly, said Iraq's recovery was not complete, but was on the right path toward a stable, democratic, federal form of government.

"What we see these days in the Arab world, the Muslim world, the Middle East, showed that the Iraqi experiment in democracy was worth all the sacrifices by American, other coalition forces and first and foremost the people of Iraq themselves," he said.

Zebari, a man who rarely sees the glass less than half full, said Iraq's transition had not been "tidy, disciplined or easy" but it had avoided descending into the widely predicted risks of civil war, territorial break-up or sectarian warfare.

He criticized similar dire warnings of chaos, division and extremism that some commentators are applying to Arab countries now in the throes of revolt against authoritarian rulers.

Zebari, who said a Western no-fly zone declared in northern Iraq after the 1991 Gulf war had saved his own life, argued that Iraq's experience and now that of Libya had vindicated the idea of international intervention to protect civilians.

He said Iraq has been approached by Libya, Egypt and Tunisia to learn from Baghdad's transition efforts, involving an interim government, a new constitution and elections.

Zebari said international intervention was far trickier in the case of Syria because of its geopolitical position, which had an impact on Iraq, Lebanon, Israel and the Palestinians.

"But change in Syria from all the evidence we see is bound to happen," he said of a six-month-old revolt against President Bashar al-Assad, whose father was a Baathist rival of Saddam.

"I believe the situation in Syria is a question of time."

[vector7]

Obama to provide drones to Turkey

Reuters

Published:

09.24.11, 13:02 / Israel News

Erdogan meets Obama in NY

The United States has agreed in principle to deploy US Predator drones on Turkish soil to aid in the fight against Kurdish separatist rebels, Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said.

The US military flies unarmed surveillance Predators based in Iraq and shares images and vital intelligence with Turkey to aid Ankara as it battles Kurdish Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) rebels who have camps in northern Iraq.

Erdogan, speaking to reporters in New York on Friday where he attended a UN General Assembly, said Turkey has offered to buy or lease the drones and that details are being worked out.

US troops are due to leave Iraq at the end of 2011. Turkish officials have expressed concern the PKK, which has bases in northern Iraq, might exploit any security vacuum left by the departure of the US military from Iraq.

Security experts say Turkey is very dependent on the Predators and other spy aircraft in its fight against the PKK, which is listed as a terrorist organization by Turkey, the United States and the European Union.

Turkey, a NATO ally for the United States, agreed earlier this month to host a NATO early-warning radar system as part of the defenses of the Western military alliance.

The Turkish military has launched air strikes and artillery raids against suspected PKK hideouts in northern Iraq in retaliation for a spate of militant attacks inside Turkey, despite opposition from Iraq's regional Kurdish government.

"If the terrorist organization can manage to lay down weapons, naturally the operations will also stop."

There has been an increase in rhetoric by Turkey of a potential cross-border land operation into northern Iraq, possibly in cooperation with Iran, which is locked in its own conflict with an offshoot of the PKK.

The PKK has fought for Kurdish self-rule for more than 27 years in a conflict that has killed 40,000 people.

[American Patriot]

Wtf?

[vector7]

Obama Sold Turkey Drones

Written by: Hudson InstitueSeptember 27, 2011
By Lee Smith

In Newsweek, Eli Lake reports that “Obama Sold Israel Bunker-Buster Bombs.” Actually, as the story notes, it was George W. Bush who ordered the bombs toward the end of his second term. Former Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert wanted them delivered in 2007, but Bush told him to wait until 2009-2010, and in 2009, according to Lake’s story, “Obama finally released the weapons.”

Maybe it’s not the case, as some have speculated, that “news about the bunker buster sale was leaked now” for domestic reasons, “to prove [Obama] is as good a friend to Israel as any of his predecessors.”

However, it’s worth noting another U.S. arms deal receiving considerably less attention.

Yesterday, the Turkish media reported, “Turkey … agreed with the US on a deal involving the transfer of US-engineered unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) that could prove crucial in combating terrorism.” The Predator drones, expected to be delivered in June 2012, are supposed to help the Turks combat terrorists, which in Ankara’s narrow definition means the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) crossing into Turkey from the Iraq border.

The Predators, said Turkish defense minister ?smet Yilmaz, “are UAVs with better qualities and features than the [Israeli-made] Herons.” Ankara, the report explains, was “disappointed by Israel’s failure to return six Herons it had sent to the country for maintenance.”

Presumably, Jerusalem held on to the drones to maintain some sort of leverage with Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, reminding him that he was risking the two countries’ strategic alliance with Turkey’s new anti-Israel foreign policy posture. The White House has reportedly tried to patch up relations between Turkey and Israel but by selling the drones, Obama has effectively reinforced Ankara’s worldview—that it doesn’t need Israel and is free to take whatever position it likes since Washington will fill the gap.

The point, finally, is not whether Obama is anti-Israel but whether or not he understands that Israel is the keystone in America’s regional security architecture. Right now, it seems, the White House is only capable of seeing Israel as a hot-button domestic issue, but those bunker-busters are meant to address and perhaps solve a shared strategic concern—Iran’s nuclear program. Jerusalem believes that Iranian nuclear weapons are an existential threat to the Jewish state—and whether Washington recognizes it, they are also an existential threat to American hegemony in the region. The Turks explicitly do not share that concern.

Mahir Zeynalov, the night news editor of Turkey’s Today’s Zaman, reported today on his Twitter feed that Erdogan explained Ankara’s regional sensitivities regarding the basing of a NATO radar system in Turkey designed to warn against Russian and Iranian missiles: “Turkey’s [sic] won’t ever allow any strike on Iran unless its territory is under attack.” What role the Obama administration expects Turkey to play in its regional strategy has yet to be made clear.