The Hindu : Fresh hurdles to U.S. invasion route plan

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Feb 11, 2003

International

International

Fresh hurdles to U.S. invasion route plan

By Atul Aneja

MANAMA FEB.10. In preparing for a war against Iraq, the United States has since last week begun to encounter fresh difficulties in opening a possible invasion route into northern Iraq.

The decision of France and Belgium on Monday to block the sanction of a NATO military cover for Turkey can affect Turkish cooperation with the U. S. to open a northern front against Iraq.

Meanwhile, the Chief U.N. weapons inspector, Hans Blix, who has returned from Baghdad told Reuters in Athens that he saw no new evidence about Iraqi weapons during a visit to Baghdad.

"This time they presented some papers to us in which they focused upon new issues. Not new evidence really as far as I can see, but they have nevertheless focused on real, open issues and that is welcome," Mr. Blix said.

The assassination of entire top military leadership of the pro-U.S. Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) on Saturday has also come as a big blow to Washington's plan to attack Iraq from the north.

The Kurds are seen as the core of a U.S. commanded invasion force in northern Iraq, after the war breaks out. But their military utility, without their most experienced commanders, is now likely to get undermined.

The Ansar al Islam that allegedly has links with the Al-Qaeda and the Iraqi regime is being blamed for these killings.

Because of its Al Qaeda trappings, analysts see a similarity between these killings and the assassination of the late Commander, Ahmad Shah Massood, in Afghanistan, which took place two days before the September 11, attacks in the U.S. Not surprisingly, the intelligence community in western capitals is apprehending a mega-terrorist strike in the coming days.

Apart from the gaps in the Kurdish military leadership that have emerged after these assassinations, the U.S. is finding it difficult to arrive at the right political formulation that would bring both the Turkish Government and ethnic Kurds on board a plan to invade Iraq.

Turkey has declared that it would like to position its own forces in northern Iraq to prevent a flood of refugees entering into its territory in the aftermath of an Iraq war.

This has alarmed the Kurds, who fear that the real purpose of the Turkish forces in Iraq would be to fulfil Turkey's historical ambition of establishing control over the Kurdish oil cities of Mosul and Kirkuk.

The U.S. Presidential emissary, Zalmay Khalilzad who held talks with the Turkish authorities as well as the leaders of the PUK and Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) in Ankara last week has tried to float a face saving formula. He pointed out, mainly with an eye on Kurdish concerns, that all armed forces in northern Iraq would function under a single coalition command in case of a war.

Mr. Khalilzad's formulation, however, has evoked a sharp response from Turkey. The Turkish military, according to Turkish media has been offended by the Khalilzad proposal and has expressed its opposition to subjecting itself to a foreign military command.

The U.S. effort to spearhead a military force with Turkey, the PUK and the KDP as chief allies has also generated new fault lines among the Kurds themselves.

The PKK leader Osman Ocalan, the brother of Abdullah Ocalan, who is under Turkish custody, has threatened to reopen attacks in case the Turkish army entering northern Iraq during the war exploits its presence there to assault PKK camps that exist in this area.

It is estimated that around 5000 PKK fighters are still operational in northern Iraq and their activation can be of considerable "nuisance value" to the force that invades northern Iraq.

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