"659 Disturbances"

About all that many people know about Kurds is contained in the lines of Hilaire Belloc:

The dromedary is a cheerful bird: I cannot say the same about the Kurd.

These wild-eyed tribesmen scattered in mud huts through three countries--Turkey, Iran, Iraq--have had battle lust for 3,000 years, have never knuckled under to non-Kurdish governments. From Istanbul last week came news of probably the biggest riot of Turkey's Kurds since the War. Operating from Dersim about 200 miles south of the Black Sea, 300 miles west of the Turkish-Iran border, Kurdish tribesmen with an army of 5,000 demanded that Dictator Mustafa Kamal Atatuerk should establish no military garrisons in Kurdish territory, that Kurds should be allowed to keep their arms, should continue the time-honored custom of paying taxes by bargaining with their tribal chiefs. Kamal Atatuerk gave them an answer--30,000 Turkish troops, a fleet of war planes. The rebels were dug out like foxes from their mountain holes, butchered to the tune of 5,000.

No. 1 heroine of the Kurd hunt was 22-year-old Sabiha Gogc,en Hanoum, Dictator Kamal Atatuerk's adopted daughter who last year became the first woman officer of the Turkish Flying Corps, and a pioneer in Kamal Atatuerk's movement to open all professions, even the army, to the tough, modern Turkish woman. She volunteered for service during the uprising, plunked a bomb on the house of Seyyid Riza, a rebel leader, killed him and so helped mightily to crush the rebellion. For her trouble the Turkish Government awarded her Turkey's highest aviation honor, a medal set with brilliants.

All news of this bloody Kurdish affray-- the climax, according to Prime Minister Ismet Inonue, of "659 recent disturbances in the Dersim region"--was carefully kept out of Turkey's press until the last brigand had been sent flying.

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