Bordering on War

By ANDREW PURVIS

In a region fierce with enemies, it's especially alarming when your friends start to fight. So the recent rumblings between Kurds and Turks have reminded U.S. officials that they can take nothing in Iraq for granted, especially the country's greatest success story. Seventy percent of U.S. military air cargo reaches Iraq through Turkish airspace, and over the border flow the grandfather clocks and designer clothes that make Iraqi Kurdistan feel so much more prosperous than the rest of Iraq. But from the opposite direction come the attacks by Kurdish guerrillas on Turkish soldiers. It's an escalating decades-long fight for Kurdish rights that has already claimed close to 40,000 lives, including 42 Turkish soldiers in just the past few weeks.

The brutality of the killings has produced an outpouring of anger in Turkey. Flag-waving students, some in school uniforms, mourned fallen soldiers in a nationwide funeral that spread across 11 provinces. Turkish lawmakers passed a resolution authorizing the military to invade Iraq and hunt down the militant group blamed for the attacks, the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK. Turkish troops have massed at the border; the U.S., meanwhile, has pressed Turkey to show restraint and Iraqi leaders to rein in the PKK. In response, Iraq President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, said the local government would not turn over any Kurds to Turkey, not "even a Kurdish cat."

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will try to calm these passions in person with a hastily scheduled trip to Turkey. After strong language from both Washington and London, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki appears to have gotten the message. He broke the government's long silence on the issue and finally vowed to shut down PKK "operations" in Iraqi territory. Turkey has agreed to consider talks with Iraqi government representatives, including, perhaps, Iraqi Kurds--but not with the PKK, which the U.S. has designated a terrorist group. Turkey may yet send troops across the border, but if communication channels with Iraqi leaders stay open, Washington's worst-case scenario of a clash between its allies may be averted.