Mr Nusret Ronai’s article "Zalmay Khalilzad: persona non Grata", on Kurdishmedia.com seems like a genuine expression of concern about a possible "Plot" by the Americans against South Kurdistan. It is also a strong condemnation of Mr Khalilzade who is a non Kurd working for a superpower. As usual I found no criticism of those who are genuinely and actively hatching the real and dangerous plots against their own nation. Another concerned person is taking the matter from a different point of view but nevertheless cannot bring himself to say the word Kurdistan throughout his letter to Colin Powell and uses phrases like the Kurds of Northern Iraq. He is Congressman Frank Pallone, Jr. Mr Pallone’s concern is two fold, firstly he is worried about the large sum of money and share of Iraqi oil demanded by the Turks and secondly about the Kurds of northern Iraq and the possibility of their losing their "democratic experiment" which they have been undertaking over the past twelve years.

But while the Americans are helping themselves to "changing" the Middle East region, the Arabs of course regard the whole business as interference in their national affairs, duplicity and double standards with one law for Saddam Hussein and another for Ariel Sharon. They see the whole thing as a threat to their own system and what they regard as the Arab World order. Islamic countries are against the impending war because they believe it is Anti-Muslim and having the characteristics of a new Crusade, aiming at dominating Islamic shrines and property along with their greatest enemy the Jews. While the Turks, suffering from great financial problems see in it a dilemma for which they must play their cards right to attain a win-win situation, increase their influence in the region, through hiring out their military muscle and occupied Kurdistan which is all they can hire out at present.

The Lonely Americans

Look around the world and you will find very few people who would agree with the Americans and British on the benefit, efficacy against terrorism, or moral justification (I will come to this point again later). Without doubt there will be a big price to pay by the Americans and without doubt someone in the Whitehouse has gone into the repayment and dividend with a large interest after the mayhem. And if the accountants at the Pentagon have any sense they must have over budgeted for the exercise for prudence and as a precaution against surprises and unforeseen costs.

European states with ambition to control the Middle East and thus pull the rug from under the USA and Britain are also playing the game with vigor, undoubtedly motivated by their own bids to be bigger beneficiaries of any war, than they have been after the Kuwait war, the Afghan war and the on-going Palestinian-Israeli conflict. They simply resent their remaining behind and on the sidelines, in the queue for selling their goods and wares while Britain and the US have creamed off most of the loot.

Imperialism has not died but merely changed its tactics and methods. Self-interest has motivated it for centuries. When most of the imperial powers gave up their direct rule of their colonies they did so after signing treaties and conventions and creating "intra-imperialist" organizations designed primarily to protect their colonial assets. They installed puppets and even allowed people like Saddam to reek havoc among the Kurds and among his own people in the middle and south of Iraq just as long as they continued to benefit from the cheap oil, raw materials and hungry colonial markets, buying everything from Jumbo Jets to Chewing Gum and toilet paper.

Imperialism and colonialism has never been about ideology, human rights or system of government. Members of the elite club range from oriental China and Japan, going through the Russians and Europe and ending with the United States. It would be foolish for any subject nation to think they are facing their predicament because of any political stance, ideology, religion of cultural differences. The fighting among these big bullying empires has always been about greed and the share of the loot.

It is therefore necessary and natural for such imperial entities to develop their armies, technologies and economies to protect their subject markets and puppets in power all over the world. Now, I am sure you will agree that this state of affairs of technically advanced states exploiting less advanced, less enlightened, less technologically advanced nations can hardly be the trait of democrats and freedom lovers. Nevertheless, they have established for themselves systems with the necessary elected parliaments, governments which are singing the praises of democracy and pluralism, a judicial system of law whose independence is only certain in the minds of those controlling the system and a press and media which have certain freedoms even though they are mainly controlled by barons of huge funds, fully approved and supported by the system.

Democracy in the West – Hypocrisy in the Rest

A Century of Turmoil and Colonial Wars

Dominion and Democracy

Analysis must cater for History, and a Chronology of Events

Undemocratic Outfits Deceiving the Democrats

Election-Free Rubberstamp Parliament Used to Seal our Fate for Ever

A Seasoned Performing Lawyer Making a Solid Case for Our Permanent Demise

No New Plots – Just Old Ones

Prevent the Patriots from Speaking Out – The Rest are US

Alas Ashuristan is Now Called Kurdistan - What a pity

The Up and Coming "Talabanis"

We have made many concessions and will make more if only you allow us

In the interview entitled "Barzani concerned situation in Iraq 'vague' "

• KDP leader says those international powers complaining about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq have done nothing to provide equipment and medication to protect the Kurds
• Barzani says the Saddam Hussein regime could still accept creation of a pluralistic, democratic and federal Iraq and accord could be reached and thus war could be avoided

And to further emphasis his readiness to go to Baghdad let us go to his interview again: "Barzani stressed that the London conference of the Iraqi opposition groups was not designed to burn bridges with the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein. "We want to establish a pluralistic, democratic and federal Iraq. We have not shifted from our position. If the present regime in Baghdad accommodated these demands we can still reach an accord. All the Iraqi opposition groups agree with this."

Turkish daily news goes on. Asked if this was realistic Barzani said, "They are not accepting these conditions. If they did when we were in dialogue with them the situation in Iraq would not be what it is today. They live in a different world and continue making wild accusations against us. They have not changed."

So if only they changed a little and accepted "these" conditions all would be well and Barzani and Talabani would be having tea and sweets with their nation’s Genocide maker in Baghdad. Ironically, the Americans have so frightened Saddam that he might have already conceded "these" conditions and much more just as long as he is allowed to live.

Two years ago I met Barzani in his office in Sere Resh and the first thing I asked him was "Do you have any intention to take Kurdistan back under Iraq?" He looked at me innocently and said "No by God!"

His justification for attending the Iraqi opposition groups which was sponsored and staged managed by the KDP and PUK and organized mainly by his maternal uncle Hushiar Zebari was apparently forced on him by circumstances. It was he says in the interview because he did not want to stay away because "when the destiny of our country and our people is being discussed we could not stay away, We had to be at the meeting. But I stress my presence at the conference was not to provoke anyone." Perhaps we should ask Mr Barzani which country and people he is referring to.

Unless we know the full facts and apply proper logical analysis to the reality of our situation we will remain lifeless objects which can be bought and sold by anyone. And the irony is that those Kurds who have supported the anti-patriotic parties or have been educated to any significant level are probably the worst contributors to this terribly dangerous situation by trumpeting the lines taken by the two party-leaders, in Europe and in the Diaspora, in general, as well as inside Kurdistan.

For a Nation there is only one way – For all other groups many solutions

The Kurdish No Plan Zone

Introduction

The US of A has demonstrated that keeping one’s eggs in one basket, albeit a very large and strong basket is no different from keeping them in a small and weak one because if you drop either of them your eggs will still be smashed. The Kurdish party leaders did just that and now that the basket has fallen they are terrified of the consequences. The real irony is that the Americans seem to be making policy and plans on the hop being constantly surprised by events and attitudes not least from their own closest allies. As for the Kurds, I would say that at least they had clear warnings and advice for the last three years.

From the start my strong advice for the Kurdish party leaders was not to get involved in America’s half-baked and blunderer’s plans to invade Iraq or change its regime. I advised against aligning themselves with the so called opposition but they opened up our homeland to them in the hope that they were going to get stinking richer once they got to Baghdad. Talabani even declared in his usual reckless manner that the Kurds would welcome American forces in Kurdistan, also making all sorts of excuses for the Turks to come in and do as they wish. He later boasted that he will be entering Baghdad in April and revelled in the suggestions that he may become the next president of Iraq. Dr Barham Salih wrote in an article that Kurdistan will be a “bridgehead” for the Americans. Hushiar Zebari started talking to French and Dutch Oil companies about drilling and marketing rights. For a moment they looked as if they had literally struck gold.

Working with or for the Enemy

Since 1992, both KDP and PUK have worked with the Turks and the other enemies of the Kurds to serve their every whim while they have not only distanced themselves from their brothers beyond the evil artificial frontiers which go through the heart of Kurdistan as well as from other Kurds who do not carry their party cards or do not bow their heads seven times a day towards the leaders or their many masters. Now that they desperately need support I doubt if many Kurds let alone others will go to their aid. There is talk of some 70,000 fighters at the disposal of both parties but I doubt if many of them would stay put and fight for them. It would be unclear for what they would be fighting, or whom they should be fighting; to drive the Turks out and leave Kurdistan for Iraq or fight Iraq to give it to Turkey or Iran. It all boils down to the goals of the administration. A patriotic leadership does not need to think about what to do because the course and path of freedom is absolutely clear. Had they been truly patriotic I doubt if any able-bodied man woman or child would leave their country without a fierce fight to protect the homeland.

Blunder after another

After the London conference, many a Kurdish palm was rubbed and mouths salivated at the thought of the super aristocratic-style life awaiting them as Ministers and Director Generals in a future Baghdad administration. The smell of money was nauseating and suitcases were packed to be shipped at short notice to the posh districts of Al-Mansoor and A’adhamia in Baghdad. After all during the twelve years of their guardsman’s duties they had picked up so much corruption techniques that they would now be able to compete with the best of them.

As far back as 1993, I strongly advised the Kurdish administration to keep the Iraqi opposition guys, nice and well-meaning as they may be, outside Kurdistan because they would only open up a further front for Saddam to attack us from. In 1996 Saddam was even assisted and led by the KDP to come in and massacre the first opposition lot who had taken up positions, were buying Kurdish properties and Kurdish women. My critics who were mainly the KDP and PUK and their supporters have always defended their behaviour as the only possible valid one which they thought would at least guarantee “something”. Today we find out that they have got nothing at all and are now having all sorts of doubts and worries about their fate. Never mind the nation!

They partially reconciled only when the chips were down

Ever since the Kurdish people managed to get the limited freedom they enjoyed for 12 years I have been calling for the party leaders to refrain from volunteering self-demeaning and suicidal statements such as those they continuously made about the Kurds not wanting freedom or independence, and called for them to stay silent instead. I demanded that they instil patriotism and not defeatism into each and every Kurdish soul. I recommended true democracy and not a rubberstamp parliament and true free elections instead of the election-free “parliament” which they have at the moment. But, so demoralised are the PUK, that a handful of grubby and dishevelled villagers with long beards, rusty Kalashnikovs and little else, managed to defeat them every time. And while Talabani grovelled and crawled up to the newly elected Turkish President, he and his administrations have been plotting and demanding large sums of extortion money to take part in the decimation of Kurdistan and put an end (permanently) to the Kurdish problem, in the words of one or two of the well-educated party executives.

We should fight your enemy with all our means

But it is our own political leaders we should criticize and hold primarily accountable!

What we have, today, is a selfish and greedy pair of equally anti-patriotic administrations who maintain a banal system, void of all economic, industrial, scientific or technical content. They preside over a whole generation of illiterate or half-educated people around the ages of 18 to 30 years old, who had no choice but to leave their own homeland in search of a living. The very people who should have been the building block and protector of any society which we want to build and yet they have been and are leaving their homes and loved ones by the hundreds.

Your enemy will not believe you if you lie. They know every nation wants liberty and independence!

The Kurdish leaders then did all that was asked of them. They kept the people lethargic, capitulastic, backward and subservient to the will of the Turks, Americans and Arabs. They issued denials by the dozen and called themselves Iraqis first and lately Iraqis first second and last but were still not believed. I had already told them repeatedly they would not be believed. The Turks and Arabs may be fascistic and nationalistic but they are by no means naive or stupid and can read through such silly claims. They are not like the rubberstamp parliament in Arbil who would believe and do anything their political masters, who put them there and pay their salaries, tell them.

 I have repeatedly told the Kurdish administrations that nationalists such as the Arabs and Turks who would spill anyone’s blood as well as their own for the freedom and hegemony of their races will not only disbelieve the Kurds, saying they do not want the same, but also despise them. If you do everything I ask and more without any pre-conditions, then why on earth should I reward you for it?  If I have said this once I have said it a thousand times to the point of being accused of rambling on and single-minded. The Turkish blackmail of the Americans is a prime example of how not to sell one’s interests and nation cheap.

When it is too late and things go wrong as they inevitably have done, the Kurds always blame the others.

 But today and with the absence of any true Kurdish analysts and planners everyone write in, including many whose voice has never been hear before, making all sorts of weird and outlandish suggestions just as it has become clear that a great mistake and a huge blunder has been made, ignoring the fact that once things go wrong then you can only hope to limit the damage and hopefully you start planning properly for the next episode. Unfortunately for the Kurds the next opportunity may be in the far, far distant future or never.

Any capable administration would have created a well educated, patriotic and politically-aware young class of people, to build the country up in times of peace and defend it in times of conflict. When Israel was established it took them days to defeat all the Arab armies who were intent on destroying her and finishing off all the Jews that Hitler had not managed to finish off in World War II. Only eight years later, in 1956, the Israelis managed to take the whole of Sinai in a few days and defeated the Egyptian army which had been in existence for a hundred and fifty years under the British. They did that with the British and French but they never negotiated on their then new status and not only kept everything they had but got more too.

 Defeatist Kurds who will always find an excuse to counteract such arguments would I am sure say ah yes but, and find the most irrelevant excuses to justify our inaction and defeatism. No one can deny that Israel who have no oil or any other significant material resources follow a totally different policy and way of thinking to that of the Kurds.  

 On the other hand, just look at the determination of the Palestinians who are sacrificing life and limb for their freedom and independence. Against all odds they have forced the British and Europe to making the creation of an independent state the number one priority of the world and the number two priority of the USA, to be implemented after the intended war on Iraq. For such significant gains they have sacrificed far less dead than in Halabja alone. Not once have we heard any Palestinian, leader or led person, making a concession on their complete and total independence or give a damn about what anyone else may say. Even the UN Security Council passed a resolution supporting the creation of an Independent Palestine.

Where are our politicians now and why do they not face the people?

 The mark of a true politician is his ability to foresee problems, to plan for, and deal with them, before they become chronic and before it is too late. The Kurdish party leaders have been juggling their allegiances, running around like headless chickens trying to reassure the Arabs, Turks, Iranians, British, Turks, Americans, Germans, French and just about every soul on the planet except their own people who are silently and terrifyingly awaiting their unknown fate and dubious future.

 The mark of a good analyst is the ability to take scenarios and possibilities and scrutinise them no matter how terrible or abhorrent they may be. The prime reason for the advancement of western civilisation, culture, science and technology was the openness of their mental faculties, study of everything great and small without any religious-like likes and dislikes or prejudices.

 This they called the intellectual revolution; the renaissance if you prefer. The reason for the rest of the world to have taken much longer in following was the inability of most other cultures to adapt and progress because of the old taboos and untouchable thoughts which had accumulated as a result of inward looking cultures, resistant to change and adaptability. In fact the stricter the culture the most backward that society has remained. This, as I have explained in a recent article about Turkey, has been at the heart of the reasons for Turkey and Turkish society stagnating from every angle conceivable. Their Attaturkish ideology has been like a straight jacket confining them to a cocooned existence moving only through financial kicks administered to their economy or regional turmoil which they have tried to exploit as they are doing today.

 A similar problem exists among the Kurds as was recently demonstrated by the unjustified attack I sustained from a fellow Kurd simply because I dared tackle a possible scenario where Turkey (if and when it committed a blunder) would come into South Kurdistan and annex it to the Turkish republic. This hypothetical analysis which I offered our Kurdishmedia.com readers provoked no less than a University Academic in such a way that he assumed I had not only suggested some possibilities but invited and led the Turkish army into Erbil and Slemani as the KDP did Saddam’s army in reality, in 1996, or as the PUK did when they invited the Iranians into Halabja with the famous consequences and genocide that followed. Indeed as they are doing now, not only offering a number of Iraqi lackeys of the US, the Turkish as well as of course the US armies to use Kurdistan for any purpose they wish.

 Our learned University “Professor”, never raised any objection to the real thing in 1988, 1996 or now, but could not stomach a fellow graduate simply raising a hypothetical issue. But this kind of phobia against analysis and planning exists among the two Kurdish parties. They simply dislike any logical analysis and opt instead for adopting that of a master such as for example their current US Masters and simply follow like sheep, switching their own brains off. Why should they hurt their brains and think for themselves when the United States of America does all the thinking for them. Unfortunately, the US think only for themselves using the Kurds as and when required. And if their policies fall into deep rut the Kurdish people fall in with them, and become trampled under feet and return to the point of zero.

 The USA’s naivety is exceeding all bounds

 Be that as it may, the facts on the ground point to a great blunder on the part of the US too which has started now worrying all her allies with some taking great exception to their policies openly resisting them. And it is not just the Arab friends of the US such as Egypt and Saudi Arabia who are at loggerheads with their erstwhile master and in the case of Egypt benefactor but the US’s closest allies, Germany and France as well. The Kurds who counted on siding with the most powerful nation on earth because of her power and political and economic influence are now worried. For several years they have been waiting and counting on the US to relieve them of the responsibility which they have reluctantly born on their shoulders; that of running a small self-ruled area of Kurdistan.

Working for their parties and shunning their nation

 That is why over the past twelve years they resisted everyone, such as myself to do our own analysis considering our own national interests and working for the strengthening of our national, economy, education and political structures. They rejected everyone and all of my efforts because they were afraid they might produce results which may have upset their “thinking” masters or demonstrated their incompetence. They accepted all the unreasonable demands of the UN agencies, supposedly there to carry out SCR986, such as those which forced Kurdish children using Saddam’s school books with his pictures everywhere, interlaced with his propaganda without having the courage of tearing them up and publishing their own. They were even afraid of changing the Ba’ath laws, even the colour of the Taxi cars, and were terrified to use and exploit any of the abundant rivers and water ways for fear they might break Iraqi sovereignty.

 No one pointed out to them that the US and Britain were violating Iraqi sovereignty all the time and are planning not only to do so with massive force and huge armies but also by occupying the country for long or indefinite periods. The idea which the Kurds just accepted blindly was simple enough. The USA would attack Iraq, remove Saddam, install a new government from a number of highly dubious but Kurd-friendly characters and force a solution favourable to the two Kurdish parties and Bob’s your uncle! The devil was however in the details, which was to be worked out by the eggheads in the Pentagon and the State Department and Whitehall in Britain.

 No one within the Kurdish administrations actually considered or is capable of considering the complex mechanisms of the politics of the Middle East. Uncle Sam would deal with it all they thought. However, it is always dangerous for a mouse to walk very closely alongside an elephant. My warnings of Arab and Islamic backlashes, the opportunity for the Turks to take advantage of the situation and above all British duplicity which was quite apparent to me and which I warned against via several articles which I wrote over the last three years.

 I said at the time that the Kurds should avoid any upheaval but if a deal was offered they should have it in writing and countersigned by the British. However, we have seen recently that whereas the Americans seemed to be calling the shots and making the promises and spending a great deal of money and effort, the British were just quietly watching as if the matter did not even concern them. In reality they knew that without their complete agreement no deal with the US concerning Iraq would be worth the paper it was written on.

 In a more recent article I warned of a “Hornet’s Nest” being broken open in December 2002. In August of the same year I warned of a Sudden Attack of Nerves which could be Fatal. In an article entitled “For Queen and Country and He Kicked the America Out”, I warned in a satiric way that Tony Blair would stitch Bush up. In June 2002, I wrote an article entitled “Carta non-Magna”. In it I analysed the so called “The Federal Iraq Constitution” giving reasons for its impossibility which has now proved to be so.

 In November when the English translation appeared I wrote another article “The Placebo Effect” in which I stated that it is false to assume that Turkey or the Arab states would think of a Federal Kurdish State as anything less threatening than independence and that we Kurds should therefore keep what we have and make it permanent through unity, proper democratic Kurdish elections and opening up the country to all patriots to serve it. A colleague wrote saying that the Arab street did not matter for that would be an internal matter. Barham Saleh poked fun at the Arab street in one of his defeatist articles. The demonstrations in the Arab world, the polarisation of the political scene and the awakening of all our, then-dormant, enemies have proved that my analyses were the correct ones.

The Legal Path to Self-Determination

 I did not keep my advice to areas of national security only, but extended it to legal and international law areas too. I wrote concerning the legal ways of dealing with Iraqi and other threats in November 2001. Also in that year I warned against the very current situation we are in. In the same period I wrote openly asking America to develop its own Just Policies as a means of countering terrorism in the face of “old European and colonial practices.

 However, the most striking coincidence was in my article “Time to Consult God” published on Kurdishmedia.com on the 10^th. of September 2001, i.e. on the eve of 9:11. I recommend reading it to all my readers.

 As a result of my outspoken and frank articles, however, I have suffered loss of popularity with the two parties and their hangers on and am now in less favour, than I would have been had I written just praise and Hippocratic hand-licking articles.  For that irony I wrote an article “Shooting the messenger”, August 2001, in which I talk about the age-old practice of shooting the bearer of bad news.

Sacrificing Life and Limb without any valid reasons

 Six months ago the southern Kurds were looking forward to a false hope called “Federal Iraq”, implanted into their heads by the two party leaderships. They even concocted a “Federal Constitution” which they later had to discard because their “brotherly” Iraqi opposition friends rejected it and have now decided to leave the question to a dubious “democratic” future Iraqi parliament, which structure and substance are not at all clear, to be voted on by a Parliament which will have 80% Arabs and others to the 20% Kurds. A number of years ago I wrote an article “Fast Forward to the Past” talking about a race to take Kurdistan, through the intermediate stages, back to the Ottoman era by the Kurdish parties the British and the Turks. It seems the satire has now been turned into reality and strong efforts are being expended to take us back to the pre-1958 times when Iraq was ruled by a phoney Monarch, with a phoney parliament and a an even phonier democratic system.

 Thus, it has transpired that Kurdish aspirations all these years and the struggle, sacrifices and 80 years of oppression was really about taking us back to colonial times and had no basis or justification in International Law. But why is it that I am not surprised when this comes from the efforts of two parties with a long history of capitulation and defeatist philosophies?  

The Right Way

 I wrote objectively to help in an indirect way and published “The Right Course of Action” in which I suggested at the time (before the parties committed themselves) that the right course of action was for the first time in the history of the Kurdish struggles, No Action. By that I meant that whereas if you are suffering from occupation and oppression your best course of action is campaigns and struggles, south Kurdistan’s logical action, under the current circumstances would be to do nothing and not to take part in anything apart from the strengthening of the regional government which would only come about with unity, perseverance, dedicated work to alleviate the people’s suffering and intensive work to develop the country through concerted efforts shared by governments and all the citizens. I warned that any interference in Iraq and its regime change would open up all sorts of doors from which our enemies would attack and beat us. I even talked of the example of the Genie in the bottle and how the little boy who found it managed to get it back into the bottle and then recruit the services of the Genie.

 In October 2001 I wrote an article entitled “the Empire cannot strike back” in which I describe the great opportunity we have, as unique, in that whereas you could stop a nation from breaking free and deciding its own destiny by force and trickery, you cannot force them in this day and age to give up their freedom and go under someone else’s rule particularly an alien racist state which has massacred them in the past.

 International law does not permit it and in this day and age even super powers such as the USA are facing such resistance and outcry that they would be facing the wrath of the world including their closest allies when they try to introduce democracy to a foul system such as that of Saddam because of International Law. Therefore we need not have done anything apart from declaring that we did not in anyway wish to be involved with Iraq.

We had the Law on our side as well as world public opinion

 The fact that America, Britain and even France would not accept the forcing of our people under Iraq again; the success of the KRGs according to their known propaganda and the fact that the Kurds were managing without Iraq for a dozen years all would have been ample reason for allowing our Statelet to continue. The only fear was from Turkey but even Turkey is against any changes to the current status quo. Moreover, as long as Saddam remained we would not be allowed to go under.

 There are some who say that we could not fight America. This is true but it is also true of the Arab countries and Turkey. Furthermore, not everything needs a fight, especially disagreements between supposed friends and allies. This has not however stopped them from declaring their opposition to it. The Kurds and south Kurdistan are needed by the USA if they are to succeed. Therefore, they would not force the Kurds to accept a solution which the Kurds could prove to them logically to be detrimental to their interests.

 A great deal of time and effort has gone into orchestrating a few hundred individuals and presenting them as opposition forces by the Kurds. What they should have invested their time in is trying to build the administrations faculties including a strong international legal team to try and get the Oil for Food funds for the people and to get closer to their own people instead of isolating them and treating them as foreigners and outsiders. For that purpose I wrote the article “The danger of ignoring public opinion” on the 12^Th.  November, 2001.

Accountability! Where is it?

 A most important part of the struggle for recognition, not just by some foreign visitors who are full of flattery and praise of the rubberstamp parliament based on lies they are told by the administrations, but by the Kurdish people themselves. A functioning and legitimate parliament would sort out many of our ills. Even the suggestion that defunct and illegitimate as it is Parliament should and must be made accountable and even if you do not hold another election, at least the boundaries of constituencies ought to be drawn to allow the citizens to know which “MP” represents him or her.

 Today they and the two parties for that matter are not so sure if they will survive in any shape or form, either as a result of Iraqi attacks on free Kurdistan or war between the US and Iraqi troops conducted in their midst. Over the past number of years I have warned against complacency, total dependence on US and British brains to design and sponsor Kurdish policy, predicted the outcomes we have witnessed and advised of the possible ways of dealing with matters as they were then and as I predicted.

 Imperial colonialists blaming it all on the Americans

 The trap set by the British for their Anglo-Saxon American brothers and erstwhile colony, has caught the latter in complicated chaos, having awakened unfathomed hatred for everything American. Traditional and powerful European allies are openly and verbally attacking the US and its interests. The Arab world has been charged and electrified against them with millions burning US flags and chanting anti-American slogans. Their Turkish allies are against allowing them the use of their bases and lands. The entire world is up in arms demonstrating in their millions against American “imperialism” and “colonialism” which the once-colonial Europeans are far more guilty of than the Americans and practice until now.

 We are told by the Kurdish politicians that the Turks are planning to take south Kurdistan and annex it to themselves. We are told that this is the number one danger. But the fact of the matter is: Turkey’s reluctance to be drawn into the war and into south Kurdistan is markedly apparent. We have seen Turkish diplomacy for the first time attempting to stop the war. They are in favour of the status quo within which south Kurdistan has been thriving and functioning extremely well if we are to believe the two Kurdish administrations. Even at this late hour and 5 minutes before the midnight of war, Turkey is resisting far more than the Arab countries. The Kurdish administrations on the other hand have been begging the US to launch the war which they know would give the excuse and the pretext to Turkey to come into south Kurdistan.

 Indeed they have been frequently crawling to Ankara to take part promising that they would behave and never ask for their nation’s right to self-determination if only they agree to participate. These are the realities of the situation and anyone who ignores them would so at the nation’s peril. And the Kurds never seem to remind the Turks that they claim Kurds and Turks are one and the same yet while they demand that Iraq should not be divided ethnically or racially, they demand also that the Turcoman be treated entirely on racial grounds and be given power and the share of the oil.

 What makes matters worse is the fact that the Kurds have no plan B having closed the door in their own faces and burnt their bridges not only with the outside world but also with their own people in North Kurdistan and even with the ordinary people within South Kurdistan and having wasted twelve years during which they could have mobilised the majority of the population in every conceivable way to strengthen the home front and make the enemy think twice and thrice before taking us for granted.

 However, in the propaganda war supposedly conducted to assist the British and US determination to oust Saddam, the British and the rest of Europe have imposed a canopy of silence against any mention of the Kurds, dead or alive. Unlike the “dead” children of Baghdad, the Palestinian victims of Israel, and the Israeli victims of World War II, some sixty years ago, the Halabja and Genocide campaigns perpetrated by Saddam are off limits to the British media and press, except when anti-Saddam propaganda is needed and even then they are inserted into their reports as “Saddam’s “OWN” people”. Sadly, but quite characteristically, we never hear the KDP or PUK agents ever object to such foul statements.

 The Kurdish victims have no one to defend them or remind the world of them as do others constantly. Our political leaders do not have the time and will to address rallies in London and Paris and their supporters will not make a move without instructions form them. The Kurdish people have not only been gagged at home by the Kurdish administrations, but they do not have a defender among the Kurds here in the Diaspora either. Even so many would tear their hair out should you criticise them or suggest that we are anything but loyal Iraqis.

Our leaders have reduced the Kurdish people to people without dignity

 Recently I have read reports about the Iraqi Turcoman tribes warning the KDP against any attempt to take part in creating a “Federal Iraq”. I have seen and heard Assyrians verbally attacking the Kurds and Palestinians warning them of dire consequences should the Kurds ask for a fraction of what they are asking for.

 These people are doing so believing that the Kurds are a cowardly lot who can easily be scared into making concessions to anyone asking for them and even some who do not ask for them. This impression of course is the result of decades of the subservient attitudes of the party leaders who are ready to offer great concessions and appease even the wood mice, in the name of all Kurds, if ever they made a complaining noise against the “danger” of Kurdish “nationalism”. The great irony is, they are issuing these threats despite the strenuous denials by the two Kurdish parties of any intention or thought of calling for the nation’s right to self-determination, encouraged of course by their constant assertions that all the Kurds want to do is to preserve the unity of Arab lands and the integrity of an Arab state.

 Why not? Didn’t the parties fight tooth and nail against the PKK and northern Kurds to please their Turkish masters? Did they not lie and deceive their own people? Why then should they pretend to be so surprised when their enemies treat them with the same kind of contempt?

 Every one of the disasters and tight situations which have arisen and now seem to be untreatable were envisaged and warned against. Our political leaders were warned and advised but they only listen to their new American masters and their masters’ servants. The reader can go back to my articles, entitled Carta Non-Magna, in which I am rebutting the ideas of Federal States and pointing to the fact that all the neighbouring states as well as the Arab people of Iraq would stand in its way because they will realise that the “danger” to their “sovereignty and national security” as they would perceive would be exactly the same as if Independence is about to be declared. Thus, if appeasement and trickery is the aim we would be in no better state than if we actually declared independence. Even though I recommended that we should do nothing apart from strengthening the administrations, peacefully reject US plans to use our homeland for war purposes and skilfully avoid all the wrath and anger incurred by the world as a result of appearing to be happy and enthusing over the war against Iraq.

 On the question of Weapons of Mass Destruction I wrote an article “Weapons of Mass Deception” in a comment on the amount of deception which has been churned out which in my opinion is perhaps as dangerous to mankind as those of mass destruction themselves. Our own administrations were acting as just one such outlet and deceiving their own people. Their history is riddled with lies, cheating and plain deception against individuals as well as the entire nation. I also commented on the fact that the Arab street is far more sophisticated and aware of Arab issues than the Kurdish street if of Kurdish issues, which has been cowed into capitulation and defeatism and will reject the Kurds’ drive to lead Iraq’s reconstruction or influence its future makeup.  

 And finally, the dear old weapons inspector and his Arab assistant. Here too I expected a farce and we all got a great big one. Even before they started their routines I wrote “Inspector has Blinks” and sure enough he did. The useless and repeat journeys made by the white land-cruisers as I expected would turn up nothing. The Pink Panther thief would as I envisaged play a comic cat and mouse game which confused them so much that they have been visiting the same unlikely mid-Baghdad sites dozens of times without realising they have done so. And the conclusion is inevitably: Iraq is clean of all weapons of mass destruction. And the inspectors get out with a great big pot of Iraqi gold as a result.

 The job of every planner is to determine his objectives, gather the important facts, analyse them and make the correct conclusions before deciding what system he is going to use, evaluating the possible success or failure of his system and prepare all the necessary contingency measures (plan Bs) and then start implementing his plans. Unfortunately we have a total of zero planners in Kurdistan and a large number of demagogues whose main function is to talk you out of any plan or action on the basis that they do not think it could work. On the day however and caught in a panic they will jump into the problem heads first and leave the nation to pay the price. This they do without ever putting pen to paper, but just through gut feeling. The result has been “A Kurdish no Plan Zone”.

 Today the only hope is that the USA has agreed to give the Turks a large cheque but stick up two fingers to them once they have done what they wish to do and secured Baghdad. That would be the wisest thing America has never done before. This time we hope they have learnt that the reason they are in the current mess is because of propping up and appeasing vile fascist dictatorships such as Saddam’s while ignoring the wish and will of the nations. Therefore they must never back the old world order ever again.

To the Kurdish Nation Everywhere – There is No Going Back!

 A Real and Present Danger awaits you. The leaders have let you down very badly, time after time, throughout their history. Your enemies are lurking among you and all around you. You must defend yourselves by all means possible. You are a nation of 40 million braves and thousands of years of history. You deserve your full and unfettered freedom just as do others, such as the Palestinians, and their twenty two already fully independent states; the Bosnians; the East Timor people and the rest of the world.

 You should be free just as all the other members of the body of nations including some who number a tiny fraction of your population and homeland. International Law is on your side despite what your leaders tell you. The reason they do not demand your rights is because they would lose favour with your enemies if they did. The entire world accepts and expects all peoples and nations to be free. That is why your leaders, coached by your enemies constantly proclaim in your name that you are a weird and strange nation who does not want freedom. And that is why you have no friends because they give everyone the impression that you are abnormal and illogical. They ask the world to pity you rather than respect you and recognise your legitimate rights. They bargain away your rights claiming that you do not deserve more than what your enemies allow you.

 Therefore you must stand up and be counted and prove that you are every bit as human as they are and confident of your rights. You should not accept less than anyone else and do not believe anyone who tells you the time is not right to demand your full freedom. There will never be a better time than now. Tear up the imperialist deals made behind your back, which have sold you to your evil enemies. Kick the colonialists out, the large and the small of them. Let your leaders go and live like servants of the enemy if they wish but refuse to join them in their lowly and despicable existence.

 Stand up like brave and free men and women. Liberate your minds from the fear and capitulation, which your leaders have instilled in them. Reject enemy propaganda and lies. Never capitulate or accept defeatism or any forms of slavery and subservience. Make it absolutely clear that a leadership, which is constantly selling you and your homeland down the drain cannot continue to have your trust and support. Demand your complete salvation and accept nothing less. Do not fear your enemies for they are more afraid of you than you are of them. If your freedom means discomfort and is inconvenient for those who are only on your soil to steal from you and rape your resources then so be it. If you die then you should not care who else dies with you because you are in your own homeland and they are invaders who should not be there.

 Do not be pushed into dark little holes just to survive, afraid of everything and everyone. Freedom has its price and we must not be afraid to make sacrifices. Both your current leaders and your enemies are conniving to convince you that your situation is hopeless and that no one will protect or help you, should you decide to be free. That is a total and singularly despicable falsehood. You must protect and defend yourselves and your freedom with all means at your disposal. The freedom you obtained during the last twelve years was by the blood of your fathers and forefathers, not least in Halabja and the Anfal regions and after centuries of oppression. It is that freedom your leaders are now bargaining away without even asking you or knowing for what.

 You can only live once but life is not worth a straw if you live like animals kept in a stable while all others enjoy life to the full and your leaders are living like royalty. They are the beloved blue-eyed boys of your fiercest enemies who would survive and prosper while your life will become more and more miserable even if you survive.

 The Turks, Iraqis or Western imperialists will threaten you with death but if they are not afraid of you then you should not fear them because Right is on Your Side and you are defending your family and loved ones as well as your land and honour. While they are aggressors and have their eyes on your assets and resources, which is the only reason they are interested in you. You should, therefore, not let them take your homeland without a fight to the end. People all over the world, including your enemies and the superpowers behind them defend their homelands with their lives. If they are prepared to die to steal your homeland then you should be prepared to die to protect and defend it. They expect you to do that or they will despise you and ignore you.

 The Turks are ready to come into your homeland and kill you to steal your wealth. The British and American men and women go to the end of the world to take other peoples’ assets and only give up or retreat, when their noses are bloodied or suffer casualties. Often the least advanced nations have with their courage and determination defeated the most powerful armies. All you need to do however is to defend your own homeland and people with resilience and determination. If you have to die by gassing or genocide helpless and like sheep then you should die for your homeland and your people for if you do not defend it you will still be killed.

 There is no safety for cowards. There is no hiding place for people without honour. There is no life under the boot of the occupiers. Do not believe all the ridiculous stories about brotherhood of this or that occupier for brothers do not come and steal your homes and rape your women and soil your honour and kill you with all manner of banned weaponry. Your misguided leaders want to disarm you with lies and nonsense to further plans to become rich and powerful and you should see through what they are doing. Everyone else including the Americans have realised what liars, greedy and selfish lot they have been which is why they are now abandoning you because of their behaviour and not of yours.

 They have never been able to achieve anything for you apart from humiliation, death and destruction, which they are about to inflict upon you again having got unbelievably rich as a result of your heroic sacrifices of 1991.

 So organise yourselves and fortify your homes. The world is no longer closed backstreets where aggressors and mass murderers can kill and commit Genocide without being noticed. Any significant killing of your people by your enemies will turn American occupational plans upside down and will force them to think twice and thrice before allowing it to happen. Do not make it easy for everyone or indeed anyone to walk all over you and make no account for you. Make sure the world press and media are there to see all. Persevere and stand firm for your full rights and no one on the planet can stop you from achieving your legitimate goals.

 Store up food and drink. Secure the roads of your cities and towns and be alert. Do not trust anyone who does not belong to your society or is an intruder. Set up groups of civil defence units and do not rely only on the Party members for as usual, at the first shot they will leave the country for the safety of Tehran or somewhere else. Do not take any punishment lying down or forgive anyone who harms you, your children or your family. Your enemies will not forgive you for anything they may do to you and are there primarily to choke and kill you if they can. Remember your own leaders have done nothing or very little to protect you or to serve your interests. Remember they have been constantly claiming falsely in your name that you are subhuman, do not wish for freedom and will protect the lands of your enemy and sacrifice your own homeland and nation for those who do not accept you as equals or even as free human beings.

 Most importantly you must put an end to the cycle of Genocide and murders committed against you and your loved ones and you can do so with a single comprehensive and gigantic uprising against all your enemies. If you do that, the whole world will respect your determination and will support your goals because other than you they are all free and free people like and respect only the brave and the free.

 Your freedom can only be achieved if you want it enough and do all you can for it. Half or suspect solutions have failed to work with your enemies. All the suspect and blundering tactics and solutions, which have been tried by cowardly men, have failed throughout history. Only the determined and the brave can win the day and throughout your ancient history you have proved to be brave and capable of standing upto your enemies.

 Remember Salladeddin! Remember the ancient Kurds who defeated many times their number and kept Kurdistan free for thousands of years until the enemies penetrated your society and started planting doubt and cowardice among you. This is your hour so let it be your finest. Do not wait for another opportunity and make your mind up!

 I call the Kurdish nation in all occupied zones to support and work with each other and to throw out their oppressors once and for all. If Palestinian children can fight their enemy’s tanks and planes with stones then so can you. After all it was the Kurds who taught them the values of freedom and kicking out the invaders. Today everyone support an Independent Palestine. Your determination and resilience will make them support an Independent Kurdistan also.

 Do not allow anyone to persuade you to swing between your enemies either. Reject all of your enemies. Throw them out with all your might. You can do it if you want your freedom. Once they are out then negotiate peace but not before. International law and treaties are never meant to enslave you. But there are people who interpret them to mean your enslavement then reject them with all your might. Rise up so the world will see that you refuse to accept the fate of slaves because such oppressive and unjust laws, treaties and conventions are against all human and heavenly rights.

Tell anyone who tries to convince you to accept slavery quoting nonsense such as “Respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of some other state or another which include your homeland or parts of it” to go to hell. No one has any rights over Kurdish territory or lands. Such stupid notions imply that you and your family and your nation are all someone else’s property and that is against all basic human rights and justice. If anyone claiming to represent you supports such nonsense then you know he is only a servant of your slave-masters and no leader or representative of yours. Even the super powers do not respect anyone’s sovereignty when they want to achieve a goal. A prime example is the current US and British plan to attack Iraq.

 To the people of south Kurdistan I say. Go out onto the streets, squares and main roads. Lie down before the tanks to stop them; all the tanks and dare them to drive over you. They cannot kill everyone. Call their bluff and oppose them with all your might. There are five million of you and only a few thousands of them but you also have people power, the Law, Right and Justice are on your side. One man defending his homeland bravely is better than a hundred invaders with no cause to attack.

 Forward to freedom there must be no going back! May God bless you and Kurdistan.