Iran Tests Iraqi Resolve at the Border

[Guest guest]

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/17/world/middleeast/17border.html?ref=world

Iran Tests Iraqi Resolve at the Border

By TIMOTHY WILLIAMS and NAMO ABDULLA

Published: June 16, 2010

ALI RASH, Iraq — This remote village high in the rugged mountains along the

border with Iran has been deserted, its people having fled Iranian air and

artillery bombardments with everything they could carry and whatever livestock

that could be coaxed down the steep mountain trails.

Now the hundreds of Kurds who left Ali Rash and other mountain villages are

living in sweltering refugee camp tents. They are at the center of questions

about whether Iraq is willing or able to defend its borders with Iran — which

has repeatedly breached the frontier in recent months.

The attacks on Ali Rash and at least a dozen other Kurdish villages have

continued for more than a month and have included a foray by Iranian tanks one

mile into Iraqi territory. But they have elicited only a tepid protest from

Iraq's government, including the release of a statement pleading with

neighboring countries to honor its borders.

The Iranian government has said its bombing campaigns are necessary to weaken

Kurdish guerrillas that strike in Iran and take refuge in Iraq. The only

confirmed casualty has been a 14-year-old girl.

The incursions, though, come at a critical time for Iraq — amid the political

stalemate over who should lead the next government more than three months after

a divided electorate cast ballots, and less than three months before the

American military is scheduled to withdraw its last combat soldier from the

country.

United States forces continue to patrol portions of Iraq's 910-mile frontier

with Iran, but in the Qandil Mountain villages that have suffered the brunt of

the Iranian offensive, there are no American, Iraqi or Kurdish soldiers — and

the refugees say they are getting little help.

" We have been left on our own, " said Bahar Ibrahim, 27, a refugee from Ali Rash,

who is eight months pregnant.

In the villages of Ali Rash and Sharkhan, craters from Iranian munitions dot the

ground in pastures and around crude stone houses.

The hundreds of people who lived in the villages are now in refugee camps. Only

a few stray horses remain. Even the honeybees have been taken to safer places.

On the hillsides, where villagers grew wheat, the ground is scorched black.

The shelling here continues a trend of Iranian border incursions during the past

13 months that have included a helicopter attack on Kurdish villages in northern

Iraq last May, and the occupation by Iranian soldiers of part of the Fakka oil

field in southeastern Iraq for three days last December.

Last month, Iranian troops engaged in a firefight with the pesh merga, the

Kurdish security forces, along the frontier before capturing and briefly

detaining a pesh merga soldier. Iranian forces said they had misidentified the

soldier as a member of the guerrilla group, the Party of Free Life of Kurdistan,

more commonly known by its abbreviation, P.J.A.K.

The P.J.A.K., which is seeking greater Kurdish self-determination in Iran, and

its sibling group, the Kurdistan Workers Party, or P.K.K., which is fighting for

Kurdish autonomy in Turkey, use remote outposts in Iraq's semiautonomous Kurdish

region to carry out attacks, according to the Iranian and Turkish governments.

Turkey also bombs border areas in Iraq in pursuit of rebels. On Wednesday,

clashes were reported between Turkish troops and P.K.K. fighters, which led to

the deaths of four guerrillas and a Turkish soldier. Afterward, the Turkish

military said it had dropped bombs in Iraq's Kurdish region and its soldiers had

crossed more than one mile into Iraq to pursue guerrillas. The Kurdish guerrilla

groups have been listed as terrorist organizations by the United States

government, though the P.J.A.K. has had contact with American officials as

recently as four years ago.

The P.J.A.K. maintains that its attacks into Iran have been justified.

" We never kill civilians, " said Haval Kalhwr, a P.J.A.K. spokesman. " We are

engaged in a defensive war which is internationally defined as legal. "

Officials in Iraq's Kurdish region have criticized Baghdad for not doing more to

persuade the authorities in Iran to halt the attacks. The Kurdish regional

officials here also deny that they harbor guerrillas.

" The bombardment has continued, which means that the Iraqi government has not

taken a serious position on this matter, " said Twana Ahmad, a spokesman for

Barham Salih, prime minister of the Kurdistan regional government.

Iran has announced several times during the past six weeks that it has halted

the bombing, only to resume it a day or so later, according to residents of the

village and Kurdish officials.

Kurdish refugees say that because the bombs have burned their wheat fields and

killed livestock, even when the bombardment ends it will be years before the

villages will be economically secure again.

In the meantime, they get water from relief agencies and buy food from itinerant

traders who charge twice the price found in markets.

Some have been living in tents for weeks, and health officials say unsanitary

conditions in the camps may lead to the outbreak of disease.

Sabria Salih, 26, who has an 8-month-old child, said Ali Rash — the village she

fled from more than four weeks ago — had come under heavy attack from Iranian

forces.

" We have left almost everything behind, " she said. " We have only some blankets. "

She said the Iranian government was mistaken if it believed that the villagers

were hiding guerrillas.

" No P.J.A.K. has been killed or injured in the attacks, " she said. " And no one

has ever seen P.J.A.K. in our village. "

Zaid Thaker contributed reporting.

[Guest guest]

Not much about this in the media here in the US. This could turn really nasty if Iran, and probably Turkey, decide to go on the offensive against the Kurds. My fear is that they will wait until we draw down troops later this year and leave only about 30,000 in Iraq. That sounds like a lot, but considering the tooth to tale ratio, that could mean only 5,000 combat troops. Given the size of the Iranian military and the sheer numbers of Iraqis, our force could be either contained in its bases or overrun. Certainly it could be cut off from supply overland and by air if the Iranians sent in some missile crews. For that matter, they could also attack our shipping in the Persian Gulf. What with our incredible shrinking Navy of about 200 ships (down from nearly 600 under Reagan), any losses would really tell. Iran could also bully its Arab neighbors by conventional ballistic missiles. A few SCUDS landing in Riyadh (sp) could convince the Saudis to kick our troops out since they aren't at all popular there anyway.

In a message dated 6/16/2010 11:48:52 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, no_reply writes:

Iran Tests Iraqi Resolve at the Border