Gobble-gobble

And Turkey has made the first move in preparing for its own invasion of northern Iraq. Hey, if the US can unilaterally invade a country for reasons of national self-defense, then why can't other nations do so as well?

Turkish Leaders Sending Military Observers to Kirkuk Link to a NYT article.

"URGUP, Turkey, April 10 — Turkish leaders said today that they were sending military observers to monitor Kurdish forces in the Iraqi city of Kirkuk, while American officials worked to discourage Turkey from any steps more provocative than that.

On a day of potentially critical developments for the stability of northern Iraq, Turkey's foreign minister, Abdullah Gul, said that he had sought fresh assurances from Secretary of State Colin L. Powell that coalition forces would control Kirkuk.

"We have reminded them of their guarantee," Mr. Gul pointedly told reporters, referring to American vows that the oil-rich northern Iraqi cities of Mosul and Kirkuk would not be controlled by Iraqi Kurds, as seemed to be the case today.

Mr. Gul added that Mr. Powell, who placed a telephone call to him, pledged to send American forces into Kirkuk within hours. Mr. Gul said that Turkish leaders felt "no reason for any concerns" about the solidness of that promise.

But in other comments throughout a tense day in Turkey, Mr. Gul and Turkish leaders also made clear that Turkey would be willing to send its own troops into northern Iraq if it felt that such an action was vital to Turkish interests." (more in the full article)

OK, kids, listen up. We set a bad example. On what grounds shall we oppose Turkey moving to defend its own domestic stability? Of course, if Turkey invades, well, kiss NATO good-bye, and the EU begins to be threatened. Not that Bush-baby and his pack of thugs, neo-imperialists, and cronies would mind seeing international unions and organizations crumble, oh no. All the less to get in our rapacious way, my dear.

The US needs to get the fuck out of Iraq, and the UN needs to step in (and into Afghanistan, too) and give the populations of the countries a fighting chance to establish ordinary lives. Hell, the UN should go into the West Bank and make the "settlers" (squatters, thieves, invaders) get the fuck off of the Palestinians' property. Returning those few hundred square miles of land to its rightful owners would go a very long way to clearing up a great deal of the trouble in the region.

But right now Turkey is the big issue, because it has already said it will invade if it feels threatened. The world is never as simple as it looks from the end of a gun or the inside of a Bradley.

Ang