Kurdistan: A Rivalry Reborn [STRATFOR ANALYSIS]

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turn a blind eye to, jihadist attacks in Iraqi Kurdistan in a bid to undermine investor confidence, Kurdish security and intelligence can still put up a formidable defense against threats from both jihadists and Iraqi national forces — that is, at least until Baghdad develops its air force and regains the military bandwidth to refocus on the north.

The speed and cunning with which the pipeline was completed demand respect, even — however reluctantly — from an outraged Baghdad. At the same time, the geopolitical tectonic plates are shifting once again in this volatile region, promising to complicate the energy strategy engineered by Arbil and Ankara down the line.

Iran may have been too distracted to balance Turkey in Kurdish lands over the past decade, but the coming years will look different. Iran and the United States are both serious about reaching a strategic rapprochement in their long-hostile relationship. Though there will be obstacles along the way, the foundation for a U.S.-Iranian detente has been laid. Turkey is already starting to adapt to the shifting balance of power, struggling to reach an accommodation with Baghdad, Tehran and Washington over the thorny issue of how payments from this new export pipeline will be handled. For now, the United States is trying to avoid becoming entangled in this political morass, prioritizing its negotiation with Iran while publicly maintaining a “one Baghdad, one Iraq” policy. But with time, the United States will regain its ability to manage a balance of power between Shiite Iran and Sunni competitors such as Turkey and Saudi Arabia. The more U.S.-Iranian relations progress, the more time and attention Iran can give to strong-arming regional allies, like Baghdad, in the face of a deepening Turkish footprint in northern Iraq.

The age-old Turkic-Persian rivalry will reawaken in Kurdistan as Iran reinforces its Shiite allies in Baghdad to pressure the Kurds, using military operations in its own Kurdish region to justify cross-border interventions. Iran is also already starting to discuss energy exploration in the border region with Iraqi Kurdistan, asserting that if Arbil has a problem with such activities, it can take it up with Baghdad. But the sharpest tools Iran and its allies in Baghdad have to undermine Turkey’s alliance with the Kurdistan Regional Government are the Kurds themselves.

The past decade of Kurdish unity between Massoud Barzani’s Kurdistan Democratic Party and Jalal Talabani’s Patriotic Union of Kurdistan is highly anomalous and arguably temporary. Iraq’s Kurdish region has effectively been split between the Barzani and Talabani fiefs politically, militarily and economically, with the Kurdistan Democratic Party ruling the northern provinces of Dohuk and Arbil and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan ruling Suleimaniyah to the south. Though the two parties have demonstrated the ability to suppress their rivalry in times of extreme stress or opportunity, the fault lines that intersect this fractious Kurdish landscape are still present. On the surface, the Kurdistan Democratic Party and Patriotic Union of Kurdistan have united their peshmerga forces into a single, unified ministry. In reality, the political lines dividing Peshmerga forces remain sharper than ever. Further complicating matters is the political rise of the Gorran movement, a faction that broke away from the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan now that the latter is suffering from a leadership vacuum. Though the Gorran can only claim votes at this point, it is only a matter of time before it, too, develops its own peshmerga forces, creating an even wider imbalance of power among Iraq’s main Kurdish parties.

The cracks in the Kurdish landscape will be exploited the more competition grows between Turkey and Iran. One does not even have to reach far back in history to get a sense of just how deep Kurdish rivalries can run. The Kurdistan Democratic Party and Patriotic Union of Kurdistan were engaged in an all-out civil war from 1994 to 1996 that arose from a property dispute. More willing to turn to their regional adversary than compromise with their ethnic kin, the Kurdistan Democratic Party reached out to Ankara for assistance, while the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan took help from Iran and even Saddam Hussein. Those fault lines have tempered since the fall of Hussein, but the influx of oil money into an already highly corrupt and competitive leadership, a growing imbalance of power among the main Kurdish parties and a developing rivalry between regional forces Turkey and Iran will apply enormous stress on the Kurds’ brittle union.

Sober Reminders

For now, Kurdish and Turkish officials and energy executives alike will brush these inconvenient warnings aside; their eyes will remain set on the hundreds of thousands of barrels of crude and billions of cubic meters of natural gas lying beneath Kurdistan’s rocky surface. From their point of view, how could Baghdad refuse the commercial benefits of another viable export line out of Iraq? It’s only a matter of time, they say, until Baghdad comes to the negotiating table on Ankara’s and Arbil’s terms and a win-win solution is achieved.

But matters of territorial integrity, financial sovereignty and nationalism are not easily trifled with at the intersection of empires. This is easy to forget when watching heavy concrete blocks being lifted by cranes over Arbil, a bubble of a city where two five-star hotels are filled with expats and Versace-clad locals who look like they belong in a “coming soon” promotion on the oil riches about to be bestowed on Iraqi Kurdistan.

Just a few miles from that glitzy scene is a crowded, smoke-filled cafeteria filled with women in head scarves, screaming children and a mix of men wearing business suits and the traditional Shal-u-Shepik style of baggy trousers with thick bands around the waist. Carts filled with tea in tulip-shaped glasses, warm sheets of flatbread, Kurdish kabob, hummus, cucumbers and radishes rattle noisily through a maze of long tables. Across from me, a young Kurdish man with bright eyes and an American flag on his phone fidgets in his seat. After a long pause, he says, “you know … we have a saying here. Kurdistan is a tree. After a long time, we grow tall, we become full of green leaves and then the tree shrivels and becomes bare. Right now, our leaves are green. Give it enough time. This tree won’t die, but our leaves will fall to the ground again.”

Editor’s Note: Writing in George Friedman’s stead this week is Reva Bhalla, vice president of Global Analysis.

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