Turkey Closer To Invading Northern Iraq After Kurdish Rebels Kill 12 Soldiers

Times of London:

The prospect of Turkey invading northern Iraq drew closer today after Kurdish rebels killed at least 12 soldiers in an ambush, blowing up a bridge near the Iraqi border as a military convoy crossed.

The Turkish Prime Minister flew back to Ankara for an emergency summit with military leaders after the attack, in which another 16 troops were injured in heavy fighting and, according to unconfirmed reports, a further 10 were missing, believed kidnapped. In a separate incident in the same province today at least 17 people were injured when a mine blew up a wedding convoy.

Read the whole story: Times of London

Comments

[getoffmedz]

10:28 AM on 10/22/2007

Turkey has been sending troops into Iraq for a week or two and is in the process of massing 100,000 combat troops along the Turkey/Iraq border. They are supported by heavy armor, F-16s and Russian advisers (aka "contractors") probably to assist with the use of thermobaric ordinance they recently acquired.

The U.S. is too over-extended in Iraq to prevent this Turkish oil grab in the North which is another crime against the people of Iraq. Northern Iraq was only stable region of Iraq.

Heckofajob, Bush/Cheney.

[Observer1]

05:09 AM on 10/22/2007

George Bush is a genius!! He knows how to use the American people and how gullible they are.
How come no millions marchers to Washington.??
How come Obama doesn't organize a group?? Or Hillary or any one of the other idiots.

George Bush is a great businessman.

Any fool can sell something he has and that they want. That is not business.....BUT
To sell people something that you don't have and they don't want, that is business... WW111.

[watchingthings]

12:04 AM on 10/22/2007

So the Kurds want to carve themselves out a country by stealing it from 2 other countries. At least they are in the right part of the world for this. Another set of people carved themselves out a country in the area just after the 2cnd world war. The displaced people....who were chased off the land to make room for this new country are still pissed off today. Who could have foreseen that. One would have thought they would have forgotten about it already.....but nooo.......they still keep lobbing rockets into their ex-country.

[RegularFolk]

12:19 AM on 10/22/2007

Are you talking about Jordan. They took land from the Palestinians.

[BuyRubles]

08:34 AM on 10/22/2007

have you ever been denied the right to teach English? do you know anyone that has been brutally forced by a government adopt a particular culture? have you ever been treated like a second-class citizen? unless you've experienced being treated like an animal, don't deny the kurds the right to carve out a country of their own.

[getoffmedz]

10:38 AM on 10/22/2007

watchingthings - I'll bet you don't even know a Kurd much less an Iraqi?

You speak from your rectum.

Buzz off.

[JaneaneTheAcerbicGoblin]

11:33 PM on 10/21/2007

Bill Kristol will soon say...

The way to solve this Kurd/Turk war is to invade Iran...

[GenericBlogger]

02:26 AM on 10/22/2007

After Willie Kristol consults daddy Irving.

[wmbear]

10:31 PM on 10/21/2007

WE SHOULD TELL THE TURKS THEY CAN ***HAVE*** IRAQ!...

And good luck to ya! 'Bye now....

[wmbear]

10:22 PM on 10/21/2007

I THOUGHT TURKEY ***ALREADY*** INVADED NORTHERN IRAQ...

We kept seeing these stories about Turkish troops crossing the border into Iraq. Was this NOT an invasion, or what?....

[getoffmedz]

08:29 PM on 10/21/2007

Read this carefully -

http://www.botas.gov.tr/eng/about.asp

This Turkish invasion of Northern Iraq is ALL ABOUT THE OIL!

If Turkey can secure the wells in Northern Iraq and the control of the reserves there it means $trillions of dollars of increased revenue for Turkey.

Simple as that.

The U.S. lied to get us into Iraq and Turkey has learned from the Bush/Cheney swine herd very well.

[nefertiti]

06:48 PM on 10/21/2007

brooklyncitizen

they have been friends and allies for a long long time via Moti Zaken (who is a kurdish Jew very close to Aipac ) and Jeff Goldburg

http://abutamam.blogspot.com/2005/12/corrosive-israeli-mossad-in-iraqi.html

[nick1936]

05:35 PM on 10/21/2007

If we can go after the folks that attacked us on 99=11 why can't the Turks go after those who attack them. Oh shit i forgot Iraq didn't attack us and those who did along with the Saudis are still running free even after the chimp said we would get them DEAD OR ALIVE it's been 6 years folks.the trolls keep drinking the Kool Aid an supporting this cocksucker

[godlessclif]

04:29 PM on 10/21/2007

Kill the kurds, they are a pain in the butt.

[Peabodies]

04:19 PM on 10/21/2007

World conquest, yes. How laughable, if it weren't so tragic.

[Peabodies]

03:07 PM on 10/21/2007

What if "they" gave a war, and nobody CARED? Because wars are now media-driven, like sports -- our side, their side. But if we all screamed B*llshit and TURNED OFF our radio, TV and stopped buying newspapers, the "war" provocations would peter out, for lack of interest. I'm serious.

[MtDavid]

02:39 PM on 10/21/2007

But there is a problem.
One tragic consequence of the Bush Administration's invasion and occupation of Iraq is that we have changed international law(lessness).
Now, anytime a country's "leaders" feel the need for a nice little preemptive war...

Will humans ever reject violence as a means to resolve problems?

[getoffmedz]

09:10 PM on 10/21/2007

Read this carefully -

http://www.botas.gov.tr/eng/about.asp

This Turkish invasion of Northern Iraq is ALL ABOUT THE OIL!

If Turkey can secure the wells in Northern Iraq and the control of the reserves there it means $trillions of dollars of increased revenue for Turkey.

Simple as that.

The U.S. lied to get us into Iraq and Turkey has learned from the Bush/Cheney swine herd very well.

[CeeCee]

01:59 PM on 10/21/2007

On the face of it it looks like Turkey is blackmailing the U.S. again, i.e. "Do what we want or else" (don't recognize the Armenian Genocide as a genocide). It wouldn't be the first time Turkey has given the U.S. the finger. The mystery is why the U.S. insists on this toxic "friendship".

But, wait, maybe it isn't the usual blackmail Forked-tongue Turkey is so good at. Maybe they have a plan:

To get rid of the Kurds. And then deny it.

(You all know, of course, that the Kurdish language is forbidden under heavy penalty in Turkey. Kurds are not allowed to speak their own language. It's anti-Turkish, dontcha know! If you were a Kurd, you'd be fighting these people too.)

[Ping]

07:19 PM on 10/21/2007

To the Turks the Kurds are terrorists.

[LIR]

07:54 PM on 10/21/2007

The old axiom that one man's freedom fighter is another's terrorist applies...

[brooklyncitizen]

01:42 PM on 10/21/2007

Israel has been training and arming the Kurds since 2004. Seymour Hersh reported on this in the New Yorker a few years ago.

This of course puts US in a bit of a pickle since Turkey their closest Muslim ally, is where much of the staging for the current Iraq invasion occcurs. Turkish bases are used for transporting all sorts of goods for the invasion.

One wonders if the Dem's call for a resolution on the Armenian massacre by Turkey isn't a way of forcing Trukey's hand to stop aiding and abetting neo-con interests in Iraq (and maybe in Iran) thereby making it more impossible to carry on this war.Turkey, without question, will not be as "fiendly" to US govt if the resolution is passed.

And now this. It will be intersting to see if wha happens whn the Turks go into Iraq.

[MajorKong]

03:19 PM on 10/21/2007

Which is odd, because Israel is also an ally of Turkey.

[Ping]

07:17 PM on 10/21/2007

Odd how the US media isn't labeling the Kurds as the terrorists they are.