Iran, Iraq: Turkey, the U.S. and the Kurdish Wedge

Iran, Iraq: Turkey, the U.S. and the Kurdish Wedge
August 21, 2007 Stratfor Global Intelligence Brief
Turkish and Iraqi media are reporting active shelling by Iranian military forces into areas of northern Iraq where Kurdish rebels are hiding out. For now, it appears Iranian military action in northern Iraq will not go beyond the scope of shelling and artillery fire -- a periodic exercise the Iranians undertake to prove their worth to Turkey and exacerbate tensions between Washington and Ankara. The current spate of shelling reportedly started up around Aug. 14. The last Iranian military offensive in northern Iraq occurred June 8, when Iranian aircraft bombed Kurdish rebel hideouts a day after Turkish forces conducted hot-pursuit operations across the Iraqi border. An Iranian army helicopter crashed near the northern Iraqi border Aug. 18 while engaged in an operation against the Party of Free Life of Kurdistan (PJAK) and Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) rebels, leaving six security force members dead. The Iranian military labeled the helicopter crash a technical failure, which followed another Iranian helicopter crash in February that killed 14 army personnel, including Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commanders. This causes a great deal of embarrassment for Tehran, whose military is notorious for mechanical failures because of shortages of U.S. parts and hardware. The aggressive operations in northern Iraq allow the Iranians to save face from the incident and flex their muscles in the region. The thought of Iranian troops venturing across the border to carry out military operations will also allow Iran to unnerve Washington. Any hint of an Iranian military incursion into Iraq could create a crisis in Washington and Baghdad over Iranian threats and the U.S. inability to respond to those threats. The Iranian regime knows how U.S. politics are played, and is watching the scene in Washington closely for a window of opportunity to increase its leverage in the Iraq talks. The Iranians recently also have been putting much effort into strengthening ties with Turkey, which they see as their fellow non-Arab regional powerbroker. A prevalent theme in Iranian Friday prayers over the past few weeks has been the common ties that Turkey and Iran share as Islamic governments given the recent parliamentary win of the Islamist-rooted Justice and Development Party in Turkey. The prayers also have emphasized the need for the two countries to join to resist foreign elements, e.g., the United States. Iranian and Turkish officials also spent the weekend discussing ways to deepen energy cooperation, much to the consternation of Washington. While Iran is heavily playing up the uptick in Iranian-Turkish cooperation, the Turks are proceeding with caution in their relations with Iran. Ankara prefers to downplay these agreements, using these gestures toward Tehran as a way to pressure Washington into doing more to contain the Kurdish rebel threat in northern Iraq. Though Iraq's Kurdish leadership has an interest in bringing as much international attention to these Iranian aggressions as possible, it probably has had implicit knowledge of these operations for some time. There is little love lost between the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Iraq and PKK and PJAK rebels. The Kurds often can be their own worst enemy, and Kurdish factions in Iraq have been known to pit these rebel groups against each other in their own internal fights. Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki led a delegation to Turkey on Aug. 14 to discuss with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan what can be done on the Iraqi side to help contain the PKK. Al-Maliki's delegation included Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, a Kurd, who privately agreed on behalf of the KRG to allow commando operations against the PKK along the Turkish-Iraqi border.