OEI - Turkey will invade Iraq
Yesterday I posted Open-Ended Issues — Middle East — v 1.0 — Part 1 (Technical). Today I added a new Open-Ended Issue, “Turkey will invade - the Kurdish region of - Iraq“.
My IDEA (Integral Dynamics’ Estimated Assessment) about this potential event is:
Probability of “Turkey will invade - the Kurdish region of - Iraq“: Unlikely, with a Moderate Confidence.
Impact on “The current regime in Iraq will collapse“: Weak, with a Moderate Confidence.
Key arguments regarding Probability of “Turkey will invade - the Kurdish region of - Iraq“: Unlikely, with a Moderate Confidence.
Incrasing the probability
- The Iraqi foreign minister claims that 140,000 Turkish troops are massing on the border.
- Many Turkish generals think the government should go in, and so do senior politicians in the main opposition party.
- In the Turkey’s Kurdish region there is a civil war / a struggle against terrorism / a fight for freedom going on for more than 20 years.
- Two Turkish soldiers were killed just days ago, by Kurdish fighters.
- Turkish military says the Kurdish guerrillas - the PKK, who have long holed up in the mountains - now operate with impunity from within Iraq itself.
- The Turkish military see the existence of Kurdistan in Iraq as both an immediate strategic threat and a political one.
Decreasing the probability
- The Iraqi Kurds are Americans’ most important and most loyal allies within Iraq.
- Turkey invading Iraq has been ramped up as an election issue. A stick to beat the ruling AK party with, as too scared to stand up for Turkish interests, too craven to defy the Americans, unwilling to pursue and destroy the terrorists.
- The idea of a land invasion seems fanciful. Surely a few special forces, or air strikes or artillery barrages would do the job better
- Talk of invasion does worry the Americans. Not just because it would destabilise the one region of Iraq that could be called almost stable, but because their latest “surge” in Baghdad relies on Kurdish fighters. If these felt their homeland was threatened they might go home, forgetting to drop their American weapons on the way, and leave the surge, well… distinctly un-surgey.
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