Q&A ABOUT REPERCUSSIONS OVER TURKISH GENOCIDE RESOLUTION

Kansas City Star, MO
Oct 12 2007

A U.S. House committee this week endorsed a measure that declares
the mass killings of Armenians by Turks almost a century ago to
be genocide.

This has always been a hugely sensitive matter with the Turks, who
insist that while many Armenians died in the hardships of the times,
it is not correct to label it genocide.

Turkey has ordered its ambassador in Washington to return home for
consultations, a sign of extreme diplomatic displeasure.

Why should we worry about how Turkey feels?

Because Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has indicated his
country may retaliate by shutting the flow of material to Iraq and
even Afghanistan.

Declining to answer questions about whether Turkey might shut down
Incirlik air base in southern Turkey, a major cargo hub, or the
Mediterranean port of Iskenderun, he said, "You don’t talk about such
things, you just do them."

About 70 percent of U.S. air cargo headed for Iraq transits Turkey,
as does about one-third of the fuel used by the U.S. military in
Iraq. U.S. bases also get water and other supplies by land from
Turkish truckers.

Using the C-17 cargo planes out of Incirlik also avoids the use of
Iraqi roads vulnerable to bomb attacks and helps reduce American
casualties.

"We are concerned about that," Gen. David Petraeus, the top
U.S. commander in Iraq, acknowledged Thursday.

Any other cards the Turks can play?

If Turkey makes good on threats to cross the northern border in
pursuit of Turkish Kurdish militants, Iraqi Kurdistan, a haven of
relative calm, could suddenly become another Middle East fault line.

The Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) has been fighting for autonomy
in southeast Turkey since 1984. The conflict has claimed tens of
thousands of lives.

Turkey claims the rebels use Iraqi Kurdish territory as a safe haven.

Iraqi and Kurdish authorities reject the claim.

"The violence that has been undertaken by the PKK is an enormous
challenge, Petraeus said. "These terrorists … are up in the very,
very high mountains that straddle the border there."

While Washington calls the PKK a terrorist group, Turkey says the
U.S. has done little.

Turkish warplanes and helicopters hit border positions this week,
and Turkey’s parliament may vote next week to allow a large-scale
offensive into northern Iraq.

Are there more than military and diplomatic concerns?

Iraq’s Kurdish region also is heavily dependent on trade with Turkey,
which provides electricity and oil products. Annual trade at Habur
gate, the main border crossing, is more than $10 billion.

What’s our history with Turkey?

Turkey is a longtime NATO member and played a huge role in the Cold
War, sending troops to fight in Korea and providing the United States
with military bases and listening posts on the former Soviet Union’s
southern flank.

But relations hit a low in 2003, when Turkey’s parliament refused
to allow U.S. forces use their country as a staging ground for the
invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein.

What’s the issue over the genocide?

Historians estimate up to 1.5 million Armenians were killed by Ottoman
Turks around the time of World War I, an event widely viewed by many
scholars as the first genocide of the 20th century.

Turkey, however, contends the toll has been inflated and that those
killed were victims of civil war and unrest, just like Muslims and
other groups. But the Armenians, an ancient people in eastern Turkey,
had always been seen as a potential "fifth column," and suffered
smaller, earlier massacres as well in the late 1800s.

The Turks deny any coordinated campaign, but Henry Morgenthau, the
U.S. ambassador there at the time, vividly reported the systematic
slaughter of Armenian men and family deportations.

"No one claims those were not horrible days," said Egemen Bagis,
a Turkish member of parliament who was in Washington this week.

Don’t the Turks have anything to lose in all this?

The leaders in Ankara know Turkey’s standing as a reliable ally of
the West and its ambitions to be a mediator on the international
stage are at risk.

Military ties with France were suspended last year over a bill to
make it a crime to deny that genocide occurred against the Armenians.

Turkey has even more to lose with America, a major business partner
with $11 billion in trade last year, and provider of much of its
military’s equipment.

How does the White House view this?

The Bush administration, like the Clinton White House before, sees
the measure as needlessly troublesome.

"We look forward to his (the ambassador’s) quick return and will
continue to work to maintain strong U.S.-Turkish relations," said
Gordon Johndroe, a spokesman for the National Security Council. "We
remain opposed to House Resolution 106 because of the grave harm it
could bring to the national security of the United States."

Ex-U.S. Rep. Richard Gephardt of Missouri is lobbying for the Turkish
interests. Ex-Sen. Bob Dole of Kansas always was favorable to the
Armenians.

"Why do it now? Because there’s never a good time and all of us in
the Democratic leadership" supported it, said Speaker Nancy Pelosi,
indicating the measure, a nonbinding resolution without the force of
law, will move ahead.

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From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress