A CONFLICT-LADEN ADMINISTRATION SEARCHING OUT TROUBLE
By Jonathan Schwartz, Columnist
Binghamton University Pipe Dream, USA
Oct 30 2007
I was bored the other day, daydreaming about more ways that our
government could create some new enemies, when a brilliant idea came
to me. Why don’t we dig up some of the most unpleasant memories in
the modern history of our most important Middle Eastern ally, Turkey,
and drag their nearly century-old wrongdoings back through the mud at
one of the most critical junctures in U.S. foreign policy history,
ignoring the threats of permanently strained relations from their
generals in the process? Well, they must be reading my thoughts down
there in Washington, D.C., because sure enough, Congress went and
stole my idea.
When I first read of this news, I was furious, not because anyone
actually likes us very much in the Middle East these days short of
our good friends, the Saudis. But for a while there, Turkey was at
least willing to be drawn on the same map as us.
Continued instability in the northern region of Iraq in the post-Saddam
era has drawn the ire of the Turkish government who is now voicing
its dissatisfaction with the United States’ lenient approach to the
Kurdish rebels in northern Iraq. Recently, attacks from a particular
Kurdish rebel group based in northern Iraq, the PKK, on Turkish
soldiers have led to talk of a Turkish military incursion into
Northern Iraq citing Americas inability to guarantee them security,
something that Washington would rather not have to deal with.
But despite all that, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi felt that we
hadn’t quite irked the Turks as much as we possibly could.
She thought that now would be the most opportune time to come out and
say to the people of Turkey, "By the way, right now, 90 years later,
you are going to take responsibility for the actions of a regime
most of you were never alive to even remember. This concludes the
reaffirmation of our moral superiority, just in case you thought our
two countries were on an even playing field."
There exists resounding and irrefutable evidence supporting the
conclusion that a mass-genocide was perpetrated on the Armenian
population by the Turkish regime between 1915 to 1917. There’s even
a Wikipedia article aptly named "The Armenian Genocide." No one in
tune with the actual facts of history denies these horrific events
occurred. Certainly, I’m in no way insinuating that this didn’t happen.
What I am insinuating is that a non-binding resolution from the United
States Congress on this matter is not a wise foreign policy decision
at this time.
Turkey’s assistance on both the military and intelligence fronts of the
war in Iraq are vital to any sort of winning campaign that may still
yet ensue. Turkey’s supportive voice on the world stage is vital in
the fight being waged on America’s image in the media. And the fact
that we feel the need to blame an entire population for a regime that
many of their grandparents died to overthrow despite these obvious
consequences serves as an example of poor politics.
I wonder who made America the voice of the world that gets to say,
"What you did was wrong, we condemn it, you should be ashamed;
anytime you’d like to apologize, we’ll be here." That’s basically
all a non-binding resolution does. No action is taken, no sanctions,
no anything. Simply, it is legislation being passed in this case for
the sake of wagging our finger at someone else.
That we feel as though we in America are in a position to be the
judges, or worse, the writers of history, might explain why everyone
outside the States is so angry. Until we decide to step off our high
and mighty, our image throughout the world will continue to suffer.
Unfortunately, with the current set of elected officials on both
sides of the political spectrum, this seems very unlikely.
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