Cliff Kincaid
Many Republicans and Democrats seem to think American national security lies with several thousand communist terrorist homeless Kurdish fighters, who are devoted to a mythical “Kurdistan,” over and above the Turkish Armed Forces, the second largest standing military force in NATO.
Nothing would please Vladimir Putin more. The Russians have long worked to destroy NATO. Now, the Congress, led by Senators Lindsey Graham and Chris Van Hollen, is doing it for them, threatening to pass economic sanctions against Turkey because the nation is defending its borders from terrorists armed by Barack Hussein Obama’s CIA and Pentagon.
All of this is being allowed to happen because the conservative media have become indistinguishable from the left-wing media on the matter of the alleged U.S. betrayal of our Kurdish “allies.”
The constant pro-Kurdish propaganda demonstrates that the Deep State, with its hooks into both major political parties and much of the media, is desperate to keep the U.S. bogged down in endless and costly military conflicts. Trump is, so far, standing up to the pressure.
Indeed, at a news conference, Trump put the blame where it belongs – on Barack Hussein Obama, saying, “Obama started this whole thing” when he “created a natural war with Turkey and their longtime enemy, PKK. And they’re still there.”
The PKK is the Marxist-Leninist designated terror group whose Syrian affiliate, the YPG, was armed and funded by Obama’s Deep State. Their rationale was that funding one group of terrorists was necessary to defeating another group of terrorists, ISIS.
At this point, despite a ceasefire and plan to move YPG terrorists away from the Turkish border, it’s not clear what the future holds.
Under these circumstances, however, it makes no sense for President Trump or Vice-President Pence to threaten Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. It’s his country that has been under attack for decades by the communist PKK/YPG. He has every right to fight back. And it makes absolutely no sense for the Congress to vote against the president’s policy and then threaten Turkey with crippling economic sanctions to drive it further into the arms of Vladimir Putin.
Turkey’s border security operation wouldn’t have been possible without Trump’s wise decision to get American troops out of the way, and out of the business of protecting Marxists fighting for the Marxist-inspired “liberation” of “Kurdistan.” That was Trump’s only practical way out of this morass. He has nothing to apologize for. Indeed, he ought to express support for Turkey, a long-time member of NATO, in this struggle.
Ignoring the communist terrorist orientation of the PKK/YPG, Frank Gaffney of the Center for Security Policy referred to the Kurdish forces that “fought bravely alongside ours in the recent, successful campaign to destroy the Islamic State caliphate.”
But any real conservative would not justify using one terrorist group to fight another, when American troops are bound to get caught in the middle of the bloodletting. There’s no justification for supporting Obama’s illegal policy of supporting terrorism, on the grounds that “our” terrorists were better than some other terrorist group. This is the kind of madness that results in endless wars and thousands of wounded and dead American military personnel. This has got to stop.
In getting U.S. troops out of the business of funding and protecting the PKK and its affiliate, the YPG, National Review’s Rich Lowry claimed that Trump was repeating Obama’s mistake, when Trump was in fact reversing the Obama policy of support a Marxist guerrilla movement. Lowry, of course, never explained to his readers the Marxist roots of the Kurdistan Workers Party, the PKK, and its demands for their own state of “Kurdistan.” National Review is returning to its Never-Trump roots.
Also at National Review, a “conservative” journal, Andrew McCarthy talked out of both sides of his mouth about our Kurdish “allies,” the PKK and YPG, saying, “…I would be open to considering the removal of both the PKK from the terrorist list and Turkey from NATO. For now, though, the blunt facts are that the PKK is a terrorist organization and Turkey is our ally.”
So despite its terror campaign of killing innocent people, he is suggesting we should consider whitewashing the Marxist PKK’s record or consider changing the law to permit support for terrorism. This deadly mumbo jumbo is what passes for modern conservatism. Such a view is guaranteed to get the U.S. more deeply involved in disastrous Middle East politics.
In more confusing rhetoric, he writes, “Without any public debate, the Obama administration in 2014 insinuated our nation into the Kurdish — Turk conflict by arming the YPG [an affiliate of the PKK]. To be sure, our intentions were good. ISIS had besieged the city of Kobani in northern Syria; but Turkey understandably regards the YPG as a terrorist organization, complicit in the PKK insurgency.”
This former federal prosecutor, who had stated publicly that Robert Mueller was a great choice for Russia-gate prosecutor, doesn’t seem to understand that the lack of “public debate” means that “conservatives” at the time said and did nothing. McCarthy writes that arming the Kurds “undermined our anti-terrorism laws while giving [Turkish leader] Erdogan incentive to align with Russia and mend fences with Iran.” Yes, Obama broke the law and pushed Turkey into the arms of Russia. That’s why there is chaos in the region today.
Obama’s intentions were good? The law prohibits support for foreign terrorist organizations. Why wasn’t Obama held accountable or even impeached?
Other commentators on the right, including at the “conservative” American Enterprise Institute, are imagining all kinds of reasons and excuses to continue supporting communist Kurds. Marc A. Thiessen, who also writes for the Washington Post, is regularly on Fox News trying to get Trump to beat up on Erdogan.
The AEI is financed by big conservative foundation money.
One of their most popular arguments is that bolstering Marxism in the region somehow helps Christians. Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council buys into this one. He says the U.S. must “stand” with the Kurds, ignoring their history of Marxist terror.
In the face of the well-documented facts about the communist nature of the PKK, easily ascertained by such diverse sources as The New American and the Wall Street Journal, a so-called “conservative” writer named Quin Hillyer wrote a piece for the Washington Examiner accusing President Trump of malfeasance for supposedly abandoning these brave and heroic people. He makes no mention of their affinity for a philosophy that has killed one hundred million people.
Rather than bash President Trump over Syria or attack long-time NATO ally Turkey, the Congress ought to open investigations into the activities of the Deep State under Obama. The inquiry would and should examine CIA support under pro-communist CIA Director John Brennan for the PKK/YPG.
That investigation would take real guts. Let’s see if Senator Lindsey Graham has the courage to launch it.
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E-Mail Cliff Kincaid: Kincaid@comcast.net
