Kurdish Rebellion of 1983
Encyclopedia
The Kurdish Rebellion of 1983 occurred during the Iran-Iraq war
Iran-Iraq War
The Iran–Iraq War was an armed conflict between the armed forces of Iraq and Iran, lasting from September 1980 to August 1988, making it the longest conventional war of the twentieth century...

 as Kurds
Kurdish people
The Kurdish people, or Kurds , are an Iranian people native to the Middle East, mostly inhabiting a region known as Kurdistan, which includes adjacent parts of Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Turkey...

 of northern Iraq rebelled against Saddam Hussein
Saddam Hussein
Saddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti was the fifth President of Iraq, serving in this capacity from 16 July 1979 until 9 April 2003...

, in an attempt to form their own autonomous country. The most violent stage of this rebellion was the al-Anfal campaign
Al-Anfal Campaign
The al-Anfal Campaign , also known as Operation Anfal or simply Anfal, was a genocidal campaign against the Kurdish people in Northern Iraq, led by the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein and headed by Ali Hassan al-Majid in the final stages of Iran-Iraq War...

 of the Iraqi Army against the Kurdish minority, which took place between 1986–1989 and included the Halabja poison gas attack
Halabja poison gas attack
The Halabja poison gas attack , also known as Halabja massacre or Bloody Friday, was a genocidal massacre against the Kurdish people that took place on March 16, 1988, during the closing days of the Iran–Iraq War, when chemical weapons were used by the Iraqi government forces in the Kurdish town of...

. The rebellion ended in 1988 with an agreement of amnesty between the two belligerents, Iraq
Iraq
Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....

i government and Kurdish rebels. In the aftermath, no gains had been made by the Kurds and their losses can be measured in the immensity of human deaths.

The Kurdish People

The Kurdish region of Iraq is located in northern Iraq
Iraq
Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....

 along the Syria
Syria
Syria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest....

, turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...

, Iran
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...

 border. It is mostly broad plains and desert. This is the most fertile area of the region, where most Kurdish towns and cities are located. Towards the north, along the Iranian border, is the periphery of the Iranian Zagros Mountains. The Kurds has lived in this region for thousands of years, but have never been able to form an independent state. Instead many different empires and rulers have controlled this region.

The Kurds identify themselves as Kurdish through the language they speak, their customs, religion (Sunni Muslim), tolerance of other religions, and their tribe affiliation. Tribes are determined through kinship and territorial location. For Kurds, identification with the tribe is more important and significant than the official country the tribe is located in. Since the 1920s the Kurds have harbored grievances against the commanding government due to a lack of sovereignty or representation in state institutions.

Kurdistan Democratic Party

The Kurdistan Democratic Party, KDP, is the longest standing and preeminent political party of the Kurdish people. It was created in 1946 under Mulla Mustafa Barzani with initial goals based on Kurdish nationalist aspirations and the desire for self government. Overtime Barzani and his supporters evolved the mission of the KDP into a fight for “the full rights of the Kurds for self-determination...achieved through peaceful means in a democratic, pluralist, and federal Iraq.” Barzani was the first person to assemble almost universal Kurdish nationalism among the people and from the mid-1930s through to his expulsion from Iraq in the 1970s he was synonymous with the Kurdish quest for independence. Barzani led rebellions intermittently against the governments of Iraq (First
First Kurdish Iraqi War
First Kurdish Iraqi War was a tribal Kurdish uprising, led by Mustafa Barzani, in an attempt to establish independent Kurdish state in north Iraq. Throughout the 1960s, the uprising escalated into a long war, which failed to resolve despite internal power changes in Iraq...

 and Second Kurdish Iraqi War
Second Kurdish Iraqi War
Second Kurdish Iraqi War was an offensive, led by Iraqi forces against rebel KDP troops of Mustafa Barzani during 1974-1975. The war came in the aftermath of the First Kurdish Iraqi War , as the 1970 peace plan for Kurdish autonomy had failed....

s), Iran, and Turkey, in hopes of gaining larger revolutionary forces each time.

Patriotic Union of Kurdistan

The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan
Patriotic Union of Kurdistan
The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan is a Kurdish political party in Iraqi Kurdistan. The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan was founded on June 1, 1975, by coordinations between Jalal Talabani and Nawshirwan Mustafa...

, PUK, was established in 1975 under Jalal Talabani
Jalal Talabani
Jalal Talabani is the sixth and current President of Iraq, a leading Kurdish politician. He is the first non-Arab president of Iraq, although Abdul Kareem Qasim was half Kurdish....

. Talabani had worked as as Kurdish revolutionary in the KDP
KDP
KDP may refer to:*Kurdistan Democratic Party of South Kurdistan*Kurdistan Democratic Party of East Kurdistan*Korea Democratic Party*Khmer Democratic Party*Communist Party of Germany *Kappa Delta Pi...

 and grew his name and reputation by speaking out against Barzani. In 1975 Talabani and his followers split from the PUK and started a new, more liberal party. In essence the PUK is run on the same platform as the KDP, lobbying for “autonomy for Kurdistan, democracy for Iraq”. The PUK defines itself a part from the KDP by drawing its supporters from central and southern Kurdistan. The PUK has come to represent a more urban, intellectual, and politically forward group of people, versus the traditional rhetoric of the KDP. Supporters of each party are able to distinguish themselves personally by tribal alliance, personal differences, and ideological disagreement.

The Iraqi Government

The KDP
KDP
KDP may refer to:*Kurdistan Democratic Party of South Kurdistan*Kurdistan Democratic Party of East Kurdistan*Korea Democratic Party*Khmer Democratic Party*Communist Party of Germany *Kappa Delta Pi...

 and PUK
PUK
PUK may stand for:* Patriotic Union of Kurdistan * Partia e Unitetit Kombėtar * Pin Unlock Key used in GSM mobile phones* Prefectural University of KumamotoPuk may refer to:...

, although separate political parties, fought the same opponent, the government of Iraq under the leadership of Saddam Hussein
Saddam Hussein
Saddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti was the fifth President of Iraq, serving in this capacity from 16 July 1979 until 9 April 2003...

. Since the beginning of the Ba’ath rule in Iraq there have been issues between the leaders of the Ba’ath and the Kurdish people. Intermittent negotiations occurred between the two groups to discuss party platforms and to try and come to a consensus on representation; however the Ba’ath were exceptionally distrustful of the Kurds and harbored suspicions against the KDP, especially of leader Barzani. In contrast, a natural alliance was drawn between the Ba'ath and political party PUK. Both were leftist organizations that advocated a Kurd-Arab alliance.

Window of Opportunity

A window of opportunity is defined by Stephen Van Evera
Stephen Van Evera
Stephen William Van Evera is a professor of Political Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, specializing in International Relations. His research includes the U.S. foreign and national security policy and causes and prevention of war.-Biography:Van Evera received his A.B. in...

 as a time period where there are incentives for war and belligerency by a less powerful state or faction. There are many different types of Windows, in this instance, the window was short-term that facilitated “now is better than later thinking.”. In 1980 Iraq engaged in warfare with Iran over the shatt al-Arab and rather than a quick victory the war had degenerated into to a very long drawn out stalemate. The Kurds saw this as the prime opportunity to attack while the Iraqi government was preoccupied and weakened. The goal was to create a new bargaining platform and push Iraqi governmental forces out of Kurdistan.

War Tactics

A wide variety of war tactics were used in this conflict, everything from the most simple hit and run to advanced chemical warfare. This conflict is a good case to look at how asymmetrical capabilities influence battle.

Kurdish Tactics

To combat the Ba’ath the Kurd’s strategy involved the use of conventional guerrilla warfare
Guerrilla warfare
Guerrilla warfare is a form of irregular warfare and refers to conflicts in which a small group of combatants including, but not limited to, armed civilians use military tactics, such as ambushes, sabotage, raids, the element of surprise, and extraordinary mobility to harass a larger and...

 and armed with light weapons either stolen from the Ba’ath troops or given to the by the Iranians. The peshmerga
Peshmerga
Peshmerga or Peshmerge is the term used by Kurds to refer to armed Kurdish fighters. Literally meaning "those who face death" the Peshmerga forces of Kurdistan have been in existence since the advent of the Kurdish independence movement in the early 1920s, following the collapse of the Ottoman...

 worked with the locals to build up defenses and teach defensive tactics to the local militia in hopes of educating the mass public and protect them against future attack and seizure by the Ba'ath army. Furthermore the peshmerga supplied the villages with a local government and services (education, medicine, security).

The mountains in northern Kurdistan proved to be an excellent place to hide and camp out. The mountain region was also very difficult for the Iraqi army to traverse on foot and by air. The guerrilla style war tactics of the Kurds proved very beneficial when fighting in this region. In contrast to the helpful assistance of the northern region, the southern flatlands of Kurdistan worked against the Kurdish insurgency. The Iraqis were able to easily bomb the major cities of the southern region and the fertile valley. Kurdish guerrilla tactics of hit and run did not prove to be successful against the firepower of the Iraqis during aerial bombardment and shelling.

Iraqi Tactics

The Iraq army used full-scale military tactics
Military tactics
Military tactics, the science and art of organizing an army or an air force, are the techniques for using weapons or military units in combination for engaging and defeating an enemy in battle. Changes in philosophy and technology over time have been reflected in changes to military tactics. In...

 in combating the Kurdish insurgency
Insurgency
An insurgency is an armed rebellion against a constituted authority when those taking part in the rebellion are not recognized as belligerents...

. In the heavily populated agricultural areas daily air raids destroyed towns, crops, and people. The army used its superior military power of more men, guns, and artillery to combat the insurgents. In order to inflict the greatest destruction, the Iraqi army divided Southern Kurdistan into a grid pattern, dividing the most densely populated cities and farming areas into sections. The grid facilitated a mechanized detonation of heavy artillery in predetermined areas by fighter planes and inflicted the greatest destruction possible. The Kurds had no knowledge of the oncoming attack or ways to protect themselves from the shelling. This was very structured and assigned per Iraqi army goals. The shelling and bombing per grid was very successful in driving mass fear among the Kurds.

Al-Anfal Campaign

Beyond using traditional warfare techniques the Ba’ath engaged in the use of chemical weapons against the Kurds during the al-Anfal campaign
Al-Anfal Campaign
The al-Anfal Campaign , also known as Operation Anfal or simply Anfal, was a genocidal campaign against the Kurdish people in Northern Iraq, led by the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein and headed by Ali Hassan al-Majid in the final stages of Iran-Iraq War...

 of 1987-1988. A total onslaught began against the Kurdish people that eventually killed tens of thousands of Kurds and displaced at least one million of the Kurdish population to Iran
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...

 and Turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...

. Ali Hassan al-Majid
Ali Hassan al-Majid
Ali Hassan Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti , , was a Ba'athist Iraqi Defense Minister, Interior Minister, military commander and chief of the Iraqi Intelligence Service...

, nicknamed “Chemical Ali,” led the three step process of “village collectivization": the destruction of hundreds of Kurdish villages and the relocation of their residents to concentration camps, mujamma’at. This campaign was the first documented use of chemical weapons by a government against its own civilians. The process of village collectivization violated widespread human rights, it is an example of systematic genocide
Genocide
Genocide is defined as "the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group", though what constitutes enough of a "part" to qualify as genocide has been subject to much debate by legal scholars...

 that went unchecked by the global community.

Al-Majid and his commanding officers warned if the pershmerga did not lay down their arms and allow the cleansing program to continue peacefully the army would stop the pershmerga with chemical weapons. Iraq had signed the 1925 Geneva Protocol outlawing the production and use of chemical and biological weapons, however this did not stop al-Majid from giving the OK to the army to proceed with the deployment of shells carrying the deadly weapons. This was the first time a government used chemical weapons against its own civilian population.

The Iraqi government and leaders behind the campaign were not punished for their campaign of genocide or the violations against the Geneva Protocol
Geneva Protocol
The Protocol for the Prohibition of the Use in War of Asphyxiating, Poisonous or other Gases, and of Bacteriological Methods of Warfare, usually called the Geneva Protocol, is a treaty prohibiting the first use of chemical and biological weapons. It was signed at Geneva on June 17, 1925 and entered...

 of 1928.

Halabja Poison Gas Attack

The most famous attack of chemical warfare by the Iraqi army against the Kurds was the attack on the town of Halabja
Halabja
Halabja , is a Kurdish town in Northern Iraq, located about north-east of Baghdad and 8–10 miles from the Iranian border....

 on March 16, 1988. Over 4,000 Kurds were killed in this one attack by the combination of mustard gas and hydrogen cyanide. Between 7,000 and 10,000 civilians were injured and thousands more died of complications, diseases, etc stemming from the release of chemical gas. The town was attacked because Kurdish guerrillas had allied with Tehran and the city was now under Iranian control. Conventional artillery, mortars, and rockets bombed Halabja for two days before the chemical attack; the use of chemical weapons was done for good measure to assure no survivors were possible. This attack is considered separate from the al-Anfal campaign and was one of the last attacks by the Iraqis during the Iran-Iraq War
Iran-Iraq War
The Iran–Iraq War was an armed conflict between the armed forces of Iraq and Iran, lasting from September 1980 to August 1988, making it the longest conventional war of the twentieth century...

. This act has also been declared an act of genocide against the Kurdish people of Iraq.

End of Rebellion

The rebellion by the PUK and KDP was officially declared over by the Iraqi government on September 6, 1988 when a decree of amnesty for all Iraqi Kurds was read aloud on the radio. The announcement came as a surprise to the Kurdish population. The decree was declared most likely because Baghdad believed the peshmerga had finally been defeated. The government pardoned the insurgents, but refused to let the Kurds return to their previous relatively free lives.

The Ba’ath instituted draconian measures on all surviving towns and cities in Kurdistan. The government feared a resurgence of the insurgent peshmerga group, draconian measures prevented a revival. Furthermore any man suspected having ties with the peshmerga insurgency were round up and relocated to camps in the southern deserts. The men taken to these deserts were tortured on a daily basis and murdered in mass quantities. It is believed these efforts to weed out any remaining insurgents lasted through 1989 with an additional 300,000 people relocated from various villages to “more modern villages with better facilities.” Secure zones, or cluster camps, were created along the Iranian border as well as outside the major Kurdish cities of Erbil, Mosul, and Suliemaniyeh.

Refugee and Death Statistics

  • Refugees: At least 1 Million people fled (almost 30% of the population) to Iran
    Iran
    Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...

    , Turkey
    Turkey
    Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...

     and Pakistan
    Pakistan
    Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

    • Since 1971, at least 370,000 has sought refugee in Iran, over 10% of the Iraqi Kurdistan population
  • Al-Anfal Campaign
    • 50,000 to 100,000 were killed, including women and children
    • 90% of targeted Kurdish villages were destroyed, this is approximently 4,000 villages
  • Halabja Poison Gas Attack
    • 3,000-5,000 Killed
    • 7,000 to over 10,000 injured
    • At least 50,000 Kurds escaped into Iran after this one attack


These numbers were collected by Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch is an international non-governmental organization that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. Its headquarters are in New York City and it has offices in Berlin, Beirut, Brussels, Chicago, Geneva, Johannesburg, London, Los Angeles, Moscow, Paris, San Francisco, Tokyo,...

.

Role of Iran

Iran
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...

 covertly aided the Iraqi Kurds against the Iraqis with weapons, food supplies, and intelligence in exchange for intelligence on Iraq movements and assistance along the northern Iran-Iraq border.

In addition, Iran was an ally of Masud Barzani’s and aided the KDP with arms and training of peshmerga forces and leaders. In exchange for arms and education the Iranians received intelligence on Iraqi military information and Kurdish assistance in fighting the Iraqi army. The Iranians had an invested interest in assisting the Kurds. The constant siege by the Kurds preoccupied the Ba'ath and prevented the army from devoting entire resources to conquering the Iranians. The Iranians supported the Kurds just to the point where they were powerful enough to fight against the Iraqis, but not strong enough to overcome the Iraqi army. The Iranians were also careful in their support to the Iraqi Kurds because too much help might send the wrong message to Iranian Kurds, who also lobbied for increased legitimacy and representation in the Iranian government-this was not a topic the Iranians wanted brought to the forefront of domestic politics.

Post Rebellion

The decree of amnesty did not bring any gains for the Kurdish front nor did it redistribute Kurdish powers or representation in the Iraqi government. After al-Anfal
Al-Anfal
Sura Al-Anfal is the eighth chapter of the Qur'an, with 75 verses. It is a Medinan sura, completed after theBattle of Badr. It forms a pair with the next sura, At-Tawba.-Badr:...

 and the post-rebellion oppression the Kurds did not engage in further resistance, instead the leaders tried more diplomatic means to engage the Ba'ath in coming to a consensus on Kurdi status. No progress was made in the diplomacy realm either. Inner factional issues between the KDP and PUK were continually on the rise and prevented any progress in Kurdish autonomy. These internal issues degenerated into civil war in the 1990s (see Iraqi Kurdish Civil War
Iraqi Kurdish Civil War
The Iraqi Kurdish Civil War was a military conflict which took place between rival Kurdish factions in Iraqi Kurdistan in the mid 1990s...

).

The Kurds Today

With the overthrow of the Ba'ath government by the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 in 2003 the Kurds have increased diplomatic means to try and seek further gains towards legitimacy. The United States and Kurdish parties disagree over the ethnic alignment of the regional government, and this disagreement continues to stall any concrete gains from occurring. The United States believes a non-ethnically defined government is best for the region so that the collective majority can broker an identity and connect both politically and as a society. However the Kurds do not agree with this concept, as they prefer a regional government explicitly built on the Kurdish identity. This is a step in the direction of autonomy and a method for the Kurdish population to showcase their abilities in governing themselves and generating a productive self-sufficient economy. Time will tell if these new negotiations and concepts will bear success for the Iraqi Kurdish plight. Massoud Barzani
Massoud Barzani
Massoud Barzani is the current President of the Iraqi Kurdistan Region and the leader of the Kurdistan Democratic Party. Barzani was born in Mahabad, Iran, during the rule of the Republic of Mahabad...

 has been elected president of Iraqi Kurdistan and Jalal Talabani
Jalal Talabani
Jalal Talabani is the sixth and current President of Iraq, a leading Kurdish politician. He is the first non-Arab president of Iraq, although Abdul Kareem Qasim was half Kurdish....

 has been elected president of the new Iraqi democratic government.

See also


Literature

  • Ghareeb, Edmond. The Kurdish Question in Iraq, Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1981.
  • Gunter, Michael M. "The KDP-PUK Conflict in Northern Iraq." Middle East Journal 50.2 (1996)
  • Gunter, Michael M. The Kurds of Iraq: Tragedy and Hope. New York: St. Martin’s Press, New York, 1992.
  • McDowall, David. the Kurds: A Nation Denied. London: Minority Rights Group, 1992.
  • O’Ballance, Edgar. The Kurdish Struggle 1920-1994. New York: St. Martin’s Press, Inc (1996).
  • Romano, David. Kurdish Naitonalist Movement Opportunity, Mobilization, and Identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University, 2006.
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