but irrelevant Sunni groups that
have already effectively lost.
The Kurds are all that’s left.
And the Kurds are the most
pro-American people in the
entire Middle East. They’re
more pro-American than the
Israelis. Ideologically, yes, the
PKK-aligned groups are a bit
iffy. They were once Soviet
proxies and they’re at war with
a member of NATO. But the
Turks share at least half of the
blame for that conflict.
Nowhere in the region will
Kurdish people accept cultural
genocide lying down. Surely
they would have accepted help
from the United States had it
been offered during the Cold
War, but it wasn’t, so they took
largesse and ideology from the
Russians instead.
For what it’s worth, though, the
PKK is not what it used to be.
The Soviet Union is dead, and
a lot of the ideological
Marxism its leaders once
mouthed has been diluted over
time to standard-issue leftism
with a culturally conservative
twist. The Kurds of Turkey and
Syria are not struggling for the
collectivization of agriculture.
They are not interested in
liquidating landlords or “the
kulaks.” They certainly aren’t
interested in imposing a police
state in Ankara. First and
foremost, they’re fighting
against the fascists of ISIS, and
second for Kurdish
independence, a secular system
of government, and equality
between men and women.
They detest the Islamic religion
as much as far-right
“Islamophobes” in America.
Compared with just about
everyone else in the region,
they’re liberals.
Not in any alternate universe
would the United States oppose
these people right now. The
Kurds of Iran and Iraq are
more politically palatable, but
you fight a proxy war with the
proxies you have, and
Americans will never find a
better proxy in Syria against
ISIS than the Kurdish People’s
Protection Units.
JOY FEELINGS | DECEMBER ISSUE
178