Iraq: A Unified Kurdish Army?

[KURDISTANICA]

Stratfor Today » December 10, 2009

Summary

Kurdish Regional Government President Massoud Barzani has announced
his intention to establish a unified Kurdish army in Iraq’s semi-
autonomous Kurdish region. Combining Kurdistan Democratic Party and
Patriotic Union of Kurdistan forces will not be an easy task, but
Iraq’s Kurdish leaders have a strategic imperative to band together in
dealing with their Arab rivals in the Iraqi central government. The
Kurdish proposal signals a potential revival of militia building in
Iraq, which carries significant implications for the U.S. exit
strategy.

Analysis

As sectarian tensions flare ahead of Iraq’s parliamentary elections in
January, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in the north has
announced plans to build its own army. KRG President Massoud Barzani
said Nov. 22 that he intends to establish a unified Kurdish army in
Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdish region by outlawing the areas’ private
militias (peshmerga) and bringing them under the direct jurisdiction
of the Ministry of Peshmerga. The KRG leaders hope this initiative
will mend a political rift within Iraqi Kurdistan and give the KRG
more strength in battling its Arab rivals in Iraq’s central
government.

Iraq’s Kurds inhabit a mountainous region in the country’s north.
While this terrain has protected them from foreign invasion, it has
also nurtured deep-seated tribal rivalries. These rivalries are so
strong that Kurds have often sided with a common enemy (like Iran,
Turkey or Baathist Iraq) to undermine each other. However, in 2003,
rivals Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and the Patriotic Union of
Kurdistan (PUK) put aside their differences and formed a unified
regional government to represent Kurdish interests in Iraq’s post-
Saddam Hussein government. The alliance has remained intact through a
series of formal agreements that have roughly divided power between
the parties.

Barzani is hoping the creation of a unified army will consolidate the
KDP and PUK and insure the integrity of their alliance. Barzani saw
the alliance threatened most recently in July, in the Kurdish
provincial election, with the rise of the Goran (“Change”) party.
Goran — which campaigned on an anti-corruption, reformist platform —
did particularly well in the PUK’s stronghold in Iraqi Kurdistan’s
east, claiming 25 parliamentary seats and winning nearly a quarter of
the popular vote.

The erosion of PUK’s power has become obvious. Already Jalal Talabani,
head of the PUK, has acquiesced to several KDP demands. For example,
the KDP has held the KRG’s premiership since 2005 when, according to
the KDP-PUK agreement, it should have relinquished control of the post
in 2007. However, the KDP does not want to see the PUK deteriorate any
further. The KDP is aware of the PUK’s fragile unity, especially
following the political turmoil the PUK experienced in the past year,
and is concerned that any further weakening will exacerbate existing
fissures and splinter the group. Barzani is loath to see a political
vacuum develop in the north — especially one that might be filled by
Goran, whose demands for a more transparent government and the
establishment of rule of law directly challenge the KDP’s domination
of the KRG.

Barzani’s bid to consolidate peshmerga forces is also a direct
response to the Kurds’ uncertain relationship with its neighbors. The
KRG’s relationship with Baghdad has deteriorated significantly in
recent months. As the presence of U.S.-led coalition forces in Iraq
diminishes, and as the country readies itself for its second post-
Hussein parliamentary elections early next year, the nation’s ethno-
sectarian tensions have started bubbling to the surface again. In
November, Barzani announced that the Kurds will boycott the upcoming
election unless the election laws are amended to increase Kurdish
representation in the national parliament. Furthermore, Iraq’s
upcoming round of oil auctions has reignited the debate over the
distribution of oil revenues from Iraq’s northern fields (the Iraqi
central government’s November statement that it would not honor oil
contracts signed by the KRG is an example of the strife over oil
revenues).

Not only is Baghdad is working to contain Iraqi Kurdistan’s economic
gains, it also does not want to see the region gain influence in
security issues. Starting in 2005, Iraq’s central government, with a
strong push from the United States, half-heartedly announced several
steps to heal the country’s ethno-sectarian wounds by integrating
Kurdish and Sunni militias into the Shiite-dominated army and police
force. The plan, however, has not been fully realized. Kurds currently
compose 7.2 percent of the Iraqi army, well below the 18-20 percent
mandated by the country’s constitution. Nearly 200,000 peshmerga have
yet to be integrated into the Iraqi army. Furthermore, Iraqi Prime
Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s announcement in November that he would
prioritize reconstruction over security could provide him the cover to
impede the integration of Kurdish and Sunni forces into the country’s
military and maintain the Shiite’s dominance of the army. Baghdad has
also dragged its feet on its promise to create two Kurdish brigades in
the KRG and recently shut down two military colleges located in the
Zakho and Qalachwalan districts in the Kurdistan region.

The slow progress is in no small part due to the Shiite-dominated
government’s reluctance to share its security responsibilities with
its ethno-sectarian rivals, but the Kurdish leadership is just as wary
of relinquishing control of its entire security apparatus to the
central government. The KDP and PUK each control about 100,000
peshmerga. Iraq’s army currently numbers just under 260,000 soldiers.
If the PUK and KDP can work out their internal differences to create
an umbrella group, the Kurds will be able to better resist their Arab
rivals in Baghdad, not to mention the Kurds’ array of external rivals
in Turkey, Iran and Syria.

While the idea for a unified Kurdish army came from the KDP, the PUK
will control the Ministry of Peshmerga — an indication that the plan
enjoys at least some high-level support from both parties. However,
implementing the plan will be difficult. The KDP and the PUK each
control their own police, security and intelligence peshmerga, and it
is uncertain how effectively the Ministry of Peshmerga can streamline
its operations and overcome substantial issues of distrust. Also, the
KRG, which is running a budget deficit of more than $500,000,000
according to some reports, will be hard-pressed to find funding for
this plan: The estimated cost of funding a Kurdish army is more than
$100 million a month. The KRG’s prime minister and Iraq’s finance
minister met Dec. 8 to discuss a host of financial issues, but given
the tensions between the KRG and the Iraqi central government, Baghdad
is not likely to be willing to bail out the KRG.

The KRG’s proposal that would legalize the plan for a unified army
notably specifies that this force will “defend Kurdistan and protect
the security of Kurdistan-Iraq, its soil, and the Kurdish people and
law.” In previous bills, the KRG has referred to its jurisdiction as
“Iraqi Kurdistan.” The shift to “Kurdistan-Iraq” signifies that the
Kurds’ ambitions have become more nationalistic. This type of rhetoric
is bound to worry Baghdad as well as Turkey, Iran and Syria, all of
whom have significant Kurdish populations.

With ethno-sectarian tensions reaching a fever pitch, Iraq’s rival
factions can be expected to rely more heavily on their traditional
insurance policy: private militias. As the Shiite-dominated government
continues to block the integration of its rivals into the security
apparatus, the Kurds are unifying their peshmerga while many of Iraq’s
Sunnis continue to use the threat of an insurgency as leverage in
getting their demands met. Should Iraq witness a resurgence of private
militias amidst rising ethno-sectarian tensions, the U.S. exit
strategy for Iraq could face serious complications.