Many positive developments in Iraq

Mining Gazette, Michigan - August 02, 2006

Did you know there is a vast region of Iraq where no U.S. troops have been killed, enemy terrorist activity has been negligible, there are few U.S. troops deployed, it is safe for Westerners to walk the streets, new business investment is taking off and there is a stable, democratic government providing more than adequately for the regions security? The good — no, make that outstanding — news from Kurdistan is that life in the northern Iraqi region is well on the way to normalcy. It’s not your fault for not knowing. The relentlessly negative Western media have not told the Kurds’ story.

This is the same region whose people Saddam Hussein tried to wipe off the face of the Earth. His regime murdered some 200,000 Kurds with new-fangled chemical weapons and old-fashioned thuggery. After the first Gulf War and the debacle in which the first President Bush failed to provide protection against Saddam’s helicopter squadrons, the Kurds recovered and began to rebuild their society under cover of a U.S. and Coalition-enforced “no-fly zone.” But fear of Saddam’s regime still was a powerful dampening force.

When the U.S. invasion of Iraq came in 2003, Kurds joined with U.S. forces to topple Saddam. Today they tightly control their own regional border, mostly keeping out foreign terrorists who can more easily penetrate Iraq’s larger border and make their way to Baghdad to wreak havoc.

The rebuilding process in Kurdistan is going so well that some of the region’s leaders now are engaged in an economic development and “thank-you” tour of the United States.

The Kurds’ desire for complete independence is, of course, a well-known and tragic story. During the past century, they’ve found themselves under the often brutal rule of Turkey, Syria, Iran and Saddam’s Iraq. But they’ve made the pragmatic choice to participate in the new Iraqi government, because they are in a pretty rough corner of the globe.

Their formula for success is pretty simple: Secure their borders and keep out terrorists, push as many governance decisions to the local level as possible, and promote economic development.

Their message to the United States: Stay the course. Provide to Baghdad and other trouble spots the same security umbrella that made Kurdistan’s success over more than a decade possible. Secure borders, one province at a time, until foreign terrorists are swept out.

Don’t try to apply a TV-episode, video-game attention span to a security and rebuilding effort that will take years. It is good advice for success — from a region of Iraq where success seems to be occurring.

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