The Soviet Union and the Kurds

Wilson Nathaniel Howell

The Soviet Union and the Kurds, a study of national minority

University of Michigan

INTRODUCTION

The Kurdish problem gives every indication of remaining a major factor in the chronic instability of the Middle East. A final solution to the difficulties presented by this significant minority and its unrealized aspirations is no closer today than it was at the conclusion of World War I. The most recent manifestation of Kurdish discontent - the four-year-old uprising led by Mullah Mustafa Barzani in Iraqi Kurdistan - has, in fact, exhibited a degree of unity and resiliency absent in previous Kurdish revolts. Despite differences of opinion within the Kurdish leadership and the strenuous efforts of three successive Iraqi regimes to dislodge and defeat the insurgents, Mullah Mustafa's forces are in effective control of a substantial area in northern Iraq. Recent reports on the situation in this region, moreover, indicate the real possibility that armed ...

Table of contens

Preface / ii-iii
List of Maps / vii
Introduction / 1

Part I. The Kurds...
I. Kurdıstan: The geographic setting / 14
The topography of Kurdistan
A historical approach
An ethnic ppproach
Kurdish nationalist claims

II. The Kurds: Cultural and social aspects / 56
Origin of the Kurds
Numerical strength of the Kurds
Characteristics
Modes of social organization

III. Kurdish politics: An introduction to the national movement / 125
The treaty of Sèvres
Kurdish nationalism: manifestations
Kurdish nationalism: political evolution
Kurdish nationalism: Objectives
Kurdish nationalism: The record
Kurdish nationalism: The problem of leadership

Part II. ...And the Soviet union
IV. Mainsprings of Soviet Kurdish Policy: background factors / 226
The Tsarist heritage
The Kurds of the Soviet Union
Soviet Kurdology
Kurdistan in Soviet strategic thought
Soviet Policy alternatives in Kurdistan
The profile of Soviet Policy

V. The Soviet Union faces the Kurdish problem: the evolution of an official Policy / 289
A period of adjustmient, 1917-1521
Quiet interlude: the Soviet Union and the inter-war revolts
Watershed of Soviet Kurdish Policy, 1939-1947
The Soviet retreat from a "Policy of force"
Kassem and After: Soviet Kurdish Policy in a Minor Key

VI. Sovıet clandestine operations among the Kurds / 433
Propaganda
Scale
Themes
Agents
Mullahs and Dervishes
Emigrés, refugees and students
The role of other socialist states

VII. Communism and the Kurds / 522
Kurdish politics and communist dogma
Kurdish society and communism
Regional communist parties and the Kurdish question
Kurdish communists

Conclusion / 599
Appendices / 608
Bibliography / 639

INTRODUCTION

The Kurdish problem gives every indication of remaining a major factor in the chronic instability of the Middle East. A final solution to the difficulties presented by this significant minority and its unrealized aspirations is no closer today than it was at the conclusion of World War I. The most recent manifestation of Kurdish discontent - the four-year-old uprising led by Mullah Mustafa Barzani in Iraqi Kurdistan - has, in fact, exhibited a degree of unity and resiliency absent in previous Kurdish revolts. Despite differences of opinion within the Kurdish leadership and the strenuous efforts of three successive Iraqi regimes to dislodge and defeat the insurgents, Mullah Mustafa's forces are in effective control of a substantial area in northern Iraq. Recent reports on the situation in this region, moreover, indicate the real possibility that armed hostilities between the Kurds and the Baghdad government, interrupted since February, 1964 by an uneasy cease-fire, will be resumed in the near future. It is difficult to see how either side in this struggle can achieve a definitive military victory. The real significance, therefore, of this as of former Kurdish uprisings is not its military aspect, interesting as it may be; it is rather the political implications of -the Kurdish problem for the states of the Middle East where the Kurds form large minorities of a million or more persons.

The current uprising in Iraqi Kurdistan raises once again the spectre of Soviet intrigue in the strategic territory south of the Soviet Republics of Transcaucasia. Though the official position which the Soviet government will assume in the event Kurdo-Iraqi hostilities are resumed is not yet clear, the evidence of Soviet activity among the Kurds, as well as the expressions of sympathy for Kurdish aspirations which have emanated from Moscow, have done much to rekindle both scholarly and popular interest in Soviet Kurdish Policy in the West. While this Policy is a fitting subject for academic investigation, it is of most immediate concern to Policy-makers responsible for the development of Cold War strategy in the region that has come to be called the "Northern tier."

The attitudes and behavior of the Kurds is quite naturally of vical interest to the states of the Middle East - Turkey, Iran, and Iraq - for which they have been a perennial problem. Soviet efforts to exploit the frustrations and aspirations of the Kurdish minorities in these countries cannot but occasion alarm in governmental circles since the repercussions of Kurdish activity in any one are generally felt in all three...

Wilson Nathaniel Howell

The Soviet Union and the Kurds, a study of national minority

University of Michigan

University of Michigan
This is an authorized facsimile
and was produced by microfilm-xerography
in 1975 by
Xerox University Microfilms,
Ann Arbor, Michigan,
U.S.A.

This dissertation has been
microfilmed exactly as received 66-3151

Howell, Jr., Wilson Nathaniel, 1939-
The Soviet Union and the Kurds: a study
of national minority problems in Soviet Policy.
University of Virginia, Ph. D., 1965
Political science, international law and relations
University Microfilms, Inc., Ann Arbor, Michigan