Review David McDowall, The Kurds, A Nation Denied, Minority Rights Publications, 1992

  

David McDowall is one of the leading Western writers on Kurds. He released several books including this The Kurds, A Nation Denied. It is a very short review of Kurdish history and their struggle in the Middle East since nation states were created there in the wake of World War I.

 

The book includes four chapters on Kurds in Turkey, two on Iran, three on Iraq and the last one on Syria, Lebanon and the former Soviet Union.

 

One of the strong points of McDowall’s analysis is that he differentiates between tribal revolts and struggles for Kurdish autonomy and independence. There are some books that claim Kurds have always wanted independence and therefore almost every single time they took up arms it was to work towards that goal. Sheikh Mahmoud Barzinji of Sulaymaniya for instance fought a number of battles with the British and then the Iraqi government from 1919-31. McDowall characterized those as a drive for personal power rather than ones motivated by nationalism since Barzinji fought against his Kurdish rivals several times and didn’t have an overarching idea of Kurdish identity to rally people around.

 

This brings up the second major conclusion of The Kurds which is that the community has never been able to unify. The author blames this upon a number of issues from linguistic differences, the division between migrating tribes and settled Kurds, the various sheikhs and chiefs, and the split between rural tribes and urban intellectuals and workers. Finally various Kurdish movements have sought foreign assistance which has allowed those countries to play Kurds against each other.

 

The Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) in Iraq for instance took up arms against the Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran (KDPI) during the early years of the Iran-Iraq War because it blamed the KDPI for desecrating the grave of its founder Mulla Mustafa Barzani and to gain favor with Tehran. These differences have undermined the Kurds ability to negotiate with the various governments they live under.

 

Regional powers have also used the Kurds against their rivals. The most famous case was when the Iran, Israel and the United States supported the KDP against the Iraqi government. They just wanted the Kurds to keep Iraq tied down however not win. In 1975 Baghdad and Tehran made a deal and the Kurds were abandoned leading to the KDP to be defeated and pushed into Iran with its founder Barzani going to the United States where he died. Relying upon outside help has been treacherous and unreliable for the Kurds.

 

The Kurds is a very short read but contains a thorough history of the Kurds in modern times up to the 1990 Gulf War. It provides a good primer for someone just getting into studying the subject.

 

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