NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC VIDEO: Saddam's Terror - Anfal

Iraq’s Anfal Campaign And The Destruction Of The Kurdish Opposition

From February to September 1988 Saddam Hussein launched the most repressive campaign of his rule. This was the time of the Anfal, when the government temporarily destroyed the two main Kurdish opposition parties, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP). This was accomplished through the leveling of thousands of villages by conventional and chemical weapons. The survivors were put into camps, where many were killed and the others dispersed into government controlled areas. This was a much more vicious and systematic offensive than previous ones against the Kurds.

Areas attacked during the Anfal campaign. Click on image for larger view (Rights Maps)

The 1^st Anfal lasted from February 23 to March 19, 1988, and targeted the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan’s (PUK) command center in the Jafati Valley of Sulaymaniya province. It started with Iraqi forces opening a 40-mile front in the valley in Sulaymaniya province. On February 23, the villages of Yakhsamar, Sergalou and Bergalou were shelled. The PUK’s pershmerga were able to hold off the government forces for a few weeks, but eventually gave way by early March. Several towns fell, and each one was bulldozed and dynamited. Some of the displaced fled to neighboring Iran, which had a large population of Kurdish refugees from previous government attacks. In these opening weeks, Middle East Watch estimated that 28 people were killed, and 300 wounded. This was the opening salvo of the government’s plan to destroy the popular base of the Kurdish parties. While many PUK fighters were killed, the real target was the rural towns and population that the opposition relied upon.

Click on image for larger view (Rights Maps)

The 2^nd Anfal went from March 22 to April 1, and revealed the true outline of the Baath Party’s plans. Government forces targeted PUK held areas of Qara Dagh, Sulaymaniya, which had fallen to it in the early 1980s. The region had been attacked and gassed by the army in January and February, and Iraqi intelligence said that the peshmerga militia had been dispersed, but by March they had moved back in. On March 22, Qara Dagh was hit with chemical filled artillery shells. The next day, a neighboring village that was a PUK base was attacked. On March 24, another hamlet that was used by the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) for its operations against Kirkuk was gassed. As people fled from these villages, chemical weapons hit them as well. The survivors that were rounded up were taken away to detention centers, where they were split up by gender. Many of the men were taken away, and never seen again. The operations in March revealed some of the main tactics of the Anfal campaign. Villages would be attacked, sometimes with gas, and then the people captured would be sent away to camps. The goal was to eventually empty out the rural areas, to deny any kind of support to the Kurdish resistance.

Click om images for larger view (Rights Maps)

The 3^rd Anfal lasted from April 7 to 20, and focused upon the Germian area of Sulaymaniya. This was a place where peshmerga and refugees from previous attacks were gathering. They were set upon by a large pincer attack by Iraqi forces, which funneled people into collection points where they were arrested. In the process some 120 villages were destroyed. The 3^rd Anfal was also noteworthy because women and children who were captured and placed into camps began being taken away and killed. Some were taken to Hatra in Ninewa province and executed, while others were transported as far as southern Iraq to be killed and buried. In April 2005 for example, a mass grave was found near the city of Samawa in Muthanna province that held as many of 1,500 Kurds most of which were women and children killed during this period. This marked a new level of brutality as before only men were killed in the camps. The government was initially targeting anyone that could be considered a peshmerga or someone who might become one in the future. Now, the authorities were going after everyone, no matter what their age or gender in a brutal campaign to destroy the civilian population.

Mass grave found at Samawa containing up to 1,500 Kurds killed during the Anfal (Associated Press)

The 4^th Anfal started on May 3, and occurred along the Lesser Zab River, Sulaymaniya. On the first day, the town of Kogtapa was hit with chemical bombs. Another massive multi-pronged assault was then begun in the area. As before, towns were destroyed, refugees were rounded up, and put into camps.

Click on image for larger view (Rights Maps)

The 5^th Anfal marked the end of the PUK’s presence in Iraq. It focused upon the Balisan Valley in Sulaymaniya from May 15 to August 26. By then, the campaign had forced the PUK from most of their strongholds, and they were on the run. On May 23, the 5^th Anfal began with a chemical attack upon villages in the valley, followed by infantry attacks. In the middle of the offensive on July 17, Iran told the United Nations they would accept a cease-fire with Iraq in the Iran-Iraq War. This was a major blow to the Kurds, because Iran was their main supporter. Having lost most of its base, its foreign support, and being faced with more and more infantry and chemical attacks, the PUK decided to withdraw from Iraq into Iran. By the end of August, the party was devastated. Its fighters and supporters were dispersed along the Iranian border or within Iran itself. It had ceased to be a fighting force, and had no real camps or villages to go to anymore within Iraq.

Click on image for larger view (Rights Maps)

The final Anfal was from late August to the beginning of September. With the PUK defeated, the Iraqi government then focused upon the KDP in Dohuk province. The cease-fire with Iran allowed Baghdad to deploy new divisions to the north as reinforcements. In total, 200,000 troops were deployed against 6,000-10,000 KDP peshmerga. The assault started with artillery and aerial bombardments. The KDP headquarters was attacked on August 24. On August 25, chemical weapons were used against villages throughout the area. Like the PUK, the KDP eventually ordered its followers to withdraw in face of the overwhelming onslaught by the government. The Army tried to block their escape, but failed. 65,000-80,000 people ended up fleeing towards Turkey. Others hid in the mountains. The situation was made worse when Turkey blocked the border. It was afraid that the Iraqi Kurds would enflame its own Kurdish situation. Eventually, under international pressure, Turkey allowed the refugees to enter, but they were only given minimal aid, and Ankara tried to force most of them into Iran. The effective end of the Iran-Iraq War, not only eliminated the Kurds’ main military supporter, but also sent more troops to the north. The PUK’s presence in Iraq had already been eliminated by the end of August. By the beginning of the following month, the KDP had fled Iraq as well.

Click on image for larger view (Rights Maps)

The Iraqi government was so confident that it had finally defeated the PUK and KDP that it issued an amnesty in September. The order said that all Kurds within and without Iraq, except for Jalal Talabani who was labeled a traitor, had until October 8 to turn themselves in. Those that did were sent to two camps. In total, some 45,000 Kurds ended up returning. Some were held as late as 1990, but the majority was dispersed to different areas away from the Iranian-Turkish border. Many ended up settling in the major cities and towns of Kurdistan or just outside of them. Baghdad thought it had finally gotten rid of the Kurdish parties, so it allowed those that wanted to return to Iraq, but under the watchful eye of the authorities.

Saddam Hussein wanted to make an example out of the Kurds for challenging his power. The Kurds were pushing to create their own country, which would require the dismantling of part of Iraq. The Iraqi government had gone back and forth with the Kurds previously, offering them talks while wiping out villages and settling Arabs in the north at the same time. In 1975 it actually drove the KDP out of the country, and into Iran. There the peshmerga re-grouped, and made a return during the Iran-Iraq War. By 1986 however, Saddam had enough as the Kurds were in control of most of rural Kurdistan. In 1988 he launched Anfal. Human rights groups believe that 50,000-100,000 people were killed as a result, the Kurds claimed 182,000, while Ali Hassan al-Majid, the man in charge of the campaign, claimed he had done away with around 100,000 people. After the Anfal there were only 673 villages left in the three Kurdish provinces of Iraq. 4,049 had been destroyed. 1.5 million people had been displaced or resettled by the government. The KDP and PUK were smashed, and the rural areas of northern Iraq were devastated. The government believed that it had done away with its Kurdish problem, and was in control of the country. That proved transitory as the PUK and KDP would eventually regroup in Turkey and Iran, and continue the fight another day. In the meantime, the Kurdish countryside was left deeply scared with the ruins of most of its villages, and the bodies of thousands of people. Anfal showed the extent to which Saddam was willing to go to ensure his rule of Iraq.

SOURCES

Agence France Presse, “Kurdish mass grave with 900 corpses found in Iraq,” 7/7/11

BBC, “Babies found in Iraq mass grave,” 10/13/04

Hayes, Harry, “Genocide in Iraq: Further Reasons for a Criminal Tribunal,” International Review, 1/14/03

Human Rights Watch, “Whatever Happened To The Iraqi Kurds?” 3/11/91

Knickmeyer, Ellen, “113 Kurds Are Found in Mass Grave,” Washington Post, 4/30/05

Marr, Phebe, The Modern History of Iraq, Colorado, Oxford: Westview Press, 2004

McCarthy, Rory, “Hundreds of Kurds found buried in Iraq mass graves,” Guardian, 10/14/04

Middle East Watch – Human Rights Watch, “Genocide In Iraq, The Anfal Campaign Against the Kurds,” July 1993

Iraq’s 1988 Assault Upon Halabja, And Its Conflation With The Anfal Campaign

In early 1988, Iraq opened its Anfal Campaign against the Kurdish opposition. Right at the beginning of that offensive government forces launched a chemical attack upon the town of Halabja killing thousands. Since the two happened during the same time, histories have conflated them together. In fact, Anfal and the Halabja assault were two separate events. The latter was an attempt to destroy the rural base of the Kurds, while the former was a retaliatory strike against an Iranian-Kurdish peshmerga offensive in northern Iraq during the Iran-Iraq War.

In the beginning of 1988, the Iran-Iraq War was waning, which allowed Baghdad to focus upon the Kurds. With the backing of Iran, the Kurdish peshmerga militia was able to rest control of most of rural Kurdistan from the government by 1986. In 1987, Saddam Hussein had enough with the northern rebels, and put his first cousin Ali Hassan al-Majid in charge of the region. He began more intensive military campaigns, which sometimes involved chemical weapons, to destroy Kurdish villages, and issued a series of repressive orders taking away the rights of Kurds in areas not controlled by the authorities. By early 1988, Iraq could free up some of its forces from the southern part of the country that had been fighting Iran, and redeploy them to Kurdistan. Al-Majid put them to work in his Anfal campaign, which was a massive military assault upon the popular base of the Kurdish parties.

The first Anfal offensive began in February 1988. It was characterized by the deployment of massive military formations against the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) led by Jalal Talabani. Hamlets were destroyed, chemical weapons were used, and thousands of people fled to the Iran-Iraq border. The plan was to push the peshmerga and civilian population out of the region’s hamlets, then destroy all the buildings and farms, capture the fleeing refugees, and relocate them to government controlled areas. This was meant to destroy the Kurdish opposition.

The PUK decided to retaliate against these attacks, supported by Iran. In March, Iranian Revolutionary Guards and peshmerga forces swept into Sulaymaniya province capturing a large number of villages. By March 13, they were outside of Halabja, a town of 40,000-60,000 people, and began shelling it. The Iraqi forces eventually gave way and the Iranians and Kurds were in control of Halabja by March 15. It looked as if the drive was going to be a success as the Iranians and Kurds had not only captured a large swath of the countryside, but a government held hamlet as well.

(BBC)

On March 16, Iraq counterattacked. At first, the security forces used air strikes and artillery. The assault drove many residents into their bomb shelters, which were common throughout Kurdistan because of all of the conflict there. Later that day, Iraqi aircraft flew overhead and dropped chemical bombs on Halabja. Many of those in their underground redoubts got the worse of it. Others were able to flee. On March 17, around 6,000 refugees fled to ruined villages outside of Halabja, and then to the Iranian border. The Iraqi forces then entered the town and began leveling it. The soldiers then left, and conceded the area to Iran and the peshmerga. Afterward, Tehran bused in journalists to report on the massacre. It was immediately seen as a propaganda tool Iran could use against Iraq. Halabja seemed to follow the pattern of the Anfal operation with shelling, bombing, the use of chemical weapons, and then the town being destroyed, but in fact it was part of the Iran-Iraq War.

Halabja became a poster-child for the Iraqi government’s use of weapons of mass destruction against the Kurdish population. An estimated 5,000 people died in the attack, and thousands were displaced. The story was broadcast around the world, thanks to Iran, who wanted to exploit it for all that it was worth to tarnish the image of Iraq during the Iran-Iraq War. Since it occurred during the Anfal campaign, many thought it was part of it, but it was not. Halabja was a major town that was in government hands before the peshmerga and Iranian Revolutionary Guards captured it. Anfal largely involved small towns out in the countryside. The attack upon Halabja was aimed at the Iranians, and their PUK allies. Anfal was mostly about driving civilians out of the rural regions to deprive the Kurdish parties of their support. That in no way lessons the brutality of the raid or the massive loss of life, but Halabja was retaliation for the PUK and Iranians capturing it, and not part of the Anfal. The two together will go down in history as one of the most brutal acts committed by Saddam Hussein during his 24-year rule of Iraq.

SOURCES

Human Rights Watch, “Whatever Happened To The Iraqi Kurds?” 3/11/91

Marr, Phebe, The Modern History of Iraq, Colorado, Oxford: Westview Press, 2004

Middle East Watch – Human Rights Watch, “Genocide In Iraq, The Anfal Campaign Against the Kurds,” July 1993

Tripp, Charles, A History Of Iraq, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press, 2008

VIDEO: The Chemical Bombardment of Halabja by the Iraqi Regime

AL-JAZIRAH CARTOON: Iran Steers Iraq

SOURCE: Al-Jazirah, 9/1/11 via MEMRI Blog

APTN VIDEO: IRAQ: The Grassroots Recovery

Pres. Bakr, Saddam, And Iraq’s Kurds Before The Anfal Campaign

Relations between the Baathist run government of Iraq and the Kurds was always characterized by mistrust and violence. President Ahmad Hassan al-Bakr fluctuated between talks and going to war with the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) of Mustafa Barzani, the main Kurdish opposition group within Iraq. It was during this time that the government started its Arabization program in northern Iraq to move out Kurds and replace them with Arabs. During the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s and Saddam’s rule, the KDP and the breakaway faction the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) of Jalal Talabani joined the Iranian side, which led to a new round of conflict. These years would all set the stage for the later Anfal campaign, as the government destroyed Kurdish villages, used chemical weapons, and designated Kurds as non-Iraqis.

President Ahmad Hassan al-Bakr unsuccessfully attempted to co-opt the Kurds. In 1968 the Baathists took power in a coup. President Bakr appointed three Kurdish ministers, two from Mustafa Barzani’s faction of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), and one from Jalal Talabani’s. The President then tried to play Barzani off of Talabani to keep the Kurds divided. Within a month, the Kurdish ministers quit, and Barzani would launch a military campaign by the end of the year. As the new leader of Iraq, Bakr tried to create the image of a national unity government by including the Kurds. There was nothing substantive behind the move, as the President just wanted to split the Kurdish groups.

In January 1969, Baghdad appeared to change its tone as it offered a new autonomy deal to Barzani. The KDP wanted to push for as many concessions as possible, so it aligned with Iran, and launched an attack upon the Kirkuk oil field in March. In the summer, the government retaliated militarily, while opening secret talks with Barzani at the same time. Bakr appointed Saddam Hussein as his emissary to the Kurds. In March 1970, the government offered to recognize the Kurds’ national identity and language, allow them political representation, and control of the local government in northern Iraq. That did not include defense, oil or finances. Barzani appeared to take the offer seriously, and ended his association with Iran, called off his military attacks, and started negotiations with Baghdad. Again, the Baathist regime carried out a two-track policy. While talks were going on, it moved Arab families into the Kirkuk area to secure its oil reserves, and there were several assassination attempts upon Barzani in 1971, which many thought Saddam was behind. By early 1972, the KDP was fed up, and went back to being under the patronage of Tehran. Bakr again proved to be a tricky character. On the one hand, he appeared to be willing to give the Kurds some of their long promised rights in Iraq. At the same time, he tried to shore up his control of Kirkuk, and might have tried to kill Barzani. That led the KDP to return to armed struggle, rather than deal with Baghdad anymore.

That proved to be a bad choice, as the Kurds became pawns in a regional struggle during the mid-1970s. The Shah of Iran did not like the new Baathist government in Iraq because of its socialist and pan-Arab rhetoric, and began pushing boundary issues. In 1972 Iraq also signed a strategic treaty with the Soviet Union. Together this led to the United States and Iran to back the KDP against President Bakr. Barzani then returned to fighting. By the summer of 1974 there was outright war in northern Iraq. Suddenly in March 1975, Iraq and Iran cut a deal over the border, and Tehran and Washington dropped the Kurds. The KDP could no longer withstand the government’s forces without outside support, and the military tide turned in the favor of Bakr. He then offered an amnesty, which led to thousands of Kurdish peshmerga fighters to surrender, while Barzani and his followers fled to Iran. Baghdad then began a resettlement program to move Kurds away from the Iranian-Turkish border area. Some 500,000 families were moved either to the large cities and towns of northern Iraq or to the southern part of the country. At the same time, the authorities settled more Arabs into Kirkuk province to try to shore up their control of this important, oil-rich area. By the middle of the 1970s it appeared as if the central government had won a decisive victory against the Kurds. They were used by Iran and the United States, and when they lost interest, their aid was suddenly cut off, and the KDP was forced to abandon Iraq. It appeared as if the Kurdish resistance had been taken care of.

Flush with its victory, the Iraqi government started its Arabization program in 1975. The security forces tried to clear the border areas with Iran and Turkey, and built military outposts throughout the region. More importantly for the future, it started destroying some Kurdish towns along the Iranian border, and placed their residents into government run camps. Those areas not under central control were marked as restricted, and constantly shelled. Occasional military raids were conducted, and several Kurdish tribes were co-opted, and turned into the Jahsh militia. Baghdad was not content with simply driving the KDP off. It wanted to establish its control over the north by moving the population, and using military force against those who remained.

The Iran-Iraq War offered the Kurds another opportunity to make a return. In 1979, the KDP was able to forge good ties with the new revolutionary Iranian government. When the war broke out the next year, the Kurds were still in disarray, and the various Iraqi factions spent most of their time arguing and fighting with each other. In October 1983, however, the KDP assisted Iran in launching an attack into northern Iraq, which was able to seize a few villages. Baghdad rounded up 8,000 males of the Barzani clan in retaliation, who were never seen again. The Iranian-KDP foray also scared the newly formed Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) led by Jalal Talabani, who was afraid of being overwhelmed. It opened talks with the government, but those went nowhere as Iraq’s new leader Saddam Hussein was unwilling to offer any serious concessions. The PUK was then forced to make a peace treaty with the KDP in 1985, and Tehran pushed them to cooperate more closely militarily. With the aid of Iran, the Kurdish peshmerga were able to make large advances in northern Iraq, while most of the security forces were caught up fighting Iran in the south. In October 1986 for example, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards and the PUK’s militia were able to launch an attack upon the Kirkuk oil fields. This was part of Iran’s plan to increase military operations in the north to relieve pressure off the south. By late-1986, the Kurds had been so successful that the government was left in control of only the cities, large towns, pipelines, and major roads, while the countryside and villages were conceded to the PUK and KDP. As seen in the past, the Kurds fell back upon Iran when they wanted to take up arms. This time however, it allowed the government to rally support against them, by claiming that the Kurdish parties were Iranian puppets. The sudden loss of territory, and the presence of Iranian forces in northern Iraq were unacceptable, and Saddam was determined to do something about it.

From 1986-1987, the Iraqi government launched a new campaign against the Kurds. First, Baghdad ordered the Baath Party leader for the north in 1986 to regain control of the area in six months. When he failed, Saddam decided on a more severe crackdown on the Kurds the following year. The authorities decided to empty the border region of the Kurdish opposition and destroy them. This was to be accomplished by wiping out towns, villages, and farms, and cutting off all government services and trade. The emphasis would be upon the rural areas of northern Iraq, which was the basis of the PUK and KDP’s support. To carry out this new policy, Saddam placed his first cousin, Ali Hassan al-Majid in charge of northern Iraq. His appointment meant that the Baath Party, not the Iraqi Army would be in charge of the campaign. Majid was known for his ruthlessness, and was eventually given authority over two army corps, the Republican Guard, the Special Forces, commanders, Emergency Forces, the Baath Party militia, and the Kurdish Jahsh to wipe out the KDP and PUK. This was not just a regular military operation, but would have the full backing of the government, and the attention of Saddam.

In April 1987, an offensive launched by the PUK brought quick retaliation, and showed the lengths to which al-Majid was willing to go to combat them. At the beginning of the month, Talabani’s peshmerga started new operations in northern Iraq. On April 15, the security forces responded by shelling two villages with chemical artillery shells in the Balisan Valley. That same day, the PUK headquarters in the mountains of Sulaymaniya were bombed. The next day, two more villages were shelled, followed by the Army and Jahsh moving in to destroy them on April 17. The inhabitants were rounded up and imprisoned. The men were eventually taken away and never seen again. The remaining women and children were later dumped in a field and left to their own devices. In three days, 225-400 people were killed. The government was not done however, as five more villages in the Malakan Valley were gassed on April 20. These were the first times that Iraq had used chemical weapons against civilians, which was almost a year before the infamous Anfal campaign of 1988. Although future operations would be much more brutal and widespread, April’s attacks showed that the people would be the main targets, and that the authorities were willing to use weapons of mass destruction to achieve their goals.

In late April 1987, the government launched its spring campaign against the Kurdish opposition. The security forces swept into rural Irbil and Sulaymaniya provinces to destroy villages. The authorities warned the inhabitants about what they were doing beforehand, leaving them unharmed otherwise. Some families were even given compensation for having to move. The locals were told they had a choice to make, either side with the government or the peshmerga. Where they chose to live afterward, would determine their loyalties. In total, 730 villages were dynamited and bulldozed. The government was attempting to draw the line with the rural population, telling them that they would be considered enemies in the future if they did not side with the authorities. The population had little idea what would happen to them next, as only buildings were being attacked, and not individuals. The Kurds had fled before, and they probably thought this was no different from past actions.

Al-Majid had other ideas. From April to June he issued a number of orders that would lay the foundation for the coming Anfal campaign. On April 6, he signed a decree saying that all peshmerga were to lose their property. On April 10, residents that lived in banned areas lost all their legal rights. On May 1, the first relatives of peshmerga fighters would begin to be executed. On May 14, any wounded civilians who were caught and determined to be with the Kurdish opposition were to be killed. Finally, on June 3, the military was authorized to kill anyone found in restricted areas, which covered 1,000 villages. To top it all off, the Iraqi air force bombed the PUK headquarters and the surrounding 25-30 villages with chemical weapons from June to July. Al-Majid was telling the security forces and government that it was to ruthlessly deprive and kill any opponents. This would be done by denying the Kurdish parties of their popular support by killing them and destroying their hamlets,

The next step in this process was the October 1987 census. Everyone answering the survey was told to identify themselves as being either an Arab or Kurd. Anyone could sign up as an Arab, but if an individual registered as a Kurd they would be deprived of government services, and be eligible for deportation, and their house being destroyed. Anyone who did not sign up with the census was also no longer considered Iraqi. After the survey was conducted, the government started a largely ineffective economic embargo of restricted areas not under its control. The Baathists were very bureaucratic and kept meticulous records. The census was a way to collect some rough data on just how many people were living in the contested Kurdish region. Baghdad also used the survey as a political tool to see who was for and against the government.

From 1968 to 1987, Baghdad and the Kurdish opposition constantly upped the ante against each other. There would be talks, followed by fighting as Baghdad proved to be an unreliable party to negotiate with. The peshmerga ended up being the main way the KDP and PUK tried to influence events in Iraq, and this in turn, pushed them into the arms of Iran for military support. That would backfire each time, as it solidified the image of the Kurds as traitors in the eyes of Iraq’s leadership. By the 1980s, Baghdad was unwilling to tolerate this threat any longer, and its policies set the stage for the later Anfal campaign. Ali al-Majid saw the remote rural villages as the root of the problem as they were the backbone of the Kurdish resistance. With the forces and authority he had at his disposal he began targeting these areas, while depriving their inhabitants of their legal rights to even life eventually. All these early elements would be amplified, and taken to new levels of brutality in the Anfal campaign. This highlighted the extent to which the Baath Party and Saddam were willing to go to eliminate anyone that stood in their way.

SOURCES

Hayes, Harry, “Genocide in Iraq: Further Reasons for a Criminal Tribunal,” International Review, 1/14/03

Human Rights Watch, “Whatever Happened To The Iraqi Kurds?” 3/11/91

Marr, Phebe, The Modern History of Iraq, Colorado, Oxford: Westview Press, 2004

Middle East Watch – Human Rights Watch, “Genocide In Iraq, The Anfal Campaign Against the Kurds,” July 1993

Polk, William, Understanding Iraq, New York, London, Toronto, Sydney: Harper Perennial, 2006