When President Donald Trump ordered hundreds of U.S. troops out of the Kurdish controlled region of Syria, a global chorus criticized the move as a coldhearted abandonment of a loyal ally who played a pivotal military role in reclaiming land from the Islamic State (ISIS). This sudden shift in U.S. policy pushed the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces to form a new alliance with the Syrian Assad government, opposed by the United States, in an effort to seek protection against a Turkish advance into their territory: a protection previously granted by U.S forces in the region. While this action was bold, the international community should not be surprised; the United States’ historical relationship with the Kurdish people has been characterized by mild sympathy and support for their autonomy insofar as it aligns with American objectives.
After World War II, the United States gradually replaced Great Britain as the leading influencer in the Middle East. While periodic contact occurred between Kurdish activists and U.S. diplomats, the U.S. interest in the Kurds materialized in the early 1970’s as a way to counter the Soviet-friendly Iraqi regime. Through the 1960s the United States maintained official neutrality on the Iraqi Kurdish, despite pressure from Israel and Iran to support the Kurds. However, soon after Saddam Hussein took power in Iraq and solicited aid from the Soviet Union in an arms deal 1971, and a Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation 1972, alarming Nixon. In line with the U.S. policy of containment during the Cold War, the United States sought to weaken the Saddam government through covert action. In this context, the United States began to arm and train the Iraqi Kurdish rebel forces in 1974 to destabilize the Iraqi regime and tie up their troops from invading Israel or Iran under the Shah. In 1974, Secretary of State, Henry Kissenger, sent an official diplomatic cable that would become the bedrock of the U.S.-Kurdish relationship to the U.S. embassy in Tehran. He outlined three points: to give Kurds capacity to maintain a reasonable base for negotiating recognition of rights by Baghdad Government; to keep present Iraqi government tied down; but not to divide Iraq permanently because an independent Kurdish area would not be economically viable and the United States and Iran would have no interest in closing door on good relations with Iraq under moderate leadership.
From this point onward, the United States has maintained a relatively consistent foreign policy towards the Kurds, characterized by passive commitment to increased autonomy as long as the Kurdish rebellion is weakening U.S. adversaries. Also, as Kissenger’s note alludes, the United States had no interest in supporting an independent Kurdish state as its land-locked status would make it reliant on its often hostile neighbors to export goods. This is the emergence of what Michael Rubin, Resident Scholar at American Enterprise Institute told the HPR, an American-Kurdish relationship, “defined by short-term goals.”
The United States first broke their alliance with the Kurds by halting this weapons supply line to Iraqi Kurds in 1975, following the Algiers Agreement between Iran and Iraq. The agreement defined strict borders between the two nations and ended “infiltration across the border.” This heavily implied that the U.S.-backed Shah Iran would stop supporting the Iraqi Kurds militarily, thus ending the short-lived U.S. relationship with the Iraqi Kurds. At the time, there was significant backlash from Iraqi Kurdish leaders, who were not told of the U.S. exit and felt abandoned. This prompted the famous alleged quote from a top U.S. official, “Covert action should not be confused for missionary work.” These U.S. actions make sense in the context of the Cold War, in which supporting independence movements such as the Kurds was not the primary objective, but rather the short-term means for containing communism. This is a clear example of how the United States historically treats the Kurds’ fight for autonomy as a useful tool in accomplishing U.S. regional objectives.
Later after the Iranian Revolution of 1979 and the disposal of the U.S.-friendly Shah, the United States viewed Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi government as an important counter to post-revolution Iran. Needing a strong Iraq to thwart Iran, meant that it was in the U.S. interest to not aid the Kurdish rebellion in northern Iraq. The United States cut off contact with the Iraqi Kurds for about a decade. Sadly, while the United States prioritized keeping Iran weak; the Iraqi government killed about 5,000 Kurdish civilians in a chemical weapons attack in 1988. “After the 1979 Islamic Revolution, the Reagan administration looked at Saddam Hussein as a bulwark against Ayatollah Khomenei’s radical fervor, and so was willing to turn a blind eye to the Iraqi leader’s genocidal campaign against them,” remarked Dr. Rubin.
The United States resumed its relationship with the Kurds during the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990. To stymie any further genocide against the Kurds and weaken Saddam Hussein’s power, the United States established a no-fly-zone over northern Iraq. Additionally, the United States helped establish the Iraqi National Congress, an opposition political group based in Iraqi Kurdistan. This congress was designed both to bolster public relations with the Kurds and to create political conditions to overthrow Saddam Hussein. The quick change of heart to bolster Kurdish autonomy underlies the larger historical trend that the United States has supported the Kurds on a precarious need-to basis.
When it came to finally toppling the Hussein regime in the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq, the United States again sought Kurdish military collaboration. This time, Kurdish peshmerga and U.S. special forces worked together to reclaim Mosel and Kirkuk from government forces. During a time of need, the Kurdish forces assisted the United States in fighting a common enemy. Following the successful overthrow of the Saddam regime, the United States again distanced itself from Kurdistan, particularly the Kurdish independence movement. Specifically, the United States originally opposed a proposed expanding oil pipelines that would connect from the oil field of Kurdish-controlled Iraq to Turkey, out of concern that an economically strong Kurdish region would threaten the integrity of Iraqi nation-building. (They have since become a legal arbitrator in a fight between the Kurdish regional government and Iraq over who controls this oil revenue). Consistent with other historical examples, the United States reserved support for Kurdish autonomy was overshadowed by regional security interests.
More recently, the United States did not recognize the legitimacy of the 2017 Kurdish Independence referendum. While the Kurds were incredibly useful in the fight against ISIS in Iraq and Syria, their independence undermined the U.S. vision of a stable Middle East. U.S. foreign policy maintains that an independent Kurdistan would be reliant on its hostile neighbors to export oil and prone to invasion. “The practicalities of diplomacy and regional policy make any U.S. support for Kurdish independence or greater autonomy in any country unlikely until the regime falls in Iran,” explained expert Dr. Michael Rubin. “The reason for this is that while Turkey might try to co-opt a Kurdish region — making it the Kurdish equivalent of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus — the Iranian government would use military force to quash it.”
In light of the current uproar about Trump’s decision to pull U.S. troops out of Kurdish-controlled Syria, it is important to keep in mind the historical legacy of U.S.-Kurdish relations, and how the Kurds have largely been viewed as a usable piece in U.S. foreign policy. As Dr. Rubin noted, “Unless anyone in Washington was willing to go to war to defend a nascent Kurdish entity, then, it is unlikely we will see any significant change in the status quo in which most Americans admire the Kurds but, simultaneously, aren’t willing to do much to empower them.”