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177 World Affs. 57 (2014-2015)
No Friends but the Mountains: The Fate of the Kurds

handle is hein.journals/wrldaf177 and id is 547 raw text is: NO FRIENDS BUT THE MOUNTAINS The Fate of the Kurds Terry Glavin It is out of the Middle East's current nightmare that the old dream of a united Kurdistan is drawing new breath. Kurdish independence, if not in whole then at least in some combination of its disconnected parts, may well be the one thing worth salvaging from the region's killing fields. A firmer alignment on the part of the US with Kurdish interests would certainly salvage something from the shambles of American for- eign policy in the Middle East, too. But if the Kurds' time has at long last arrived, their own pragmatism and a distinctly utopian strain of politics are combining to confound even their most fervent overseas champions. It's not at all certain that anything like statehood is what the Kurds immediately want or need, and in any case, President Obama's opaque and haphazard approach to the Middle East, having already cost him the confidence of so many of his key administration officials, has also cost him the trust of the Kurds. Numbering perhaps twenty-five million people throughout their homelands in the mountainous region that lies astride the borders of Iraq, Iran, Turkey, and Syria, the Kurds are arguably the most populous Terry Glavin is a Canadian author and journalist. He writes a regular column for the Ottawa Citizen and the National Post. His most recent book is Come from the Shadows: The Long and Lonely Struggle for Peace in Afghanistan. MARCH/APRIL 2015 57

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