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Book by Aliza Marcus
Review By Hasan Usak:
The Kurdish conflict has directly affected the political and social conditions of the Middle East since the establishment of Turkey. From 1919 up to the present, Kurdish people rebelled 29 times against the regimes in charge of the land they live in. Except for the last rebellion of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), all were suppressed by force in a short period of time.
The regimes, including the Turkish state, after suppressing the rebellions, have implemented denial and destruction policies against the Kurds. The continuation of these policies against the Kurdish population in each country they live in, namely Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Syria, caused new and better-organised rebellions, like a vicious circle.
However, the fate of the last rebellion was not the same as the rebellions before it. The last one was organized and led by a political and ideological party called the PKK, the Kurdistan Worker Party. The fight between the Turkish army and the Kurdish guerrillas, armed members of the PKK, has left a scar on the last 30 years of Middle East history.
Over 40,000 people were killed, 3,000 villages were evacuated and destroyed, 17,000 people disappeared and many were extra-judicially killed, tens of thousands were jailed and tortured, and hundreds of thousands were forced to migrate internally to metropolitan cities in Turkey and externally to European Union countries.
I am one of the Kurds who was affected directly by the conflict in the region. Due to this vital reason I have been interested in the turbulent Kurdish conflict. Many books are published regarding the Kurdish conflict and the PKK. Almost all of them are written by ‘state minded’ authors, favouring the regimes against the Kurds.
The first ‘alternative’ book, in English, came out in 1996 written by the journalist Ismet Imset and entitled ‘The PKK: Terrorists or Freedom Fighters?’ It was very difficult, even dangerous, to ask this question.
There was a big knowledge-gap relating to the PKK, its leader Abdullah Ocalan and their fight for independence. I supposed that Aliza Marcus’s book, ‘Blood and Belief; the PKK and the Kurdish Fight for Independence’, would fill the gap.
Aliza Marcus is an American journalist who works presently for The Boston Globe. She covered the struggle of the PKK for eight years. She worked for The Christian Science Monitor, Reuters News Agency and received a National Press Club Award. ‘Blood and Belief: the PKK and the Kurdish Fight for Independence’ was published by New York University Press in 2007.
In order to understand the PKK, its leader Mr Ocalan, and its fight for independence we must look at the period of the establishment of the Republic of Turkey. To my way of thinking, the main causes of the conflict lie there. Aliza Marcus’s book starts in the late 1940s, with the birth of the PKK founder Ocalan, whereas she should go further back to find the true origin of the PKK and the Kurdish conflict.
The book, consisting of 351 pages, is divided into four main sections. It starts with ‘Ocalan, the Kurds and the PKK’, then ‘the PKK consolidates power’, then ‘PKK militants fight for control’ and finally ‘Ocalan’s capture and after’.
“One chilly fall night in 1978, a small group of university dropouts and their friends gathered behind blacked-out windows in Turkey’s southeast to plan a war for an independence Kurdish state.` The book starts with this introductory sentence which is a very short summary of the PKK’s establishment.
In the first section she bases the PKK’s origin in the period 1949-1976. We read of Mr Ocalan’s personality formation and development. The author takes us on a historical journey covering Ocalan’s childhood, family, absolute poverty, first impressions of life and student life in the capital city of Turkey, Ankara. The PKK’s inner circle comes together in that period and discusses what to do. Ocalan asks the group: “Why do the Kurds always lose?” He refers to the previous 28 Kurdish uprisings and their leadership. The answer is clear: the main reason is weak leadership. The path to leadership for Mr Ocalan opens with this accepted view.
The inner circle rapidly grows and the PKK, an outlawed armed organisation, is established on 27 November 1978.
Aliza Marcus argues that the PKK fights with pro-state Kurds while inspiring non pro-state Kurds. “The PKK understood well the psychology of the Kurdish people,” she quotes Huseyin Topgider, a former member of an outlawed Turkish leftist party called TKDP.
The subject deepens in the following sections. The first attack carried out by the PKK is as important as its establishment: Kurdish guerrillas attack two centres of the Turkish army on 15 August 1984.
The rise and fall of the guerrilla war against the Turkish State and for an independent Kurdistan is detailed in different phases: 1985-1991, 1991-1997 and 1997-2007. The time periods are determined by the ‘strategic change and transformation processes’.
Aliza Markus gives readers the views and memories of former members of PKK to explain the process which started in 1984. Selim Curukkaya, Sukru Gulmus, Sait Curukkaya, Ayhan Ciftci, Huseyin Topgider, Selahattin Celik are the main former members of the PKK among her narrators.
“This book is based on extensive interviews with former members of the Turkish Kurdish rebel group the PKK”, says Aliza Markus. This makes the book half true, or it should make readers suspicious of the content, because most of the people interviewed are now PKK opponents.
Some opponents of the PKK – such as Sukru Gulmus, Selim Curukkaya, Sait Curukkaya and Ayhan Ciftci – are fighting against the PKK and are known to be extreme opponents of the organisation. On the other hand there is not even one member of the PKK who is still involved or supports the organisation’s perspective among Aliza’s interviewees. I asked her the reason for this. “They did not talk to me”, she replied.
How can the opinions of these opponents explain everything about the PKK?
Aliza’s ‘Blood and Belief’ is seen by many as a reference book. However it only explains half the story – the negative side of the PKK and its struggle. It should be completed by the other half to become a real reference book.
