Volume 49, Number 14 · September 26, 2002
In Iraqi Kurdistan
By Tim Judah
With all the debate about whether the United States should go to war with Saddam Hussein's regime, hardly anyone seems to have noticed that the war for Iraq has already begun. A few weeks ago I sat on a mountainside in northern Iraq and watched Kurdish fighters, who are known as peshmergas, trading shellfire with a group that they say is linked to al-Qaeda and that had dug into positions on the mountain opposite. The Kurdish fighters claimed that their opponents, who are mainly Kurds but include some Arabs as well, receive some support from Saddam Hussein and a lot from Iran. As the peshmergas served tea, the otherwise silent landscape reverberated with the shelling, and puffs of smoke and dust twisted and vanished with the evening breeze. This is an overture to the war.
Feature, 5588 words
To read the full text of this piece, please choose one of the following options:
|
If you are already a subscriber to the Review's electronic edition, please sign in: |
To subscribe to the electronic edition, please press the button below. |
To purchase access to this article for $3, please press the button below. |