Ramadi Falls

[merrylander]

We stuck the PKK on the terrorist list just to keep the Turks happy, all they want is their homeland back from the Turks, Syria, Iraq and Iran.

[Ike Bana]

Originally Posted by Boreas

We've been here before. I know you have this Kurdish friend and, according you, he says the PKK is the "Taliban" but that's wrong. They're secular and pretty Marxist. Not only that, they have female fighters on the front lines who do the same work as the men. Would an Islamic extremist organization permit that? Comparing them to religious fanatics like the Taliban is silly.

I have a Kurdish friend and several Pakistani friends. They all say the same thing. You don't want the PKK running things. They'll put a bullet in anybody's head who crosses them. Just like the Taliban will. So you can say what you will John...but I'm gonna be going with these guys.

[Boreas]

You may have a good answer for this, Ike, but what the hell do Pakistanis know about the PKK? As far as I know, the PKK isn't active there. The Kurdish population of Pakistan is less than 300 and they're all Iraqi refugees.

[Ike Bana]

Originally Posted by Boreas

You may have a good answer for this, Ike, but what the hell do Pakistanis know about the PKK? As far as I know, the PKK isn't active there. The Kurdish population of Pakistan is less than 300 and they're all Iraqi refugees.

My Pakistani friends are mostly mental health professionals. Three of the four of them are psychiatrists. Highly educated and all spent their early years and early professional lives in the region. Not sitting pontificating on some fucked up internet political forum. They have personal experience and know Islamic cultures in ways that you and I guess at from what we read in our last fucking Google search on the Kurdish population in Pakistan.

When they tell me that if PKK thinks you're the opposition they will put a bullet in your head just as fast, if not faster than the Taliban will...I'm going with them John, not you and the results of your refugee search.

[donquixote99]

I am shocked, shocked to hear that the PKK personnel are in many cases hard men disposed to violence.

[Ike Bana]

Originally Posted by donquixote99

I am shocked, shocked to hear that the PKK personnel are in many cases hard men disposed to violence.

And from the patronizing tone of this I will reply...who the fuck cares what you think about it?

[Ike Bana]

Just one more thing John. It's so interesting that you're commenting on the Pakistanis who I'm acquainted with and not the Kurd. So...just for your information. My Kurdish acquaintance is a Turk. As he once told a small group of us some years ago, as a young man, out of anger and frustration at the oppression and treatment of his people by our loyal ally the Turkish government, he joined the PKK. He said it was sold to him as a political activist group fighting for the rights of Kurds all over Turkey. He lasted a while, until the violence against anybody who crossed them finally overwhelmed him.

His refugee status in this country has remained in limbo for over 15 years because he was honest when he made his request for asylum and reported that years before he was a PKK member. He also told us that his request for asylum here was just as much in fear of the PKK that he abandoned, as from the Turkish government, were he to be deported back to Turkey. For over a year immediately after 9/11 he was locked up in some shithole federal detention center in Detroit without charge and without contact with family or an attorney by the Bush administration. He was only released when the outcry and publicity generated by his supporters became something the Bush people did not want to deal with, so they released him. The Bush administration and now the Obama administration both have refused to take action on his request for asylum...so he sits in limbo all this time down the road.

So that's where the information comes from that leads me to my opinion on this. You got Google...I got this.

[icenine]

Back on point:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/...y.html?hpid=z1

[Boreas]

Originally Posted by Ike Bana

Just one more thing John. It's so interesting that you're commenting on the Pakistanis who I'm acquainted with and not the Kurd. So...just for your information. My Kurdish acquaintance is a Turk. As he once told a small group of us some years ago, as a young man, out of anger and frustration at the oppression and treatment of his people by our loyal ally the Turkish government, he joined the PKK. He said it was sold to him as a political activist group fighting for the rights of Kurds all over Turkey. He lasted a while, until the violence against anybody who crossed them finally overwhelmed him.

His refugee status in this country has remained in limbo for over 15 years because he was honest when he made his request for asylum and reported that years before he was a PKK member. He also told us that his request for asylum here was just as much in fear of the PKK that he abandoned, as from the Turkish government, were he to be deported back to Turkey. For over a year immediately after 9/11 he was locked up in some shithole federal detention center in Detroit without charge and without contact with family or an attorney by the Bush administration. He was only released when the outcry and publicity generated by his supporters became something the Bush people did not want to deal with, so they released him. The Bush administration and now the Obama administration both have refused to take action on his request for asylum...so he sits in limbo all this time down the road.

So that's where the information comes from that leads me to my opinion on this. You got Google...I got this.

Interesting and unsurprising but still doesn't address my point that the similarities between a secular Marxist insurgency and a brutal Theocratic movement/government are tenuous at best.

[Ike Bana]

Originally Posted by Boreas

Interesting and unsurprising but still doesn't address my point that the similarities between a secular Marxist insurgency and a brutal Theocratic movement/government are tenuous at best.

That's the great thing about the political forum isn't it? A member addresses an issue posed, and then some other member decides they didn't address it. And so it goes...

The point my sources are making is that the specifics of one organization's agenda don't matter much when that organization will wantonly put a bullet in the brain of anybody who publicly opposes them, and maybe even drag their corpse through town behind a motorbike to discourage others who mistakenly believe they have the right to a little free expression. Thus...PKK is the Taliban, is Hamas, is Isis, etc., etc.

Next, some meathead hereabouts will say...is Israel, and the stupid fucking argument will start all over again.