Iraqi Futures, Turkish Options

Abstract: This paper, completed as Ankara was considering extending its green light to cross-border military operations in northern Iraq, will explore a range of possible outcomes for Iraq, and Ankara's stakes in and policy preferences for Iraq and particularly northern Iraq. It will consider the aspirations of Iraq's Kurds, and the domestic, regional and international constraints on both Iraq's Kurds and Turkey. A range of alternative policy approaches available to Ankara will be discussed, and their implications assessed. The paper will argue that, whatever the outcome for Iraq overall, a high degree of Iraqi Kurdish independence will be an unavoidable feature of the region's political arrangements. Ankara's adjustment to this reality will be difficult.