Thanks for the good points. I am quite convinced that there have been Turkish incursions into northern Iraq, sometimes coordinated with Iranian actions including artillery shelling of villages, etc. I hope this story is false and am delighted you think it’s false. I don’t know anything special, I just saw this story and thought it useful to raise the general point. On Syria, I’ve been calling for action against the terrorist training camps for more than twenty years. And we of course agree on the Iranian matters: nice to see Qods Force thugs arrested and even killed, but it’s not nearly enough.

I don’t see how the central Iraqi Government can cede the defense of the national integrity of the country to the Kurds, or anyone else. I had thought the deal was that the Kurds were responsible for security–as in regional security, counterterrorism, law enforcement, etc. You know these things better than I, but I’m surprised to hear that the Iraq Army isn’t entitled to defend its northern border. Is that right? Gracious…

Finally, I’m certainly not arguing for moral, or any other, equivalence between our actions, or Turkish actions, and Iranian actions. I’m not very sympathetic to this Turkish Government, but it has higher standing than the mullahcracy, obviously. I am only saying that, in the unfortunate way the world works, we will find it heavy going to argue that it’s ok for the Turks to strike inside Iraq but not for the Iranians. If that’s what we think–which I doubt–we should explain why. I think it’s much better to stand for the territorial integrity of Iraq and tell the Turks to do the same. And then work with them against terrorism, which we’re doing already. They aren’t satisfied with our actions, but then hardly anybody is, are they?

Anyhow, thanks again for the good points.