The current plight of the Kurdish people begs a couple of immediate questions. First, why is the fourth largest ethnic group in the region, with somewhere between twenty-five and forty million people, without their own state? Indeed, why are they almost without a recorded history? After browsing through a number of current books on the history of the Middle East, one finds a few pages, perhaps a dozen, devoted to the Kurds. Why so little for such a large and ancient people?

There are many answers to this question, but one is certainly related to the fact that the Kurds are minority populations within Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Syria. Their history, as with their culture generally, has been overshadowed by the histories of the majority populations in these countries. In the century since these countries have existed, nationalism and dictatorship have also left little room for minority expression. When not faced with military oppression or political discrimination, Kurds have been forced, at the very least, to cope with an environment hostile to developing their own identity.

Because the division of the Kurdish population among several other countries seems to be at the root of so many questions regarding their history, this article seeks to sketch out a brief history of the partition. When all of these other countries were formed after World War I, why was an independent Kurdistan not formed? What role did the Kurds, as well as the Turks, Arabs, and Europeans, play in the partition?

The complicated web of ethnicity, religion, war, oil, and the competing interests which have historically manipulated these factors in the Middle East, makes writing about this region challenging to say the least. The task is complicated further when dealing with the Kurds, who are a large group with common linguistic and cultural roots, but also with major divisions themselves. Consequently, this complexity demands careful definitions and careful approaches to the subject. The first cautionary note is to make clear that “Kurdistan” is simply a geographical expression—a term used to describe the location where the majority of Kurds in the world live. It was never a country. We must be careful with the expression because it implies a unity that the “Kurds” have never shared. There are several dialects, tribes, and other differences between these people. For example, the majority of this article deals with the Kurdish populations in what is today Iraq and Turkey. Their history is tied to the Ottoman Empire and its break-up, unlike the Kurdish tribes further east whose history is influenced by Persia. The other consequence of this complex subject is a layered approach to the material; like peeling away the layers of an onion, we begin with World War I, then focus on the Ottoman Empire, and finally get to the core of the issue, Kurdistan. This approach of starting “big” and then narrowing the view seemed the best capable of teasing out the various issues involved with the subject.

Background: World War I and the Treaty of Versailles

The roots of the partition of Kurdistan lay in World War I. The Ottoman Empire, under which the majority of Kurds lived, joined Germany and Austria-Hungary (the "Central Powers") in the conflict against Britain, France, Russia (until October 1917) and eventually Italy, Greece and the United States (collectively known as the "Allies") in 1914. The Ottomans were motivated partially by economic and military ties with Germany, but primarily to reconquer lost territories in Egypt from the British and the Caucasus Mountains from the Russians. There were some successes during the war, the most famous being the defeat of the British invasion at Gallipoli. But the Ottoman Empire, already known as the "weak man of Europe" throughout the nineteenth century, could not meet the exhausting demands of total war in the twentieth century. Faced with enemies with greater resources from without as well as corruption, inefficiency and rebellion from within, the Sultan could not hold his own empire together, let alone support the Germans and Austrians in defending theirs in Europe. After four years of bloody fighting, the Central Powers agreed to a cease fire in 1918.

The war had caused unprecedented bloodshed and destruction. The American president Woodrow Wilson had hoped to make a better future for the world out of this catastrophe. Throughout the peace negotiations, he advocated a number of idealistic principles directed at ending future wars; they were encapsulated in his so-called "Fourteen Points". Among these principles were ending secret treaties, establishing free trade, and creating the League of Nations. Most of the points, however, concerned “self-determination” for subject peoples (at least self-determination for the peoples of the defeated countries). In other words, he argued that national boundaries should be drawn based upon ethnicity. Point Twelve addressed the Ottoman Empire specifically:

The Turkish portion of the present Ottoman Empire should be assured a secure sovereignty, but the other nationalities which are now under Turkish rule should be assured an undoubted security of life and an absolutely unmolested opportunity of autonomous development, and the Dardanelles [the Straits] should be permanently opened as a free passage to the ships and commerce of all nations under international guarantees.

Unquestionably one of the “other nationalities,” the Kurds were given the first international justification for independence. And while the other great powers, namely Britain and France, scoffed at many of Wilson's ideas, the principle of “self-determination” served them well because it justified dismantling the multi-ethnic empires of their adversaries.

The Partition of the Ottoman Empire

The Allies dictated peace terms at Versailles, which the Central Powers signed in 1919. In addition to reparations and military occupation, the defeated faced partition. Out of Germany and especially Austria-Hungary came the new countries of Eastern Europe, including Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Yugoslavia. Out of the Ottoman Empire eventually came Iraq, Syria, Transjordan, Palestine, and the Arabian states. In theory these states were created out of "self-determination". Indeed, it is tempting to draw such a conclusion based on the publicity of Wilson’s Fourteen Points and because of the famous Arab uprising (aided by T.E. Lawrence—a.k.a. “Lawrence of Arabia”) against Turkish rule during the war. In reality, however, the partitions had little to do with the rights of subject peoples and almost everything to do with the interests of the Allies. This was particularly true of the Ottoman lands, where Greece, France and especially Great Britain had important military, economic and religious interests.

Plans for the partition of the Ottoman Empire were drawn up long before World War I ended. In 1916 Britain, France and Russia signed the Sykes-Picot Agreement which divided the Ottoman territories to suit their individual purposes. Russia hoped to control the Straits and to defend traditionally Orthodox Christian populations, which meant occupying many of the holy sites in Jerusalem. France wanted Syria because of its ties to Christianity, while Britain eyed Iraq and Jordan. The Italians and Greeks also had demands and were promised land in exchange for their entry into the war. The withdrawal of Russia in 1917 after the Bolshevik revolution mattered little, as the other Allies divided the remaining spoils among themselves. In August 1920 the Allies got what they wanted when they forced the Ottoman government to sign the Treaty of Sèvres. Britain and France got their territories put under so-called “mandates”, which left them independent in theory, but under European protection and guidance. These mandates were no more than colonies by another name, but because they were liberated in the name of self-determination, they needed at least the appearance of self-governance. The Treaty gave lands to the other interested parties as well: eastern Anatolia to Armenia, Smyrna and Thrace to Greece, and suggested the possibility of an independent Kurdistan. The humiliation of the dismemberment was exacerbated by the Greek invasion of Turkey beyond their treaty concessions.

To make matters worse for the Ottoman government, it had a full-scale rebellion on its hands beginning in 1919. The Turkish nationalists, led by Mustafa Kemal (“Ataturk”), had broken with the Sultan’s government by May over the coming capitulations in the peace treaty. The Treaty of Sèvres only added fuel to their cause. After retreating to central Anatolia, the Kemalists slowly succeeded in taking control of Turkey. With the help of the new U.S.S.R., it first eliminated Armenia. By the summer of 1922 the Greeks had been driven off Anatolia, the French were willing to deal, and the British decided to cut their losses and abandon their defense of the sultan. By the fall of 1922 the sultanate was abolished and the first republic in the Middle East had been established.

The new government immediately set out to replace the Treaty of Sèvres. With the military advantage and with adversaries tired of fighting, Kemal signed a much more favorable treaty in 1923. The Lausanne Treaty did not reverse the partitions, but curtailed them and guaranteed the independence of Turkey. It allowed for no Armenia, no Kurdistan, and no foreign occupation of Turkey itself. Marking another significant achievement of the Kemalist movement, Turkey was the only defeated country in World War I to negotiate its own peace terms.

The Partition of Kurdistan

While the Treaty of Lausanne was a triumph for Turkish nationalists, it marked the end of any hope for a unified and independent Kurdistan.

The possibility of such an entity as Kurdistan began with the Sykes-Picot Agreement of 1916. France was originally promised control over the region. Even though Kurdistan had been carved out of the Ottoman Empire as a convenient means to partition it, and not because of any recognized right to Kurdish independence, the idea of a unified Kurdistan remained a possibility for the next five years.

Realizing this dream came closest at the conclusion of the war. The realities of Ottoman weakness and the Allied desire to partition the empire were coupled with the moral justification of self-determination based on nationality. Although the Kurds were hardly a unified group, they did have a representative at the peace negotiations after the war. A former Ottoman diplomat from the Kurdish aristocracy, Sherif Pasha had joined the opposition against his government and now campaigned for Kurdish independence. In March 1919 he argued to the Conference:

In virtue of the Wilsonian principle [of self-determination] everything pleads in favour of the Kurds for the creation of a Kurd state, entirely free and independent… We demand that independence which is our birthright, and which alone will permit us to fight our way along the road of progress and civilization, to turn to account the resources of our country and to live in peace with our neighbours… (Speech to the Paris Peace Conference, Kurdish Institute of Paris)

The British understood that educated and wealthy Kurds such as Sherif Pasha who lived in Istanbul all their lives hardly represented the majority of Kurds. To gauge Kurdish nationalist feeling themselves, the British government sent an envoy, Major E.W.C. Noel, to Kurdistan itself. Accompanied by two members of the Bedirkhan family (a large and powerful Kurdish clan famous for their opposition to the Ottomans) and sympathetic to Kurdish independence himself, Noel not only found enough nationalist sentiment in the region, he also strongly advised British officials to keep out of Kurdistan if they hoped to have lasting influence there.

In this light, the division of Ottoman lands the next year in the Treaty of Sèvres makes sense, especially the recognition of Kurdistan. The treaty officially stated the possibility of making a Kurdish state with an entire section (Section III) devoted to Kurdistan. Specifically, Article 62 called for the drafting of a “scheme of local autonomy for the predominantly Kurdish areas.” Article 64 went further by outlining a process for statehood based on self-determination:

If within one year from the coming into force of the present Treaty the Kurdish peoples within the areas defined in Article 62 shall address themselves to the Council of the League of Nations in such a manner as to show that a majority of the population of these areas desires independence from Turkey, and if the Council then considers that these peoples are capable of such independence and recommends that it should be granted to them, Turkey hereby agrees to execute such a recommendation, and to renounce all rights and title over these areas…

… If and when such renunciation takes place, no objection will be raised by the Principal Allied Powers to the voluntary adhesion to such an independent Kurdish State of the Kurds inhabiting that part of Kurdistan which has hitherto been included in the Mosul vilayet [province].

This treaty is considered a major turning point in the history of the Kurdish people. For the first time ever, an international document discussed the future of the Kurds. It seemed that the principles of self-determination had in fact reached Kurdistan.

But it was not to be. British political and economic interests, Turkish nationalism, and Kurdish disunity would divide and subsume any developing Kurdish state.

The main concern for the British in Kurdistan, as well as the entire region, was to maintain a strong influence in the former Ottoman lands without antagonizing the local population with direct rule. The solution was to rule through native leaders within the framework of the mandate system. Thus any support for nationalist movements, such as a unified Kurdistan, was simply a cover for diminishing the chances of local rebellion and weakening their former adversary, Turkey. When Kurdish nationalism did not suit their interests or it got “too independent-minded”, it was crushed, as in 1919 over a conflict with their chosen governor of Sulaimania. Shaikh Mahmud Barzinji was a member of one of the most powerful Kurdish families in southern Kurdistan who ignored British interests and set about forming a government, army and addressing himself as the “King of Kurdistan”. The British declared him a rebel, and after a half-year of battling his army, had him exiled to India. There were two other anti-British uprisings in 1919. Such resistance, coupled with advice from Major Noel, convinced the British to take an even more hands-off approach. In November 1919 the British Secretary of State informed the British Civil Commissioner in Baghdad that:

Kurdistan must be left to its own devices, and the practical question is how this can be done consistently with peace and security on the Mesopotamian [Iraqi] frontier. We are advised by Noel that there are three essential conditions: (1) that Turkish authority should be excluded from Kurdistan; (2) that Kurdistan should not be partitioned; (3) that the frontier should follow as nearly as possible the ethnological line between Kurds and Arabs. Noel’s view is that Kurds, if left to themselves, will be strongly pro-British and will need no encouragement or assistance from us to keep the Turks out. (Nov. 1919, British PRO, FO 371/4193/157955)

Economic concerns also influenced British policy towards Kurdistan. The above order is interesting, for example, because the provision that “Kurdistan should not be partitioned” had already been violated. Even before the conclusion of the war the British were willing to organize territory around oil instead of nationality if economic interests dictated. In the original Sykes-Picot agreement the oil-rich Kurdish city of Kirkuk went to the British, while the rest of Kurdistan went to France. British officials then pressed the French to grant these areas "self-determination", but again, this was only to allow for greater British influence in the region, not to unify Kurdistan for its own sake. Building on their possession of Kirkuk, the British convinced the French to detach the state of Mosul, also oil-rich, from Kurdistan and transfer it to their sphere in exchange for some other disputed territories in Syria and a ration of the oil coming from Kirkuk. When Kemalist forces invaded the region, with the help of several Kurdish tribesmen, the British used Kurdish nationalism to their advantage once again by inviting Mahmud out of exile. With his help the British had organized and unified resistance to the Turkish invasion, and the region remained in British hands. (Perhaps not surprisingly, the British found the guns turned on them (again) as Mahmud had not given up his dreams of ruling an independent Kurdistan. From 1923-27 he controlled much of the province. After finally getting captured, he eventually lived out his days under house arrest in Baghdad.) Mosul was formally incorporated into Iraq by 1926.

The fate of the rest of Kurdistan was sealed with the new Kemalist government of Turkey. The idea of further dismantling the former empire was intolerable for a regime dedicated to rebuilding the strength of Turkey. By the same token, they met with no serious resistance from the Europeans because the remaining part of Kurdistan had no real economic value and thus was not worth fighting over. The Treaty of Lausanne recognized the territorial integrity of Turkey, including the substantial Kurdish regions.

For their part, the Kurds did not aid the cause of national unity. As mentioned in the beginning, the Kurds have never been a monolithic people. They did not have a common language (that they all could understand) let alone a common set of goals for independence. Aside from a few individual leaders and dreamers such as Sherif Pasha and Shaikh Mahmud, neither of whom ever enjoyed anything approaching universal Kurdish support, the Kurds remained a divided people. This was recognized by the British as early as 1915 when Lt.-Col. Sir Mark Sykes said:

The Kurds have no sense of nationality of any kind whatever. They have a subconscious sense of race and certain tribal instincts, but they are entirely uninfluenced by the idea of nationality as modern Europeans understand the word…There is a tradition of an Armenian nation and a Jewish nation which once formed a State; this tradition the Kurds have not got. No Kurd repines over his lost Empire. (British PRO, CAB27/1)

Instead of nationality, most Kurds identified more with tribe, or if they did view themselves as part of a larger group, with religion. This explains the Kurdish complicity in the (Christian) Armenian massacre in Turkey, why the majority of Kurds remained loyal to the Sultan and his call for jihad against the infidels (i.e. Europeans) during World War I, and why they eventually rebelled against the secular Kemalist government of Turkey in 1925. But even these dramatic actions were not part of a larger Kurdish movement; they were isolated events by parts of the Kurdish population.

Conclusion

What can we conclude from the partition of Kurdistan? For one, it highlights the cynical policies of the great powers after the war. Their actions in Kurdistan clearly demonstrate that these governments had no genuine interest in Kurdish unity; indeed, self-determination was only another convenient tool to wrest control from the Turks. In this way, it parallels European support for Arab nationalism, which historians have also determined was only to weaken the Ottomans.

Moreover, the story of the partition of Kurdistan foreshadows Kurdish history throughout the twentieth century. Foreign manipulation of Kurdish nationalism, the subordination of Kurdish identity by other “nationalisms” (mainly Turkish and Arab), oil interests, and Kurdish factionalism are all commonplace themes to anyone familiar with Kurdish affairs today. However, we must resist the temptation to see the partition as an unnatural division. Organizing people by nationality is not “natural”; it is a man-made idea that has only been around since the nineteenth century. Instead, the partition of Kurdistan must be seen as an unjust division. The idea of unifying all Kurds in a place called “Kurdistan” is still a worthy goal not because of their “natural” unity, but because such unification seems to be the best hope for all Kurds to find freedom and justice. They have seen little of these under the regimes which were created out of the partition.

Jeff Pardue is an American, and a friend of Kurdistan, currently an Associate Professor of History in Gainesville College.
Butan Amedi is Treasurer of the Kurdish American Youth Organization (b.amedi@kurdyouth.org).