Re: How sophisticatedly do you write? Must be in 2013 graduation (year 10 going to 11
Something I did back in year 10 for Elective history. Wonderful course, I'd encourage people to try it.
I believe the question was something along the lines of: "Assess the success or failure of your chosen terrorist organisation."
Be warned, its a rather long read.
Kurdistan Workers Party
Kurdistan was originally a province of the Ottoman Empire prior to World War One. After the allied victory, the empire divided into several countries. The geographical area that was Kurdistan is now part of Turkey. This left the Kurds without a self ruled nation, and they were forced to live under the Turkish government. Naturally, many of the Kurdish people were displeased with this arrangement, and frustration built up over the next 45 years, resulting in the formation of the Kurdistan Workers Party. The Kurdistan Workers Party, or the PKK, is a Kurdish group of left wing terrorists active in Turkey, Syria and Iraq. Abdullah Ocalen founded the PKK in 1978 in Turkey and the group has been fighting an insurgency against the Government of the Republic of Turkey up to the present day. Most of the attacks were rural, up until 1992, where the PKK began to attack urban targets. Unfortunately for the PKK, their leader, Abdullah Ocalen, was forced to leave Syria in 1998 because of threats made to the Syrian government by Turkey. As a result, Ocalen was captured on February 15, 1999, in Kenya, and PKK stopped all violent protests or terrorist attacks until 2004, when they renounced the ‘cease fire’.
Even after the capture of Abdullah Ocalen in 1999, the PKK has still been active, and despite Abdullah condemning violence after his imprisonment, the terrorist group is still attacking targets, both military and civilian. The motives of the PKK, both in early years (Urban War: 1978-1980) and in more recent times, are fairly complex. The PKK was a left wing group and Abdullah Ocalen had Marxist ideology. Their objectives reflected this as Ocalen wished to instate Marxist rule in the Kurdish state the PKK wished to create. Self-ruled by the Kurds, the state would occupy areas of Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran.
Then came the decline and collapse of the Soviet Union during the 80’s, and although the Russians did not directly support them, the PKK toned down their operations and sought refuge in Syria and Iraq. They did this because the support for communism was much less among the public and the PKK did not have as much influence as it did before. The PKK also began co-operating with other ethnic left-wing groups, and continued to fight for an independent Kurdish nation. This was sustained until 1999, when Abdullah Ocalen was captured and imprisoned. The PKK then became politically active, with no violent attacks or protests. The organisation also toned down the scope of its vision and became focused on achieving cultural and lingual (Speaking Kurdish was outlawed) for the Kurdish people.
As of 2004, however, the violence was recommenced and at the same time, the PKK’s motives became extremely difficult to identify. The most obvious motive found is the PKK’s supposed desire to preserve the autonomous Kurdish region in Iraq created by an agreement after the Iraqi-Kurdistan war in 1970. The area is governed (in part) by the Kurdish people and may provide a stepping-stone for achieving rights for Kurdish people for Kurdish political parties [For example, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), the Kurdistan Democrat Party (KDP) and the Kurdistan Democratic and Freedom Congress (KADEK)].
There are many people who believe that the PKK has other, ulterior motives. Mümtaz'er Türköne, as written in his academic study on the organisation, believes the new goal of the PKK is to destroy the prestige of the government. This could be true, as the newspaper ‘The National’ featured an article in 2008 about PKK attacks “casting doubt on current leadership” (in Turkey). In addition, Altan Öymen¬¬¬¬ wrote in his study that he believes the intent behind the PKK attack is to create a civil war in the Turkey, causing citizens to fight against each other. “They want the citizens of this country to become enemies and want conflicts to grow bigger, paving the way for a civil war.”
The PKK have always been infamous for the brutality of terror attacks. They often attack civilians rather than military targets and apart from the 5-year period from 1999 to 2004, they have always used violence to try to achieve their aims. The Aktutun raid in 1992 made by the PKK was one such attack where 400 members of the terrorist group charged the outpost, and killed 22 Turkish soldiers. The PKK, like all other terrorist groups, have resorted to violence to achieve their goals, rather than using peaceful, democratic methods. The main, for violent attacks is the belief among the PKK that violence is the only message that gets through. The PKK attempted to use democratic and peaceful methods between 1999 and 2004, with slight success, but the Kurdish people have no real political voice, so the PKK resorted back to violence. This is a common theme seen in terrorist organisations, and Jeffery Ian Ross wrote in his academic study on the causes of terrorism that the reasons for terrorism are related to structural and psychological factors, as well as the concept of “rational choice”, both within and outside the organisation. The PKK follows this ‘formula’ in that the organisation chose terrorism after the psychological factors of the Kurdish situation and tried to make a ‘rational’ choice to fix their problems, this choice being the path of terrorism. Another person who has studied the reasons for terrorism is Joseph Pilat. In his article on the topic, he says the root causes of terrorism are impossible to define, and believes that terrorism occurs in divers conditions and must be “viewed through historical, cultural, demographic, economy, social and political lenses.” Viewed through the political, social and cultural lenses, it is evident that this is true for the PKK, and the reasons for their terrorism are difficult to determine otherwise.
Originally, the PKK acted more as rebellion fighters in regards to their motives, and this was reflected in the violence they used. The PKK ran an insurgency against Turkey. The aim at this time was the creation of an independent state, and speaking from a historical context, this has very rarely been achieved without the use of violence. If Abdullah Ocalen and the PKK had looked at the statistics regarding successful creation of independent states, they would have realised it can realistically only be achieved with violence and terrorism. The terrorist organisation resorted to violence because of this realisation. The ideology that only violence will achieve their aims is the most common reason terrorist groups use terrorism, and the PKK is no exception. However, their goal to create an independent Kurdistan was unsuccessful. They fought for 21 years trying to achieve this goal, but never succeeded. The PKK did not have big media coverage at this time, and the attention they received was mainly focused in Turkey. This meant that the rest of the world knew relatively little about the PKK and organisations such as the UN did not lend political support to the idea of creating an independent Kurdistan. In Turkey, however, the PKK quickly gained support and recruits to help their cause. Although this helped, the lack of international media coverage hindered the PKK from achieving its goal. Local media coverage at this time also secured multiple ‘sponsors’ for the PKK in Turkey, Syria and Iraq. This was essential for the PKK to be able to support its operation as a terrorist organisation.
Then there was a stage when the PKK used no violence, and that was immediately after the capture of Ocalen. From 1999 to 2004, the PKK launched political campaigns for Kurdish rights, not the independent state they originally wanted. Overall, this was unsuccessful, although they succeeded partially when the Turkish government passed a bill allowing people to speak Kurdish at home, but when not in a public place. The PKK had more extensive media coverage this time, and as a result, some of their objectives were successfully achieved due to political support from the people of Turkey and the world.
As of 2004, the PKK resorted to violence once more. With renewed aggression, they began to attacks more often, and even targeted Kurdish people. According to Mümtaz'er Türköne, the goal of the PKK violence is to push people to become fed up with violence, making the state lose prestige in the eyes of its citizens and force it to accept the PKK's demands in order to stop violence against the people. This is the reason why the PKK has stepped up the level of violent attacks in recent times. The amount of terrorist strikes by the PKK in the past few years has escalated exponentially, leading some to believe that the PKK has other, unknown motives, which are yet undetermined. So far, the PKK has successfully retained the Kurdish province in Iraq but has not incited civil war as yet. In addition the Turkish government has been losing prestige in the face of the PKK attacks so they have been partially successful on this front. Media coverage of this renewed violence has been global, but a lot of it has reflected negatively on the PKK. Since they are now attacking civilians and Kurdish people, the PKK are quite literally killing their support. Media reports on these attacks have further destroyed the popularity of the PKK in recent years. In regards to gaining rights for Kurdish people, this tactic is not working. In general, the PKK has not been overly successful in achieving their goals and objectives. There are a few circumstances in which they succeeded, but most of their goals remain unachieved.
The PKK, in their 34-year period of activity, attempted to achieve their objectives with the combination of attacks on military and civilian targets. They have had mixed success in accomplishing their goals over the years, and in recent times, the PKK seems to have radically changed their ideals and objectives. Media coverage definitely played a part for the PKK’s operations, and it helped their cause substantially by spreading their message locally, and also globally. It helped them obtain sponsorship, degrade the government’s image and let people know about what they were doing. Conversely, the negative media coverage the PKK has received in recent years in regards to the attacks on their own people (Kurdish) has resulted in less support for the organisation both locally and globally. Despite this, the PKK is still active and it is unlikely the organisation will die out any time soon.
