Why is there no Kurdistan?

[MadMike]

It’s strong amongst Kurds.

The British promised them one after the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire than reneged on that promise (you noticing a theme here?).

That's... not true. They didn't renege, the result went another way. The nationalist Turks of Kemal Ataturk won the war. The result was the treaty of Lausanne in 1923. Losers don't get to dictate terms to the winners that would partition the winner's area of control. It's that simple.

 

[4bars]

Because they had served their purpose, and ultimately not upsetting NATO Turkey was more imperative to the US and her allies than helping the Kurds reach their dream of statehood, thats the sad reality of it.

Oh, I know the reasons. And is disgusting what they did to them. There was other things that they could do for them besides statehood than just allowing them to run for their lives like cornered dogs

 

[The Corinthian]

That's... not true. They didn't renege, the result went another way. The nationalist Turks of Kemal Ataturk won the war. The result was the treaty of Lausanne in 1923. Losers don't get to dictate terms to the winners that would partition the winner's area of control. It's that simple.

They took for granted that Kurds were a race and that Kurdistan was a place. In fact, it was already depicted in pre-WWI atlases. The problem of drawing its borders fell, British Parliamentarians told themselves, to them in immediate postwar years. And it’s what some powerful people in British officialdom assumed would happen.

Not only did it fit British race thinking to create Kurdistan – to be heavily staffed by British “advisers” like the other new states, of course – but they believed the Kurds truculent and independent, unlikely to accede to domination by a neighbor.

They would “never accept an Arab ruler,” in the words of one British Colonial Office official, if they were embedded in an Arab nation.

A missed opportunity
But the Allies and the League of Nations never created Kurdistan. Why not?

British imperial self-interest in this case overruled ethnonational thinking. By the terms of the Sykes-Picot agreement, the secret French and British understanding of roughly who would get what after the war, the French claimed dominance of the northern Levant, what’s today Lebanon and Syria.

The British wanted a big geographical bloc in the region to match that of the French, to act as a counterweight. They formalized this by inventing a large country soon dubbed “Iraq.”

The line dividing Sykes-Picot’s French sphere and British sphere already cut straight through Kurdish areas. That partition was part of the reason why the British could not simply carve out a new, large Kurdistan (that they’d dominate like Iraq).

 

[MadMike]

They took for granted that Kurds were a race and that Kurdistan was a place. In fact, it was already depicted in pre-WWI atlases. The problem of drawing its borders fell, British Parliamentarians told themselves, to them in immediate postwar years. And it’s what some powerful people in British officialdom assumed would happen.

Not only did it fit British race thinking to create Kurdistan – to be heavily staffed by British “advisers” like the other new states, of course – but they believed the Kurds truculent and independent, unlikely to accede to domination by a neighbor.

They would “never accept an Arab ruler,” in the words of one British Colonial Office official, if they were embedded in an Arab nation.

A missed opportunity
But the Allies and the League of Nations never created Kurdistan. Why not?

British imperial self-interest in this case overruled ethnonational thinking. By the terms of the Sykes-Picot agreement, the secret French and British understanding of roughly who would get what after the war, the French claimed dominance of the northern Levant, what’s today Lebanon and Syria.

The British wanted a big geographical bloc in the region to match that of the French, to act as a counterweight. They formalized this by inventing a large country soon dubbed “Iraq.”

The line dividing Sykes-Picot’s French sphere and British sphere already cut straight through Kurdish areas. That partition was part of the reason why the British could not simply carve out a new, large Kurdistan (that they’d dominate like Iraq).

I mean, that doesn't remotely prove your point.

The Sykes-Picot Agreement was a 1916 agreement on how to carve up the Ottoman Empire when it failed. It indeed never made provisions for the Kurds. However it never came to actual effect. The nationalist Turks won the war.

According to the agreement these would be the new borders

Spoiler: huge image

Tell me. What happened to the French-ruled purple patch? What about Russian-ruled Armenia in orange? Does Syria overlap Iraq to have a border with Iran?

The actual outcomes of WW1 and the Turkish war of independence rendered the agreement meaningless. Also, according to the Sykes-Picot agreement, all the Kurdish majority areas would fall into French controlled areas. Either the purple area which is directly controlled by the French or Syrian French protectorate. Not British. The part that now is northern Iraq with its Kurdish majority was to be part of Syria.

But again, none of this came to be. The Sykes-Picot agreement was superseded by various other temporary agreements including the treaty of Sevres, until the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne which gave Turkey its current borders. Where most of Kurdistan fell within Turkey.

A better argument can be made for southern Kurdistan which falls in Iraq. Where the Mandate of Mesopotamia was given to the British Empire in 1920. But the Iraqi revolt of 1920, in which Sunni and Shia Muslims cooperated, upended those plans. Ultimately the Brits realised they had limited actual control and of the area and no appetite to fight further nationalist insurgencies. The revolt ended with the Anglo-Iraqi treaty of 1922 which gave Mesopotamian Arabs control of Iraq, with Britain only shaping foreign policy for a few more years until 1930.

As for the role of the Kurds of Iraq in this:

At the end of July, the majority of the southern and mid-Euphrates area was controlled by the Arab rebels. This inspired Kurds in southern Kurdistan to start a rebellion of their own. They succeeded in seizing a number of towns, but the insurgency quickly fizzled out, as they proved to lack a unifying force. Most leaders were content to fall under British rule, as it provided them with a bureaucratic and consistent system. They eventually faltered on choosing a single leader, and lacked communication when it came to organising a successful revolution.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraqi_Revolt#Influence_in_Kurdistan

Long story short, the Kurds of Iraq ended up in an Arab country because a) Britain had limited actual control of the area b) the Arabs fought long and successful rebellions c) the minority Kurds had only small rebellions and didn't want to fight the Arabs for independence. I know it's fashionable to blame the British Empire for everything, as it did meddle and feck up a lot, but c'mon.

 

[2cents]

Also, according to the Sykes-Picot agreement, all the Kurdish majority areas would fall into French controlled areas

I’m pretty sure Suleymaniyeh fell into the British protectorate. But as you say, it’s irrelevant as Sykes-Picot was never implemented.

I’ve posted this two-part critique of the idea of the supposed artificiality of Iraq before on here. It doesn’t directly address the Kurdish question but posters following this thread may still find it interesting:

Lines drawn on an empty map - part 1 & part 2

 

[2cents]

Almost reads like an account of the Pashtun I once read.

Just came across this quote from Arnold Toynbee, as the future of the Kurds was being considered in British circles after the First World War:

"If there is to be an individual Mesopotamia under Arab government with British administrative assistance, the natural corollary would be an autonomous Kurdistan, likewise assisted by H.M.G. and performing the same function towards Mesopotamia as the NW Frontier province performs towards India."

 

[owlo]

Just came across this quote from Arnold Toynbee, as the future of the Kurds was being considered in British circles after the First World War:

"If there is to be an individual Mesopotamia under Arab government with British administrative assistance, the natural corollary would be an autonomous Kurdistan, likewise assisted by H.M.G. and performing the same function towards Mesopotamia as the NW Frontier province performs towards India."

If I recall, the NW Pathan brigades refused to fight for the Brits against the ottomans due to not wanting to fight other Muslims. Perhaps they were afraid the mostly Muslim Kurds would act similarly, refusing to fight and thus perform that functio.