Kurdish–Turkish conflict#2004–present: Renewed insurgency

{{Main|Kurds in Turkey}}

The history of Kurdish rebellions against the Ottoman Empire dates back two centuries, but the modern conflict dates back to the abolition of the Caliphate. During the reign of Abdul Hamid II, who was Caliph as well as Sultan, the Kurds were loyal subjects of the Caliph and the establishment of a secular republic after the abolition of the Caliphate in 1924 became a source of widespread resentment.{{cite book |last=Hassan |first=Mona |title=Longing for the Lost Caliphate: A Transregional History |publisher=Princeton University Press |page=169}} The establishment of the Turkish nationalist state and Turkish citizenship brought an end to the centuries-old millet system, which had unified the Muslim ethnic groups of the Ottoman Empire under a unified Muslim identity. The diverse Muslim ethnic groups of the former Empire were considered Turkish by the newly formed secular Turkish state, which did not recognize an independent Kurdish or Islamic national identity. One of the consequences of these seismic changes was a series of uprisings in Turkey's Kurdish-populated eastern and southeastern regions.{{cite book |last=Şentürk |first=Burcu |title=Invisibility of a Common Sorrow: Families of the Deceased in Turkey's Kurdish Conflict |publisher=Cambridge Scholars Publishing |date=2010 |page=99 |isbn=9781443839549}}

{{main|Bitlis uprising (1914)}}

The Bitlis uprising was a Kurdish uprising in the Ottoman Empire in early 1914.{{Cite book|last=Henning|first=Barbara|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=c2tZDwAAQBAJ|title=Narratives of the History of the Ottoman-Kurdish Bedirhani Family in Imperial and Post-Imperial Contexts: Continuities and Changes|date=2018-04-03|publisher=University of Bamberg Press|isbn=9783863095512|pages=322–327|language=en}} It was supported by the Russian Empire. It was fought concurrently with an unrelated Kurdish uprising in Barzan in the Mosul Vilayet, which was also supported by Russia. Later Kurdish nationalist historiography portrayed the uprising as part of a Kurdish nationalist struggle, but its actual causes laid in opposition to conscription and taxation. The uprising began in early March, with a skirmish between Kurdish fighters and Ottoman gendarmes, where the latter was forced to retreat. The Kurds subsequently laid siege to the city of Bitlis, and captured the city on 2 April. Ottoman forces were then dispatched from Muş and Van and suppressed the uprising. After the defeat of the uprising on 4 April, one of the rebel leaders, Molla Selim, successfully sought asylum in Russia.

{{main|Kurdish rebellions during World War I}}

During World War I, several Kurdish rebellions took place within the Ottoman Empire.

{{main|Koçgiri Rebellion}}

The 1920 Koçgiri Rebellion in the overwhelmingly Qizilbash{{citation needed|date=October 2021}} Dersim region, while waged by the Qizilbash Koçkiri tribe, was masterminded by members of an organisation known as the Kürdistan Taâlî Cemiyeti (KTC).{{harv|van Bruinessen|1978|p=446}} (footnote 35) and {{harv|Olson|1989|pp=26–33}} This particular rebellion failed for several reasons, most of which have something to do with its Qizilbash character. The fact was that many Dersim tribal chiefs at this point still supported the Kemalists — regarding Mustafa Kemal as their 'protector' against the excesses of Sunni religious zealots, some of whom were Kurmancî Kurds. To most Kurmancî Kurds at the time, the uprising appeared to be merely an Alevi uprising — and thus not in their own interests.{{harv|van Bruinessen|1978|pp=374–75}} In the aftermath of the Koçkiri rebellion there was talk in the new Turkish Republic's Grand National Assembly of some very limited forms of 'Autonomous Administration' by the Kurds in a Kurdish region centered in Kurdistan. All this disappeared in the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne, however. Bitterly disappointed, the Kurds turned again to armed struggle in 1925 — this time led by the Zaza cleric Sheikh Said, but organized by another, newer, Kurdish nationalist organization, Azadî.

{{Main|Beytussebab rebellion}}

{{main|Sheikh Said rebellion}}

The main rebellion which dominates the history of the Kurds in Turkey is that of the 1925 rebellion in Kurdistan region of Turkey which was led by Sheikh Said. The repression and aggression of Kemalist secularism followed and all public manifestations of Kurdish identity was outlawed which, in turn, prepared Kurds for more rebellion. The revolt of Sheikh Said began in February 1925. Of almost 15,000 fighters who participated in the rebellion against the 52,000 Turkish Gendarmerie, the main Kurdish tribes participating in the rebellion came from Zaza. The rebellion covered most of the part of Amed (Diyarbakir) and Mardin provinces. The Sheikh Said rebellion was the first large scale rebellion of the Kurdish race movement in Turkey. The main organizer of this rebellion was the Kurdish Independent Society, Azadî. Azadi's intention was to liberate Kurds from Turkish oppression and thus deliver freedom and further, develop their country. By March 1925 the revolt was pretty much over. Sheikh Said and all the other rebel leaders were hanged by June 29.

In Fall of 1927 Sheikh Abdurrahman (brother of Sheikh Said) began a series of attacks on Turkish garrisons in Palu and Malatya.{{Citation needed|date=July 2011}} Districts of Lice, Bingöl were captured by the rebels. They also occupied the heights south of Erzurum. Turkish military used air force against the rebels using five airplanes in Mardin. In October 1927, Kurdish rebels attacked and occupied Bayazid. The brother of Sheikh Said tried to exact revenge on the Turkish government by attacking several army bases in Kurdistan. Nothing permanent was accomplished. They were driven out after Turkish reinforcements arrived in the area.{{harv|Olson|2000|p=79}}

The rebellion failed, however, by 1929, Ihsan Nuri's movement was in control of a large expanse of Kurdish territory and the revolt was put down by the year 1930.

{{main|Ararat rebellion}}

The Republic of Ararat ({{langx|tr|Ağrı}}) was a self-proclaimed Kurdish state. It was located in the east of modern Turkey, being centered on Ağrı Province. The Republic of Ararat was declared independent in 1927, during a wave of rebellion among Kurds in south-eastern Turkey. The rebellion was led by General İhsan Nuri Pasha. However it was not recognized by other states, and lacked foreign support.

By the end of summer 1930, the Turkish Air Force was bombing Kurdish positions around Mount Ararat from all directions. According to General Ihsan Nuri Pasha, the military superiority of Turkish Air Force demoralized Kurds and led to their capitulation.{{harv|Olson|2000|p=82}} On July 13, the rebellion in Zilan was suppressed. Squadrons of 10–15 aircraft were used in crushing the revolt.{{harv|Olson|2000|p=84}} On July 16, two Turkish planes were downed and their pilots were killed by the Kurds.{{harv|Olson|2000|p=85}} Aerial bombardment continued for several days and forced Kurds to withdraw to the height of 5,000 meters. By July 21, bombardment had destroyed many Kurdish forts. During these operations, Turkish military mobilized 66,000 soldiers and 100 aircraft.{{harv|Olson|2000|p=86}} The campaign against the Kurds was over by September 17, 1930.{{harv|Olson|2000|p=88}} The Ararat rebellion was defeated in 1931,{{Citation needed|date=July 2011}} and Turkey resumed control over the territory.{{cite news|last=Abdulla|first=Mufid|url=http://www.kurdmedia.com/article.aspx?id=14198|title=The Kurdish issue in Turkey need political solution|date=2007-10-26|work=Kurdish Media|access-date=2008-08-01|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071228164624/http://www.kurdmedia.com/article.aspx?id=14198|archive-date=2007-12-28}}

After suppression of the last rebellion in 1937, Southeast Anatolia was put under martial law. In addition to destruction of villages and massive deportations, Turkish government encouraged Kosovar Albanians and Assyrians to settle in the Kurdish area to change the ethnic composition of the region.{{cite journal | url = http://people.cas.sc.edu/dahlmanc/Dahlman%202002%20Political%20Geography%20of%20Kurdistan.pdf | doi = 10.2747/1538-7216.43.4.271 | author = Dahlman, Carl | journal = Eurasian Geography and Economics | volume = 43 | issue = 4 | pages = 271–299 | year = 2002 | title = The Political Geography of Kurdistan | s2cid = 146638619 | access-date = 2008-06-30 | url-status = dead | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20081003071614/http://people.cas.sc.edu/dahlmanc/Dahlman%202002%20Political%20Geography%20of%20Kurdistan.pdf | archive-date = 2008-10-03 }} The measures taken by the Turkish Army in the immediate aftermath of the revolt became more repressive than previous uprisings. At times, villages and/or buildings were set on fire in order to repress the Kurdish population. In order to prevent the events from having a negative impact on Turkey's International image and reputation, foreigners were not allowed to visit the entire area east of Euphrates until 1965 and the area remained under permanent military siege till 1950. The Kurdish language was banned and the words "Kurds" and "Kurdistan" were removed from dictionaries and history books and Kurds were only referred to as "Mountain Turks".Gérard Chaliand, A.R. Ghassemlou, M. Pallis, A People Without A Country, 256 pp., Zed Books, 1992, {{ISBN|1-85649-194-3}}, p.58

{{cquote|The Turks, who had only recently been fighting for their own freedom, crushed the Kurds, who sought theirs. It is strange how a defensive nationalism develops into an aggressive one, and a fight for freedom becomes one for dominion over others|author=Jawaharlal Nehru on the response to the Kurdish revolts in the early Turkish Republic.J.D. Eller, From Culture to Ethnicity to Conflict: An Anthropological Perspective on International Ethnic Conflicts, 368 pp., University of Michigan Press, 1999, {{ISBN|0-472-08538-7}}, p.193{{cite book|title=Glimpses of world history|url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.190913|author-link=Jawaharlal Nehru|first=Jawaharlal |last=Nehru|year=1942|publisher=John Day|page=708}}}}

{{main|Kurdistan Workers' Party insurgency}}

Kurdish ethnic revival appeared in the 1970s when Turkey was racked with left-right clashes and the Marxist PKK was formed demanding a Kurdish state.{{cite web|url=http://www.fas.org/irp/world/para/pkk.htm|access-date=2008-08-23|title=Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK)|publisher=Federation of American Scientists|date=2004-05-21|first=John|last=Pike}} PKK declared its objective as the liberation of all parts of Kurdistan from colonial oppression and establishment of an independent, united, socialist Kurdish state. It initially attracted the poorer segments of the Kurdish population and became the only Kurdish party not dominated by tribal links.{{Citation needed|date=February 2008}} PKK's chairman, Abdullah Öcalan, was proud of being from humble origins. It characterized its struggle mainly as an anti-colonial one, hence directing its violence against collaborators, i.e., Kurdish tribal chieftains, notables with a stake in the Turkish state, and also against rival organizations.{{Citation needed|date=February 2008}} The military coup in 1980 lead to a period of severe repression and elimination of almost all Kurdish and leftist organizations. The PKK, however, was the only Kurdish party that managed to survive and even grow in size after the coup.{{Citation needed|date=February 2008}} It initiated a guerrilla offensive with a series of attacks on Turkish military and police stations and due to its daring challenging of the Turkish army, gradually won over grudging admiration of parts of the Kurdish population.{{Citation needed|date=February 2008}} In the beginning of 1990, it had set up its own local administration in some rural areas.{{Citation needed|date=February 2008}} Around this time, PKK changed its goals from full Kurdish independence to a negotiated settlement with the Turkish government, specially after some promising indirect contacts with President Turgut Özal. After Özal's sudden death, the Turkish military intensified its operations against PKK bases. These measures succeeded in isolating the PKK from the civilians and reduced it to a guerrilla band operating in the mountains. In 1999, increased Turkish pressure on Syria led to Öcalan's expulsion and ultimate arrest by Turkish Maroon Berets in Kenya.van Bruinessen, Martin. [http://igitur-archive.library.uu.nl/let/2007-0312-083811/UUindex.html The Kurdish movement: issues, organization, mobilization] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110724173136/http://igitur-archive.library.uu.nl/let/2007-0312-083811/UUindex.html |date=2011-07-24 }}, Newsletter of the Friends of the International Institute for Social History, No.8, 2004, pp.6–8 A cooling down occurred, and a ceasefire was brokered in 2014 – but then due to the Siege of Kobane the conflict has restarted.

During the 1980s Turkey began a program of forced assimilation of its Kurdish population.{{cite book|chapter-url=http://www.cogsci.ed.ac.uk/~siamakr/Kurdish/KURDICA/1999/JUL/policy.html|chapter=Kurdish Language Policy in Turkey|title=Nationalism and Language in Kurdistan 1918–1985|access-date=2008-08-23|publisher=Edwin Mellon Press|year=1992|pages=132–136;150–152|first=Amir |last=Hassanpour}} This culminated in 1984 when the PKK began a rebellion against Turkish rule attacking Turkish military. Since the PKK's militant operations began in 1984, 37,000 people have been killed. The PKK has been continuing its guerrilla warfare in the mountains.{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6537751.stm|access-date=2008-06-29|work=BBC News|title=Kurdish rebels kill Turkey troops|date=2007-04-08}}{{cite news|url=http://www.todayszaman.com/tz-web/yazarDetay.do?haberno=143866|access-date=2008-08-23|title=AK Party and the Kurdish issue: a new beginning?|work=Today's Zaman|date=2008-06-05|first=Ibrahim|last=Kalin}} {{Dead link|date=November 2010|bot=H3llBot}} As a result, the fighting is limited to approximately 3000 fighters.{{cite news|url=http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2007-10/19/content_6192126.htm|access-date=2008-08-23|title=Turkish forces on high alert against PKK attacks|date=2007-10-19

|work=Xinhua|publisher=China Daily}}

{{main|Serhildan}}

{{expand section|date=June 2017}}

The word serhildan describes several Kurdish public rebellions since the 1990s with the slogan "Êdî Bese" ("Enough") against the Turkish government. The first violent action by the populace against police officers and state institutions occurred in 1990 in the Southeast Anatolian town Nusaybin near the border to Syria. The rebellion in Nusaybin is the beginning of the serhildan, during the following days the riots initially widened to other cities of the province Mardin and to the neighboring provinces Batman, Diyarbakır, Siirt, Şanlıurfa and Şırnak, and later to other Eastern Anatolian provinces such as Bingöl, Bitlis, Hakkâri, Muş and Van, as well cities such as Ankara, Istanbul, İzmir and Mersin.

{{Main|Kurdish Independence Movement in Turkey}}

• Timeline of the Kurdistan Workers' Party insurgency (1978–2015)
• Timeline of the Kurdistan Workers' Party insurgency (2015–present)
• List of Turkish operations in northern Iraq
• Kurdistan Region-PKK conflict
• Kurdish–Turkish relations
• RAF Iraq Command
• Timeline of Kurdish uprisings
• List of modern conflicts in the Middle East

{{reflist|30em}}

• {{cite journal|author=Arin, Kubilay Yado|title=Turkey and the Kurds – From War to Reconciliation?|journal=Working Paper at Uc Berkeley's Center for Right-Wing Studies|series=UC Berkeley Center for Right Wing Studies Working Paper Series|date=March 26, 2015|url=https://www.academia.edu/11674094}}
• {{Cite book

|last = Olson

|first = Robert W

|year = 1989

|publisher = University of Texas Press

|location = Austin

|isbn = 0-292-77619-5

|url = http://www.xs4all.nl/~tank/kurdish/htdocs/his/said.html

|title = The Emergence of Kurdish Nationalism and the Sheikh Said Rebellion, 1880-1925

|url-status = dead

|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20080917035343/http://www.xs4all.nl/~tank/kurdish/htdocs/his/said.html

|archive-date = 2008-09-17

}}

• {{Cite journal

| last = Olson

| first = Robert

|date=March 2000

| title = The Kurdish Rebellions of Sheikh Said (1925), Mt. Ararat (1930), and Dersim (1937–8): Their Impact on the Development of the Turkish Air Force and on Kurdish and Turkish Nationalism

| journal = Die Welt des Islams

| volume = 40

| issue = 1

| pages = 67–94

| doi = 10.1163/1570060001569893

}}

• {{Cite book

|title=Agha, Shaikh and State: On the Social and Political Organization of Kurdistan

|publisher=University of Utrecht

|location=Utrecht

|year=1978

|first=Maarten Martinus

|last=van Bruinessen

|isbn=1-85649-019-X

}} (also London: Zed Books, 1992)

• {{cite book|last=Küpeli|first=Ismail|editor1=Marcus Hawel|title=Work in Progress: Doktorand*innen Jahrbuch 2019|chapter=Machbarkeit der türkischen Nation: Diskursive Exklusion und physische Vernichtung als Säulen von nation building|year=2019|publisher=Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung|location=Berlin|isbn=978-3-96488-042-0|pages=129–139}}
• {{cite book |last=Eccarius-Kelly |year=2011 |first=Vera |title=The Militant Kurds: A Dual Strategy for Freedom |publisher=Praeger |isbn=978-0-313-36468-6 |url={{Google books|DhtRxs4CVSUC|plainurl=y}}}}

{{Kurdish–Turkish conflict}}

{{Middle East conflicts}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kurdish-Turkish conflict}}

Category:Kurdistan independence movement

Category:Kurdish rebellions

Category:Ethnic conflicts

Category:Turkish nationalism