Turkey will not stand for this

A Kurdish rebel group took responsibility today for a bombing in the resort city of Antalya. The US needs to stabilize this situation in a hurry or else the Turkish Army will go nuts in Northern Iraq. Indeed, the Administration’s failure to cool the border may yield yet another strategic advantage to Iran. From the CSM article:

"We do recognize that Turkey sees the PKK as its number one security threat and because of that it's a top priority for the US to combat the PKK," says a US official based in Ankara.
Despite the shelling and buildup on the border, Turkey has only taken very limited military action against the PKK.

"[But] if it gets to a point that it is unbearable and if the concrete steps [taken by the US and the Iraqis] don't bear the fruit that we are expecting, then all options are available," a Turkish foreign ministry official says.

Further complicating matters for the US is Iran's involvement. Although the PKK's Iranian counterpart, the Kurdistan Free Life party (Pejak), has recently increased its own activities, observers believe that Iran's recent cooperation with Turkey has less to do with security and more to do with trying to drive a wedge between Washington and Ankara.

"The Iranians can now say, 'We are doing something about the PKK and the United States is not doing anything,' " says Candar.

The Turks are smart, fiercely nationalistic, and tougher than shoe leather. And as the Armenians and Kurds already know, the Turkish military operates with a certain amount of, let’s say, “latitude” when it comes to civilian casualties and collateral damage. Things could get very ugly, very fast.