PKK has made terrorist attack targeting our Kurdish people. In this period, people in this region were the targets of PKK and in some terrorist attacks all members of families were killed. How an organization kills civilians on the half of its people is the first question comes to my mind. But the answer is very clear. PKK thinks that these massacres are inevitable so as to help them to remind their rights and mobilize them. So, PKK will benefit from frightening power and the effect of suppression. Ocalan talked about this approach clearly. Terrorist organizations first try to create an atmosphere of fright and make social groups fell desperate and helpless. The clearest message of terror is that ‘nobody can help you and do not think of any address or authority apart from us.’ This is the reason of why terrorists are so cruel in their activities and give much importance to visuality. The propaganda of terrorists is that “We give the most pain and we are the cruellest.” For these reason terrorist activities are called ‘death based propagandas’. The precious treasure of human being is his or her own life and if there is a risk of losing his or her life people generally prefer to be quiet. What PKK tried to do was that. The reasons of why PKK tries to massacre Kurdish people are very clear. Because PKK intended to create a widening gap between state powers and regional communities and this gap was created by the terrorist activities. For PKK, result is important and every method is legitimate to achieve its goal without worrying about legitimacy. PKK was a frightening power and a nightmare in 1990. Turkish state had great difficulty in protecting her nation from the cruelty of PKK.

Second Period 

The second strategy of PKK was the stage of becoming a guerrilla force. Guerrilla stage is an important target of terrorist organization especially which aims ethnical division. This is valid for PKK. It was high time PKK had challenged the Turkish state. The goal of this strategy was diverting civilians in shock to associations with different names.  Guerrilla stage has some fundamental characteristics. These are; to show that there is a piece of soil under their control, to prove the existence of a wide range of volunteer supporters and to facilitate successful terrorist activities against Turkish state that PKK defined it as enemy. That’s why, PKK resumed terrorist activities against Turkish officials (soldiers, polices, teachers, doctors, nurses). But PKK failed in their violent activities and it costed lives of many terrorists. Strategy of having a piece of soil under control was tried to be implemented in the same period and within this context, PKK struggled to take Northern Iraq under control. Somehow PKK took a piece of area under control. But ironically there were no Kurdish people for whom they were fighting. To achieve this goal immigration of Kurdish people who were complaining about the so-called ‘cruelty of Turkish State’ was compulsory; and so many families were forced to immigrate. Hundred thousands of families were forced to migrate to the western regions of Turkey (Adana, Antalya, Izmir, Bursa, Izmit and Istanbul). Only a few thousand Kurdish people migrated into Northern Iraq. This strategy also resulted in failure. PKK, who failed in their operation, could not accomplish the migration into Northern Iraq and not find the support aimed in elections. PKK decided to return its strategy in the first period.

Third Period 

Third period meant the acceptation of failure in the mountains. This period continued until the arrest of Ocalan in 1999. PKK was in the search of separating Turkish and Kurdish people. The basis of this strategy was spreading out violence and terrorist activities in the western cities. The aim of all these violent terrorist attacks was to ignite Turkish nationalism. As a result, by claiming that the terrorist attacks were implementing on the behalf of Kurdish people PKK tried to create conflict between Turkish and Kurdish people. Thus living together and sharing the common values for a long time, Anatolian people would be separated into two camps, Kurds and Turks. Following these expectations, PKK resumed its violent attacks in Istanbul, Izmir, Adana, Ankara and Antalya. But this process did not bare the desired result. The basic reason of failure is sharing the same fate, the unexpected effect of PKK’s terrorist attacks. PKK could not find the necessary support for its activities. Police intelligence and related operations prevented many possible planned attacks before implementation. In spite of the separatist actions of PKK there were not desired effects. The arrest of Semdin Sakık and Abdullah Ocalan, the leader of PKK in 1999 was a shock effect on PKK. Some of the terrorists tried to commit suicides, but most of the actions resulted in failure.

Fourth Period

The fourth period of PKK was the implementation of contradicting strategies. This lead to ask what PKK was trying to do.  The reason of the last confusion was the statements of Abdullah Ocalan.  “I am ready to serve Turkish State, will do my best to stop the bloodshed.” Ocalan also stationed his militants in the Northern Iraq and called for ending terrorist activities for a while. PKK was forced to take this initiative as all conditions were against PKK. Another reason of this inertia was the September 11 terrorist attack against USA. In the aftermath of September 11 USA declared that it would fight against terrorism forever. This atmosphere in international arena had forced PKK not to use terrorist activities.
 
Factors Leading PKK into Operation Stage Since 2004
 
Turkey’s EU membership period, PKK’s domestic problems, war in Iraq and terror policies of the USA are the factors leading PKK into violent actions. After the arrest of Ocalan, PKK was deployed in Iraq and was tracing the agenda in Turkey. Confusion of terrorists lead to suicides but this situation did not continue so long. Understanding that they were not able to achieve their aims by use of terrorist activities PKK tried to become a political reality. Within this framework PKK founded associations and parties with different names. PKK struggled to use its power in general elections. HEP, DEP, DEHAP, HADEP were political parties of Kurdish community in Turkey and their promises were not intended to solve economic and social problems. Instead of producing constructive solutions these parties endeavoured to spread the separationist approach of PKK. These approaches had no initiative to solve the problems of Kurdish people neither to provide any better future for them but for terrorist organization. September 11 terrorist attacks put PKK into a very difficult position. The aggressive statements of USA about terrorism did not help individuals who were struggling to use terrorism in accordance with their aims. Now the greatest hope of PKK was to obtain political gaining. But for PKK, reaching its goals in political life was very difficult and it seemed almost impossible as the background of PKK was not very bright. In fact policymakers in Turkey were very worried about politic future of PKK. The thoughts of PKK were that “we won the armed conflict but it will be very difficult to win the struggle based on brain power”. For PKK, what was frightening did not happen; March 1 memorandum was not accepted in Turkish National Assembly, so this created an opportunity for revival of PKK. Sharing clashing ideas with USA, Turkey was forced to limit her role in Iraq. USA declared Kurds and Shiites as allies. PKK had not become the direct target of USA. Turkey’s not being on the USA side helped PKK greatly. There were significant differences in what USA and Turkey understood from terrorism. Turkey took an active role in the fight has been started by USA against terrorism but USA only traced her terrorists. Consequently, the USA did not launch any operation against PKK in Northern Iraq. PKK’s leader in Northern Iraq Murat Karayılan said that USA could not prepare operations against PKK because USA would not want to be on contrary sides with Kurds, her allies in Iraq. This lack of desire to conduct any operation against PKK was very important for the revival of this terrorist organization.                     

Efforts of PKK against Dispersion

Another reason of starting terrorist activities again is to prevent the dispersion in PKK’s composition. Not only PKK waited for messages of Ocalan, but PKK also endeavoured to solve its problems with the help of current leaders. Leaders such as, Zübeyir Aydar, Murat Karayılan thought that PKK had to start its terrorist activities again. There are two reasons of this decision; first, after a long period of inertia, terrorists may lose their activeness and secondly; PKK has restricted sources to reach its objectives. Within this framework PKK assaulted civilians, tourist destinations and transportation vehicles as they were deprived of ability to attack security forces.

Democratic Community Movement

Besides giving support to these terrorist activities Ocalan was aware of the fact that guaranteeing his life was depended on PKK’s performance in political arena. That’s why; he gave utmost importance to the foundation of Democratic Community Movement (DCM) in accordance with his instructions. DCM was the only address of Kurdish politic movement and the only representative of Kurds as he called. The most important reason of this was the murder of Hikmet Fidan (a well-known person in the Kurdish politic life) and threatening of people surging for alternatives (Abdulmelik Fırat, Ibrahim Guçlu, Kemel Burkay, Umit Fırat…) DCM tried to prove that it was the only representative of Kurdish community not only with politic projects but also with murdering people surging for alternatives. The development of PKK following the year of 2004 has been very complex but it has two basic strategies. The first are the armed operations less hazardous in terms of PKK and second has been revival of politic movement. These two processes have been synchronous. Politic movement included messages about Turkey’s full membership to EU. All these efforts have been intended for improving the conditions of Ocalan and releasing him in the long term. This will lead to the foundations of new alternatives in the near future as Kurdish problem and problem of Ocalan and terror are not the same things. Different messages in this new period showed that PKK do not have a hierarchy. Not undertaking the bombings directly and the refusal of leaders in spite of undertakings of the some militants, proved that there is not a unique PKK against us. It is beneficial that there are not a unique Kurdish Politic movement (DCM) and unique PKK. These forced PKK to assassinate other alternatives. Kurdish people are targets in the assaults implemented in accordance with this strategy.  Fostering terrorist activities and gaining continuity are very difficult. As a result, current strategy of PKK includes threatening with possible terrorist activities and diverting public opinion. What is aimed in this current strategy is not solution of problems of Kurdish community. The statements of Mayor of Diyarbakır Municipality Osman Baydemir in the aftermath of meeting with President of European Parliament, Joseph Borrell were very interesting. Drawing attention to the differences in the economic developments of regions, Baydemir demanded allocations of European funds mostly to the Eastern and South-eastern regions of Turkey. The sincerity of this demand needs questioning. Recent five-year economic indicators prove that there are important development breakthroughs in Eastern and South-Eastern regions of Turkey, tourism has revived, state of emergency had abolished completely in all cities. Instead of condemning of terrorist activities, municipalities of DEHAP have been supporting the meetings of terrorist organization and participating into the funerals of terrorists. What terror can bring is obvious from previous experiences. Municipalities of DEHAP must not be on the side of a terrorist organization. Kurds living in Turkey are on the way to EU and their future is sabotaged by these municipalities. There are efforts aiming for the revival of PKK but futures of Kurds are endangered. In meeting with Borrell, Baydemir said that “incidents in Gemlik are alarming.” However; this worry is the result of PKK’s meeting supporting a terrorist leader and within EU framework, supporting a terrorist organization is a big crime.  In the meantime, there are efforts to create an atmosphere of conflict but it should not be forgotten that the main catalysts are PKK and Ocalan.

Conclusion       

In conclusion, PKK is on the way of diversion, municipalities of DEHAP have a wrong target and Kurdish community and Kurdish elites in Turkey are on an important crossroad. A decision must be taken and it is not so complicated. This decision is a project of preventing tears, destroyed villages and bombings in order to create a free, developed and safe region. Preventing PKK and people under control of this terrorist organization is duty of every Turkish citizen. Preliminarily, this must be primary duty of every Kurdish citizen in Turkey as PKK mostly endangers futures of Kurdish people.                

Translated by Ihsan Konak