This is the fifth installment in a Back to Iraq series which is basically a single long essay. Don’t miss Part One, Part Two, Part Three, and Part Four.
DOHOK, IRAQ - Sean and I walked up to the front steps of the Political Science building at Dohok University and lit up a couple of cigarettes. We had just arrived in Dohok, Iraqi Kurdistan, and we had no ride, no guide, and no translator. What better place to pick somebody up than where the young and the educated gather to study, to meet, and to hang out?
Thirty or forty sharply dressed young men and women loitered with backpacks slung over their shoulders and books under their arms. I figured we could stand there for a minute or two and see if anyone felt like approaching us. But no one did.
“Let’s go talk to that guy,” I said to Sean and gestured toward a garrulous-looking barrel-chested young Kurd wearing glasses and a tie and joking with friends. “He looks friendly enough.”
“Hello!” I said to the young man who would, in fact, be our guide later that day. “Do you speak English?”
He looked startled.
“Yes?” he said. “Can I help you?”
Heads turned all around at the sound of spoken English.
I hope we continue to work with the Kurds. Like the Israelis, they could be our strongest allies out there. Most impressive is the instinctive rapport between them and us; this is the kind of thing that can eliminate the need for lots of diplomacy, etc.
Remarkably, the transnationalists and leftists havent found a pretext for hating the Kurds just yet. I'm interested to see how that plays out. No friend of the US can be a friend of the far left, although the Kurds have had a taste for marxism.