Cspan created 35 years ago and brought to you as a local service by your cable or satellite provider. Coming up tonight, booktv looks at books on isis. First, David Phillips and the shifting alliance in the fight against isis. And then we discuss isis inside the army of terror. Looking at the groups rise and leadership. And later the groups appeal in the middle east and the threat to the United States. You are watching booktv in prim time. David phillips director of the Peace Program at Columbia University institute of the study of human rights talks about the shifting alliances in the fight against isis and talks about the governments relationship with the kurds and the relationship with syria. This was held at columbia in new york city. Good afternoon. And welcome on this snowy day to the book round table with David Phillips. I am a professor of Political Science science at barnard and Deputy Director for social sciences and programming. On behalf of of the Hammer Institute and Columbia University and want to welcome you to this book launch, book conversation, the kurdish spring a new map of the middle east authored by David Phillips sitting here to your right. David is director of a program on peacebuilding and rights about the study of human rights. He has worked as Senior Adviser to the United Nations secretariat and the Foreign Affairs expert and Senior Advisor to the u. S. State department. So positions, different academic universities conflict Resolution Program director at the American University program on conflict and peacebuilding. Hes a visiting visiting scholar for middle east studies and a professor at the academy of kenya. He has written numerous books. This is the latest one and he has been involved in peacebuilding operations, practice, theory, analysis throughout the world and has been to some far corners of the caucasus so can testify to the thought and care he puts into his analysis. He is extremely prolific. The timing of this book takes him to one of his longstanding areas of focus, iraq, the kurdish areas in the middle east. So what we will do today is have a conversational format about the book, its timeliness and they will link ups to some established in 1988. It initiated an Armed Struggle against turkey which resulted in the deaths of 30,000 people over the course of several decades. At the same time in iraq which became independent in 1932 the kurds saw their aspirations tonight. King faisal was an arabist. He believed in a pan arab approach. The kurds rebelled. They launch something called the maha bodnar public which was suppressed many thousands of kurds were killed. When saddam husein and the baathists came to power they negotiating autonomy provisions. These were merely in name only and never implemented so the kurds rebelled again and many many thousands were killed. In 1980 iran and iraq ended up at war. It was perceived in baghdad that the kurds were supporting iran. It was part of an effort to create a security buffer on the iraq iranian border. As i said earlier almost 200,000 people is the result of that policy. In syria, there was the surely been movement which was a kurdish independence movement. Many kurds who fled from turkey when iran was put down and adopt in syria. They are too the kurds suffered as a result of that baptist regime. Their identity was denied. There were citizenship laws that were adopted in the kurds were denied citizenship rights. They were not provided Identification Cards so 300,000 kurds were essentially denied and a privilege of employment or education. They couldnt marry or hold property. They joined with other Opposition Forces and put forward the damascus declaration 2004 which is really the root of the opposition in syria today but throughout the 20th century the kurds in syria suffered a terrible fate. The same can be said for the kurds in iran. They lost the Kurdistan Democratic Party of iran. They supported the overthrow of the shah with the expectation that they would be given greater autonomy and rights by the new regime. They were denied those rights. In turn they boycotted the constitutional convention. They were distrusted by ayatollah khamenei. Kurds are mostly sunni and they werent seen as loyal to his regime. As a result of that we see across the four states were kurds reside rebellion movements that were launched. The pkk in turkey, the Kurdistan Democratic Party in iraq, what has become the p. Y. D. In syria and the kde pim iran. The kurds are factionalized and there are deep divisions but when they are under duress they come together to defend their collective national interest. By the end of the 20th century we started to see a little bit of a turn in fortune. The u. S. Established a nofly zone over Iraqi Kurdistan in the kurds were able to govern their own affairs and that experiments in grassroots democracy inspired kurds throughout the region to seek something similar, federal arrangement where power was decentralized. It is an extraordinary tale these dispersal against the four states in the struggle of the four states with their own challenges and parameters of regimes. You hinted at some turning points there in your last comments but how have kurdish movements and political organizations networked with each other . Has the relationship also had some tensions . Has it evolved . Give us a sense of how in resistance to kurds have managed to find political expression or not in various points of history . Because they were fragmented before poor countries they never coalesced as a coherent Kurdish National movement. In each of the four countries there are Kurdish National movements but they are divided by tribal affinities, by language. He kurds of Iraqi Kurdistan enjoyed special privilege because of assistance that the u. S. Provided after the gulf war. The kurds and other countries didnt benefit in the same way. We see a systematic crackdown against the kurds in syria by the baathists regime of assad. In turkey there was a resettlement policy. Several million crews were relocated. Villages were destroyed en masse. Kurdish political and cultural rights were systematically denied. One of the things that Bashar Alassad did successfully was to manipulate the kurds in syria against the regimes in iraq and turkey. The kurds unfortunately have always been the victims of regional and great powers who pitted kurds against kurds and kurds against the regimes and the algiers accord in 1975 essentially expelled kurds from iran and the pan kurdish vision of a republic. The kurds until recently have never really coalesced as a group. I say until recently because the defining moment in this transition was the recent battle of kobani in syria. What we saw there was a truly remarkable occurrence. The kurds from the four countries join to defend kobani against the Islamic State fighters and kobani was occupied almost entirely by isis until the u. S. Launched airstrikes and decided to deliver weapons to the Peoples Protection units which is a part of the pyd the kurdish syrian party. The pkk which has strong loyalties with the pyd wanted to join the battle and kobani so did the Kurdish Militant Group in iran. In Iraqi Kurdistan and the peshmerga negotiated an arrangement with 155 of their fighters transited through turkey to join the battle so you had kurds from all poor four countries essentially fighting together against the Islamic State. Initially the Obama Administration said kobani has no Strategic Value but it changed its view. It decided to launch airstrikes and to deliver weapons over the very strong objections of president erdogan in turkey. Kobani is an emblematic event in the formation of the new Kurdish National identity much the way hollister was in 1988. Very interesting. Lets bring ourselves up to date and delve into that a little bit more. It seems that the rise of isis has fundamentally affected and changed kurdish u. S. Cooperation. Take us through some of the big changes going on now on the ground but also politically. How has the political terrain shifted because of isis . In may the kurds in iraq went to the u. S. Government. They went to the government of baghdad and they warned that isis would launch an attack against iraq. Their warnings were ignored. That phenomena of Wishful Thinking and ignoring reality has been a defining characteristic of Foreign Policy in this region and of the Obama Administration in recent years. June 10 the Islamic State stormed across the border. They seized mosul which is the secondlargest city in iraq. The iraqi Army Garrisons they are, essentially fled abandoning all of his weapons. Over an eightyear period the u. S. Had invested 13 billion into a train and equip program for the iraqi army and in a 24hour period the iraqi army folded. They left office state of the art military equipment made in the usa. Islamic state forces rushed south through the deserts of anbar. They got to within a birdseye view of baghdad and shiite militias came out to meet them and the peoples detection unit opened the humanitarian corridor leding tens of thousands of people to flee to the area. The second phase was human humanitarian. Americas approach evolved to a point where we focused on retaking territory and assisted some iraqi forces and the battle to retake the mosul dam and launched counter offenses to regain other territory like on the region of the turkey syria boulevard. All of this is happening at the same time we were getting involved in kobani and isis is a real threat to iraq to syria, it controls people that live under isis control. Isis is wellarmed because of the arms they seized from the iraqis armed forces. They were operating 18 oil wells and refineries and generate revenue from hostage taking and artifacts. The budget is estimated at 2 billion. They are a force to be wreck with. I want to back up because you have been very straight with criticizing u. S. Iraq policy and you have done so across both administrations in terms of the governance of iraq and some of the decisions that were made after the American Military intervention there. So i want to get your take on the failure of the United States to reach a status of forces agreement with iraq. At the time there were different issues in the negotiations, status of contractors, you know different rights of command and control. Also the u. S. According to gates biography told the iraqis they should consult with some other countries that have posted u. S. Military forces in the past and it turned out that backfired because of the japanese and the they got all the details of issues that should be of concern to them. So we have this parting of the ways, this withdrawal of u. S. Forces. What is your take on that . Was that just one of these pivotal points and at the u. S. Had withdrawn would we have seen the isis problem in all of its theory and complexity now . So isis goes back to the invasion and occupation of iraq. It was originally established as al qaeda in mesopotamia. The surge of 2006 and 2007 was intended to deal with the sectarian conflict between shia and sunnis. It was the election of Nouri Almaliki and his descendents to the Prime Minister that further polarized iraqi society. We should ascribe responsibility to the withdrawal of u. S. Forces where it belongs which is with president bush. In 2008 he announced u. S. Forces would be withdrawn. The day we set the withdrawal, timing and procedures for withdrawal were negotiated with the government in baghdad. The status of forces agreement to which you refer is something that the Obama Administration tried to negotiate with malikis government. They broke down for a variety of reasons mostly because the Obama Administration did want to stay. The Iraqi Government did want to happen there. The rationale for u. S. Forces staying as a residual deployment was a hard case to make. So by the end of 2011 as you saw the u. S. Essentially withdraw all of its assets from iraq, and mind you this was after we had invested enormous amounts of troops and treasure, 4500 americans killed, 30,000 maimed, 2 trillion spent. Lets not forget 130,000 iraqis that we know of who were killed. So it was really time for that war to end but in order for iraq to be viable and stable in the future we needed to have the government of national reconciliation. Nouri almaliki was just the wrong person to be in the Prime Ministers post at that time. He replaced sunnis from the armed forces. He created his own shia led battalions. He turned to iran and iranian backed militias, assuming a more and more prominent role in providing security around the country. So the sectarian divide in iraq is fundamentally at the root of the countrys problems today. We talk about a government of National Union in iraq. Maliki left. Abbadi replaced him as Prime Minister but fundamentally nothing has changed. Prime minister. The u. S. Has also fallen into a little bit of a trap which has further polarized sunnis in iraq starting with arab spring and 2012. Iraqi forces massed to retake the city from isis is dominated by sulemani, the general in charge of the quds force the Iranian Revolutionary guard. Hes not commanding from afar he is on site. Shiite militias are on the front line. Capabilities of the professional Iraqi Military still leave an enormous amount to be desired. So the perception that the u. S. Has, essentially shifted its alliances through its negotiations with iran by finding common cause, you know, with hezbollah against muslim sunni fighters in syria have all polarized the sunnishia divide and made iraqs viability which was already remote even more difficult to achieve. What about, you referred to them what about u. S. Traditional allies in the gulf . How have they responded . What is their role in the whole unfolding of this political dynamic . Make no mistake about it the initial funding or more alqaeda and for isis came from individuals in the emirates. It may not have been official policy of saudi arabia but members of the saudi royal family provided significant financial resources. Monies flowed from the uae. Theres a widespread view that the u. S. Hasnt preserved its traditional alliances. Particularly the arab spring and what happened in egypt raised all kinds of red flags because none of the sunni heads of state who we supported wanted to fall to the same fate as mubarak. And they pelt that americas loyalty and they felt that americas loyalty and support was at question. Interesting. Another neighbor, turkey. Take us through turkeys performance, its strategy, its objectives throughout this whole crisis the multiple constituencies that theyre addressing. How do you view the turkish role both now and Going Forward in this . So turkey has proven to be a false friend of the United States. It has betrayed the interests of its Strategic Partnership with the iraqi kurds. How so . The kurds and ankara established a Strategic Partnership beginning in 2011. A pipeline was built from kirkuk to jahan on the eastern mediterranean. Oil would be exported and stored in tankers in jahan. In 2013 there were 13 billion worth of turkish goods sold in kurdistan, there was an additional 30 billion worth of Construction Contracts that were agreed to, so there was a lot of economic cooperation. What happened in 2012 in turkey was a seminal shift in the countrys approach. ThenPrime Minister erdogan felt deeply offended by president assad of syria. He turned against assad, with whom he had worked to establish friendly relations. He thought that the u. S. Would lead an effort to support the Free Syrian Army and the Syrian National council so there would be are ea regime change finish there would be a regime change. When that didnt happen, turkey decided to support arab sunni extremists as the point of the spear fighting the assad government. And that included support for alnusra and, ultimately, for the Islamic State. So turkey was serving its own National Interests without regard for its longstanding loyalty and ties to the United States. When isis invaded Iraqi Kurdistan, the Kurdistan Regional government sent an envoy asking for weapons and support. They were told by the turkish counterpart