The Turkish military has announced on its website that it has withdrawn all its troops from Iraq. According to the military, the decision to withdraw the troops wasn’t forced on the Turks by outside forces: they had simply accomplished their goals. According to Turkey, the threat the PKK posed to Turkish citizens has now been removed.

All in all, 237 Kurdish terrorists have been killed. 24 Turkish soldiers have died in combat as well (the PKK says that many more soldiers have died, but in these cases it’s better to trust the government than a terrorist organization considering the fact that it’s more difficult to lie about this for an army since it has to release the names of those killed, etc.).

This is one of the major advantages of an operation such as the one Turkey started: there’s no need to stay in Iraq for ages. The goal wasn’t to bring stability to Iraq, the goal was to remove the threat the PKK posed. That’s, frankly, quite easily done. No, destroying the PKK completely is not easily done, but weakening it severely is doable.

It’s now up to the Iraqi government to step up to the plate and to make sure that the PKK doesn’t return / rebuild.