Struggle with and without arms: The 15th of August and its meaning in the current phase

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Introduction

Following the proposal of Abdullah Öcalan expressed in his message released on February 27, 2025, the central committee of PKK held its 12th congress. On May 12, 2025, it took the decision to dissolve the party and halt the armed struggle. On the occasion of the 42th anniversary of the beginning of the armed struggle on August 15, 1984, we want to share with you our analysis about its importance in the Kurdish people‘s history and the meaning behind the decision to interrupt it regarding the current dynamics between international hegemonic and democratic forces.

Historical context: the necessity to take up the arms

“The Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) was founded in the 20th century, one of the most violent periods in history.” This is the first sentence of the Call for Peace and Democratic Society, arrived from Imrali and read by representatives of DEM party in Turkey on February 27, 2025. The PKK was founded in 1978 to give an organizational framework to the realization and the claim: “Kurdistan is a colony”. When Rêber APO1 whispered this sentence the first time he fainted. It was the first thunder of the storm that would begin revealing this rastî, a word that in Kurdish means both truth and reality. Such a simple sentence in the 70s in Turkey had a disruptive effect. It was a shaking truth, not only for the state, which of course is founded on negation and oppression, but especially for the others revolutionary forces. Those forces, blinded by a dogmatic and chauvinist interpretation of Marxism-Leninism and under the influence of Kemalism2, were watching the first group of Kurdistan revolutionaries suspiciously, or even acting against them. In his call, Rêber APO identifies the political and ideological landscape shaped by the two world wars, real socialism and the Cold War as the: “fundamental condition for the emergence of the PKK”.

The founding group of PKK consisted entirely of young students, and PKK started as an ideological and political movement. In the beginning, there was no intention to start an armed struggle. But quickly it became clear that the Turkish nation state, as a country that is acting according to the principle “One Nation, one flag, one language”, will not accept any serious alternative than its nationalist paradigm.

Because of this policy and the Turkish role for NATO interests, it was also the place where the counter-insurgency and special warfare practices reached some of the highest peak of violence. The examples the Kurdish Revolutionaries, the group around Rêber Apo, were referring to at that time, were the ones of the previous generations of militants of the Turkish Left waging a huge struggle, including the armed struggle, against the state during the 60s. With the military coup of March 12, 1971 this generation was almost annihilated. Personalities like Deniz Gezmiş3, who proclaimed the immortal brothership between Kurdish and Turkish people before being hanged, had a huge influence on younger revolutionaries like Rêber APO. Events like that forged the internationalist4 nature of the party. The topic of the armed struggle is naturally connected to the topic of revolutionary revenge against the oppressors. But taking up arms was a necessity, forced upon the Party because of brutal state repression. In essence, armed struggle was the only way to survive as a revolutionary movement. On the occasion of the murder of Heqî Karer on May 18, 1977, the answer of Rêber APO on this topic is an example of the mentality which since then always formed the line of party: “Our revenge against the collaborationists who killed Heqî Karer will not be simply to kill them as well, our revenge will be the foundation of the party”. This mentality has been a key factor for the success of the PKK: not replying to the violence in a symmetric way, but being creative and free, to answer in totally unexpected ways. The laying down of the weapons and the dissolving of the party is one of these kinds of answers.

In that phase, there was a really high level of political violence not only practiced by the state but also by far-right groups, Islamist groups and between leftist against each other. What kept PKK alive in this period was not its arms. It was the foresight of Rêber Apo who took the right political steps and strengthened the PKK cadres through continuous ideological education and who never cut the bond to society. Due to this understanding, the organization moved most of its cadres to the Syria-occupied Lebanon just before the military coup of September 12, 1980, and continued to operate clandestinely among the Kurdish society in North Kurdistan and Turkey. In Lebanon, in particular in the Beqa’a valley’s PLO5 camps, the PKK started training the firsts ranks of guerrilla, at this point with the clear goal of armed struggle. At the same time, they were fighting together with other internationalists from the Middle-East and the rest of the world against the Israeli invasion of the South of Lebanon in 1982. The military junta in Turkey in the same period was waging a huge war against the PKK and the few other leftist organizations which still resisted in the society and in the jails. The torture suffered by thousands of comrades in Amed and all the others prisons, all the martyrs fallen and the brave actions they carried out, were urging a strong answer from the party. This answer finally arrived on August 15, 1984 with the guerrilla action lead by commander Agit6 against two Turkish army outposts. As it was clear immediately, the value of this action was not military but historical and political. More than an action against the external reality of the enemy, it was an action against the internalized oppressed mentality and the demonstration that it was possible and necessary to overcome this mentality. It was the most urgent and rightful way to protect the honor of the people as much as it was protected through the resistance in the prisons.

This day is celebrated in the Kurdish society under the name of “cejna vejînê”, the “celebration of the rebirth” to underline that since that day, the existence of the Kurdish people could not be denied anymore. The August 15 action lead to the first uprising in the history of the Kurds where they were not fighting for Kurdish reign or monarchy. This way, they were breaking with the chauvinist Turkish approach as well as with the primitive Kurdish nationalism. It was the beginning of a struggle looking beyond the enemy with the aim of changing a thousand-years old feudal social system which always brought the Kurds to collaborate with ruling power. Important women comrades like Şehîd Sara7 were part of the history of the party since its foundation. Her vanguard and the one of Rêber APO towards the topic of women participation in the struggle led thousands of women to abandon their traditional roles to undertake the revolutionary path of the PKK in the 90s. A consequence of the women‘s participation is the increase of internal debate about gender struggle and how to implement the woman‘s freedom within the ranks of PKK. In 1993, the women guerrilla army was created and more and more women became important commanders in the struggle. This event represents a key moment for the women who got to know their own strength in this way. Every bullet that these women shot was not just targeting the Turkish army but the whole sexist mentality which is the basis of all oppression and colonialism.

The change of paradigm: to fight beyond state, power and violence

The creation of the women’s army in 1993 is the signal that around this year deep change is going on within the party. This issue is wider then just a military and social development: it is possible to see in this moment the beginning of what the movement defines as “change of paradigm”. A few Years before, in 1989, the Soviet Union fell, with enormous consequences for all national liberation movements of the world. Even though PKK never received active support from the USSR, its end brought about the necessity of a renewed understanding of the socialist paradigm to the party. The end of real socialism in USSR unveiled a reality made of the negation of freedom. In many parts of the world, the liberation movements which succeed in obtaining independence and building their own state often achieved neither prosperity nor peace. According to these reality, it became clear to Rêber APO that the only way to face modernity, to prove that the thesis of “the end of the history”8 was false, was to undertake a process of renovation of the ideological fundaments of the party. In 1993, the first attempt to start a peace process with the state was made; Turgut Özal, president at that time, had to pay with his life for having this tentative9. In this moment Rêber APO realized that the goal of the PKK and any genuine revolutionary organization of modernity can never be the idea of “taking power”, that the idea of democracy in the frame of the State, especially the Nation-State, is nothing else then a thousands of years old lie to legitimize oppression. Democracy only stems from society and its historical structures; thousands of years older than any state. In 1999, Rêber APO decided to leave Syria due to the Turkish threat of waging war against the country’s population in case they refused to obey. Since also the option of going to the mountains would have led to an intensification of the war, he decided to go to Europe with the goal of leading the political and diplomatic work for the recognition of the right of the people’s self-determination and a political solution. It is well known that, while searching for a country which would grant him the status of a political refugee, Rêber APO was kidnapped by a NATO-Israel conspiracy and handed over to Turkey. Since then he is imprisoned on the prison-island of Imrali. In those 26 years of isolation, the leader of the movement went through an analysis of human history, sociology and a constructive critic of Marxism. The result of this intellectual effort resulted in the 5 books of the Manifesto of Democratic Modernity, renewing ideology which was then has been discussed, implemented and became the beacon of the party and the whole freedom movement. The new paradigm investigates the roots of “power”, its birth at a certain point of the history of humanity, through the oppression of women, youth and nature. According to these and others theses the movement developed a model of radical democracy based on the communalist nature of society. This type of democracy is did not need to be created, it already exists. It has always survived capitalist modernity and is practiced in the margins of the statist civilization by mountain and village communities, neighborhood organizations, culture and student movements, workers unions and other sectors of society until today. To protect this democracy the self-defense is an undeniable right. Because of this, the PKK guerrilla developed innovative ways to face the second largest army of NATO. After 42 years of armed struggle, HPG and YJA-STAR10 reached, on one side, a level of professionalization and rooting in the society and in the environment that cannot be defeated by NATO. On the other side they were not able to overthrow the military of the state. This led to a situation in which other methods than classical military success had to be found. In a phase where all hegemonic forces are insisting on war a step in the direction of peace was a very courageous and strategic decision made by Rêber Apo. The excuse used until now in order to wage a liquidation war against the whole Kurdish Freedom Movement was the fight against “terrorism”. This is the excuse that was internationally used to massacre society, imprison thousands of politicians and militants and force millions of Kurds to flee from their homeland. With the step of laying down the arms, Rêber Apo wants to take this line of argument out of the hands of the state, in order to force the Turkish state to political steps. So the clear perspective is to end any military activity against the Turkish state and to wage the conflict on a political basis. Because the existence of Kurds was denied for decades, this basis did not existing for a long time. As Rêber APO said in his “Call for Peace and a Democratic Society”: “The need for a democratic society is inevitable. The PKK, the longest and most extensive insurgency and armed movement in the history of the [Turkish] Republic, found social base and support, and was primarily inspired by the fact that the channels of democratic politics were closed.”

But after a huge struggle for the acceptance of the existence of the Kurds, these channels seem to be opening up. Rêber Apo is using the current political, economical weak position of Turkey as an opportunity to finally force the Turkish state to change its politics towards the recognition of the Kurds. News agencies reporting about the “surrender of PKK” are supporting the psychological warfare Turkey tries to spread in order to camouflage their weak position. In these terms, the process of laying down the weapons is not resembling the peace process of any other National Liberation Movement. The position of the movement is very strong, so laying down the arms is mainly a strategical step of course also depending on steps from the other side. If this process succeeds, it will not just impact Kurdistan positively but also other regions, as the Israel-Palestine conflict will be affected and the position of oppressed people of the Middle East and the world will take advantage of these historical changes. Of course this does not change anything in the line of self-defense. In places of direct threats by other armed forces, such as in Rojava or in Şengal, the necessity of armed self-defense continues. In these places, laying down arms would mean a big danger for the people of being massacred by Jihadist forces again. As Rêber Apo says, a people that can wage an armed self-defense struggle is an honorable people. In the last 42 years, the Kurdish people gained back their honorable existence and now take new steps towards a political solution for them and all the peoples.

Today, on August 15, we remember the struggle made and commemorate the Şehîds who gave their lives in the fight for freedom. Where we are today is only possible through the resistance that has been waged. This is why on the occasion of August 15 it is more important than ever to remember the history of resistance and celebrate the rebirth of the Kurdish people and the people of the Middle East.

Long live Commander Egîd – Long live August 15!

1 Abdullah Öcalan.
2 The world comes from Mustafa Kemal Atatürk and describes the ideology at the base of the foundation of the republic of Turkey in 1923: one race, one religion, one language.
3 Deniz Gezmiş: young marxist-leninist turkish revolutionary, hanged at the age of 25.
4 The first comrades of Abdullah Öcalan were Heqî Karer, a Turk, and Kemal Pîr from Laz people.
5 PLO: Organization for the Liberation of Palestine.
6 Mahsum Korkmaz, known as Heval Egîd was the first commander of the guerrilla. The party‘s central academy was named after him.
7 Sakine Cansiz, known as Şehîd Sara, is one of the two women part of the foundation congress. She is a vanguard of the women’s party and woman liberation ideology.
8 The end of the history is a political thesis developed by Francis Fukuyama.
9 After some political reforms to create the ground for the peace process, such as the formal recognition of the Kurdish language and its public use, the process ended because of the murder of Turgut Özal by the Turkish deep state.
10 YJA-STAR: free women units, the women‘s guerilla.

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