Arm the Kurds? Peshmerga fighters want U.S. weapons. -AP

Peshmerga fighters in Iraq. -AP

Kurdish fighters are desperate for U.S. weapons. -AP. The United States has always been wary of selling weapons to the Kurds, but the rise of ISIS may change things. Already, the U.S. has provided advisers and some limited air strikes but the Kurdish Peshmerga fighters want arms to counter the massive stockpiles of U.S. provided Iraqi arms that ISIS captured over the summer. Some in the U.S. government are calling for arms to be sold directly to the Kurds.

My Comment:

There is a good argument for selling weapons to the Kurds. They are more competent then the Iraqi Security Forces (which isn't saying much) and they at least know how to fight. But there are three reasons this might not happen:

1. Iraq itself might not like it. They don't want a completely independent Kurdistan. Giving them tons of weapons gives them a chance to resit central authority which is not what Iraq wants. 

2. Turkey might have a problem with it as well. They have had problems with their own Kurdish minority so having a heavily armed army on their border might make them nervous. (I'm all for this, I have a very low opinion of the Turkish government).

3. The Peshmerga fighters might lose or abandon these weapons to ISIS. That is what happened to the Iraqi Security Forces and it helped to make ISIS into a formidable fighting force. The U.S. might want to avoid throwing good money after bad.

My take is sell some small arms, body armor and other small weapons systems but keep the heavy weapons at home. The fighters need ammo and guns to fight but I'm not comfortable with the prospect of ISIS capturing even more western weapons.