Dohok, Iraq - Part 5 of Michael Totten's trip to Iraqi Kurdistan

Entire post can be found here. Excerpt:

It's hard to convey what it's actually like meeting Iraqi Kurds. Fleshing
out the dialogue doesn't capture the feel of it. Americans and Kurds don't
just get along because we're temporary allies of convenience in the Middle
East. The connection is deeper and personal. Kurdish culture and American
culture might as well be from different planets. But somehow, oddly enough,
Kurds think much like Americans do. Let me rephrase that: Americans think
like the Kurds. We have similar values despite our extraordinarily different
cultural backgrounds. I find it easier to develop a rapport with Iraqi Kurds
than with people from any other country I have ever been to. It's instant,
powerful, and totally unexpected.
Michael Yon noticed something
similar a year ago.
Meetings with Iraqi Arabs sometimes seem more
like talking with the French. We are not enemies. But, generally speaking,
there is no real personal connection. At best, our collective personalities
just don’t seem to “click.” Yet by recognizing the sovereignty and
inevitability of each other, we manage to cooperate toward our common
interests, while not going to war when we disagree. But with the Kurds, like
the Poles or the Brits, there is an easy and audible click. We have mutual
goals, mutual enemies, and, also importantly, we actually like each
other.