Yesterday, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld apologized. Not for rudely telling Americans to "back off" in their criticism of his lousy performance; not for going to war in Iraq without adequately planning for stabilizing the country; not for running the U.S. armed forces into the ground; not even for infecting Bartlett's with inanities about "unknown unknowns."

Donald Rumsfeld didn't even apologize to America. He apologized to Turkey.

Last month at a NATO training seminar in Rome, a U.S. lieutenant colonel showed his audience a map displaying a "Free Kurdistan" where parts of Turkey are today. That's kind of a painful idea for Turks, who like their country the way it is. Several Turkish officers stalked out of the event. Back home in Turkey, the incident re-ignited fear that the United States secretly harbored plans to carve up the country -- an abiding worry due to the U.S.'s close diplomatic relationship with the Iraqi Kurds.

You see, Turks were already on edge about this "secret plan." In June, the Armed Forces Journal -- a non-government publication -- published an article by retired Army Lt. Col. Ralph Peters that featured a very similar map. Titled, "Blood Borders," the piece imagined the geography of the Middle East if colonial powers hadn't created artificial boundaries in the earlier part of the century.

I spoke with Peters today by phone. He was, perhaps ironically, unapologetic. "The fact these societies have descended into self-destructed paranoia isn't my problem," he told me. "I have no regrets about writing it, and I would do it again."

Besides, Peters grumbled, "anything that makes Donald Rumsfeld's day more unpleasant is a good thing."