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Apr 24, 2010 at 6:00 pmArmenian Genocide: 95 Years Later, It Must Be Recognized
Today, on the 95TH anniversary of the genocide perpetrated against the Armenian people by the Ottoman Empire, tens of thousands of people gathered in the Armenian capital Yerevan. There were also commemorations worldwide, including in Beirut, France and the United States. In Istanbul, human rights activists organized a rally at Haydarsa train station where the first convoy of deported Armenians left on 24, April 1915.
Protesters in Yerevan chanted “recognize” and carried Armenian flags alongside flags of nations who have recognized the massacre as genocide including Canada, France, Poland and Switzerland.
“We thank all of those who in many countries of the world, including Turkey, understand the importance of preventing crimes against humanity and who stand with us in this struggle. This process has an irreversible momentum which has no alternative,” said Armenia’s President Serzh Sarkisian.
Countries such as Canada, Argentina, France, Greece, Russia, Poland and Switzerland, where the survivors of the Armenian genocide and their descendants live, have officially recognized the Armenian genocide. However, the present day Republic of Turkey still adamantly denies that a genocide was committed against the Armenians during World War I.
Further, and for geopolitical reasons, the United States has never labeled the atrocities committed by Turkey a genocide. Turkey is considered by Washington to be a key partner in NATO. While candidate Obama made numerous promises to call the massacre a genocide, President Obama failed again to do so today. The President commemorated Armenian Remembrance Day, and called the deaths of 1.5 million Armenians “one of the worst atrocities” of the 20TH century and “a devastating chapter in history”, but he did not call it a genocide.
“It is a devastating chapter in the history of the Armenian people, and we must keep its memory alive in honor of those who were murdered, and so that we do not repeat the grave mistakes of the past,” said President Obama.
A Brief History Of The Armenian Genocide
On the night of April, 24 1915 the Ottoman Empire government placed under arrest 200 leaders of the Armenian community in Constantinople, hundreds more were arrested soon after. All of them were sent to prison in Anatolia and were summarily executed. The Ottoman Empire had been planning the Armenian genocide for a while, and reports of atrocities committed against Armenians had been filtering in during the first months of 1915.
The Ottoman Empire’s army had acted ahead of time on the government’s plan by disarming the Armenian recruits, and by reducing them to labor battalions and working them under conditions similar to slavery. These acts were committed by the Ottoman Empire under the cover of a news blackout on account of World War I.
Part of the international community condemned the Armenian genocide from the start. In May 1915, France, Great Britain and Russia advised the Ottoman Empire leadership that they would be held personally accountable for crimes against humanity. But despite the moral outrage of part of the international community, no strong actions were taken after the end of World War I against the Ottoman Empire, either to sanction its brutal policies or to salvage the Armenian people still alive from extermination. The genocide went on until 1923, and no sanctions were ever taken against the post war Turkish governments to recognize the crimes of the Ottoman Empire, and make restitution to the Armenian people for their incredible losses.
It is estimated that one and half million Armenians died between 1915 and 1923. Right before World War I, there were an estimated two million Armenians living within the borders of the Ottoman Empire. Well over one million were deported in 1915. Hundreds of thousands were slaughtered right away while others were put in concentration camps and died of starvation, exhaustion and diseases.
The United Nations Convention Charter defines genocide as “acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group”. This definition clearly applies in the case of the atrocities committed against the Armenians by the Ottoman Empire, and should be recognized as such by the United States and Turkey. In Germany, it is a crime to deny the Holocaust. The same rule should apply in Turkey regarding the Armenian Genocide.
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An Open Letter to President Obama:
Dear President Obama,
Despite my initial skepticism regarding your campaign avowals to call the Armenian Genocide as such, now that you have once again broken your promise to do so, I am surprised to find myself feeling disappointed. It turns out that I had some faith in your eloquent speeches.
As a first-generation Armenian, this issue is important to me. Were I not Armenian, it would be as important to me, if I were aware of the facts. This leads me to one of the problems with your euphemistic actions: they teach a whole country, even the most erudite newspaper reading public, to doubt something that is a very real historical fact. You are promoting ignorance.
The only upside to being a descendant of Genocide is that it forces me to judge other government policies with critical skepticism: seeing the way you treat the Armenian Genocide of 1915 leads me to seriously doubt your speeches and political stances.
stop lying about history stop armenian lyings
Lying about history? @levent, I guess the school teachers in Turkey did a great job in brainwashing you.
I think you did a great job in painting a beautiful image of innocent armenians. In this whole article you don’t mention about armed armenian rebellions, turks being massacred.
And great writing with “The Ottoman Empire had been planning the Armenian genocide for a while”. Shows you have no idea for how long and there is no evidence to a state organized plan.
We are not saying armenians didnt die. They did at the hands of ottomans who acted like animals, i agree. But you cannot dismiss turks being massacred by armenians as well.
Have you no shame!
Your feeble attempt to justify Genocide by blaming the victims is disgusting. Every oppressed people have a right to revolt against oppression. Every people that were subject to genocide rightfully resisted.
The fact that a woman resists a rapist cannot be used to justify her murder. That is what you are doing.
The Armenians did not force the entire Turkish population into the Syrian desert to die. They couldn’t have done so even if they wanted to. That is exactly what was done to them. Stop your transparent attempts to equate the actions od a victim with that of the perpetrator.
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The German General Bronsart von Schellendorff worked in Ottoman General Staff as Senior Chief Staff until 1917 . Here are a few excerpts from his declarations about immigration and resettlement of the Armenians after the murder of Talat Pa?a in Germany:
‘The published advertisements, provacative brochures, weapons, ammo and explosives etc in total were proof of the fact that the uprising was being prepared by a third side.
It was so overt that Russia provoked, supported and finansed this uprising. The entrique against the high rank soldiers and officials in ?stanbul was displayed just at that time.
The Muslims who could be summoned to military service were already in the Turkish Army. So the Armenians did not face any difficulty to attempt a horrible massacre in a society which was not capable of defending himself.
Because, they attacked not only from the Russian side, from the back of the Turkish Army in the East but they also exterminated the Muslim folk who lived in the region.
As a wittness, I want to note that the dimensions of the wildness displayed by the Armenians, was far worse than the so-called Armenian wildness for which the Turks were accused later.
First, the Turkish Army interfered with the situation, in order to keep its relations beyond the front safe. But the Army had to admit to the Jandarme since it had to use its all power to overcome the Russian superiority and the uprising was spreading all over the empire
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The German General Bronsart von Schellendorff’s second observation:
‘ Talat was not an unbalanced man, a revengeful murderer but a statesman who was far-sighted. According to him, the Armenians were very useful (efficient) citizens during peace time, although they were agitated and raged being provoked by the Russian and the Russian Armenians.
He hoped that they would be able to give life to fertile and profitable soil in Syria and Mezopotamia being away from the effect of Russians and Kurdish dispute.
‘He also foresaw the ‘so-called Christian hunt’ propaganda of the foreign press while defining the relocation of the Armenians. So he wanted to be far away from every kind of violence.
He was right; what he got afraid occurred! Propaganda worked and foreign people were made believe in this stupudity!
It should be thought that the so-called events took place within an army which was an ally of Christian states and employed many Christian soldiers and officers in it’.
‘Now I want to talk about the immigration issue:
In the Turkish Empire, the vilayets are nearly free from the center due to the empire’s large area and its inefficient substructure. For example: The Ottoman governors have more authority than our presidents. Depending on this, they advocate that they can evaluate the developments in their area better than the government. So, the orders of the Internal Affairs Ministry were not fullfilled as it should have been.
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‘To transfer thousands of Armenians and additional thousands of Muslim immigrants to the settlement places, to nourish them, to find home for them were unusual and difficult tasks and exceeded the capacity of the few and unqualified officials. Just here Talat interfered with the situation using every kind of facility, in a devoted manner.
The orders which were sent by him to the jandarme and the governors should still be present. Emergent help of the Army was being asked by telegrams sent to Ministry of War from the Ministry of Internal Affairs, which I was informed, due to my charge. These calls were taken seriously and this duty was being implemented as much as the army could.
The Army presented its own food, vehicles, homes, doctors and medical equipments which it itself was deficient in, just for the aim of help. Unfortunately, thousands of Muslim immigrant and immigrated Armenians died not being able to stand the difficulties of this walk.
‘Here, one asks if it was not possible not to give the decision of immigration, predicting such situations. It was already a well known fact that it was not possible to stop the Turkish immigrants because of their rightful fears of Armenian wildness and savageness. Additionally, it should be approved that the Armenians should have been sent from the areas where they had uprised! Additionally the results of this should have been standed.
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‘….Talat fiercefully resisted to expelling all the Greek in the Mediterrenian voiced by the military wing. Because there, only they were working as ‘spies’. They did not attempt dangerous uprisings as the Armenians did, although it sounded reasonable for them.
(Bronsart von Schellendorff, Talat Pa?a için ?ahitlik, Ermeni Ara?t?rmalar? Dergisi, 4 (Aral?k 2001-Ocak-?ubat 2002), p.79,81).
The third important inspection of General Bronsart von Schellendorff: About misbehaviours against the Armenian convoys:
‘Now let me tell about the events which took place against the Armenian convoys. The Kurds made use of this opportunity which perhaps they would never seize again, and they robbed the Armenians who had attempted wild and savage attacks against the Muslims before and therefore they hated and they killed them if necessary. The misery trip of the Armenians had to follow the way through many Kurdish provinces! Because there was no other way to Mezopothamia.
‘ The hearings about the jandarme who accompanied the Armenian community in companies (bölük) is different from each other. Sometimes they defensed the Armenians against the Kurdish guerrilla bravely. It is also said that they sometimes left them and ran away. Additionally it is many times claimed that they cooperated with the Kurds or they themselves robbed and killed the Armenians’.
‘…..However the senior military officials gave immediate and hard punishments as soon as they were informed about these outlaw behaviors.
Let me tell that Vehip Pa?a, the Commander of the East Army judged his two military officials in the court and had them executed by shooting, because of this reason.
‘Enver Pa?a punished a Turkish general who was the governor of Halep, by expelling him and sentencing him to a long prison punishment’.
‘I think these examples will prove that the anti-Armenian incidents were not approved by the administrators. Talat can not be kept responsible for these events; these developments occurred 2000 kilometers away from him and as it was told before the jandarme was educated only by the French until the war burst.
Additionally, it was war time and the customs had become wild. I want to remind you the wildness that the French committed against our prisoners and wounded soldiers’.
[Bronsart von Schellendorff, Talat Pa?a için ?ahitlik, Ermeni Ara?t?rmalar? Dergisi, 4 (Aral?k 2001-Ocak-?ubat 2002), p.81].