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Add an Event88 YEARS OF THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE
On the night of April 23-24, 1915, Armenian political, religious, educational, and intellectual leaders in Constantinople (Istanbul) were arrested, deported into Anatolia, and put to death. In May, after mass deportations had already begun, Minister of Internal Affairs Talaat Pasha, claiming that the Armenians were untrustworthy, could offer aid and comfort to the enemy, and were in a state of imminent rebellion, ordered ex post facto their deportation from the war zones to relocation centers — actually the barren deserts of Syria and Mesopotamia. The Armenians were driven out, not only from areas near war zones but from the length and breadth of the empire, except in Constantinople and Smyrna, where numerous foreign diplomats and merchants were located. Sometimes Armenian Catholics and Protestants were exempted from the deportation decrees, only to follow once the majority belonging to the Armenian Apostolic Church had been dispatched. Secrecy, surprise, and deception were all part of the process.
The whole of Asia Minor was put in motion. Armenians serving in the Ottoman armies had already been segregated into unarmed labor battalions and were now taken out in batches and murdered. Of the remaining population, the adult and teenage males were, as a pattern, swiftly separated from the deportation caravans and killed outright under the direction of Young Turk agents, the gendarmerie, and bandit and nomadic groups prepared for the operation. Women and children were driven for months over mountains and deserts. Intentionally deprived of food and water, they fell by the thousands and the hundreds of thousands along the routes to the desert. In this manner the Armenian people were effectively eliminated from their homeland of several millennia. Of the refugee survivors scattered throughout the Arab provinces and the Caucasus, thousands more were to die of starvation, epidemic, and exposure. Even the memory of the nation was intended for obliteration, as churches and cultural monuments were desecrated and small children, snatched from their parents, were renamed and given out to be raised as non-Armenians and non-Christians.
The following excerpt from a report of the Italian consul-general at Trebizond typifies the hundreds of eyewitness accounts by foreign officials:
The passing of gangs of Armenian exiles beneath the windows and before the door of the Consulate; their prayers for help, when neither I nor any other could do anything to answer them; the city In a state of siege, guarded at every point by 15,000 troops in complete war equipment, by thousands of police agents, by bands of volunteers, and by the members of the "Committee of Union and Progress"; the lamentations, the tears, the abandonments,, the imprecations, the many suicides, the instantaneous deaths from sheer terror; the sudden unhinging of men's reason; the conflagration; the shooting of victims in the city; the ruthless searches through the houses and in the countryside; the hundreds of corpses found every day along the exile road; the young women converted by force to Islam or exiled like the rest; the children torn away from their families and from the Christian schools and handed over by force to Moslem families, or else placed by the hundreds on board ship in nothing but their shirts, and then capsized and drowned in the Black Sea and the River Deyirmen Dere — these are my last ineffaceable memories of Trebizond, memories which still, at a month's distance, torment my soul and almost drive me frantic.
Henry Morgenthau, Sr., the American Ambassador to Turkey at the time, tried to reason with the Young Turk leaders and to alert the United States and the world to the tragic events, but, except for some donations for relief efforts, his actions were in vain. His description of the genocide begins:
The Central Government now announced its intention of gathering the two million or more Armenians living in the several sections of the empire and transporting them to this desolate and inhospitable region. Had they undertaken such a deportation in good faith, it would have represented the height of cruelty and injustice. As a matter of fact, the Turks never had the slightest idea of reestablishing the Armenians In this new country....The real purpose of the deportation was robbery and destruction; it really represented a new method of massacre. When the Turkish authorities gave the orders for these deportations, they were merely giving the death warrant to the whole race; they understood this well, and, in their conversations with me, they made no particular attempt to conceal the fact.
Ambassador Morgenthau concluded: "I am confident that the whole history of the human race contains no terrible episode as this."
Estimates of the Armenian dead vary from 600,000 to two million. A United Nations Human Rights Subcommission report in 1985 gives the figure of "at least one million," but the important point in understanding a tragedy such as this is not the exact and precise count of the number who died — that will never be known — but the fact that more than half the Armenian population perished and the rest were forcibly driven from their ancestral homeland. Another important point is that what befell the Armenians was by the will of the government. While a large segment of the general population participated in the looting and massacres, many Muslim leaders were shocked by what was happening, and thousands of Armenian women and children were rescued and sheltered by compassionate individual Turks, Kurds, and Arabs.
Although the decimation of the Armenian people and the destruction of millions of persons in Central and Eastern Europe during the Nazi regime a quarter of a century later each had particular and unique features, there were some striking parallels. The similarities include the perpetration of genocide under the cover of a major international conflict, thus minimizing the possibility of external intervention; conception of the plan by a monolithic and xenophobic clique; espousal of an ideology giving purpose and justification to racism, exclusives, and intolerance toward elements resisting or deemed unworthy of assimilation; imposition of strict party discipline and secrecy during the period of preparation; formation of extralegal special armed forces to ensure the rigorous execution of the operation; provocation of public hostility toward the victim group and ascribing to it the very excesses to which it would be subjected; certainty of the vulnerability of the targeted groups (demonstrated in the Armenian case by the previous massacres of 1894-1896 and 1909); exploitation of advances in mechanization and communication to achieve unprecedented means for control, coordination, and thoroughness; and the use of sanctions such as promotions and incentive to loot or, conversely, the dismissal and punishment of reluctant officials and the intimidation of persons who might consider harboring members of the victim group.
Too bad they're all dead.
2 daughters; the oldest turned 7 today.
Happy birthday, Sarah! Daddy loves you!
At the turn of the 20th century Armenians were citizens of nearly 600 year-old decaying Ottoman Empire. The Islamic State, established by Ottoman Turks, was home to millions of Muslims and Christians of different races living side by side in peace for centuries. However, during the Industrialization Period in Europe the ideals of liberte et egalite of the French Revolution quickly became influential within the truly cosmopolitan Turkish empire with the help of European powers who wished to partition the vast dominions for themselves.
At the end of the 19th century while European powers were racing with each other for recognition and domination, Ottoman Empire was struggling for its survival. Imperial Russia relentlessly pursued wars with Ottomans for over a century in order to gain access to warm waters while British kept them in check by helping Ottomans from time to time not to relinquish all powers to the Czars who masterfully utilized Ottoman minorities to revolt against the Sultans. Weakened from within, Ottoman government could no longer control the Greeks, the Serbs and other European minorities as new nations began to emerge through series of revolutions.
When Kaiser's Germany rose as the new power of Europe British changed sides in favor of Russia and this ultimately tipped the balance of power against the Ottomans. Recognizing the strength and the resilience of Ottoman Armenians the Czar pushed them to revolt within the Ottoman State while the Russian army supported by Armenian volunteers was directly engaged with Ottoman forces.
The results of the Armenian revolts spelled human tragedies in eastern Anatolia. While Armenian Diaspora frequently condemns Turks for the massacres of their people Turkish casualties have always been neglected in convenience.
At the time of World War I the total Armenian population within Ottoman Empire has been tabulated around 1.5 million not only by official Ottoman sources but also by the British, the French and other Western sources. Nevertheless, Armenians always claimed that nearly 1.5 million Armenians were deliberately killed by Turks. If so, Armenians in Armenia clearly should have been extinct today.
Both Turkish and Western historians show Armenian losses to be around 600,000 during the tragedy years of the early part of the 20th century. Meanwhile historical facts point out that Turks had nearly five times more losses due to Armenian campaigns in eastern Anatolia and Caucasus under Russian supervision.
What occurred in eastern Anatolia was no different in the Caucasus, the Crimea, and the Balkans. As early as the beginnings of the 19th century all these lands were heavily populated by Turks. But Russian campaigns have literally exterminated Turks from these lands with the help of local nationals such as the Greeks, the Serbs, the Bulgars, the Ukrainians, and so on. However, Anatolian campaign was different because Armenians, who were literally used as peons by the Czar, were not majority in any part of Anatolia, which has been the home for the Turks for nearly a millennium.
During the Russian invasion of eastern Anatolia and Caucasus, Turks suffered innumerable casualties by wild Armenian bands. By taking advantage from the lack of authority of the central government Armenians plundered Turkish population. However, at first opportunity Ottoman government decided to relocate Anatolian Armenian population to another part of the empire in order to put a stop to the senseless bloodshed.
However, the decision and the following act of relocation of 1915 has been interpreted by Armenians and their supporters in the Western World as the intent and the act of genocide of Armenians. For obvious reasons it is not surprising to see that there is so much support for such claim in countries like France, Italy, and the United States.
By the end of the 19th century the United States had received multitudes of Armenian immigrants from Ottoman domains. Many already had significant wealth, as Armenians were the richest minority within the Ottoman Empire. America became a fertile ground to establish the roots of the Armenian Diaspora fighting for an independent Armenian state within Ottoman real estate.
Similarly France also took multitudes of Armenian immigrants who eventually became politically influential as they did in the United States. As opposed to listening to common sense and paying attention to national interests politicians remained under intense influence of lobbyists forces to formally accept the claim of genocide.
Significant amount of damaging information against Turks came from American Ambassador Morgenthau who served until 1916 in Istanbul, the capital city of the Ottomans. Ambassador Morgenthau however never personally investigated the sites of alleged crimes against Armenians. Instead he received all of his information from his two aides working in the embassy. The aides were both of Armenian descent. All the information provided by these two Armenians were all taken at their face value. In addition, records have shown the prejudice of the ambassador against the Turks.
Despite the fact American politicians fashionably keep using the comments of Ambassador Morgenthau to blame Turks, historians in most part do not accept such historical records as credible reports of history.
Similarly most Armenian sympathizers have used the accounts of British Ambassador Lord Bryce and British Historian Arnold Toynbee as proof of Armenian genocide. Both these British characters, contemporaries of Ambassador Morgenthau, never produced credible and irrefutable proofs for an act of genocide committed by Turks. Once again, most distinguished historians agree that such works were a product of a wartime propaganda against the Ottomans.
Clearly there had to be motives to pursue a defamation campaign against the Turks. The explanation in this article will be, however, an oversimplification of a complex case, which needs to be scrutinized.
World War I was between the Central Powers of Germany and Austria against the Allied Powers (a.k.a. Entente) of Britain, France, and Russia. The clear aim of the war was an obvious power struggle within Europe. However, when the Ottoman Empire made a mortal mistake of entering the war on the side of Central Powers another goal arose for the Entente Powers; this was about an intent to partition the Turkish Empire.
Shortly after the Ottomans entered the war multiple but well known Secret Treaties occurred between the Allied Power nations to partition the wealth of the Ottoman domains well before the clear outcome of the war. Although Armenians played a crucial role in the war for the purposes of the Entente, they were never included within the schemes of the partitioning.
When the war ended, it became clear that the Allied Power nations had disagreements amongst themselves in terms of dividing up the Ottoman loot. As the bickering continued at Paris Conference in 1920, Armenian delegation leader Boghos Nubar Pasha served his protest to the Allied Powers for being ignored in the partitioning process while Americans, the late participator in the war, tried to play a neutral role in determining the fate of the vanquished Turks. The loser Germany was nearly kept intact, but the Turkish State was effectively rendered ineffective.
With its historical wealth the capital city of Istanbul was taken by the British. The western Anatolia was given to Greeks. The southeastern Anatolia was quickly taken by the Italians who were angry for losing the Western lands to Greeks against the capitulations of the previously signed Secret Treaties. While the French took over the troublesome southeastern Anatolia, the British also took oil rich areas of Ottoman domains. Russia was already out of the partitioning picture since the Bolshevik Revolution, which caused the dethroning of the Czar, occurred well before the end of the war.
Armenians were just allowed to take over the northeastern corner of Anatolia while Turks were no longer allowed to form their government. Under these extremely difficult circumstances Turks rose under the leadership of the future founder of Turkey, Mustafa Kemal (Ataturk), and eventually in 1923 established a sovereign state known as Turkey. The new government denounced the authority of the Sultan in Istanbul and this effectively ended the existence of nearly six-century-old empire.
Eager to prove Turkish guilt of the alleged Armenian genocide, in 1920 the victorious British gathered most prominent Ottoman Turkish officials at the Malta War Crimes Tribunal. After all they had the implicating records of Ambassador Morgenthau, Ambassador Lord Bryce and historian Arnold Toynbee. However, as British investigations digged deeper into the claim of Armenian genocide, even with the fruitless help of the American government, the tribunal campaign began to shape up as a face losing effort for the British. The official Ottoman archives being at the full disposal of the occupying forces did not reveal a shred of evidence for the claim of alleged genocide. As a result, the investigators concluded that there was no genocide and the detainees were released free of all charges.
Even though there was never clear-cut evidence to implicate Turks for Armenian genocide, Armenian Diaspora could never let go their claim. Even today the motive did not change from what it used to be; Armenian extremists still dream of capturing a piece of the Turkish real estate along with compensation for material Armenian losses during the war.
Wrongfully Armenians and their sympathizers equate Armenian dilemma to that of Eastern European Jewish sufferings. The supporters of the genocide claim try to justify their efforts by showing the illegitimate recognition of the alleged genocide by some European nations and the United States.
Such so-called official recognition is illegitimate because these acknowledgments were made by political pressures created especially during elections years in these nations. Furthermore, it is not coincidence to see that such unfortunate recognitions are made by the very countries that were members of the Allied Powers accusing the Ottoman government of calculated mass massacres of Armenians.
As much as they did nearly 85 years ago but today as well, both Armenian Diaspora and the supporting cast of today's version of Entente still ignore the intricacies of the tragedies that began with Armenian treason followed by Armenian relocation and ending with Turkish retaliation. There was no question that Armenians instigated terror in Anatolia by massacring their Turkish neighbors under the umbrella of Russian officers. But as Turks did not give in as it was hoped, the events became more complex, and they eventually led to mutual tragedies.
It is crystal clear that casualties occurred as a result of a bloody civil war between the two peoples. The Western nations, such as France, Italy, Australia, and United States, as members of the old Entente, perhaps feeling the guilt for not upholding their promises to the Armenians for their service against the Ottoman government, are now trying to redeem themselves by distorting historical facts and thereby desecrating history.
The truth is in the eye of the beholder. The parties who are after the pursuit of fallacies are not interested in the truth nor will they ever be. The ultimate goal is still an attempt to revive now defunct Sevres Treaty, which would have given eastern half of modern day Turkey to Armenia as a reward for Armenian service against the Ottoman government. This was a promise to the Armenians made by the Entente but it was never upheld because no one could have ever imagined that Turks under the leadership of Ataturk, against all odds, would have eventually defy the strength of the Entente and refuse to give up their right for self determination.
As long as the Armenian Diaspora and its supporters continue to uphold the claim of the alleged genocide Turks will never accept the guilt for a crime their ancestors never committed. Besides, ignoring the higher number of casualties caused by Armenians is an insult to the Turkish nation. The suggestion that Turks are in denial is preposterous, as this is totally baseless claim. It is not Turks who are in denial but Armenians who would like cover up their shameful act of treason.
If it were not for such treacherous deed today Armenians and Turks perhaps would have been in peace, and innumerable souls could have been spared. Neither side is absolutely innocent. For an action there was a counter-action. Against Armenian aggression there was response from Turkish vigilantes at first opportunity. The resulting tragedies created deep wounds that now need to be mended and not aggravated by inflammatory actions of the Armenian Diaspora and the provocating outside forces.
Common ground can be found by acknowledging the losses of both sides. The tragedies that occurred in Anatolia in the early part of 20th century should not be looked as a one sided event as one should remember that there are always two sides to a coin. Peace and prosperity between the two wounded nations can be achieved by burying the hatred.
"I am a 50-years-old History professor and I want to testify that the Armenian genocide occurred as stated above."
You are a 50-years-old Prof. But you are still missing some facts.
- There was no genocide. It was a war situation. Armenian co-operated with Russia against Ottoman Empire at that time.
- Both side lost a lot of people. Not only Armenians.
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"As far as denial is their policy, one might fear they would do it again (against Kurds this time?)."
I am a Kurdish Turkish citizen. Our Ex-president Turgut Ozal was Kurdish too.
And what you are writing here sounds like only an anti-Turkish propaganda.
If you go back to history you will find out more about Turks.
I will suggest you to stop by in a Jewish Center (Not a Turkish Center) and ask them the documentary of "Desperate Hours-Special award winning movie about Jewish -Turkish relation during the Holocaust."
Desperate Hours tells the inspiring story of how Turkey protected its Jewish citizens and provided safe harbor for Jews of many nationalities during World War II. Turkish diplomats played a critical role in securing safe passage for many Jews from occupied countries, sometimes putting their own lives in jeopardy. Other Turkish Jews, notably academics, physicians, architects and musicians found sanctuary at Istanbul University and helped President Kemal Ataturk achieve his vision of establishing a modern Turkish state. As one of a handful of neutral states during the Second World War, Turkey served as a jumping-off point for Palestinian emissaries who conducted daring rescue missions throughout Europe. In Desperate Hours, Teddy Kollek, the long-time Mayor of Jerusalem, recounts his harrowing adventures in Turkey on behalf of the Jewish Agency. A lush and beautiful film, Desperate Hours reminds us that during the dark, desperate times of the Holocaust, there were courageous souls who fought back against the Nazi regime.
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You may learn more than what you already learned from your 50 years.
Best Regards
Timucin
Bullshit. Of course, armenian genocide IS very well-known. in europe. If you, americans have bad knowledge in the History - IT'S NOT THE JEWS FAULT, it's only your own problem..
Firstly, armenians was (and are) christians, and the turks are muslims. This is was the first reason, why armenians who lived in Turkey been slaughtered - BECAUSE ARMENIANS REFUSED to CONVERT
TO ISLAM. But those armenians, who did accepted conversion to islam been survived..
Here is the first difference between the jewish holocaust and armenian genocide -
the jews was slaghtered by germans REGARDLESS they was converted to christianity or not, even not practicing and assimilated jews was killed by nazis.
That means, the jewish genocide was RACE-biological , but armenians - only RELIGIOUS. genocide. Armenians could easily survive, if they would accepted to change religion.
Secondly,, armenian genocide was 88 years ago, no any witness any more.
And Turkey deny their crimes.
Actually, the russian jews always was solidary with armenians ,
Don't try use rulers techniques - trying to confront one opressed group against other.
This techniques always was typical for the fascists and other opressors, to deflect people's attention from own tyranny.
How ever, don't try to mix the jews even in this. tragedy.
IF IT COMES FROM ARMENIANS?
(OR Is International Terrorism Acceptable if it victimizes Only Turks?)
Terrorists who claim allegiance to the Armenian cause have killed more than 70 Turkish diplomats and their family members in the last 30 years.
Most of these assassinations and bombings took place "deep in the heart of Europe". In broad daylight, during business hours, in the middle of some of the worlds largest cities... Is terrorism tolerated if it comes from Armenians? Is terrorism welcome if it victimizes only Turks?
Before you rush to a judgment, please consider the following facts. Very few Armenians terrorists were ever caught and even fewer were convicted. Those who were convicted got very lenient sentences. Some of those convicted were released before they served their full sentence, before the blood of their victims dried. Many more suspects were released on minor technicalities.
Is it any wonder, therefore, that some KNOWN TERRORISTS have legitimately established efficiently functioning OFFICES in Europe where they quietly conduct BUSINESS? That they plot their next hate crime, which can be perpetrated next week, next month or next decade? Are they immune to civilized law in every country? Will we allow them to continue their destructive hate crimes just like those terrorists managed to stay out of the reach of law in the United States of America until September 11, 2001!
These facts speak for themselves. No matter how one slices it, all will agree, it is not a pretty picture.
Armenian terrorists base their hate crimes on allegations that genocide was committed against their ancestors residing within the Ottoman Empire during World War I. These claims are not based on facts, but on deliberately distorted historical rhetoric.
The facts is that the certain Armenian groups located in Eastern Anatolia resorted to a wide scale, bloody uprising during World War I, when the Ottoman Empire was fighting for its survival. These Armenians sided with invading Russian armies in 1914 and in doing so lost the trust and protection of the Ottoman forces. Since it was a time of limited technological resources the Ottoman forces were not able to precisely distinguish between who betrayed and who didn't. To minimalist an internal conflict during a period of global struggle the Ottoman Empire decided to relocate the Armenian population of Eastern Anatolia away from a vulnerable border and further from the influence of the Russian forces, since that group posed the most serious threat to Ottoman security. The displaced Armenian group was to be sent to the non-war zones within the Empire, such as Iraq and Syria.
It is important to note that the Armenian population of Istanbul, the capital of the Ottoman Empire where the Ottoman power was most secure, was not affected by this wartime measure. These Armenians remained in Istanbul, at their homes, throughout WWI and their descendants are still there today.
“In time of war, nine months after general mobilization, the Ottoman government had to stop the subversive actions of Armenian political organizations, and arrested on April 24, 1915 their leaders, 2345 persons in Istanbul. If this was genocide, why did they do nothing to the remaining 78,000 Armenians of Istanbul?” (Hurried Oct., 16,2000)
Likewise, the Armenian groups of Izmir and Edirne and other Western provinces of the Empire, were unaffected by this relocation measure, because these Armenians were not judged to pose a "threat" to the Ottoman war effort.
Last but not least, even in Eastern Anatolia not all Armenians were relocated. The following groups, for example, were not moved because they did not engage in fifth column activities and did not harbor Armenian fighters brought in from Russia: 200 families in Elazig, 100 families in Malatya, 1700 families in Konya, 1000 families in various other parts of Eastern Anatolia. (Reference: Salim Cohce, Head of History Department, Inonu , University Malatya, Turkey)
The Turkish families bid a tearful farewell to their Armenian neighbors and friends who were deported from Erzurum. The Turks walked with them to the city limits and poured water behind them, a Turkish tradition meaning 'Come Back Safely'. Sadly, through misunderstanding and the deliberate distortion of facts, the children of those departing Armenians later came back to Erzurum and killed 90% of the remaining Turkish population in cold blood. (Reference: Official Russian Document No.31 to the Caucasus Army Commander dated March 3, 1918 - Erzurum, written by Lt. ABGRAL the Military Commander of Erzurum. Also see, the preface handwritten by the Erzurum Deveboynu Region, Artillery Officer, Lt. Col. Twerdo-Khlebof to the book 'The History Of The Second Artillery Contingent In Erzurum Kale".)
On route to Syria Turkish soldiers shared their rations with the Armenian deportees. It was a time of famine; nevertheless, the Turkish soldiers showed their gallantry. Also Turkish families took in and cared for many children until the war was over.
It is important to point out that most of those who were relocated did make it to their destinations. Ottoman governors cared for them upon their arrival and throughout the war with what limited resources were available.
Ottoman government records clearly show that the intention was to remove not eradicate, as alleged, Armenians located in a certain region in order to preserve the safety of the whole of the Empire. Not all Armenians were deported, as alleged. Not all those relocated perished, as alleged.
Due to typical limited resources and supplies available during a terrible wartime, disease and famine took more lives than bullets and battles. These events cost both Turks and Armenians great suffering. In the end, for every Armenian casualty, there were 4 Turkish casualties. During the same time period, living with the same wartime conditions. The ratio is 4:1!
And yet, what one has consistently heard in the West, mainly due to relentless Armenian nationalist propaganda, was that only the Armenians suffered during WW1, as if Turks were not humans. This 4:1 ratio meant nothing to some biased minds.
It is indeed, important to remember that: Turkey did not retaliate against the Armenians or any other minority after its victory for independence, in spite of the fact that Armenians joined the enemy invaders causing serious casualties. Also the Turks have in no way retaliated against Armenians in the last 30 years, although the Armenian terrorist attacks around the world by ASALA, JCAG and others claimed more than 70 Turkish lives. These simple but irrefutable facts clearly demonstrate that Turks did not harbor, neither at the beginning nor the end of the 20th century genocidal intent, feeling or tendencies, despite the fact that the Armenian extremists have worked very hard to provoke such feelings among the Turks.
The simple fact is, while it was a terrible human tragedy, costly to BOTH SIDES, it was an uprising-caused-relocation-turned-civil war-during-a-world-war, but not genocide. Genocide is defined as the deliberate and systematic destruction of a racial, political or cultural group. Nothing even remotely like that was intended, attempted or realized during the relocation of this group of Armenians during WW1. Here is the whole picture in a few simple words.
“ While Turkey and Russia were at war, in Anatolia, the various communities fought and killed one another. This was civil war, not genocide... If one calls this genocide, then this is genocide for both sides. Thus, the word is inappropriate as it has become meaningless.” (J. McCarthy, historian, Binyil, November 10, 2000)
It was a civil war during the time of a world war, provoked by bloody Armenian uprisings, designed to establish a Greater Armenia on Turkish soil, where the Armenians were not even close to a majority, in fact they comprised less than 30% of the population in any Ottoman province. Here is the rub: If the Armenians had succeeded, it would have been the first "apartheid" of the 20th Century, where an Armenian minority would be ruling over a Turkish majority.
The British government agrees with the above characterization. In a press release dated July 23, 2001, the British Ambassador to Ankara stated that he could not consider these events, while tragic and costly to both sides, genocide.
The Israeli Government also agrees with the above statement of fact. In an interview dated April 9, 2001, Shimon Peres, Foreign minister of Israel, told the press "The Armenian allegations are meaningless". He said what happened to the Armenians cannot be compared to the Jewish Holocaust.
Turkish Academicians are in agreement, too. More than 300 of them signed a statement on April 23, 2001, saying the events were a civil war within a world war, provoked by wide scale Armenian uprisings. (See http://www.turkishforum.com for further information)
Western Scholars & Historians voiced similar sentiments. More than 70 prominent historians in the United States of America signed a statement on May 19, 1985, urging the U.S. Congress NOT to legislate history. They said, "Historical evidence unearthed so far showed, that it was a civil war, mainly fought by Christian and Muslim irregular forces." Recognizing only Armenian suffering, and ignoring Turkish suffering would, therefore is untrue, unscholarly, and unfair.
To that, it must be added, that such "selective morality" would also be unethical, discriminatory, and racist. Plain and simple!
Armenian delegations tried once again to partition Anatolia, despite the fact that they comprised no more than 30% of the total population in any province within the Ottoman Empire, at the 1919 Paris Peace Conference. The delegation was given an opportunity to speak directly to the victorious Allied forces, without-it must be added the scrutiny or cross-examination of a Turkish delegation, and deliberately misrepresented the facts in order to gain favor. They did not succeed in this attempt and have not succeeded in subsequent attempts. Today when there is a Global Turkish Collation determined to let the truth be heard, they will never succeed.
The truth is easy to locate. The vast archives of the Ottoman Empire, spanning over 7 centuries, were classified and opened to scholars for research more than a decade ago. The root of the lies are well hidden because the Armenian archives in Erevan, Armenia, and Armenian Revolutionary Federation archives in Boston, USA, still remain closed to this day! Collectively called "The Armenian documents", these archives contain crucial information on thoughts, plans, schemes, connections, propaganda, agitation and terror used by the Armenian nationalists and terrorists. They constitute the other side of the story, so it is not surprising that they remain closed to this day!
As the strongest and most reliable friend of the Western world in the troubled near and Middle East, Turkey was recently devastated by activities of Kurdish terrorists who are in collaboration with Armenian extremists. Unfortunately, all this was observed with a callous indifference by our allies, with an attitude that can only be summarized by an ancient Turkish proverb: "Let the snake that doesn't touch me live 1000 years". However, as the September 11, 2001 atrocities indicate, terrorism has become a universal epidemic, which can only be stopped by eradicating it everywhere. “The Snake” has perhaps bitten off more than it can chew.
What any civilized person or institution must urge for first, is the opening of all ARCHIVES by all parties. Second, we must allow and support free and unrestrained scholarly RESEARCH of all evidence. Finally, all this must be followed by a meaningful, just and equitable DIALOG between the Turks and the Armenians. Siding blindly with partisan Armenian allegations of genocide, attempting to legislate history by votes of politicians and ignoring much larger Turkish suffering and loss, does not facilitate peace efforts.
This same civilized route to resolving conflicts peacefully can and must also be applied to Armenian aggression in Azerbaijan. Today, it is a bitter and sad fact, that Armenia continues to occupy 20% of Azerbaijan property by use of force, causing more than a million Azerbaijani non-combatant men, women and children to spend their 9th winter in cold, leaky tents with little food, medicine or hope.
It is because many fair-minded people started abandoning those baseless Armenian allegations of genocide during WWI and expansionist Armenian policies of 1990s, in favor of the Archive-Research-Dialog approach, that three major events took place in the West recently:
1. On October 11, 2001, the Foreign Relations Commission of the Austrian Parliament rejected to include into its agenda a resolution, stubbornly advanced by pro-Armenian and anti-Turkish circles, attempting to unfairly
label the events of WWI as genocide.
2. On October 24, 2001; the European Parliament refused to include into the “Lamasery Report” a precondition, advanced by Armenian lobbyists in 4 separate legislative attempts (on the same day), that would force Turkey to accept the baseless allegations of genocide as the truth prior to acceptance to the European Union.
3. On October 24, 2001, the U.S. Senate rejected pressure from the Armenian community and Armenia's President Robert Kocharian to maintain Section 907 in its current form. The U.S. Senate voted to amend the fiscal year 2002 foreign aid bill to include language that would modify Section 907 of the Freedom Support Act. This would allow President Bush to waive this law if he determines that providing USA assistance to Azerbaijan is necessary to support United States efforts to counter terrorism.
As one can clearly see, the tide is turning. Common sense, reason, and fairness are replacing bias, hype, and hysteria.
We would like to reiterate our hope that the threesome of archive-research-dialog approach will eventually lead to an even bigger threesome: understanding, friendship and peace.
Isn't it time to stop this senseless blame-game and give peace a realistic chance?
Thank you for your time.
Peace,
Dr. Kayaalp Buyukataman, President
Turkish Forum, CONNECTICUT, USA
Mr Egemen Bagis, President
Federation of Turkish American Associations, NEWYORK, USA
Dr. Orhan Kaymakcalan, President,
Assembly of Turkish American Associations, WASHINGTON, D.C., USA
Dr. Seyhan Nuyan
President, Federation of Canadian Turkish Associations, ONTARIO, CA
Dr. Seyhan Nuyan
President, Federation of Canadian Turkish Associations, ONTARIO, CA
DI. Birol Kilic, Secretary General
Head Association of The Turkish Organizations in Austria, WIEN, AUSTRIA
Kufi Seydali, Masc., DIC
President Friends of TRNC
President European Cyprus-Turkish Associations Congress, WIEN, AUSTRIA
V. President World Cyprus-Turkish Associations Congress
Dr. Ata Erim,
President, World Turkish Congress, NEWYORK, USA
Mr Nazmi Kaya
President, Australian Turkish Association- VICTORIA, AUSTRALIA
Mr Ali Sencer
Federation of Turkish Cypriots Association, NEWYORK, USA
Gurkan Capar, Secretary General
Australia Turkish National Unity Council
Ali Bonab, President
Azerbaijan Cultural Organization (BIRLIK) ANGERED - SWEDEN
Mustafa ALINCA, Président
Association Pour l'Echange Culturel avec l'Azerbaidjan
(APEC AZERBAIDJAN) STRASBOURG/FRANCE
Gokhan Genc, President
Turks Forum Nederland, Leiden The Netherlands
Shadman Huseyn,Chairman
West Azerbaijan-International Society of Deported People, Baku Azerbaijan
Ramadan Arif President
The Federation of Turkish Cypriot Associations of Canada
Dr. Manaf Sababi, Secretary General
Chamber of Azerbaijani studies, Lund Sweden
Bahar Yucel, President
TURKISH WOMEN LEAGUE OF AMERICA, NJ, USA
Yilmaz Gursoy, Ex. Director
Australian Turkish Media Group, Victoria Australia
Dr. Ergun Karamuk, President
Turkish Community in Switzerland, ZURICH, SWITZERLAND
Turkan Aksu, President
Turkish Mothers Association , Istanbul TURKEY
Kemal Akin, President
Peace and Democracy Platform, Bonn, Deutschland
Dipl.-Ing. Birol Minik
EATA, European Association of Turkish Academics, BERLIN, GERMANY
No offense to any of you who may be Muslim. It's nothing personal. But, lets be honest, the 1000-1500 year history of Islam basically revolves around killing, taking over countries, and forcing people to choose between converting to islam or dying.
So has Christianity, and judging from the body count, Christians are better at it. These people steal entire continents and enslave entire races. Blood drips from Christendom's fangs. Religion is a curse on humanity.
The FACT IS TURKEY ACCEPTS ALL RELIGIONS AND RACES, despite the LIES of its ENEMIES.
Armenians have a lot of guilt in the eyes of God. Now they are once again at it and lying and cheating. They are good at that. Please note 3 million Turks/Kurds/Circassians/Laz died at the hands of Armenians and Greeks, while the Armenians suffered 300,000. Most of these deaths were from disease and starvation, which was prevelant in the area that had been in peace for 1,000 before the fundamentalist Christians with their weapons of mass destruction infiltrated a peaceful nation.
If there is anything in the world that has kept Armenians Armenian from generation to generation everywhere in the world; if there is anything that has required this relatively miniscule population to organize, establish institutions, and empower itself politically; in short, if there is anything that has made Armenians stronger throughout the generations, it is you and your wonderful denials.
Right after the genocide, the Armenians were a poverty-stricken, powerless people; today, the Armenian diaspora is an interconnected international political force that, you must admit, is a bigger pain in the Turkish government's ass than anything it has experienced before. Thanks! Your lies have been so effective in galvanizing the Armenian community that I almost feel that it should be the Armenians paying you for the service and not the Turkish government.
I understand that it must be difficult for you to maintain yourselves in the schizophrenic mindset required to turn reality on its head, but please do try to keep it up for as long as you can. The job is not as difficult for Armenians. One day, even you will admit that the Turkish government murdered one and a half million human beings because they happened to be Armenian, and the road to that admission is paved by your denials. Did I thank you already? Well, thanks again.
Best Wishes,
-Armen.
please explain two things for me:
Who ruled the Ottoman Turkey (ittihat ve Terakki) during the massacre?
Who were they (Enver pasha and Talat pasha; well known turkish extreme nationalists).
And tell me why it is so difficult to believe that they did not order such a massacre?
Question 2: Where did these armenian people dissappeared. They were many more than thei population in Anatolia Today. IT IS DIFICULT TO BELIEVE THAT THEY MOVED OUR TO LOOK FOR JOBS IN STATES AND FRANCE :-)
Sorry, too many indications that claims might be true.
I do not say that armenians were completely innocent, but be honest and look at the result. And why should they suffer generations after generations, are they masochists? I do not think so.. Of course there are fanatics and racists among them, but that should not change tha fact that we should act human. Armenians are actually our brothers and we should have some understanding for their suffering.
Selamlarimla.
and intelligence; hence, I suggest that you leave propaganda writing
to someone more competent than you.
Who might such a person be? Let's see. Do you think it is possible that
someone more competent than you could be:
someone who, say, has an incling that there was no rollerblading in 1915?
someone who has the wits to refrain from casting
himself as one concerned
about "Kurdish suffering" when the Turkish army is on
the very brink of
attacking the Kurds in Iraq?
Someone who, say, if not in his many years of "reading, reading,
reading," then at least on TV, has at some point come
accross the name
Ocalan and has a clue that the Kurds might not exactly be in love with Turkish
nationalists like himself?
someone who doesn't refer to "A (real) Turkish male" as "my Armenian brother"?
someone who isn't so oblivious to how he comes accross that he goes
ahead and questions the patriotism, the very race, of a fellow Turk simply
because of the fellow Turk's (who is quite possible a Turkish citizen, too)
political and historical beliefs?
Is it possible?
of your race--it is the result of your person. Every village has its idiot, and in your village, you are the idiot. You should be glad that I call you an idiot and
not a criminal because in some places denying genocide, the way you are doing, is a CRIME, and you could go to jail for it.
I know that the genocide happened, and you know it happened to. If you really live where you say you live, then you know about the mass graves in your neighborhood
and near Lake Van. You know that they are there. I've been there. I've seen them with my own eyes. A taxi driver showed me the site. To this day, poor people in your
neighborhood loot those sites looking for gold. You see, I know what the truth is, and I don't feel the need to debate the facts with you. Anyone who is interested
in learning the truth can easily find it by paying a visit to the library: the information is already out there, and I am not going to tediously go over it with another village
idiot. It is far more satisfying for me read your ridiculous rants because not only are they hilarious in their impotent attempts at reasoning, they lend me an
insight into the thoughts of people like you--people who deny the genocide took place. What you say will help me and others to one day put people like you
where all people who deny genocide and crimes against humanity belong: behind bars.
Instead of talking about my "poor peoples' gold looting", why don't you talk about the illegal Armenian workers in Turkiye? They support their entire family from the money they earn in Turkiye through a low-paying job such as house-keeping.
Yes, there are many mass graves in Turkiye. Those mass graves carry the bodies of the Turks and Kurds. I believe you didn't want to see that; you closed your eyes. The last time I wrote to you I brought up many topics such as the ASALA terrorism, and the motive to gain Anatolian lands behind the disguise of the so-called genocide, and to devise a plan of the so-called genocide to get money from Turkiye and give to poor Armenia. And I wrote that PKK terrorist organization was built by Armenians, and that Ocalan was not the leader of the Kurds and the biggest proof of this is the fact that the 12 million Kurds living in Turkiye never once supported him.
Your are not providing a discussion nor are you answering any of my questions. You are just blabbering and getting satisfied to call a Turkish citizen an "idiot". In fact, your capability does not reach beyond insulting others.
Happy Turkish Citizen from village close to Mount Agri
happy Turkish citizen
I am as turkish as you can ever imagine, by the ancestors who served both ottoman and turkish army and bureaucracy. I am, truly, evem more turkish racially than many of you, who are possibly recruits (devshirme).
But if your now consideration of belonging to a concept of nation does not allow me to have freedom of speech, empathy and being human, I can easily resign of belonging to that identity. I think you have to see around undertand how western european democracies have made up with their past and protect their minorities. We have to understand, as turkish, that we have to catch up these nations who have reached a level through human rights. Muasir medeniyetler seviyesine gelmemizin baska bir yolu oldugunu da hic mi hic sanmiyorum dogrusu.
Please, we should keep a level in the discussions be factual and do not accuse each other with nonsense. We, as a nation, which includes and should include minorities, can not live with conspiracy theories forever. Wake up!
Happy Turkish citizen
Happy Turkish citizen
Read it here:
http://users.ids.net/~gregan/pet_pb.html
The petition affirms what is the truth. In light of the petition and the million other documents affirming that the genocide took place, it is clear who you are: a filthy liar, someone who doesn't care about what the implications are of denying genocide, a rabid, poisonous racist, and, ultimately, someone who deserves to go to jail...AND WILL!
bone shower from the sky! Since you speak and understand even be able to say "selamlarimla" I don't have to explain you what does it mean Armenick!
Another one : leave Hatice alone come to the subject:))
I am still not hearing any argument from you about so called genocide. There is subject written by turkish Forum in this discussion area. It seems like you are not competent to argue against them. So my real armenian brother leave the argument to those competents!
The petition affirms what is the truth. In light of the petition and the million other documents affirming that the genocide took place, it is clear who you are: a filthy liar, someone who doesn't care about what the implications are of denying genocide, a rabid, poisonous racist, and, ultimately, someone who deserves to go to jail...AND WILL!
Whew!
Hey Armen, do you live in Armenia? Otherwise, trust me... nobody is going to jail for denying a crime one is accused of when it's clearly a false accusation... in fact, it is the accused's right to affirm innocence when the accused happens to be innocent. If someone accused you of a murder you know you did not commit, are you telling us you would not deny it?
Unfortunately, you will never be able to see this light, Armen. You are just too bogged down in your hatred and your unwavering belief in a version of events taught by your many unscrupulous godfathers, such as Vakahn Dadrian. Run into an irrefutable fact that proves otherwise, and your senses go into a spin... everything has to be explained as "lies," "denial" or "revisionism."
I'm so glad that petition exists. Unfortunately for many of the authors who put their reputations on the line by signing such a blindly one-sided depiction of the story, the day will come when they will become recognized as the gullible suckers they are.
I'm not referring to the Armenians on that list... of course, it's their duty to confirm false information. Nor am I referring to some of the non-Armenian professors who suspiciously tow the Armenian line, disregarding objective counter-evidence, which does not make them professors but prosecutors.No, I'm only referring to the majority of the names on that list... who have enough of a prejudice against Turks to blindly and irresponsibly accept whatever the Armenians and their apologists shove down their throats. It's not going to be easy to erase the automatically accepted image of the Armenians as poor, innocent lambs and Turks as barbaric savages.
Thank God for the Armenians' hero, Uncle Adolf.... whom Armenians enthusiastically served during WWII, slicing and dicing Jews, which even Armenophile pseudo-historian Christopher Walker admits to. (Not that we need his example... the Armenians' own Nazi newspapers of the period easily verify it.) If it wasn't for that Hitler quote, which this petition naturally repeats, I don't think the Armenians would have ANY concrete "genocidal proof."
Naturally, that silly quote is said to have been uttered in 1939, and Hitler was referring to the Poles, not the Jews... turning the Holocuast correlation on its ear. Efforts were made to introduce this quote into the Nuremberg proceedings, but the officials were aware of its inauthenticity; yet, as with so many other Armenian falsifications, the quote still persists. And these irresponsibly clueless authors (Susan Sontag, Allen Ginsburg, Grace Paley, Joyce Carol Oats, Seamus Heaney... as you proudly pointed out), have no qualms about attaching their valuable names to a document, the facts for which have yet to be proven.
This is the advantage the Armenians have, and they are experts in their ability to exploit it. If these gullible bigots had made any substantial effort to research both sides of the story, instead of blindly wishing to affirm their devotion to a people widely seen as victims, the ones with integrity among them would have steered clear of the nonsense this paper contains. Otherwise, the impact of these names are worthless.... why would anyone listen to the words of non-historians such as Kurt Vonnegut and Norman Mailer, when genuine historians are still not in agreement over what exactly took place? Because people are famous, or have achieved some sort of celebrity status does not make them correct.
Let's only take the first couple of sentences: "Between 1915 and 1918 the Young Turk government of Ottoman Turkey carried out a systematic, premeditated genocide against the Armenian people, who were an unarmed, defenseless, minority living under Turkish rule." What terrifying gall. Unfortunately for the Armenians, there is not one single, reliable shred of evidence that proves the Ottoman government was behind the massacres that took place. All the British (Bryce/Toynbee) Wellington House propaganda, entirely provided by unconscionable missionaries, freely and immorally used by Morgenthau and Lepsius, along with the U.S. consuls who only listened to missionaries and Armenians (some of these people are referred to as "eyewitnesses"... I've got news for you. Seeing some dead corpses -- as maybe one or two of them personally may have -- does not make one an "eyewitness" to genocide), in additon to newspaper accounts freely making use of the made-up wartime propaganda from these very sources, does not constitute as evidence. The British were dying to prosecute the Ottoman officials at Malta, and even the British knew all the aforementioned "evidence" was mostly pure, unadulterated B.S. ..!
Let us not forget... what granny told you in the form of "Armenian oral history" cannot pass for fact. By contrast, the Nazis left behind tons od evidence that made the Holocaust irrefutable. How suspicious is it that not one Ottoman telegram has yet to be found attesting to a government-sponsored plan of extermination. Not one! (Of course, the Armenians will beg to differ, but those forged telegrams thoughtfully provided by Aram Andonian don't count.)
We're still on that first sentence, now; look at the second part of this deceptive document: the Armenian people, who were an unarmed, defenseless... even though there is unarguable proof the reason why the Armenians suffered was because they almost wholly threw their support behind their revolutionary leaders, the Armenians unethically still have no problem with perpetuating their myth of innocence. Even Armenians from the period admitted their belligerence, such as Boghos Nubar in his telling Times of London letter. The fact of the matter is, Armenians were lying in wait to strike, with hidden caches of weapons and even uniforms... and strike they did, when the Turks were at war and at their weakest. They struck against their own nation, where they lived and prospered for centuries... in their nation's darkest hour.
And the truly disgusting part of all this is... when they struck, they did so in a systematically exterminating way, chopping up villagers unguarded by men, mobilized for the army as they were, busily entertained at five or more fronts, far away from home. Yet no Armenian will admit they even gave the Turks a scratch, since it's so important to keep up the image that they were as "unarmed" and as "defenseless" as the Jews of WWII.
Nothing would have happened to the Armenians had they not turned traitor. No other country would have behaved differently, under the same circumstances as the Ottoman Empire. It's unfortunate the "Sick Man of Europe" was bankrupt and dying, and did not have the resources to protect the resettling Armenians properly... and the Armenians can show dignity in admitting their responsibility for what befell them... instead of finding phony reasons, such as the old chestnut about Moslems hating Christians, in a nation historically leagues ahead of its Christian counterparts, in terms of tolerance..
I can go on and on with taking this invalid document apart, but let me only give the first few sentences as examples. In the second sentence, at least we don't have the regular figure of 1.5 million as the dead Armenians, but "over a million." But then we are told a million Armenians survived (which is in keeping with Boghos Nubar's claims.) If the pre-war population of the Armenians within the Ottoman Empire was between 1 and 1.5 million (relying on Armenian "historians" are not allowed; these figures are confirmed by OVER half a dozen NEUTRAL -- i.e., Western -- sources of the time; the Ottoman census put the figure at 1.3 million), subtract 1 million from 1.3 to 1.5 and what do you get? Seems to me a lot of Armenians survived... and the majority of those who died did so for the same reasons their Muslim neighbors did... famine and disease. Meanwhile, out of the 2.5 million Turk/Muslim dead from WWI, there is documented proof that over a fifth died directly at the hands of Armenian and Russian ethnic cleansing. These are the lives Norman Mailer and Kurt Vonnegut don't give a pig's eye about, because they're only Turks...
Now let's look at the third sentence: "ancient homeland of 3,000 years." Of course, Armenians write their own history almost exclusively, and we know just how reliable their information can be. However, most accept the Armenians popping up around the 560's BC. Where did the extra 500 years come from?
Of course, those like Armen cannot help themselves... unlike Turks, who look upon Armenians as their brothers (while fully aware of how dirtily they behave), those like Armen have been raised from birth to hate Turks... a hatred perpetuated in their own churches, to their own Christian shame. And we can't blame those like Armen who wrap phony petitions (as the one he led us to) around themselves... especially since Armenians need the enemy, to support their sense of self-identity. How can we blame Armen, when foolish and/or bigoted Western authors and scholars unthinkingly do the very same thing?
You know, I got so hung up on our friend Armen, I didn't pay attention to what went on before. Now I've got to lay on my thoughts.
Geronimo, regarding "What the U.S. did to the Indians," you have made an excellent point. I don't know if the writer of the article ("Daneil" Berger, whom I'll be addressing momentarily) is American, but in all likelihood, he is. Not that he does not have the right to examine any situation of his choosing, but it is curious that the Armenian "Genocide" keeps continually getting harped on when there are countless examples of "Man's Inhumanity to Man," getting swept under the rug. Not long before the Armenian tale, for example, Americans who were so high and mighty regarding the ill treatment of the Armenians were mum about atrocities committed by Americans during the Philippine War... by generals who were graduates of the Indian wars. Certainly the Turks suffered deplorable losses by genocidal Orthodox peoples, as documented in "The Ethnic Cleansing of Ottoman Muslims" by Professor Justin McCarthy ... but do you think Mr. Berger gives a rat's fanny about what occurred to the Turks? He keeps large company among Westerners who couldn't care less.
So why all this attention regarding the Armenians? I'll give you one gue$$.
The bottomless pockets of the Armenian Diaspora know few limits. For example, Armenian-Americans raised almost a quarter of a million dollars in just two days to dig up the Armenian Nazi General, Drastamat Kanayan ("Dro"), flying his body back to Armenia to be reburied there with full state and military honors. Dro, known as the "Jew Hunter" by the Nazis, cut his teeth on people-extermination by specifically targeting Turkish/Muslim women and children. Yet the Armenian president and chief patriarch honored this miserable coward and mass murderer. (Where was Simon Wiesenthal while Dro was happily living in America? How interesting that today's Jews are so oblivious regarding their Armenian-Nazi killers.)
Geronimo, at least rest assured the world recognizes the Indians as getting the short end of the stick. Not long ago, the Indians were regarded as the bloodthirsty savages of the conflict between Europeans and Native Americans. Of course, legitimate historians finally took account of the actual facts and did what legitimate historians do... they engaged in "revision." Today, within the conflict between Turks and Europeans, the Europeans regard the Turks as bloodthirsty savages. The day will come when the Turks will be regarded as the Indians finally have come to be regarded... make no mistake about that.
A Turkish writer above claims Armenian Turks number in the hundreds of thousands today; I would like to correct that: I believe the actual number hovers around 70,000.
A pro-Armenian writer above suggests one go into any library to prove the Armenian "Genocide." He makes a valid point. Any library in America will have no end to books written from the viewpoint of Armenians. The Armenians have had a huge head start on building their Big Lie, and it will take a long time for truth-seekers to correct the Armenian-produced false version of events. Fact of the matter is, there haven't been too many books written in English supporting the truthful side of the story, and those few that have come out, not many libraries in America will make a point of carrying. When such a book comes out, the Armenian militia goes on the attack, doing their best to discredit such books. For example, when Judge Sam Weems' "Armenia -- Secrets of a 'Christian' Terrorist State" was announced, Armenians far and wide criticized the book... even before the book was released. (Which is in keeping for the Armenians, since the facts account for very little.) The author was libeled by the Armenian Assembly of America as being a "convicted felon." This is another tactic of the Armenians... destroy the reputations of writers and historians who dare disagree, ensuring few future historians choosing to step into the minefield of Armenians.
They're a clever people, the Armenians; no wonder they were the favored people of the Ottoman Empire, before they turned treacherous... beginning in the early 19th Century, well before the years of the "Genocide."
As far as the 50-year-old "History professor" (you know, the one who says "50-years-old" and has trouble capitalizing), somebody above said it best: "By the way, 'Julian Horowtiz' doesn't sound like a very Armenian name ..." Armenians love to guise themselves as Jews. The more Jews they can get sympathetic to their cause, to closer they can line themselves up with the people most associated with genocide. Ironically, as anyone can see by visiting an Armenian Internet forum, Armenians enjoy giving themselves Jewish monikers.... but for a different reason. Among themselves, Armenians can be hopelessly anti-Semitic. Maybe this is why there are only two to three dozen Jews left in the entire nation of Armenia, today.
And don't you worry about the Turks possibly committing genocide against the Kurds, "Julian." Even Saddam Hussein couldn't come close to wiping out as many Kurds as the Armenians did, during the years of the Armenian "Genocide." (I believe the numbers in the 1968 book, The Kurds, are somewhat exaggerated, but its author writes: "...more than 600,000 Kurds [were] killed between 1915 and 1916 [by 'Armenian volunteers'] in the eastern vilayets of Turkey.")
Finally, let me target the man whose article begat this lively discussion.... Mr. Daniel Berger.
I can understand why many Christian Westerners can be so virulently anti-Turkish, and there's no reason why Jews (I presume Mr. Berger must be one) should be any less ignorant or bigoted, since Western Jews are exposed to the same anti-Turkish propaganda as everyone else. However, it's always so heartbreaking when one encounters such a one-sided, pro-Armenian piece as this, written by a Jew. Such a tremendously persecuted people as the Jews should remember one of their extremely few historic friends, the Turks, and not jump on the "Hate the Turks" bandwagon so readily.
Of course, if there really were an Armenian genocide, gratitude shouldn't prevent Jews, or anyone, from giving the facts. However, since the events of the Armenian "Genocide" are so hotly disputed, any rational, truth-seeking individual would at least entertain reasonable doubt. This article reads like it could have been written by Vakahn Dadrian or Richard Hovannisian. Mr. Berger is practically foaming at the mouth in his attempt to lay guilt upon the Ottoman Turks.
Maybe Mr. Berger comes from the same school as "Julian Horowitz," given his problem with properly capitalizing (the first couple of lines tell the tale) and even spelling.
There are just too many points to cover here (already in the first line, he claims the Turks were "opressive" [sic] with the Armenians; could have fooled Mathias of Edessa, the Armenian historian, who wrote: "[Turkish Sultan] Meliksah's heart is full of affection and goodwill for Christians, he has treated the sons of Jesus Christ very well, and he has given the Armenian people peace, affluence and happiness." Of course, we won't mention all the many Armenians who rose to the highest positions in Ottoman society, and sometimes the Armenians were treated more respectfully than the average Turk), and while I would love to destroy this bunch of bilgewater, I don't want to go on forever. So I'll just hit some main points.
In the second paragraph, the popular word "deported" is used... but if you look at any dictionary, you will see the meaning for that word is banishment outside the borders of a country. The Armenians were relocated within the boundaries of their own nation, and not to the "barren deserts" as is claimed here. (Aleppo and Damascus were barren deserts, or actual cities?) And I guess Talaat Pasha would have had good reason to think "the Armenians were untrustworthy, could offer aid and comfort to the enemy, and were in a state of imminent rebellion," by May of 1915, since the treacherous Armenians began their rebellion in late 1914.
Deceitful articles as this one are so omnipresent, it becomes sickening to even rebut them. Is Mr. Berger a really incompetent scholar or does he have an agenda he is unscrupulously pushing? And which is worse?
I found the Italian consul's testimony highly interesting. How very convenient for the Armenians to be passing right under his consul office's windows. It is simply amazing that he "eyewitnessed" all the events described from his windows, capping off with "the young women converted by force to Islam or exiled like the rest; the children torn away from their families and from the Christian schools and handed over by force to Moslem families, or else placed by the hundreds on board ship in nothing but their shirts, and then capsized and drowned in the Black Sea."
Like all the other overtly sympathetic Christian consuls, this one had ears only for what the missionaries and the Armenians told him. Did he really go out and check things out for himself, or simply accept what he was being told, like all the other consuls? As an Italian, aligned with the Allies during wartime, did he perhaps have a motive to make the Turks look like monsters? For a strong clue, please keep in mind what he claimed about those drownings in the Black Sea that he so ethically "eyewitnessed."
Has anyone actually read Ambassador Morgenthau's Story? This ghostwritten book which highly deviates from Morgenthau's own letters and diaries... some letters of which were written under Morgenthau's name by his Armenian secretary Hagop Andonian, already discrediting Morgenthau as a legitimate source... has a couple of chapters that are ugly to the hilt, exposing the lawyer-turned-ambassador's unbelievable racism. Yes, the Armenians have had the luxury of using Morgenthau as a source these many years, and Morgenthau still has some potency left (after all, he was an "ambassador"); but for truth-seekers in this day and age, Morgenthau can no longer cut the mustard. Armenians can still trap the unwary, like ethnic-politics playing U.S. congressmen looking into okaying one of their ridiculous resolutions.... but anyone who chooses to give Morgenthau credence must also use the early writings of David Duke for an accurate portrayal of Jews and blacks.
The fact that Mr. Berger has the gall to actually cite Henry Morgenthau sheds volumes regarding his own credibility.
(If anyone prefers using an American ambassador as a source, consider going with one who had actual integrity: Ambassador Mark Bristol, so suspiciously overlooked in the Armenian "Genocide" discussion... and when his name occasionally comes up, Armenians naturally fall all over themselves in an attempt to discredit him.)
"Estimates of the Armenian dead vary from 600,000 to two million." Which estimates are being referred to, here? For example, Russell Warren House wrote in the Los Angeles Herald Examiner's January 31, 1982 article, "Death in Westwood":
"In 1977, the French newspaper Le Figaro, prompted by Armenian outrages in France, investigated their background and came up with a figure of 15,000 Armenians dead from shootings, sickness and deprivation on the march."
While I don't believe the figure is that low, you can see the point. Mr. Berger is showing his partial colors as a writer if he wants to mislead his reader into believing the figures he cites. We all know two million is a number reserved for the funny farm, as there were no more than 1.3 to 1.5 million Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire. Kamuran Gurun gives THREE different ways of interpreting the figure of 300,000, in his excellent Western-documented book, "The Armenian File."
There's a lot more I could say about this ridiculous article, but I'll cap off with the following.
I don't have the URL with me, but if you want to travel to the site of "The Armenian Forum," you will see an incredible rarity; an Armenian actually negates another Armenian's blind claims.
The subject: the map you see above.
The editor of the publication, Ara Sarafian, takes issue (in an article entitled "Tendentious Criticism") with ANI's Rouben Adalian regarding the inaccuracies and exaggerations of the map. Supposedly, the map was constructed utilizing the latest information, taking the 1920 map this one was based on... but went much too crazy with the red circles. Adalian gets nasty, and cites -- get this -- Bryce's discredited Blue Book as evidence. Sorry, Mr. Adalian... the Blue Book, like Henry Morgenthau, are now off-limits to genuine truth-seekers.
Now do you remember the drownings I asked you to keep in mind? Sarafian actually uses COMMON SENSE (bravo! A rarity, for an Armenian) by including a picture of the type of rowboat used, and concluding two thousand trips would have been requried to drown the number of Armenians claimed... pretty hard to do in the time span given (one afternoon).
Such absurd reports are incredibly present in many of these missionary-provided horror stories... sadly reported without question in such newspapers as The New York Times.
And here's the capper: In Oct. 7, 1915, The New York Times once again deemed worthy of print another unbelievable story: "Bryce reported Treibzond's Italian consul claiming ten thousand Armenians drowned in the Black Sea in one afternoon." YES, THE SAME ITALIAN CONSUL MENTIONED IN THE ARTICLE ABOVE! Sarafian then reports even Lord Bryce found the story too ridiculous to include in his 1916 Blue Book (after irresponsibly releasing the nonsense to the media of the period, and causing his propagandistic damage, anyway).
So Lord Bryce himself, the champion falsifier of Britain's infamous Wellington House even ultimately turned down the Italian consul's report....AND YET, DANIEL BERGER CHOOSES TO INCLUDE IT IN HIS ILLEGITIMATE ARTICLE IN 2003, EIGHTY-SEVEN YEARS LATER, IN AN EFFORT TO OBSCURE THE TRUTH.
Remember that name, "Daniel Berger"... if that's his real name (and not "Bergerian"), and know thee from this point hence it is forever to be synonymous with "Not to be Trusted."
Stay tuned for a comprehensive web site on this falsified genocide, coming up shortly, where many such liars are given the third degree. Little by little, this "Tall Armenian Tale" shall be crippled into submission.
You have born false witness, and you know it.
History is full of cringing non-entities like you.
Sorry London Bar, the Armenian holocaust is well documented. Even Hitler acknowledged that it occured, but of course, that is why you hate it so much isn't it?
The Independent (London)
January 28, 2000, Friday
by Robert Fisk
"WHO NOW remembers the Armenians?" Hitler asked, just before he embarked on
the destruction of European Jewry. Precious few, it seems. As the memorial
day for the Nazi genocide against the Jews was proclaimed by Mr Blair this
week, there was not a single reference to the slaughter of one and a half
million Armenian Christians by the Ottoman Turks in 1915. The world's first
holocaust - and Hitler's inspiration for the slaughter of the Jews - was
ignored.
Why, I wonder? Mr Blair did not mention it. President Chirac is frightened
of the very subject, refusing even to condemn the slaughter when he last
visited Beirut, where the grandchildren of the victims live in their tens of
thousands. The United States government prefers to forget the holocaust of
Armenians, while the Turks - the inheritors of the empire that committed the
worst atrocities of the First World War - are studiously denying the
genocide. And we let them get away with it.
Who, I wonder, chooses which holocaust we should remember and which we
should not? The six million Jews who were murdered by the Nazis must always
have a place in our history, our memory, our fears. Never again. But alas,
the Armenians who perished in the rivers of southern Turkey, who were
slaughtered in their tens of thousands in the deserts of northern Syria,
whose wives and daughters were gang-raped and knifed to death by the
gendarmerie and their Kurdish militiamen - they have no place in our memory
or our history. Turkey is our friend. Turkey might one day join the European
Union. Turkey is an ally of Israel.
History, of course, is a hard taskmaster, veined with inconvenient facts and
corrupted heroes as well as the massacre of innocents. The Armenian
community in Turkey had its Allied sympathisers when the Ottoman army was
fighting the British and French in the First World War, and Armenians also
fought in the tsarist Russian army against Turkey. But the proof of genocide
is intact. The Young Turk movement - once a liberal organisation which the
Armenians had supported - had taken control of the dying empire and adopted
a "pan-Turkism" which espoused a Turkish-speaking Muslim nation from
Constantinople to Baku. Within weeks of their victory over the Allies at the
Dardanelles in 1915, they fell upon the Armenians. Churchill was to refer to
the "merciless fury" unleashed upon the Christian minority. The US
ambassador in Constantinople - himself a Jew - wrote heart-wrenching reports
back to Washington of mass slaughter. Near the Turkish village of Mus,
hundreds of men were lined up on bridges and shot into the rivers,
Serb-style.
Behind the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp in Poland, I was once taken by a camp
guide to a series of small lakes in which the Nazis dumped the ash of the
crematoria. Beneath the water and ice lay the powdered white bones of whole
cities of people. Yet in the north Syrian desert there are still skulls and
bones in caves and in the clay of river banks. This place of martyrdom is
visited once a year by the local Armenian community to commemorate their
holocaust. They even have a holocaust memorial day. Yet I wonder if a single
non-Armenian reader of The Independent knows what the date is?
Denial of the holocaust is in some countries a crime. I'm talking, of
course, about the Jewish Holocaust - because denial of the Armenian
holocaust is not only perfectly legal, it is big business. No American
company selling weapons to Turkey will discuss the holocaust of 1915. Chairs
of Ottoman studies are being funded by the Turkish government at American
universities in which US academics - who have to prove they have used
Ottoman archives to get their jobs and thus must never have condemned the
1915 slaughters - propagate the lie that the Armenians were merely victims
of "civil war" and that Turks also died in the chaos of 1915.
Turks did. But not on the Armenian scale. Anyone who was to write that the
Jews were victims of a European civil war and that, anyway, "Germans also
died" would be regarded as cracked or a neo-Nazi. Not so if you deny the
Armenian holocaust.
Take the following letter, for example: "The myth of the 'Armenian
Holocaust' was created immediately after World War I with the hope that the
Armenians could be rewarded for their 'sufferings' with a piece of the
disintegrating Ottoman state. As such, the main aims of the inventors were
political and territorial." Now substitute the word Armenian with the word
Jew. Who would ever get away with a letter about the "myth of the Jewish
Holocaust" as an invention of Jews who wanted to be rewarded for
"sufferings" (the quotation marks suggesting their falsity)? Who would ever
publish such lies?
But that letter was written about the Armenians. And it was written by a
Turkish ambassador. In fact - heaven spare us - it was written by Barlas
Ozener, the Turkish ambassador to Israel. And it was printed, in full, in
the Jerusalem Post.
But we Europeans are just as mendacious, if more discreetly so. Take Mr
Chirac in Beirut. The French Assembly had just condemned the Armenian
holocaust of 1915 - there are men of principle in French politics. But not
Chirac. When asked less than two years ago for his views on the resolution,
he replied: "I do not comment on a matter of domestic (sic) politics when
I'm abroad." Would that have been his response if the Assembly had just
denounced the Jewish Holocaust?
Mr Blair said this week that as the Jewish survivors of the Nazi Holocaust
"age and become fewer in number, it becomes more and more our duty to take
up the mantle and tell each new generation what happened and what could
happen again".
But there are a few very Armenian survivors left. Why weren't they asked
this week about their memories? At Musa Dagh and later at Smyrna in 1920,
British, French and American warships rescued a few of the pitiful Armenian
survivors of that earlier Holocaust. But Mr Blair was silent this week. And
silence gives consent.
I am all for memorial days. Especially one that marks the Jewish Holocaust.
And especially memorial days for other holocausts. Armenians too. But
Hitler's ghost can have a little laugh this week. After all, who now
remembers the Armenians?
GRAPHIC: An Armenian priest hung in a street in Constantinople in 1915;
Topham
Don't get me wrong. I'm usually a fan of journalists who go against the tide, as sometimes Mr. Fisk has done. However, way too often Robert Fisk has plunged ahead with little regard for the facts. His work is chock full of inaccuracies.
And when it comes to the Armenians, Robert Fisk has an obsession. In the case of the Armenians, his reputation as a crusading journalist takes a giant step backwards, as he's definitely not going against the tide. Quite the contrary, Mr. Fisk chooses to be at the front lines of the unrelenting Armenian propaganda the Western world has been exposed to for over a century, beginning in the 19th Century.
My memory is fuzzy regarding this chapter, but I recall reading about an Armenian professor looking to sue England because the King of Cilicia gave Armenian gold to King (Richard?) for safekeeping (as Cilicia's already limited independence was being threatened), and the professor claimed the gold was never returned. He probably didn't make his case stronger by claiming the English were descendents of Armenia... but regardless of whether he was in cuckoo land or not (certainly wouldn't be the first case of an Armenian professor familiar with that land), I believe Robert Fisk took this professor's word and believes he is an Armenian.
Let's travel back a dozen years to the Gulf War, when a million Kurds were desperately seeking to escape Saddam Hussein, aware of the chemical horrors the dictator had unleashed upon the poor people, not long before. Iran didn't want any part of these Kurds; the country bordering on the other side of Iraq, Syria, turned up its nose at them as well. Certainly the Western countries, Robert Fisk's nation among them, weren't going to lift a finger to help these Iraqi Kurds. Only Turkey, continuing in her proud historic tradition of humanitarianism and tolerance, was willing to come to the rescue. The economic toll was gargantuan, but Turkey did her level best to provide food and shelter for these miserable souls, the effects of which must have contributed to the nation's economic woes of today.
Robert Fisk? He took all opportunities to lay slur upon slur, and the Turks finally drew the line when the muckraker charged the Turkish military of stealing blankets to sell later for profit. Fisk experienced a trial of sorts where, naturally, he could not substantiate his claims. Declared a "liar" and "provocateur,” Fisk was told to haul his butt outside the nation's borders, never to darken Turkey's doorway again. (Armenians, take note: while Fisk was not a resident of Turkey, what happened to him comes much closer to "deportation" than what happened to the relocated or resettled Ottoman Armenians; "deportation" means banishment, outside a country's borders.)
Indignant, the yellow journalist has written score after score of anti-Turkish articles as the one you see above, helpfully posted by one of our Armenian friends, falsely crediting Fisk himself. Assuming the reporter kept continuing his practice of pouring on the venom, the thugs behind ASALA could have have agreed to load up his pockets, as reported. The newspaper Fisk works for, "The Independent," is tellingly owned partially by Armenian multi-billionaire Kirk Kirkorian.
Only a month ago, Tsk-Tsk Fisk was at it again, with a report loose with the facts (as depicted in this article, "Fisk 'has not been duped by Saddam'," in the Guardian's Press & Publishing News section.) Naturally, The Independent was keen to play Tammy Wynette, anxious to stand by their man.
Well, there's that ever-lovin' Hitler quote again. Tsk-Tsk chose to actually begin his article with that dubious quote, hoping to gain maximum impact. What would the Armenians do without their one-time beloved Fuehrer's silly quote... they would be at a loss to have ANY proof of their falsified genocide.
Note how Tsk-Tsk is chomping at the bits here, outraged that attention is being paid to the Holocaust, and the British, French and Americans refused to give equal time to the Armenians. Probably the French and Americans decided to take an uncharcteristic break, since they are the world's champion Armenian butt-kissers, helped along with healthy heapings of their diaspora residing in each country. As for the British, Mr. Fisk would do well to hit the history books.... his country tried mightily to pack blame on the Turks, and immediately after WWI, they had their chance. They searched far and wide for nearly two-and-a-half years, headed by a team of Armenian researchers to boot... looking under every rock, since Istanbul was under their occupation, and even as far as the shores of America, for evidence.... ANY evidence.... but they came up with ZILCH. All the garbage that the Armenians are trying to pass off as valid documentation today was deemed inadmissible: including the Bryce/Toynbee directed British propaganda, Morenthau and the consuls' reports all tainted by the untrustworthy word of the missionaries (who were partially motivated by digging into the pockets of their teary-eyed Christian brethren; indeed, the Near East Relief is still the most successful charity effort in American history), the 1919 kangaroo court findings of the puppet Ottoman government, and the reams and reams of newspaper articles irresponsibly printing all the hearsay horror stories.
The British could not find ANY reliable evidence of the Armenian "Genocide" at the Malta Tribunals, and released every single imprisoned Ottoman official Thank you, Great Britain, for respecting the rule of Law.
Why IS Robert Fisk so hysterical about the Armenian "Genocide"? Why is he picking on this one single example of Man's Inhumanity to Man, and reporting on it time and time again? It's interesting, isn't it? If he sincerely believes the poor Armenians so terribly got it just like WWII's Jews, what about all the many other genocides of history that have been swept under the rug? He could start with his own country's flings with mass murder, when Britain was an empire. Why, for example, is it difficult to find Fisk articles on atrocities committed by the British in India? Where are the Fisk articles regarding the stories in Africa, when "Exterminate the Brutes" was the motto to be followed? He is quick to cite Churchill as "evidence" of the Armenian "Genocide".... as if Churchill did not have his reasons to incriminate the Turks, when Britain had in mind to carve up the dying carcass of the Ottoman Empire after the war... and yet Churchill could not understand the 'squeamishness about the use of (mustard) gas' to quell a 1920 tribal uprising in the Kirkuk of Iraq, which was ultimately used; In Geoff Simons' "From Sumer To Saddam," the former British prime minister was quoted as saying, 'I am strongly in favour of using poison gas against uncivilised tribes.' Indeed, one branch of the British Empire was behind a genocide that actually SUCCEEDED. Can even the plight of the Jews compare to the totally wiped-out Tasmanians?
Now, I'm not picking on the British. I like the British. I'm just using Britain as an example, because no nation is without blood on its hands; so the hypocrisy of nations like the French boo-hoo'ing about the Armenian "Genocide" is pretty hard to bear. (Did that French parliament weigh coming up with a resolution regarding the inhuman treatment of the Algerians, by the French?) No, Robert Fisk is a Briton, and that's why I'm singling out the British. We're examining the motivations of why Robert Fisk has become a crusader for the Armenain "Genocide." (The article above is only one in a series, among many.)
Here's a taste of the work of a master deceiver, from the article above: "Anyone who was to write that the Jews were victims of a European civil war and that, anyway, 'Germans also died' would be regarded as cracked or a neo-Nazi. Not so if you deny the Armenian holocaust." Uhhhhh.... could that be because the Jews had nothing to do with the Germans who died, but the Armenians had everything to do with nearly 600,000 (of the two-and-a-half million total WWI Turkish losses) Turks? You see, Tsk-Tsk, the Armenians revolted. When they revolted, they carried out a true policy of systematic extermination of their Muslim neighbors, documented even by Armenians in such works as "Men are Like That" (which a 1990 issue of The Jewish Times pointed to as a true analogy of the Jewish Holocaust). If the Armenians hadn't revolted, not one of them would have suffered through the travails of the relocation... exactly like the unharmed and loyal Ottoman Jews, among other minorities in the great melting pot that was the Ottoman nation; suspiciously exempt from the "pan-Turkism" policy you write was adopted by the Young Turks, as the reason why the Armenians were targeted. This is just one of several desperate explanations Armenians and their apologists keep repeating, iin their hopes to establish a genocidal motive.
I wonder when Tsk-Tsk lies, does he do so deliberately... or pathologically?
LDA, I don't know what planet you're from, but I haven't come across these "zionist" (don't forget your capitalization! Who do you think you are, "Julius Horowitz," or "Daniel Berger"?) groups who have "a hatred of the Armenians"... although Jews certainly have reason to be displeased with the Armenians, after the Armenians did their best during WWII to lead them toward the ovens. On the contrary, most Jews, brainwashed as they are as almost all Christians after over a century of unilateral pro-Armenian propaganda (in America, the Turks didn't begin to seriously tell their side of the story as late as the early 80s), are quick to embrace whom they regard as fellow genocide-sufferers. Lazy-thinkers like Elie Wiesel who haven't bothered to do their homework attract even more Jews to the Armenians' cause, since Mr. Wiesel is so revered. Mental midgets like Israel's Yossi Sarid actually consider "The Forty Days of Musa Dagh" as historic FACT, all the more alarming when Mr. Sarid happens to be Israel's Minister of Education!! (At least as of April 2000, when he kissed Armenian butt big time... and the "New York Times" of Israel, "Ha'aretz," ignorantly praised his comments.)
But thank you for showing your anti-Semitic stripes. I know some of you Armenians even believe the Jews were behind your falsified genocide, since in your view, the sub-human Turks simply would not have had the brains to pull off such a Herculean operation.
Now look at the reaction of our Armenian friends, above. Typical, isn't it? They're both stomping their feet, holding their breath and sticking out their tongues... exclaiming, "Liar, liar, pants on fire."
Armen, instead of claiming that I have borne false witness, you would be helping your cause a greater deal if you can provide what Armenians fail so monumentally at... THE FACTS.
Exactly where have I been less than truthful? When I said Boghos Nubar did not cry "genocide" at the Paris Peace Conference, but instead stressed the combatant nature of your treacherous forefathers? When I shed doubt at the authenticity of the Hitler Quote, which even the rare Armenian historian, Dr. Robert John (Hovhanes) said was "a forgery and should not be used" (The REPORTER, “America’s Leading Armenian Newspaper,” August 2, 1984)? That your fathers fought side-by-side with the Wehrmacht in WWII, as even another British Armenophile, Christopher Walker, admitted? (Actually, "way-back" more than "side-by-side"... the Armenians' fighting ability was so poor, they were relegated from the front to Jew-sweeping operations, in the back.) That the Bryce/Toynbee Blue Book cannot be relied upon (it was discredited immediately after the war, for lies such as Germans bayoneting Belgian babies), and "Ambassador Morgenthau's Story" is as phony-baloney as they come? (The distinguished war and political correspondent George A. Schreiner, having served in the Ottoman Empire from February through the end of 1915, totally harpooned the lying Morgenthau when he wrote directly to Henry: "In the interest of truth I will also affirm that you saw little of the cruelty you fasten upon the Turks. Besides that you have killed more Armenians than ever lived in the districts of the uprising." The "uprising"? Hmmmm.... what do you suppose he could have been referring to?) When I concluded the numbers of Armenian dead based on over half a dozen neutral (i.e., non-Armenian and non-Turkish) census figures? When I pointed to the inaccuracies of that silly map on top of this page that even one of your greatest proponents of the Armenian "Genocide," Ara Sarafian, roundly criticized?
Unlike Vakahn Dadrian, Richard Hovannisian, Dennis Papazian and many others who know the facts but deliberately choose to deceive because they make a living from the genocide con job, I know you believe with all your heart every lie you have been told. Unfortunately, you... like so many other Armenians who are fanatically passionate about this issue... have been so drilled from birth to hate Turks and to follow like lemmings the unifying cause of the falsified genocide, you are very likely a lost cause. There is probably no turning back for you; you are incapable of looking at this matter with an open mind. I can show you a signed decree from God that there was no government directed extermination plan against your people, and you will still react in the way you have above. (Hey, buddy... in fairness, if you know the meaning of that word, I am anything BUT "cringing.") I have a life other than to obsess over this long-ago period of history, so after I'm long gone from this little forum, no doubt you, LDA and others of similar state-of-mind will keep posting pseudo-articles that will continue to pull the wool over the eyes of the suckers out there... just as Armenians and their sympathizers have done so successfully, all these many years My intention is in communicating not to those like you where there is no turning back, but to those who believe in honor and integrity, and are genuinely interested in seeking the truth.... no matter how much it hurts.
Let me first disabuse you of one of the more egregious illusions that you have about me: I do NOT hate the
Turkish people. I believe that in this world that is becoming increasingly more connected, the most
reasonable attitude for a person to have toward other people is to harbor a willingness to treat them as
neighbors—including Turks. As far as the global community of average people is concerned, I am willing to
include everybody in it, and in turn, I expect to be, and am, included—again, even by Turks.
Those who deny genocide, however, constitute a category of people who, indeed, do not belong in the human
community because by denying genocide, they perpetuate it, and they perpetuate it on several levels. Of all
the crimes there are in the world, genocide and genocide denial are the most pernicious because they are a
direct threat to the survival of humanity. Part of what genocide and genocide denial are all about, part of what
they mean, is evident when one considers murder.
Most people, I think, agree that murder is the worst crime a person can commit. This is so because murder
represents a direct assault on the integrity of the identification that is the foundation of society: human beings
recognize one another as human beings, and this identification is the very bedrock upon which community,
regional and global, is based; hence, to attack it is to attack the foundation of human society and to put its
continued survival in danger. In order for one person to murder another, the murderer first has to deny the
humanity of the one who is to be murdered; otherwise, the murder cannot take place: this is why demonizing
the enemy during wars is a commonplace occurrence. However, because of the aforementioned identification,
by denying another’s humanity, the murderer denies his own humanity, and by murdering another, the
murderer murders himself. That is why, after the murder, the murderer is—on the most fundamental level—
no longer “normal”: if you look into a murderer’s eyes, there is something there that is not the same,
something that does not feel human.
To commit genocide, it is necessary for the perpetrators of genocide to deny the humanity of an entire section
of the human population. In order to do this, the targeted group has to be represented as having pernicious
qualities that are essential to it. Thus, Armenians were (during the turn of the century) and are today (in
writings such as yours) represented as being essentially treacherous, dishonest, violent, sly, mutant, and guilty
of “naturally” possessing all manner of inhuman qualities, as if these qualities constituted dictionary
definitions of Armenians. The truth is, however, that the only definition the act of the ascription of these
qualities to Armenians represents is the definition of jingoist racism. Your writing is rife with such
representations, and these, not only of Armenians, but of every single individual you discuss. These
representations are one indication of the presence of the genocidal will in your writing; indeed, they constitute
the perpetuation of genocide.
The will to kill that is palpable in your ideas is, however, not all that surprising to me, because I am an
Armenian and this drivel is something I have lived with, understand, and deal with. What is truly remarkable
in your display is how perfectly the narrative reflects—no, undertakes again—the application of the demented
logic of genocide, for it is true that you approach the people mentioned in your posts in the same manner that
the butchers of the Turkish government approached the Armenians—with the intention to negate, to deny the
subjectivity of, and, ultimately, to kill those whose presence your weak intellectual, political, and economical
abilities—not to mention non-existent ethical understanding—cannot otherwise tolerate, let alone deal with.
The list of the people you attempt to subject to vicious character assassinations is long indeed. Susan Sontag,
Allen Ginsburg, Grace Paley, Joyce Carol Oats, Seamus Heaney, Yehuda Bauer, Robert Bly, Norman Mailer,
Kurt Vonnegut, Daniel Berger, Henry Morganthau, Robert Fisk, are just some of the people whom you have
so far committed vicious libel against. Judging by the consistency and enthusiasm with which you go on your
mad rampages, what your reaction will be toward the next honest person you come across is utterly
predictable. You will kill him, to kill the truth he affirms.
You will point out that denying genocide and actually perpetrating it are two different things, and this is truer
than you think. The simple difference is that only in one of these cases are real people murdered; no one dies
from denial. The more important difference between genocide and genocide denial, however, the difference
that no mediocre propagandist such as yourself can deal with, is the object of the negation: in the former case,
people are negated; in the latter case, truth is negated. Moreover, the truth that is negated is not just any truth.
Because it is a truth that concerns matters that are central to human society, identification, negation, life,
death, and so on, it is the most important truth. The denial of genocide is not just a matter for Armenians,
therefore; it is a matter for all people, and all your posts do is affirm this.
Your posts make it clear that the genocidal will that sought to eliminate Armenians has spilled out of its
container and now does not hesitate to attack anyone who dares affirm that a genocide of the Armenians DID
take place—Armenian or not. In the 1915 genocide, the perpetrators distinguished only between Armenians
and non-Armenians; hence, as long as they were Armenian, rebels were killed along with merchants, women
were killed along with men, and adults were killed along with children. With your posts and the posts of other
genocide deniers on this forum, it is clear that the indiscriminate quality of the genocidal will has worsened.
To one who suffers from such a severe paralysis of the discriminating faculty, it is of course no wonder that
Kurt Vonnegut, Johanne Lepsius, Henry Morgenthau, and scores of others, be they short, tall, nationalists,
communists, anarchists, dim, bright, honest, corrupt, ugly, healthy, sick, Chinese, Armenian, Turkish,
Bulgarian, Italian, Greek, intellectuals, children, elderly, eye-witnesses, writers, musicians, libertarians, anti-
NRA, acrobats, street-vendors, graduate students, swimmers, it is no wonder that all, in toto, appear the same:
you now have brought within your genocidal scope all of humanity. Congratulations.
Maybe you started out doing this for a paycheck, but now it is your nature.
You try to hide this genocidal will, but it cannot help but be glaringly visible in your writing—visible not to
you, of course, but to every person who is free of your mania, and that means 99.9 percent of the human
population, maybe even of the animal population. Genocide denial is a disease that follows a predictable
course once it establishes itself in a person. At first, the victim knows that he is lying, but perhaps because he
has some stake in the lie, he continues to lie. It is said that he who continuously lies ends up believing his lies.
This saying, of course, applies to no one more than it applies to those who deny genocide. It can hardly be
denied that you, for example, are patently incapable of telling the difference between lies and truths. It is at
this point that the victim of genocide denial—the genocide denier, himself—begins to display pathological
thought patterns; it is at this point that the genocide denier becomes ensnared in his own lies; and it is at this
point that he, even if he did not possess a genocidal will at the outset, not only begins to manifest the
genocidal will, he indeed becomes constitutionally incapable of hiding it. This is the reason you—no longer
able to tell the difference between fact and fiction—can so nonchalantly make the preposterous claims that
litter your posts.
Having rethought what your posts and the posts of people like you mean to me through this examination, I
would like to take back what I called you in my last post. There, I called you, “soon-to-be-behind-London-
bars.” I have come to see that this designation is not accurate; it is not accurate because you already are
behind bars: you are in the prison house of the lies you have come to believe, and you will remain there
probably forever, with only a dim awareness of the bottomless gap that exists between who you are and who
you think you are to keep you company.
Finally, you questioned whether I know the meaning of the word “cringing.” Indeed, I do. I meant “cringing”
in the sense of “cringing, sycophantic minion of the Turkish government,” but quite interestingly, you seem to
have picked up on that meaning already in spite of the dearth of any other clues, as if that dim voice keeping
you company somehow knew exactly what to make out of that word, “cringing.”
So already-behind-bars-of-his-own-making, I have to agree with you when you say that nothing will change
“after [you] are long gone from this little forum.” I agree not because we who affirm what happened do so
because we have closed minds—that is just another one of your pathological lies. I agree because the
cringing, non-entity that you are, it is a matter of speculation whether you were ever “here” to begin with…
The Hitler-quote is a lie, read this:
“Accordingly, I have placed my death-head formations in readiness-for the present only in the East-with orders to them to send to death mercilessly and without compassion, men, women, and children of Polish derivation and language. Only thus shall we gain the living space (Lebensraum) which we need. Who, after all, speaks today of the annihilation of the Armenians? “
Armenians and their folk tell only a part of this alleged quote.
Furthermore, this quote is rejected by the accuser Alderman in the Neurenberg-trials. Because he had three other eyewitness accounts. They didn't match with this version of correspondent Lochner. Hitler never made this statement.
Morgenthau's book also is a one big lie.
Why he needed two Armenians (his secretary Hagop S. Andonian and advisor Arshag K. Schmavonian) to write this book?
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