Before we reach to the main topic, let’s talk about the Armenian Genocide briefly…
You can read in more depth here.
The Armenian Genocide
In the Ottoman Empire and its surrounding provinces, the mass deportations and massacres of Armenians alongside with the forced change of religion took place during 1915-1923. This is what we call the Armenian Genocide.
The Young Turks were the ones who planned and organized these massacres in the Ottoman Empire. Later on, the Kemal government took the role.
During World War I in 1915, leaders of the Turkish government planned the mass deportations and massacre of the Armenians. By the early 1920s, they finally ended. From 600,000 and 1.5 million Armenians died. Many more of them forcibly left the country. Today, most historians call these awful events a genocide: a premeditated and systematic campaign to exterminate an entire people. The Turkish government, however, still does not acknowledge the enormity or scope of those events.
What was the reason behind the Armenian Genocide?
On the threshold of the 1st World War, the Young Turks wanted to preserve the remnants of the Ottoman Empire. Consequently, they adopted Pan-Turkism and national homogeneous policies. Their plan was to create a huge empire that would spread up to China and would involve all Turkish speaking peoples of the Caucasus and Central Asia. The Armenian population, however, was a major obstacle to the implementation of their program.
According to the 1908 Constitution, which was restored as a result of the Young Turks’ revolution, there were equal rights for all the citizens of the Ottoman Empire. The Armenians accepted this opportunity with enthusiasm.
Ottomans permitted religious minorities like the Armenians to maintain some autonomy. However, they also subjected them to unequal and unjust treatment.
Christians had to pay higher taxes compared to Muslims. They had very few political and legal rights. Despite these obstacles, the Armenian community bloomed under Ottoman rule. Armenians were usually better educated and wealthier than their Turkish neighbors. Consequently, they grew to resent their success. The Armenian population provided huge social, cultural and economic development even under those unlawful conditions.
The resentment grew even more
…when the Ottomans got suspicions that the Christian Armenian would be more loyal to other Christian governments and especially Russia, which shared an unstable border with Turkey.
At the end of the 19th century, Turkish Sultan Abdul Hamid II, who was obsessed with loyalty above all, and infuriated by the nascent Armenian campaign to win basic civil rights declared that he would solve the “Armenian question” once and for all.
In 1890, he told a reporter, “I will soon settle those Armenians. I will give them a box on the ear which will make them…relinquish their revolutionary ambitions.”
In addition, even though the Armenian Genocide was planned during the 1910-1911 meetings which took place in Thessaloniki, the Young Turks used the World War I as a really good opportunity to execute their plan.
More than two million Armenians were living in the Ottoman Empire. Around 1.5 million Armenians became the victims of the dreadful genocide in 1915-1923.
Now that it’s clear what the Armenian Genocide is, why and when it happened, let’s check out the 10 facts about the Armenian Genocide that everyone should know.
10 FACTS ABOUT THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE
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APRIL 24 IS CONSIDERED TO BE THE BEGINNING OF THE GENOCIDE
On April 24, 1915, the Ottoman authorities began mass arrests of Armenian intellectuals and important figures in Constantinople (Istanbul). After being arrested, all of them with no exception were harshly tortured to death. April 24 is symbolically considered the Day of the Armenian Genocide, as the Turks destroyed the Armenian intellectuals on that day.
In addition, it is a common misconception that the Armenian Genocide started in 1915. Meanwhile, the systematic massacres of the Armenians took place under the rule of Sultan Abdulhamid in 1894-1896. The Young Turks have followed the example of Abdulhamid.
235 Armenian intellectuals were arrested in Constantinople on April 24, and as of April 29, their number exceeded 800. They were killed by Turkish criminal. This horrible day is therefore celebrated as a commemoration day for the victims of the Armenian Genocide.
For the first time the day of the commemoration of the genocide victims in Soviet Armenia was celebrated on April 24, 1965, on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide.
A rally of thousands of people took place in Yerevan, with slogans demanding a protest against the monstrous crime of Turkey and the restoration of historical justice. The demonstration ended with a rally near Komitas’s grave. On the same day a gathering dedicated to the genocide took place. Representatives of public, state bodies and clergy attended.
Two years later, the Memorial to the victims and survivors of the Armenian Genocide was built at the Tsitsernakaberd highway.
Under the leadership of Karen Demirchyan, the “Minute of Silence” of April 24 was put on.
During the years of the first president of Armenia Levon Ter-Petrosyan, a museum was built at Tsitsernakaberd, which later turned into a museum-institute. The museum was opened on April 24, 1995, on the 80th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide.
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HITLER’S FELLOW CONSPIRATOR WAS A WIITNESS OF THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE
The Armenian Genocide was the center of the Turkish anti-Armenian state policy when a prearranged program was launched to exterminate Armenians under the cover of the First World War. Today, the principle of denial of the Genocide in Turkish political and historiographic guidelines is presenting the Great Massacre as nothing more but a military situation, and not a deeply developed program.
However, numerous documents, including documents in political archives of different countries, undoubtedly prove the existence of the prearranged program for the consistent destruction of the Armenian people.
Max Erwin von Scheubner-Richter served at the front during the WWI. However, already in November 1914 he started diplomatic and recon work in the Ottoman Empire.
From January to August 1915, he was the Vice-Consul of Germany in Erzurum. He was one of the eyewitnesses of the Armenian genocide. Max Erwin documented the fact of the purposeful extermination of Armenians by the Turkish authorities. In the course of these events he personally saved individual Armenians, tried to influence on the situation through Berlin and Constantinople, but his attempts were unsuccessful.
At the time, he was considered as one of the most outspoken individuals regarding the deportations and harsh massacres of Armenians. Scheubner-Richter believed that the reason behind the deportations was “racial hatred” and that none could survive such a journey. He condemned the Ottoman Empire’s actions in his writings as a policy of annihilation.
Scheubner-Richter got involved in the Nazi movement, developing a close relationship with Hitler.
When he returned to Germany, heprovided Adolf Hitler with a thorough plan for revolution. During the Beer Hall Putsch, he was walking arm-in-arm with Hitler. Scheubner-Ritcher was shot in the lungs and died instantly as Hitler and others were marching toward armed guards on 9 November 1923. Out of all the early party members who died in the Putsch, Adolf Hitler claimed Scheubner-Richter to be the only “irreplaceable loss”. The first part of Hitler’s book Mein Kampf is also dedicated to Scheubner-Richter and the other fifteen men who died in the Putsch.
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THE THREE PASHAS IMPLEMENTED THE GENOCIDE
The heads of the Young Turks were the following trio or Three Pashas: Talât Pasha – Grand Vizier (or Prime Minister); Enver Pasha – Minister of War; Djemal Pasha – Minister of the Navy.
Talaat Pasha brought the political doctrine of Ottomanism to life. That is, the forced Turkishization of the non-Turkish peoples of the Empire. He was a rascal follower of Pan-Islamism and pan-Turkism. Talaat had far-reaching aspirations toward the Caucasus, Crimea and Turkestan. He participated in the development of a military-political project called “Turan Yolu” (Road to Turan).
In her memoirs, Young Turks Lady Halide Edip writes: “Talaat Pasha once pleasantly and cunningly pointed out that Pan-Turkism can lead us to the Yellow Sea.”
Talaat together with Enver Pasha and Jemal Pasha, formed a group famous as the Three Pashas. These men formed the triumvirate which ran the Ottoman government until the end of World War I in October 1918. They soon implemented the deportation and genocide of the Armenian people.
According to a German official in Mush,
“At the end of October 1914, when the Turks started the war, Turkish officials began to occupy all that they needed for the war. The property of the Armenians, their money. They confiscated everything. Later, every Turkish person could enter any Armenian shop and take everything that he needed or wanted.”
The confirmation of the genocide was given through a covert telegram which Enver Pasha sent on February 27, 1915. In the secret instructions of Talaat and Enver Pashas, they wrote the concrete steps of the “final extermination” of Armenians on April 15, 1915. The Armenian Genocide started on April 24, 1915 in Zeytoun.
In his memoirs published in 1946, Talaat Pasha confessed the extermination and destruction of the Armenians. He, however, explained it by the protection of “national interests” of the Turks and ” hindering the creation of an Armenian state on the border with Russia in the vilayets.”
On October 7, 1918, Talaat Pasha accepted the failure of the Young Turks policy and abdicated from power. He then fled to Germany where he lived under a different name. The military extraordinary court in Constantinople in 1919 remotely sentenced Talaat to death penalty for military crimes the destruction of the Armenian population of the Empire.
On March 15, 1921 Soghomon Tehlirian shot Talaat in the frameworks of the “Operation Nemesis” of the Dashnaktsutyun party.
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THEY USED THE WORLD WAR I AS A COVERUP
The Armenian genocide is very closely linked to World War I. The Ottoman Turkey was on the side of the Central Powers (Germany and Austria-Hungary). Their opponent were the Entente Powers (Great Britain, France, Russia, and Serbia).
World War I gave the Young Turk dictatorship an opportunity to implement their nationalist goals. the Young Turk government resolved a secret military agreement with their ally Germany on August 2, 1914. Soon, it formally entered the war on the side of the Central Powers on November 11.
After beating back an initial Russian invasion, Ottoman invaded the Caucasus (today: Armenia and Georgia). Afterward, they sought to advance their military positions into the Persian Empire (today: Iran). That winter, however, the Turks suffered a disastrous defeat in the Caucasus. Consequnetly, Russian troops invaded the Ottoman Empire. On the other hand, Great Britain and France attacked the Empire during the last week of April 1915 at Gallipoli. They wanted to knock the Ottomans out of the war.
Armenians were in the Conflict Zones…
Even though the Ottoman Empire was mostly Muslim, there were also some Christian populations. In the eastern provinces, though, Armenian Christians made up 45% of the population.
Under pressure, Ottoman military chiefs view Armenians as a threat which is acting in their enemy’s (Russia’s) interests. Hence, they pressed for the deportation of Armenians from the war zone. During diputes with the Entente Powers and the still neutral United States, Ottomans explained their deportations as a precautionary measure.
In January of 1915, during the Battle of Sarakimis with Russia, the Ottoman 3rd Army lost more than half of the soldiers. Even though Armenian soldiers in the Ottoman army usually fought loyally and bravely, the CUP leaders still publicly blamed the defeat on Armenian “traitors”.
The Three Pashas clearly knew that they should carry out the acts of genocide while the fog of war was still in play. That way, the foreign hands would be tied up and there would be no pressures.
Talât Pasha once even told to a German embassy representative the following when the latter brought up the genocide,
“Turkey is taking advantage of the war for thoroughly liquidating its internal foes, i.e. the indigenous Christians, without being thereby disturbed by foreign intervention.”
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ARMENIANS WERE NOT THE ONLY VICTIMS UNDER THE MASK OF WWI
Armenians surely suffered the most deaths during the attempts of the Ottoman Empire to eradicate Christian minorities during the period of World War I. Therefore, the Armenian Genocide is usually the main point of discussion. Unfortunately, other than the Armenian genocide, the genocide of both the Assyrians and the Greeks happened as well.
The Greek Genocide
The Young Turks originally planned the Greek genocide, including the Pontic genocide. It is no coincidence that in October of 1915, Turkish military Minister Enver Pasha politically declared that the Greek problem would be solved in the same way as the Armenians’.
During the same days the first wave of the extermination of the Greek people rose in Smyrna. On May 19 (1919), Kemal Ataturk in Samsun put the start of the second wave of the extermination of the Greek, including the Pontic Greeks.
By his order, the Greek and Armenian districts of Smyrna got burnt with tens of thousands of Greeks and Armenians killed. It is no coincidence that Winston Churchill said of Smyrna’s disaster the following: “Kemal turned it into ashes by annihilating all the Christian population”. Kemal, in turn, bravely and impudently announced that Turkey got rid of foreigners and now belongs only and only to the Turks.
The Greek victims’ death count is around 750,000. In addition, i 1923, a population exchange took place between Turkey and Greece. This effectively ending the bloodshed, but two million people forcibly left their homes.
The Assyrian Genocide
There are a few reasons for the Assyrian genocide, but religious cleansing of the Turkic lands seems to be main one. This happened during a period when the political and military power of the Ottoman Empire was getting weak against the Western powers. The Young Turk government soon realized that their territory at the end of World War 1 could be limited to an area not far beyond where the Turks dominated. Hence, they aimed at freeing up as much territory as possible for Turkic-speaking Muslims.
The Turkish explanation of the deportations was that the Assyrians were seeking power, autonomy, largely with the aid of the Russians(their enemy).
Most of Assyrians that died during the genocide died in the process of the deportation to and through the Syrian Desert, largely because of starvation and dehydration.
The Assyrian victims’ death count is around 300,000, with most of the killings largely happening around the Empire’s border with Persia. In the town of Midyat about 25,000 Assyrians lost their lives. In the town, there was a small uprising, which the Empire ultimately squashed.
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THE PLAN OF THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE CONSISTED OF 4 STAGES
Genocide – an organized extermination of people, with the ultimate goal of ending their collective existence. Therefore, for implementing the genocide, a centralized programming and an internal mechanism for its implementation are needed. This makes the genocide a state crime, as the state has all the resources that can be used to implement this policy.
In order to implement their program, the Ottoman authorities first tried to deprive Armenians of the opportunity to resist. So…
The first stage
Men with the age of 18 to 45 years were enlisted to the army. After the defeat of the Turkish army near Sarighamish, Enver Pasha ordered to disarm and destroy Armenian soldiers in February 1915. At first, they took the Armenians back from their front lines to the rear line – the military battalions, and then took them out of their places and slaughtered. Meanwhile, they confiscated the small amount of weapons and ammunition of the Armenian population.
The second stage
The second stage of Armenian Genocide was the arrest and destruction of Armenian intelligentsia and the power which unified them. Nazareth Chaush, Van’s Ishkhan (Nikoghayos Poghosyan), Arshak Vramyan (Onik Derdakyan) – a member of the Ottoman Parliment, and many others were killed in Zeytoun.
About 800 intellectuals were arrested in Constantinople on April 24 of 1915 and its following days and taken to the depths of Anatolia. Among them were composer Komitas, writers Grigor Zohrap, Ruben Sevak, Daniel Varoujan, Siamanto, Ruben Zardaryan, doctor Nazareth Taghavarian and many others. Most of them died. In June 1915, in one of the squares of Constantinople, Hunchakian activist Paramaz (Matteos Sargisyan) and his 19 fellow party friends were hanged.
The third stage
Mass deportations of tens of thousands of defenseless women, children and elderly people began. In some places the Armenian population tried to resist. The deportation and massacre of the Armenian population of Van, Erzurum, Bitlis, Kharberd, Sebastia, Diyarbakir, Cilicia, Western Anatolia and other places started in May-June 1915.
During the deportations, Turkish soldiers, policemen, Kurdish gangs killed hundreds of thousands of people, others died of epidemics. Thousands of women and children were subjected to violence. Tens of thousands of people became violent and turned into a Muslim
US Ambassador to Turkey Henry Morgenthau had already guessed that the deportation of the Armenian population pursues one goal – mass destruction of Armenians. The ultimate goal of deportation was also known to Turkey’s ally Germany, whose ambassador Hans Wangenhaym had informed his government about it in July 1915.
The fourth stage
The last, fourth phase of the Armenian Genocide is the universal and absolute denial of the genocide committed by the Turkish government in its homeland. Despite the ongoing process of the international condemnation of the Armenian Genocide, Turkey continues to fight against the recognition of the Genocide, including the deception, propaganda, lobbying and other means.
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THERE ARE STREETS AND BUILDINGS NAMED AFTER THE GENOCIDE EXECUTIONERS IN TURKEY
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THE ARMENIAN REVOLUTIONARY FEDERATION IMPLEMENTED THE “OPERATION NEMESIS”
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