World
Armenian Genocide: Turkish Denial
Oh, that little nation neighbouring Turkey where at least 1.5 million people were slaughtered without reason? No, no, I don’t think I’ve heard of it.
Turkey is still in denial of its history and claim that it was a just war instead of genocide. I’m sorry, but when you are attempting to obliterate the entire race, take over its entire land, and put into history that this nationality never existed, well… that kind of sounds like genocide, no?
The genocide took place in 1915, which began during WWI, which gave the Ottoman Empire a good excuse to say that it was simply part of war. However, even after WWI was over, the genocide persisted. Twenty-one nations world-wide accept the atrocities as genocide where women were raped, men executed, and elders and children forced to migrate without food or water, collapsing and dying on their way to current-day Syria. United States of America, nevertheless, did not accept the genocide, and why do you think? Maybe because of their close relations with Turkey?
What the Russians have to Say
“The Armenian Genocide resolution is a proper test for American democracy. It will uncover priorities of the United States – good relations with Turkey or historical truth”, Russian State Duma member, Konstantin Zatulin told a news conference in Yerevan October 21.
This is a harsh quote that puts into great perspective what kind of a democracy U.S is running. I think the best way to describe it would be “selective democracy.” Claim to free other nations by enslaving them under new regimes, claim to fight for justice by creating subjective injustices, and claim to be truthful and honest by buying any voices that say otherwise.
1915-1923
It started on April 24 when the Turkish government arrested 200 respected Armenian community leaders in Constantinople and taken to prisons in Anatolia. They were later murdered. Besides the fact that there were more than 1.5 millions Armenians killed following the 200, the amount of land that was stolen from them is devastation on its own. Armenia was a massive nation, but now it’s nowhere to be seen. Some atlases abbreviate it with just “Arm.” Even though we cannot bring back the millions of their people, we can at least give them retribution. Aside from the monetary retribution, the return of their land should be the main priority.
Aside from the Armenians, the Ottoman Empire had also launched a deliberate and systematic destruction of the Greek and Assyrian population. The effects were on a smaller scale, however the fact remains that the world had turned a blind eye to the crimes against humanities that were taking place at that place and time in the world. As living in a technologically advanced world where it takes only hours by plane to travel from one side of the globe to the other, I consider myself the citizen of the globe instead of just limiting myself to a single country. And since I’m a citizen of the globe, anything that happens anywhere else, no matter the country or continent, it is a burden of mine to correct any dilemma or injustice that might be taking place there. Since, however, I was not alive in that time, there was nothing I could do, but since I am alive now and I see that the injustices continue, I can stand up and actually get my voice heard along with the millions of others that feel the same way as me.
What Hitler had to Say
When Hitler was asked about whether he feared how the world would react when they would find out what he had in plan for the Jews, he smirked and replied “Go, kill without mercy. After all, who remembers the Armenians?” Even though he was completely wrong about the world not recognizing the Jewish holocaust, he might have been right about the world not remembering the Armenians. It’s a damn shame, but it’s no ones fault except the world’s. Their choice to be passive on this one, and their choice to ignore Turkish denial just attributed to Hitler’s accurate analysis.
This post was submitted by Janet Adkins.
Discussion
9 comments for “Armenian Genocide: Turkish Denial”
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It’s scary how many people haven’t even heard of the Armenian genocide. The Jewish holocaust is recognized world-wide, but there hasn’t been enough movement to get Armenia its reparation. It’s sad to hear that it’s been almost a century and barely any real action has been taken.
Didn’t the Persians and/or the Azeris try to kill off all Armos too?
@ Dolly: The Armenians never fought Iran, but they did and do have hostile relations. Armenia and Azerbajan had a territorial war, but it was occuring during the genocide, so you can say they were helping the Young Turks out, along with the Kurds. Azerbajan and Armenia had another war from 1988-94 over Nagorno-Karabakh, which the Armenians were able to retrieve.
Turkey not only denies this holocaust, but also what they did in Cyprus. Still, one should ask oneself, why is it that this massacre is almost forgotten and the Jewish one not.
I came across this page while searching for information about the role of Jews in the Young Turk movement and the alleged Jewish involvement in the slaughter of the Armenians. I happen to be of Jewish ethnicity myself , which helps stimulate my interest in such topics.
The first point I’ll make is that Ahmedinejad never said anything in any language that could be translated as threatening to “wipe Israel off the map”, in the violent sense of that English expression. Ironically, one can’t exactly ”wipe Israel off the map” in the cartographer’s sense, since the Zionist state has never provided a map that shows its claimed borders!
Neither Ahmedinejad nor the Iranian state is genocidal in its treatment of minorities, while both Israel and Turkey are! I don’t, however, think one should be calling on the U.S. Congress to label what any other governments have done as “genocide” until that Congress has applied that label to what the U.S. has done to the Native Americans, to the enslaved Africans, to the peoples of Southeast Asia and Central America, etc.. Otherwise, you’re just helping the U.S. rulers to prettify themselves by condemning the crimes of others, as they have done with the Nazi mass murders of Jews and others.
-first of all i want to say that i’m turk.even our history books in turkey say that it is not a genocide why? it’s not genocide because in that time the sultan in ottoman empire gave a speacial troop for amenian citizens to go to the syria. (today) if we wanted slaughter them why we gave a speacial troop for armenian citizens to go there safely? onthe other hand as our historians say in that time russians had important affect on armenian people. it is obvious that there was a political things in it.i’m not racist. i love armenian people very much.please dont look in one way. you should search many many books about it.coz both side have a say. thank you
Turkey may still be in denial to this day, and Armenia may never be a nation ever again, but reparations were made. The officials and politicians in charge of this genocide were summoned to International trial by the Allies, with the Unites States Secretary of State being chairman. It was a solid attempt–the only issue being Turkey was holding British hostages, and the exchange gave the guilty their freedom. Twenty nations to date recognize this as genocide. Theodore Roosevelt spoke out against this. In light of this, there was effort to rectify this atrocity. For the United States to recognize this atrocity, and for “actual” reparations to be done… that would have to rewind history of the trials, and hopefully remove United State’s current recession as it is now because the U.S.’s first and foremost priority lies with Social Security going broke, as well as Medicare. It’s not that we don’t know sin is there… it’s just that we lack the care and time to rectify it.
it is not true that the US doesn’t recognize the alleged genocide. half of the states do. i know a speech was made by Obama for the 1,5 million Armenians. anyways, i am also turkish and i must confess that i did not make a detailed research about the genocide but people are behaving way over their heads when they claim that Turkey should aologize for what Ottoman Empire did. maybe we are now what’s left of them but personally i hate Ottoman Empire and their policies. getting rid of the sultans was the best thing that ever happened in these lands. and i don’t believe that armenians honestly trying to make Turks say “yeah we did it.” they want publicity, land, more money. they are using this for an active and never-ending role in the world politics. and this makes me want to puke – im sorry. if you believe that your people got killed a hundred years ago – you should know that getting an apologize / confession from a country that did not even existed at that time, is just fake. if you were that concerned about the people getting killed, then why would you even kill the Turkish diplomats. “diplomats”. like that would solve the problem.
I’m almost done reading a great book (The Burning Tigris) about how the Young Turks, the governing body of Turkey at the time, went about initializing the genocide while one of their main goals was to cover it up their atrocities during the execution of the plan. It was an extremely well designed and ruthless plan carried out with specific orders from the main politician Talaat Pasha. It disturbs me that there are, and probably will continue to be, Turks who try to reason the actions of their previous leaders as “this was a war”. NO, trying to exterminate an entire race of people is not a war, it is in fact the definition of genocide. In fact, the word genocide was in part created to give meaning to what happened to the Armenians…look it up, it’s true. What happened to the Armenians is actually the basis, along with the holocaust, for the definition of the word ‘genocide’. What sickens me just as much as the insane denial of the current Turkish government is how the Turks back then carried out this genocide. The means of torture are beyond mid-evil, it’s the most sickening things I’ve ever heard happening to any being on earth. Perhaps the Turks of today can’t come to grips or fathom the atrocities of that time and are so embarrassed that they just would rather deny it. I suppose I’d do the same thing…I guess. I wouldn’t want my history to be linked to that kind of barbarism.