Armenian Genocide 1915 how many people. Armenian Genocide: Two Sides of the Same Coin
Armenian Genocide
The Armenian question is a set of such fundamental issues of the political history of the Armenian people as the liberation of Armenia from foreign invaders, the restoration of a sovereign Armenian state in the Armenian Highlands, a targeted policy of extermination and eradication of Armenians through mass pogroms and deportations in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. by the Ottoman Empire, the Armenian liberation struggle, the international recognition of the Armenian Genocide.
What is the Armenian Genocide?
The Armenian Genocide is the massacre of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire during the First World War.
These beatings were carried out in different regions of the Ottoman Empire by the government of the Young Turks, who were in power at that time.
The first international reaction to the violence was expressed in the joint statement of Russia, France and Great Britain in May 1915, where the atrocities against the Armenian people were defined as "new crimes against humanity and civilization". The parties agreed that the Turkish government should be punished for the crime.
How many people died during the Armenian Genocide?
On the eve of World War I, two million Armenians lived in the Ottoman Empire. About one and a half million were destroyed during the period from 1915 to 1923. The remaining half a million Armenians were scattered throughout the world.
Why was the genocide against the Armenians carried out?
With the outbreak of the First World War, the Young Turk government, hoping to preserve the remnants of the weakened Ottoman Empire, adopted the policy of pan-Turkism - the creation of a huge Turkish empire, incorporating the entire Turkic-speaking population of the Caucasus, Central Asia, Crimea, the Volga region, Siberia, and extending to the borders of China. The policy of Turkism assumed the Turkization of all national minorities of the empire. The Armenian population was considered the main obstacle to the implementation of this project.
Although the decision to deport all Armenians from Western Armenia (Eastern Turkey) was taken at the end of 1911, the Young Turks used the outbreak of the First World War as an opportunity to carry it out.
Genocide Implementation Mechanism
Genocide is the organized mass destruction of a group of people, requiring central planning and the creation of an internal mechanism for its implementation. This is what makes genocide a state crime, since only the state has the resources that can be used in such a scheme.
On April 24, 1915, with the arrest and subsequent extermination of about a thousand representatives of the Armenian intelligentsia, mainly from the capital of the Ottoman Empire, Constantinople (Istanbul), the first stage of the extermination of the Armenian population began. Today, April 24 is celebrated by Armenians around the world as a day of remembrance for the victims of the Genocide.
The second stage of the "final solution" of the Armenian question was the conscription of about three hundred thousand Armenian men into the Turkish army, later disarmed and killed by their Turkish colleagues.
The third stage of the Genocide was marked by massacres, deportations and "death marches" of women, children and the elderly into the Syrian desert, where hundreds of thousands of people were killed by Turkish soldiers, gendarmes and Kurdish gangs, or died of starvation and epidemics. Thousands of women and children were subjected to violence. Tens of thousands were forcibly converted to Islam.
The last stage of the Genocide is the total and absolute denial by the Turkish government of the massacres and extermination of Armenians in their own homeland. Despite the process of international condemnation of the Armenian Genocide, Turkey continues to fight against its recognition by all means, including propaganda, falsification of scientific facts, lobbying, etc.
In the coming days in different countries commemorative events dedicated to the centenary of the Armenian genocide in the Ottoman Empire will be held around the world. Divine services will be held in churches, memorial evenings will be held in all organized Armenian communities with concerts, the opening of khachkars (traditional Armenian stone steles with the image of a cross), exhibitions of archival materials.
In addition, 100 bells will be heard in Christian churches around the world.
It was the first genocide of the 20th century. I am ashamed and regretful that Israel has not yet officially recognized him for political reasons. Forgive us, Armenians, and blessed memory of those who died. Amen.
Every year on April 24, the world celebrates the Day of Remembrance of the Victims of the Armenian Genocide in memory of the victims of the first ethnic extermination in the 20th century, which was carried out in the Ottoman Empire.
On April 24, 1915, representatives of the Armenian intelligentsia were arrested in the capital of the Ottoman Empire, Istanbul, from which the mass extermination of Armenians began.
At the beginning of the 4th century AD, Armenia became the first country in the world in which Christianity was established as the official religion. However, the centuries-old struggle of the Armenian people against the conquerors ended with the loss of their own statehood. For many centuries, the lands where the Armenians historically lived were not just in the hands of the conquerors, but in the hands of conquerors who professed a different faith.
In the Ottoman Empire, Armenians, not being Muslims, were quite officially treated as second-class people - “dhimmi”. They were forbidden to carry weapons, they were subject to higher taxes and were deprived of the right to testify in court.
Complex inter-ethnic and inter-confessional relations in the Ottoman Empire escalated significantly by late XIX century. A series of Russian-Turkish wars, mostly unsuccessful for the Ottoman Empire, led to the appearance on its territory of a huge number of Muslim refugees from the lost territories - the so-called "Muhajirs".
The Muhajirs were extremely hostile towards Armenian Christians. In turn, by the end of the 19th century, the Armenians of the Ottoman Empire, tired of their lack of rights, demanded more and more loudly equalization of rights with the rest of the inhabitants of the empire.
These contradictions were superimposed by the general decline of the Ottoman Empire, which manifested itself in all spheres of life.
Armenians are to blame
The first wave of massacres of Armenians on the territory of the Ottoman Empire took place in 1894-1896. The open resistance of the Armenians to the attempts of the Kurdish leaders to impose tribute on them turned into massacres not only of those who participated in the protests, but also of those who remained on the sidelines. It is generally accepted that the murders of 1894-1896 were not directly sanctioned by the authorities of the Ottoman Empire. Nevertheless, their victims, according to various estimates, were from 50 to 300 thousand Armenians.
Massacre at Erzurum, 1895 Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org / Public Domain
Periodic local outbreaks of reprisals against Armenians also occurred after the overthrow of the Sultan of Turkey Abdul-Hamid II in 1907 and the Young Turks came to power.
With the entry of the Ottoman Empire into the First world war in the country, slogans began to sound louder and louder about the need for "unity" of all representatives of the Turkish race to oppose the "infidels". In November 1914, jihad was declared, which fueled anti-Christian chauvinism among the Muslim population.
To all this was added the fact that one of the opponents of the Ottoman Empire in the war was Russia, on whose territory a large number of Armenians lived. The authorities of the Ottoman Empire began to consider their own citizens of Armenian nationality as potential traitors who could help the enemy. Such sentiments were strengthened as more and more failures on the eastern front took place.
After the defeat committed by the Russian troops of the Turkish army in January 1915 near Sarykamysh, one of the leaders of the Young Turks, Ismail Enver, aka Enver Pasha, declared in Istanbul that the defeat was the result of Armenian treason and that it was time to deport the Armenians from the eastern regions, who were threatened with Russian occupation.
As early as February 1915, extraordinary measures were taken against the Ottoman Armenians. 100,000 soldiers of Armenian nationality were disarmed, the right of civilian Armenians to bear arms, introduced in 1908, was abolished.
Destruction technology
The government of the Young Turks planned to carry out the mass deportation of the Armenian population to the desert, where people were doomed to certain death.
Deportation of Armenians along the Baghdad railway. Photo: commons.wikimedia.org
On April 24, 1915, the implementation of the plan began from Istanbul, where about 800 representatives of the Armenian intelligentsia were arrested and killed within a few days.
On May 30, 1915, the Majlis of the Ottoman Empire approved the "Law on Deportation", which became the basis for the massacre of Armenians.
The deportation tactic was to initially separate from total number Armenians in one way or another locality adult men who were taken out of the city to desert places and destroyed in order to avoid resistance. Young Armenian girls were handed over as concubines to Muslims or simply subjected to massive sexual violence. Old men, women and children were driven in columns under the escort of gendarmes. Columns of Armenians, often deprived of food and drink, were driven into the desert regions of the country. Those who fell without strength were killed on the spot.
Despite the fact that the disloyalty of the Armenians on the eastern front was declared the reason for the deportation, repressions against them began to be carried out throughout the country. Almost immediately, the deportations turned into massacres of Armenians in their places of residence.
A huge role in the massacres of Armenians was played by the paramilitary formations of the “chettes” - criminals specially released by the authorities of the Ottoman Empire to participate in massacres.
In the city of Hynys alone, the majority of whose population was Armenian, about 19,000 people were killed in May 1915. 15,000 Armenians became victims of the massacre in the city of Bitlis in July 1915. The most cruel methods of reprisals were practiced - people were cut into pieces, nailed to crosses, driven onto barges and drowned, burned alive.
Those who reached alive the camps around the desert of Der Zor, the massacre overtook there. Within a few months of 1915, about 150,000 Armenians were massacred there.
Disappeared forever
A telegram from US Ambassador Henry Morgenthau to the State Department (July 16, 1915) describes the extermination of the Armenians as a "campaign of racial extermination." Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org / Henry Morgenthau Sr
Foreign diplomats received evidence of the large-scale destruction of Armenians almost from the very beginning of the genocide. In the joint Declaration of May 24, 1915, the Entente countries (Great Britain, France and Russia) recognized the massacres of Armenians for the first time in history as a crime against humanity.
However, the powers involved in a major war were unable to stop the mass destruction of people.
Although the peak of the genocide occurred in 1915, in fact, the massacres of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire continued until the end of the First World War.
The total number of victims of the Armenian genocide has not been finally established to this day. The most frequently heard data is that from 1 to 1.5 million Armenians were exterminated in the Ottoman Empire in the period from 1915 to 1918. Those who could survive the massacre left their native lands en masse.
According to various estimates, from 2 to 4 million Armenians lived in the Ottoman Empire by 1915. Between 40,000 and 70,000 Armenians live in modern Turkey.
Most of the Armenian churches and historical monuments associated with the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire were destroyed or turned into mosques, as well as utility rooms. Only at the end of the 20th century, under pressure from the world community, the restoration of some historical monuments began in Turkey, in particular the Church of the Holy Cross on Lake Van.
Map of the main areas of destruction of the Armenian population. concentration camps
It has been 100 years since the beginning of one of the most terrible events in world history, crimes against humanity - the genocide of the Armenian people, the second (after the Holocaust) in terms of the degree of study and the number of victims.
Before the First World War, Greeks and Armenians (mostly Christians) made up two-thirds of the population of Turkey, directly Armenians - a fifth of the population, 2-4 million Armenians out of 13 million people living in Turkey, including all other peoples.
According to official reports, about 1.5 million people became victims of the genocide: 700,000 were killed, 600,000 died during deportation. Another 1.5 million Armenians became refugees, many fled to the territory of modern Armenia, part to Syria, Lebanon, America. According to various sources, 4-7 million Armenians now live in Turkey (with a total population of 76 million people), the Christian population is 0.6% (for example, in 1914 - two-thirds, although the population of Turkey was then 13 million people ).
Some countries, including Russia, recognize the genocide, Turkey, on the other hand, denies the fact of the crime, which is why it has hostile relations with Armenia to this day.
The genocide carried out by the Turkish army was aimed not only at the extermination of the Armenian (in particular the Christian) population, but also against the Greeks and Assyrians. Even before the start of the war (in 1911-14), an order was sent to the Turkish authorities from the Unity and Progress party that measures should be taken against the Armenians, that is, the killing of the people was a planned action.
“The situation escalated even more in 1914, when Turkey became an ally of Germany and declared war on Russia, which the local Armenians naturally sympathized with. The government of the Young Turks declared them a “fifth column”, and therefore a decision was made to deport them all to hard-to-reach mountainous regions” (ria.ru)
“The mass destruction and deportation of the Armenian population of Western Armenia, Cilicia and other provinces of the Ottoman Empire were carried out by the ruling circles of Turkey in 1915-1923. The policy of genocide against Armenians was conditioned by a number of factors. Leading among them was the ideology of Pan-Islamism and Pan-Turkism, which was professed by the ruling circles of the Ottoman Empire. The militant ideology of pan-Islamism was distinguished by intolerance towards non-Muslims, preached outright chauvinism, and called for the Turkification of all non-Turkish peoples.
Entering the war, the Young Turk government of the Ottoman Empire made far-reaching plans for the creation of the "Big Turan". It was meant to attach Transcaucasia, North to the empire. Caucasus, Crimea, Volga region, Central Asia. On the way to this goal, the aggressors had to put an end, first of all, to the Armenian people, who opposed the aggressive plans of the Pan-Turkists. In September 1914, at a meeting chaired by Minister of Internal Affairs Talaat, a special body was formed - the Executive Committee of the Three, which was instructed to organize the massacre of the Armenian population; it included the leaders of the Young Turks Nazim, Behaetdin Shakir and Shukri. The executive committee of the three received wide powers, weapons, money. » (genocide.ru)
The war became an opportunity for the implementation of cruel plans, the goal of the bloodshed was the complete extermination of the Armenian people, which prevented the leaders of the Young Turks from realizing their selfish political goals. The Turks and other peoples living in Turkey were set against the Armenians by all means, belittling and exposing the latter in a dirty light. The date of April 24, 1915 is called the beginning of the Armenian genocide, but the persecution and killings began long before it. Then, at the end of April, the intelligentsia and the elite of Istanbul, who were deported, suffered the first most powerful, crushing blow: the arrest of 235 noble Armenians, their exile, then the arrest of another 600 Armenians and several thousand more people, many of whom were killed near the city.
Since then, “purges” of Armenians have been continuously carried out: the deportations were not aimed at resettlement (exile) of the people in the deserts of Mesopatamia and Syria, but their complete extermination. people were often attacked by robbers along the way of the procession of the caravan of prisoners, killed by the thousands after arriving at their destinations. In addition, the “executors” used torture, during which either all or most of the deported Armenians died. Caravans were sent by the longest route, people were exhausted by thirst, hunger, unsanitary conditions.
On the deportation of Armenians:
« The deportation was carried out according to three principles: 1) the “principle of ten percent”, according to which Armenians should not exceed 10% of the Muslims in the region, 2) the number of houses of the deportees should not exceed fifty, 3) the deportees were forbidden to change their places of destination. Armenians were forbidden to open their own schools, Armenian villages had to be at least five hours away from each other. Despite the demand to deport all Armenians without exception, a significant part of the Armenian population of Istanbul and Edirne was not expelled for fear that Foreign citizens will witness this process” (Wikipedia)
That is, they wanted to neutralize those who still survived. How did the Armenian people “annoy” Turkey, Germany (which supported the first)? In addition to political motives and the desire to conquer new lands, the enemies of the Armenians also had ideological considerations, according to which Christian Armenians (a strong, united people) prevented the spread of pan-Islamism for the successful solution of their plans. Christians were turned against Muslims, Muslims were manipulated based on political goals, the use of the Turks in the destruction of Armenians was hidden behind the slogans in need of unification.
NTV documentary “Genocide. Start"
In addition to information about the tragedy, the film shows one amazing moment: there are quite a lot of living grandmothers who witnessed the events of 100 years ago.
Testimony of victims:
“Our group was driven along the stage on June 14 under escort of 15 gendarmes. We were 400-500 people. Already two hours walk from the city, we were attacked by numerous gangs of villagers and bandits armed with hunting rifles, rifles and axes. They took everything from us. In seven to eight days, they killed all the men and boys over 15 years old - one by one. Two blows with the butt and the man is dead. The bandits grabbed all the attractive women and girls. Many were taken to the mountains on horseback. So my sister was also kidnapped, who was torn away from her one-year-old child. We were not allowed to spend the night in the villages, but were forced to sleep on bare ground. I have seen people eat grass to relieve their hunger. And what the gendarmes, bandits and local residents did under the cover of darkness is beyond description at all” (from the memoirs of an Armenian widow from the town of Bayburt in the northeast of Anatolia)
“They ordered the men and boys to come forward. Some of the little boys were dressed as girls and hid in the crowd of women. But my father had to leave. He was a grown man with ycams. As soon as they separated all the men, a group of armed men appeared from behind the hill and killed them in front of our eyes. They stabbed them in the stomach with bayonets. Many women could not stand it and threw themselves off the cliff into the river” (from the story of a survivor from the city of Konya, Central Anatolia)
“The lagging behind were immediately shot. They drove us through deserted areas, through deserts, along mountain paths, bypassing cities, so that we had nowhere to get water and food. At night we were wet with dew, and during the day we were exhausted under the scorching sun. I only remember that we walked and walked all the time ”(from the memoirs of a survivor)
The Armenians stoically, heroically and desperately fought off the brutalized Turks, inspired by the slogans of the instigators of revolts and bloodshed to kill as many as possible of those who were presented as enemies. The largest battles, confrontations were the defense of the city of Van (April-June 1915), the Musa Dagh mountains (53-day defense summer-early autumn 1915).
In the bloody massacre of the Armenians, the Turks did not spare either children or pregnant women, they mocked people in incredibly cruel ways., girls were raped, taken as concubines and tortured, crowds of Armenians were gathered on barges, ferries under the pretext of resettlement and drowned in the sea, gathered in villages and burned alive, children were slaughtered and also thrown into the sea, medical experiments were carried out on young and old in specially created camps. People dried up alive from hunger and thirst. All the horrors that befell the Armenian people then cannot be described in dry letters and numbers, this tragedy, which they remember in emotional colors already in the younger generation to this day.
From the reports of witnesses: “About 30 villages were slaughtered in Alexandropol district and Akhalkalaki region, some of those who managed to escape are in the most distressed situation.” Other reports described the situation in the villages of the Alexandropol district: “All the villages have been robbed, there is no shelter, no grain, no clothes, no fuel. The streets of the villages are full of corpses. All this is supplemented by hunger and cold, taking away one victim after another ... In addition, askers and hooligans taunt their captives and try to punish the people with even more brutal means, rejoicing and enjoying it. They subject their parents to various torments, force them to hand over their 8-9 year old girls to the executioners…” (genocide.ru)
« Biological justification was used as one of the justifications for the destruction of the Ottoman Armenians. Armenians were called "dangerous microbes", they were assigned a lower biological status than Muslims . The main promoter of this policy was Dr. Mehmet Reshid, the governor of Diyarbekir, who first ordered that horseshoes be nailed to the feet of the deportees. Reshid also practiced the crucifixion of Armenians, imitating the crucifixion of Christ. The official Turkish encyclopedia of 1978 characterizes Reşid as "a fine patriot." (Wikipedia)
Children and pregnant women were forcibly given poison, those who disagreed were drowned, lethal doses of morphine were injected, children were killed in steam baths, many perverse and cruel experiments were performed on people. Those who survived in conditions of hunger, cold, thirst, unsanitary conditions often died from typhoid fever.
One of the Turkish doctors, Hamdi Suat, who conducted experiments on Armenian soldiers in order to obtain a vaccine against typhoid fever (they were injected with typhoid-infected blood), is revered in modern Turkey as national hero, the founder of bacteriology, in Istanbul a house-museum is dedicated to him.
In general, in Turkey it is forbidden to refer to the events of that time as the genocide of the Armenian people, the history books tell about the forced defense of the Turks and the murders of Armenians as a measure of self-defense, those who are victims for many other countries are exposed as aggressors.
The Turkish authorities are agitating their compatriots in every possible way to strengthen the position that there has never been an Armenian genocide, campaigns and PR campaigns are being carried out to maintain the status of an “innocent” country, monuments of Armenian culture and architecture that exist in Turkey are being destroyed.
War changes people beyond recognition. What a person can do under the influence of authorities, how easily he kills, and not just kills, but brutally - it's hard to imagine when we see the sun, the sea, the beaches of Turkey in cheerful pictures or remember our own travel experience. Why is there Turkey .. in general - the war changes people, the crowd, inspired by the ideas of victory, the seizure of power - sweeps away everything in its path, and if in ordinary, peaceful life it is savagery to commit murder for many, then in war - many become monsters and not notice this.
Under the noise and intensification of the cruelty of the river of blood - a familiar sight, how many examples of how people during every revolution, clashes, military conflicts did not control themselves and destroyed, killed everything and everyone around.
The common features of all genocides carried out in world history are similar in that people (victims) were devalued to the level of insects or soulless objects, while provocateurs in every way called on the perpetrators and those who were beneficial for the extermination of the people not just the lack of pity for the potential the object of the murders, but also hatred, animal fury. They were convinced that the victims were to blame for many troubles, that the triumph of retribution was necessary, combined with unbridled animal aggression - this meant an uncontrollable wave of outrages, savagery, ferocity.
In addition to the extermination of the Armenians, the Turks also carried out the destruction of the cultural heritage of the people:
“In 1915-23 and subsequent years, thousands of Armenian manuscripts stored in Armenian monasteries were destroyed, hundreds of historical and architectural monuments were destroyed, and the shrines of the people were desecrated. The destruction of historical and architectural monuments on the territory of Turkey, the appropriation of many cultural values of the Armenian people continues to the present. The tragedy experienced by the Armenian people was reflected in all aspects of the life and social behavior of the Armenian people, firmly settled in their historical memory. The impact of the genocide was experienced both by the generation that became its direct victim and subsequent generations” (genocide.ru)
Among the Turks there were caring people, officials who could shelter Armenian children, or rebelled against the extermination of Armenians - but basically any assistance to the victims of the genocide was condemned and punished, therefore it was carefully hidden.
After the defeat of Turkey in the First World War, a military tribunal in 1919 (despite this - genocide, according to the versions of some historians and eyewitness accounts - lasted until 1923) sentenced representatives of the committee of three to death in absentia, later the sentence was executed for all three, including including through self-judgment. But if the performers were honored with execution, then those who gave orders remained at large.
April 24 is the European Day of Remembrance for the Victims of the Armenian Genocide. One of the most monstrous in terms of the number of victims and the degree of study of genocides in world history, like the Holocaust, it experienced attempts to deny it, first of all, from the country responsible for the massacres. According to official figures, the number of killed Armenians is about 1.5 million people.
Do you think the Turks recognized the Armenian genocide? No, no one seeks to incite ethnic hatred. In this article we will try to find out what happened back in 1915.
Negative attitude
Many of those who, at work or in everyday life, came across Armenians envy their solidarity. Some say that the Armenians live in a small area, that no one understands their language. Therefore, it is believed: this is why the people are well organized.
Negation
Why don't Turks like Armenians? Why don't they recognize the people? Let's find out what happened in Turkey in 1915. Shortly after the country entered the First World War, all law enforcement officers, as well as Armenian military personnel, were arrested and then shot along with their families (an old Eastern tradition).
The same fate befell all the famous Armenians who lived in Istanbul. After that, the mass extermination of the people who scattered scattered on Turkish lands began. Pogroms swept across the country, the result of which was the murder of half a million people.
It is known that Western Armenia was also part of the Ottoman Empire, on the territory of which one and a half million Armenians lived. All of them were killed. The massacre was carried out under the motto: "People must be destroyed, but gardens and crops must not be touched."
The Turks preserved the gardens for the Kurds, who later settled on these lands. As a result, Western Armenia completed its existence and became part of Turkish Kurdistan. And the eastern one turned into modern Armenia.
After Ataturk, the savior of peoples and specific people, came to power, a commission was established to investigate the Armenian genocide. During her work, the following conclusions were drawn:
- The inhabitants were massacred, but the territory remained. According to the norms of world law, these lands must be returned.
- Few Armenians lived in Turkey (maximum two hundred thousand). The war broke out, and this people, treachery and dirty maneuvers in their blood, themselves provoked numerous skirmishes.
- The patient Turkish people are people of a broad soul, instantly forgetting insults. In the Ottoman Empire in those days, a single multinational family was building a new beautiful society. That is why there can be no talk of genocide.
It is known that in Turkey it is forbidden to mention the existence of Western Armenia. According to Turkish law, public statements about her are considered a criminal offense. This point of view is the official position of the country from the time of Ataturk to the present day.
Armenian Genocide
Many cannot answer the question why Turks do not like Armenians. The genocide was prepared and implemented in 1915 in the areas supervised by the top of the Ottoman Empire. The destruction of people was carried out through deportation and physical destruction, including the displacement of civilians in an environment that leads to inevitable death.
Why is Memorial Day considered an important date in Armenia? We will consider this issue further, and now we will describe in detail the terrible events of those years. The Armenian Genocide was carried out in several stages: the disarmament of the soldiers, the selective deportation of people from the border regions, the mass expulsion and extermination of the inhabitants, the introduction of a law on resettlement. Some historians include in it the actions of the Turkish army in Transcaucasia in 1918, the murder of the 1890s, the massacre in Smyrna.
The organizers are the leaders of the Young Turks Jemal, Enver and Talaat, as well as the head of the "Special Organization" Shakir Behaeddin. In the Ottoman Empire, along with the genocide ancient people the destruction of the Pontic Greeks and Assyrians took place. Most of the world's Armenian diaspora was formed from people who fled from the Ottoman kingdom.
At one time, the author Lemkin Rafael proposed the term "genocide", which served as a synonym for the massacre of Armenians in Turkish territory and Jews in the lands occupied by the German Nazis. The annihilation of the Armenians is the second most researched act of genocide in history after the Holocaust. In the collective Declaration of May 24, 1915 of the allied countries (Russia, Great Britain and France), for the first time in history, this mass destruction was recognized as an atrocity against philanthropy.
Conditions
Now let's find out what historical background preceded the genocide of the ancient people. The Armenian ethnos matured by the 6th century BC. e. on the lands of Armenia and eastern Turkey, in the area covering Lake Van and Ko II century BC. e. Armenians under the rule of King Artashes I united, forming the state of Greater Armenia. It had the largest territory during the reign of Emperor Tigran II the Great, when the cordon of his power extended from the Euphrates, Palestine and mediterranean sea in the west to the Caspian Sea in the east.
At the beginning of the IV century. n. e. (the generally accepted date is 301), this country (the first in the world) officially adopted Orthodoxy as a state religion. The Armenian alphabet was created in 405 by the scientist Mashtots Mesrop, and in the 5th century the Bible was written in the new language.
The establishment of Orthodoxy became a decisive factor that connected the Armenian ethnos after the loss of the state system, and the Apostolic Church became the most important institution of national life.
In 428, it ended its existence, and until the 7th century, the Byzantines ruled its western lands, and the Persians ruled its eastern lands. Since the middle of the 7th century, an impressive part of this country was controlled by the Arabs. The Armenian kingdom in the 860s, under the rule of the Bagratid dynasty, restored its sovereignty. The Byzantines in 1045 captured Ani, the capital of this country. Prince Ruben I founded in 1080 and Prince Levon II in 1198 assumed the title of king.
The Egyptian Mamluks captured Cilicia in 1375, and the independent power ceased to exist. The church conflict of the Armenians, who did not want to abandon Christianity during the multiple invasions of Muslims (Persians, Oghuz Turks and Seljuks, Arab Abbasids) into the territory of historical Armenia, mass migrations and devastating wars led to a decrease in the population on these lands.
Armenian Question and Turkey
And yet: why don't Turks like Armenians? Living in the Ottoman Empire, they were not Muslims and therefore were considered dhimmis - second-class subjects. Armenians paid huge taxes, they were not allowed to carry weapons. And those who converted to Orthodoxy did not have the right to testify in court.
Of course, it is difficult to answer the question why Turks do not like Armenians. It is known that 70% of the people persecuted by them, who lived in the Ottoman kingdom, consisted of poor peasants. However, among Muslims, the image of a successful and cunning Armenian with an impressive commercial talent extended to all representatives of the nationality without exception. Hostility was exacerbated by the struggle for resources in the agricultural sector and unresolved social problems in the cities.
These actions were hampered by the influx of Muslims from the Caucasus - Muhajirs (after the Turkish-Russian and 1877-78 years) and from the newly appeared Balkan countries. The refugees, expelled by Christians from their territories, vented their evil on the local Orthodox. The claims of the Armenians for collective and personal security and the parallel deterioration of their position in the Ottoman kingdom led to the emergence of the "Armenian question" as part of a more general eastern problem.
Turks and Armenians are opposing nations. In the Erzerum region in 1882, one of the first associations of Armenia, the “Agricultural Society”, was established to protect the people from the robberies committed by the Kurds and other nomads. The first political party "Armenakan" was founded in 1885. Its platform involved the acquisition of local self-determination of people through propaganda and education, as well as military specialization to combat state terror.
In 1887, the social-democratic bloc "Hnchakyan" appeared, which sought to liberate Turkish Armenia and create an independent socialist state with the help of the revolution. In Tiflis, in 1890, the first congress of the most radical union, Dashnaktsutyun, was held, the program of which stipulated autonomy within the borders of the Ottoman Empire, equality and freedom of all residents, and in the social segment referred to the foundation of peasant communes as basic elements new society.
Extermination in 1894-1896
The massacre of Armenians began in 1894 and continued until 1896. There was a massacre in Istanbul, Sasun and the Van region, the pretext for which was the indignation of settled Armenians. In all regions of the empire in 1895, hundreds of thousands of souls were destroyed. The least studied and the most bloody is the second stage. The percentage of the administration's involvement in deploying the killings is still the subject of angry debate.
Preparations for the extermination of Armenians
Perhaps the Turks started the Armenian genocide as they needed to find a new identity after the Ittihat revolution in 1908. Imperial Ottoman unity was undermined by the constitution, which equalized the rights of various kinds of inhabitants of the Porte and deprived the Turks of great power status. In addition, this ideology yielded to the aggressive principles of Islamic doctrine and pan-Turkism. In turn, the positions of the Islamic worldview were undermined by the atheistic views of the Ittihat leaders and the fact of the existence of the nearby Shiite country of Persia.
The poet and sociologist Gökalp Ziya formulated the principles according to which the Ottoman Empire took part in the First World War. It was he who was the most authoritative ideologue of the Young Turks. His views extended to the country of Turan, which was inhabited by Turkish-speaking Muslims. He believed that the territory of Turan should have contained the entire range of the Turkic ethnos. This teaching actually excluded non-Turks not only from the government, but also from civil society. It was unacceptable for Armenians and other national minorities in Turkey.
For the main inhabitants of the empire, pan-Turkism was the most convenient, which was adopted as the basic rules by almost all the leaders of the Ittihat. Armenians identified themselves, first of all, from a religious position. They were probably mistaken in believing that Turkism is better than Islam.
During the Balkan War of 1912, these people mostly leaned towards the principles of Ottomanism, and the Armenian soldiers (more than 8,000 volunteers) played an important role in the Turkish army. Most of the warriors, according to the stories the British ambassador showed extraordinary courage. In addition, the Armenian blocs "Dashnaktsutyun" and "Hnchakyan" began to adhere to the anti-Ottoman point of view.
Turks do not want to recognize the Armenian genocide. And how did it start? On August 2, 1914, Turkey entered into a secret agreement with Germany. One of his conditions was the transformation eastern borders. This nuance was necessary for the formation of a corridor leading to the Islamic peoples of Russia, which hinted at the destruction of the Armenian presence in the reformed possessions. This policy was announced to all the people by the Ottoman leadership after entering the war in 1914, on October 30. The appeal contained a prescription for the unforced merger of all representatives of the Turkish race.
A couple of hours after the signing of the secret German-Turkish military treaty, Ittihat announced a general mobilization, which resulted in the drafting of almost all healthy Armenian men into the army. Further, after entering the First World War, the Ottoman Empire was drawn into fighting on many fronts. The raid on the lands of Persia and Russia increased the area of violence against the Armenians.
First deportations
Turks, Armenians, 1915… What happened in that distant time? In mid-March 1915, French-British forces attacked the Dardanelles. In Istanbul, preparations have begun for moving the capital to Eskisehir and evacuating local residents. The leadership of the Ottoman Empire was afraid of the merging of Armenians with the allies, so they decided to deport the entire hated population between Eskisehir and Istanbul.
At the end of March, the "Special Organization" began to prepare the massacre of these people in Erzurum. She sent the most radical "Ittihat" emissaries to the provinces, who were supposed to carry out anti-Armenian agitation. Among them was Reshid Bey. It was he who, by extremely inhuman means, including detention and torture, looked for weapons in Diyarbakir, and then turned into one of the most unbridled killers.
The eviction of Armenians began on April 8 from the city of Zeytun, whose inhabitants enjoyed partial independence for centuries and were in confrontation with the Turkish authorities. Their expulsion provides an answer to the main question related to the timing of the preparation of the genocide. A small part of the Armenians was deported to the city of Konya, located not far from Iraq and Syria - places where the rest of the people were resettled a little later.
The murders were accompanied by a wave of robberies. Merchant Mehmet Ali testified that Azmi Cemal (Governor of Trebizond) and Asent Mustafa embezzled jewelry worth 400,000 gold Turkish pounds (approximately 1,500,000 US dollars). The US Consul in Aleppo reported to Washington that a monstrous plundering plan was in operation in the Ottoman Empire.
The consul in Trebizond reported that every day he saw how a horde of children and Turkish women followed the police and seized everything they could carry. He also said that the house of the commissioner "Ittihat" in Trebizond was littered with jewelry and gold obtained as a result of the division of the loot.
By the end of the summer of 1915, most of the Armenians who inhabited the empire were killed. The Ottoman authorities tried to hide this, but the refugees who reached Europe reported the extermination of their people. On April 27, 1915, the Armenian Catholicos called on Italy and the United States to intervene to stop the killings. The Armenian massacre was condemned by the allied powers, but in the conditions of war they could not help the long-suffering people in any way.
In England, after an official check, the documentary book “Attitude towards Armenians in the Ottoman Empire” was published, in the USA and Europe people began to raise funds for refugees. The liquidation of Armenians in western and central Anatolia continued after August 1915.
conspirators
We practically found out why the Turks killed Armenians. In Boston in 1919, at the IX Congress of the Dashnaktsutyun, it was decided to exterminate the leaders of the Young Turks who took part in the murders. The operation was named after the ancient Greek Nemesis. Most the conspirators were Armenians who managed to escape the genocide. They ardently desired to avenge the death of their families.
Operation Nemesis was quite effective. Its most famous victims were one of the members of the Turkish triumvirate Talaat Pasha and the Minister of the Interior of the Ottoman Empire. Talaat, along with the rest of the leaders of the Young Turks, fled to Germany in 1918, but was liquidated in Berlin by Tehlirian Soghomon in March 1921.
Legal side
The Ottoman Empire and the Republic of Armenia interested the whole world with their confrontation. The collective declaration of May 24, 1915 of the allied countries is proof of this.
The awareness of the genocide is the most important goal of the Armenian lobbying organizations, and, in addition to the recognition itself, the demand for the payment of reparations by Turkey and territorial claims were announced. To achieve acceptance, lobbyists involve influential people and parliamentarians, founded institutions dealing with this issue, put pressure on the leadership of different countries, and widely publicize this issue in society. Almost all members of the Armenian diaspora are direct descendants of the victims of the genocide. This organization has sufficient material resources with which it can withstand the pressure of Turkey.
America has adopted resolutions on the mass extermination of Armenians three times. This genocide is recognized by the European Parliament, the parliamentary coalition of South American countries, the UN Sub-Commission on the Protection and Prevention of Discrimination of Minorities, the Parliament of Latin America.
Recognition of the annihilation of the Armenian people is not a mandatory item for Turkey to join the EU, but some experts believe that it will have to fulfill this condition.
important date
The Day of Remembrance for the victims of the Armenian Genocide in Turkey was appointed on April 24 by the European Parliament in 2015. In Armenia, this date is a non-working day and has great importance. Every year, on the anniversary of the expulsion of the Armenian intelligentsia from Istanbul, millions of people around the world pay tribute to the memory of the dead people.
The Turkish Armenian Genocide of 1915, organized on the territory of the Ottoman Empire, was one of the most terrible events of that era. Members of the ethnic minority were deported, during which hundreds of thousands or even millions of people died (depending on estimates).
This campaign to exterminate Armenians is today recognized as genocide by most countries of the entire world community. Turkey itself does not agree with this wording.
Prerequisites
The massacres and deportations in the Ottoman Empire had different backgrounds and reasons. The Armenian Genocide of 1915 was due to the unequal position of the Armenians themselves and the ethnic Turkish majority of the country. The population was discredited not only by nationality, but also by religion. The Armenians were Christians and had their own independent church. The Turks were Sunnis.
The non-Muslim population had the status of a dhimmi. People who fell under this definition were not allowed to carry weapons and to appear in court as witnesses. They had to pay high taxes. Armenians for the most part lived in poverty. They were mainly engaged agriculture in their native lands. However, among the Turkish majority, the stereotype of a successful and cunning Armenian businessman was widespread, etc. Such labels only aggravated the hatred of the townsfolk towards this ethnic minority. These complex relationships can be compared to the widespread anti-Semitism in many countries of that time.
In the Caucasian provinces of the Ottoman Empire, the situation worsened also due to the fact that these lands, after the wars with Russia, were filled with Muslim refugees, who, due to their everyday disorder, constantly came into conflict with local Armenians. One way or another, but the Turkish society was in an excited state. It was ready to accept the forthcoming Armenian genocide (1915). The reasons for this tragedy were a deep split and hostility between the two peoples. All that was needed was a spark that would ignite a huge fire.
Organization of the deportation of Armenians
The disarmament of the Armenians made it possible to carry out a systematic campaign against the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire, which consisted in the general expulsion of Armenians into the desert, where they were doomed to death from bands of marauders or from hunger and thirst. The deportations were subjected to Armenians from almost all the main centers of the empire, and not only from the border regions affected by hostilities.
At first, the authorities gathered healthy men, declaring that the government, benevolent towards them, based on military necessity, was preparing the resettlement of Armenians in new homes. The collected men were imprisoned, and then taken out of the city to deserted places and destroyed using firearms and cold weapons. Then the old men, women and children gathered and were also informed that they were to be resettled. They were driven in columns under the escort of gendarmes. Those who could not keep going were killed; exceptions were not made even for pregnant women. The gendarmes chose as long routes as possible or forced people to walk back along the same route until the last person died of thirst or hunger.
The first phase of the deportation began with the deportation of the Armenians Zeytun and Dörtöl in early April 1915. On April 24, the Armenian elite of Istanbul was arrested and deported, and the Armenian population of Alexandretta and Adana were also deported. On May 9, the government of the Ottoman Empire decided to expel the Armenians of eastern Anatolia from their densely populated areas. Due to fears that the deported Armenians might cooperate with the Russian army, the deportation was to be carried out to the south, but in the chaos of the war, this order was not carried out. After the Van uprising, the fourth phase of deportations began, according to which all Armenians living in the border regions and Cilicia were to be deported.
On May 26, 1915, Talaat introduced the "Deportation Law", dedicated to the fight against those who opposed the government in peacetime. The law was approved by the Majlis on May 30, 1915. Although the Armenians were not mentioned there, it was clear that the law was written about them. On June 21, 1915, during the final act of deportation, Talaat ordered the deportation of "all Armenians without exception" who lived in ten provinces of the eastern region of the Ottoman Empire, with the exception of those who were deemed useful to the state.
The deportation was carried out according to three principles: 1) the "principle of ten percent", according to which Armenians should not exceed 10% of the Muslims in the region, 2) the number of houses of the deportees should not exceed fifty, 3) the deportees were forbidden to change their places of destination. Armenians were forbidden to open their own schools, Armenian villages had to be at least five hours away from each other. Despite the demand to deport all Armenians without exception, a significant part of the Armenian population of Istanbul and Edirne was not expelled for fear that foreign citizens would witness this process.
The Armenian population of Izmir was saved by the governor Rahmi Bey, who believed that the expulsion of Armenians would deal a mortal blow to trade in the city. On July 5, the deportation borders were once again expanded to include the western provinces (Ankara, Eskisehir, etc.), Kirkuk, Mosul, the Euphrates Valley, etc. actually meant the elimination of the problem of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire.
First deportations
In mid-March 1915, British-French forces attacked the Dardanelles. Preparations have begun in Istanbul for the transfer of the capital to Eskisehir and the evacuation of the local population. Fearing that the Armenians would join the allies, the government of the Ottoman Empire intended to carry out the deportation of the entire Armenian population between Istanbul and Eskisehir. At the same time, several meetings of the Ittihat Central Committee were held, at which the head of the "Special Organization" Behaeddin Shakir presented evidence of the activities of Armenian groups in eastern Anatolia. Shakir, who argued that the "internal enemy" is no less dangerous than the "external enemy", was given expanded powers.
In late March - early April, the "Special Organization" tried to organize the massacre of Armenians in Erzerum and sent the most radical Ittihat emissaries to the provinces for anti-Armenian agitation, including Reshid Bey (tur. Reşit Bey), who used extremely cruel methods, including arrests and torture , searched for weapons in Diyarbakir, and then became one of the most fanatical killers of Armenians. Taner Akcam expressed the version that the decision on the general deportation of Armenians was made in March, but the fact that the deportation from Istanbul was never carried out may mean that at that time the fate of the Armenians still depended on the further course of the war.
Despite the claims of the Young Turks that the deportations were a response to the disloyalty of the Armenians on the Eastern Front, the first deportations of Armenians were carried out under the leadership of Dzhemal not in neighboring eastern front areas, and from the center of Anatolia to Syria. After the defeat in the Egyptian campaign, he assessed the Armenian population of Zeytun and Dyortyol as potentially dangerous and decided to change the ethnic composition of the territory under his control in case of a possible advance of the allied powers, proposing for the first time the deportation of Armenians.
The deportation of Armenians began on April 8 from the city of Zeytun, whose population enjoyed partial independence for centuries and was in confrontation with the Turkish authorities. As a basis, information was given about the allegedly existing secret agreement between the Armenians of Zeytun and the Russian military headquarters, but the Armenians of Zeytun did not take any hostile actions.
Three thousand Turkish soldiers were brought into the city. Some of the young men of Zeytun, including several deserters who attacked the Turkish soldiers, fled to the Armenian monastery and organized a defense there, destroying, according to Armenian sources, 300 soldiers (Turkish indicate a major and eight soldiers) before the monastery was captured. According to the Armenian side, the attack on the soldiers was revenge for the obscene behavior of these soldiers in the Armenian villages. The majority of the Armenian population of Zeytun did not support the rebels, the leaders of the Armenian community urged the rebels to surrender and allowed the government troops to deal with them. However, only a small number of Ottoman officials were ready to recognize the loyalty of the Armenians, most were convinced that the Armenians of Zeytun were collaborating with the enemy.
Minister of the Interior Talaat expressed gratitude for the help of the Armenian population in the capture of deserters to the Armenian Patriarch of Constantinople, but in later reports he portrayed these events as part of an Armenian uprising in common with foreign powers - a point of view supported by Turkish historiography. Despite the fact that the main Armenian population did not support the resistance of the Ottoman army, they were nevertheless deported to Konya and the Der Zor desert, where later the Armenians were either killed or left to die from hunger and disease. Following Zeytun, the same fate befell the inhabitants of other cities of Cilicia. It should be noted that these deportations took place before the events in Van, which the Ottoman authorities used as a justification for the anti-Armenian campaign. The actions of the Ottoman government were clearly disproportionate, but they did not yet cover the entire territory of the empire.
The deportation of the Armenians of Zeytun clarifies an important issue related to the timing of the organization of the genocide. Some of the Armenians were deported to the city of Konya, which was far from Syria and Iraq - places where later, mainly, Armenians were deported. Dzhemal claimed that he personally chose Konya, not Mesopotamia, so as not to create obstacles for the transport of ammunition. However, after April and outside the jurisdiction of Dzhemal, some of the deported Armenians were sent to Konya, which may mean the existence of a deportation plan as early as April 1915.
Recognition of the Armenian Genocide
Today, Armenians remember those who died during the genocide on April 24, 1915, when several hundred Armenian intellectuals and professionals were arrested and executed, this was the beginning of the genocide.
In 1985, the United States named this day "National Day of Remembrance for Human Inhumanity to Man" in honor of all victims of the genocide, especially the one and a half million people of Armenian descent who were victims of the genocide committed in Turkey.
Today, the recognition of the Armenian genocide is a hot topic as Turkey criticizes scholars for punishing mortality and blaming Turks for the deaths, which the government says was due to starvation and the brutality of the war. In fact, speaking of the Armenian genocide in Turkey, it is punishable by law. As of 2014, 21 countries in total have publicly or legally recognized this ethnic cleansing in Armenia as genocide.
In 2014, on the eve of the 99th anniversary of the genocide, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan expressed condolences to the Armenian people and said:
"The cases of the First World War are our common pain."
However, many believe that the proposals are useless until Turkey recognizes the loss of 1.5 million people as genocide. In response to Erdogan's proposal, Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan said:
“The refusal to commit a crime is a direct continuation of this very crime. Only recognition and condemnation can prevent the recurrence of such crimes in the future.”
Ultimately, the recognition of this genocide is not only important for the elimination of the affected ethnic groups, but also for the development of Turkey as a democratic state. If the past is denied, genocide is still happening. In 2010, a Resolution of the Swedish Parliament stated that "genocide denial is widely recognized as the final stage of genocide, cementing the impunity of the perpetrators of genocide and clearly paving the way for future genocides."
Countries that do not recognize the Armenian Genocide
The countries that recognize the Armenian Genocide are the ones that officially accept the systematic massacres and forced deportations of Armenians carried out Ottoman Empire from 1915 to 1923.
Although historical and academic institutions for the study of the Holocaust and the genocide accept the Armenian genocide, many countries refuse to do so in order to maintain their political relations with the Republic of Turkey. Azerbaijan and Turkey are the only countries that refuse to recognize the Armenian Genocide and threaten those who do so with economic and diplomatic consequences.
The Armenian Genocide Memorial Complex was built in 1967 on Tsitsernakaberd Hill in Yerevan. The Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute, opened in 1995, presents facts about the horror of the massacres.
Turkey has been urged to recognize the Armenian genocide several times, but the sad fact is that the government denies the word "genocide" as an accurate term for the massacres.
