'the Daily Texan' Editorial: The Forgotten Holocaust

[Zartonk]

The following is the 4/27 editorial of the University of Texas student paper, The Daily Texan. It is a concise, coherent, sharp and BITING commentary corroborating the authenticity of the Genocide and confronting denialist activity, particularly present on the UT campus through the Turkish student organization.

 

This article can be found on the Daily Texan website and is open to public opinion.

 

Turkish students have already begun opposing the validity of the case by attacking the article with the familiar deficiency of argument. The Armenian students of the university are doing their part to support the editorial and preserve the historic honesty of the matter.

 

I have been asked on their behalf to inform everyone here to help out the Armenian student body by providing as many intelligent, credible and dispassionate responses as possible. So PLEASE visit the link and assist the cause by countering the denialist backlash.

 

Help them help the truth.

 

Thanks in advance

 

Zartonk

 

 

Much lies hidden in the hills of Turkey. Buried beneath them, the bones of countless thousands of Armenians bear silent witness to a mass murder considered one of the greatest atrocities in a century stained with blood. Yet, even as remains from mass graves continue to be exhumed, there are still many - including some students on this campus - who continue to deny the scope of these massacres, refusing to call them by the only appropriate name: genocide.

 

The Armenian Genocide, or the Armenian "Tragedy" as it is euphemistically called, began in 1915, as the Ottoman Empire was fighting off an invasion from Russia during World War I. Burgeoning Armenian nationalism caused uprisings at the Armenian-controlled city of Van and elsewhere, where some Armenians joined invading Russian forces. Fearing a nationwide revolt, the Committee for Union and Progress ­- the ultra-nationalist wing of the ruling Young Turk Party - began liquidating the leadership of the Armenian resistance movement through imprisonment and executions.

 

Almost immediately afterward, the CUP party started "relocating" Armenians, citing a security threat from the minority group. Many argue the relocation was a legitimate measure, the unintended consequences of which were massacres of Armenians by groups of Kurdish and Muslim "bandits." The killing of anywhere between 800,000 and 1 million Armenians was a "tragedy" rather than a "genocide," because it wasn't the Ottoman government's intention to exterminate the Armenians, or so the argument goes.

 

Those who refute the genocide allegation point to the original government decree, which calls for the protection of Armenian relocation convoys, and the provision of food and supplies for Armenians. However, there is a mountain of evidence to the contrary, showing that killings did, in fact, have government support. Authenticated documents from a war crimes tribunal following the war, at which top CUP members were convicted and sentenced to death in absentia, show high levels of government involvement.

 

CUP leader Ismali Enver ***** organized the Teshkilâti Mahsusa, meaning "Special Organization," which recruited bands known as "chetas" composed of Turkish refugees, violent criminals released from prison and Kurds to carry out massacres. The brutality of their methods was matched only by their efficiency. In some cases, men, women and children were bound together in a river, where one person was shot, dragging the rest down, drowning them. Other methods included herding Armenians into a cave and lighting a fire at the entrance, suffocating those inside - a primitive gas chamber.

 

Far from providing for Armenians, as the relocation decree dictated, the deportations were a death march. In addition to the thousands who died from the direct slaughter of Turkish troops and their civilian accomplices, many thousand more died of starvation.

 

U.S. Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire Henry Morgenthau said of his meeting with a CUP member, "He made no secret of the fact that the government had instigated [the massacres]. Each new method of inflicting pain was hailed as a splendid discovery ... They even delved into the records of the Spanish Inquisition and other historic institutions of torture and adopted all the suggestions found there."

 

Despite all of this, some in the Turkish University Students Association continue to push the claim that while the killings did happen, they were an unfortunate "tragedy" of a communal civil war, where both sides committed massacres. The group will be showing a video called "Sari Gelin," which attempts to debunk the Armenian Genocide "myth." It is fuzzy moral math to excuse the mass extermination of Armenians as a response to isolated Armenian massacres.

 

It's time for Turkey and the Turkish University Students Association to own up to the crimes of Turkey's past. Why is it important to remember the Armenian Genocide? Adolf Hitler's remarks in response to a question about the international community's reaction to a possible invasion of Poland gives a good enough reason: "Who, after all, remembers the annihilation of the Armenians?"

[Armenak]

The Turks are on their campaign of disinformation once again. Look at the comments section. Funny part is that I expected it before scrolling down.

[DominO123]

Those guys are funny, both the Armenians and Turks. Lemme see if it is worth answering Zartonk.

[DominO123]

I subitted this, but I don't see my post yet.

 

 

 

Great article but not complete. For example it might be worth mentioning that mass graves in Turkey of Armenian victims are desecrated and replaced with mud after that the bones are removed. Professor David Gaunt (Turkish Daily News, Friday, April 27, 2007) had reported recently the desecration of a mass grave near Mardin. Interesting to note that the Ottoman archives released under the Turkish Republic Prime Ministry General Directorate of State archives contain one document (archive number BOA. DH. SFR, nr. 54/406) record the mass killing of 700 people on the same place. But the mass grave was desecrated under Halacoglu directives attempting to erase history. The desecration of the mass graves has been recorded for decades. First the New York Times, on December 1924 reported about the story about (New York Times, December, 1924, pg. 3, column 2) Kemalist Turkey attempting to export by cargo 400 tones of bones from the victims of the massacres to the manufacturers probably claiming them to be animal bones (animal bones were used to make glue) loaded at Mudania on the Sea of Marmora. One could keep wondering why for decades they have tried getting rid of the mass graves or when they could not, claiming them to be Turkish mass graves allegedly massacred by Armenians (mysteriously always on the same spot as where there was recorded Armenian mass graves, such as the one reported by Consul Leslie Davis in Harput).

 

 

[Armenak]

I see it.

[Zartonk]

They have no argument. My only aim is to assist the students in making sure denialist voice doesn't gain power on campus. You have to remember the oblivious youth.

[Nikephoros_Phokas]

The Turkish kanums placed upon history are specifically crafted to sound reasonable to historical ignorants. So you cannot compete with the deluge of Turkish kanum state backed history until you actually start reading some of the serious studies on the Armenian genocide written by non-kanum backed historians. Until then any Armenian arguing with a Turk is competing in a battle of the historic ignorants which Turks will win.

 

A Greek language Armenian magazine interviewed Dadrian once during May-July of 2002:

Βαχάκν Νταντριάν: "Ο άγγλος εκδότης μου είπε ότι ένα τέτοιο βιβλίο, πανεπιστημιακού επιπέδου, αν πουλούσε 1000 αντίτυπα θα το θεωρούσαν μεγάλη επιτυχία. Ήδη κυκλοφορεί η τέταρτη έκδοσή του και μέχρι σήμερα έχουν πουληθεί πάνω από 5000 αντίτυπα."

 

Vahakn Dadrian: My English publisher said that such a book, research quality, if it sells 1000 copies consider it a big success. Already the fourth publication [of the History of the Armenian Genocide] circulates and up to today it has sold over 5000 copies.

 

Anyway I posted a reply without even reading the article using my growing anti-Turkish archives. After that reply I read the article and was shocked at how bad it was. If you are not interested enough to go to the local library beforehand to do some research, why bother? Back to that Dadrian interview I posted a small excerpt of; that book was first published in 1995 and the interview was conducted 2002 and in that time only some 5000 copies were sold. If it sold some 500,000 copies and much more diaspora Armenians had read it most Turks would just shut their mouths on the internet about the Armenian genocide, because they would be scared to hurt Turkey's public image by making lies that are so easy to counter with compelling evidence.

 

Information on the nation's fifth largest academic library, containing over 8 million volumes.

from the University of Texas Libraries Homepage. When someone has such a resource so near to them there is no excuse for the Armenians posting there. You cannot just expect to counter the Turkish official history without ever accessing that library.

Edited April 30, 2007 by Nikephoros_Phokas

[Zartonk]

Point valid enough NP, but notwithstanding the actual elementary credibility of the piece, are you suggesting that mere access to voluminous resources is ample enough to silence denialist misinformation? Do you really think the average stranger cares to research the topic, or any topic? Too many are persuaded by well-advertised word of mouth rather than data and evidence. Everyone knows of heap of evidence against the Turkish position, yet the Turks EASILY sell their side to naive youngsters- and I speak from observation.

[Nikephoros_Phokas]

The same way that animals are ontologized:

Insect, Reptile, Bird, Amphibian

 

So too can Turks!:

 

Fanatic but kind of honest = Karabekir

dishonest, cunning, pretends to be tolerant at times that it suits him = Mustafa Kemal

 

You run into Turks on the internet sometimes that do not deny the Armenian genocide and instead brag for it. You run into Turks on the internet that are thoroughly dishonest, in front of Americans they say what they think they want to hear, in front of Armenians they say another thing, to other Turks they say another.

 

Anyway whichever Armenian wrote that piece was all over the place. What I would have done is take out from the library a well researched work like that of Dadrian or Akcam and used it to present in a few words some of the various compelling Turkish sources that verify the Armenian genocide. I mean you can never stop the dishonest but pretending to be tolerant ontology of Turks, but you can make things hard for them if you just know where to look.