HITLER: WHO REMEMBERS ARMENIAN GENOCIDE?

[Twilight Bark]

No, it's the other way around. The idea of living space springs from a new, "romantic" view of past glories, and the newly developed "need" to re-capture the "purity" that was associated with those supposed "glories". The "living space" is completely meaningless without a newly developed, exclusivist self-view. "Armenians are Armenians, and Turks are Turks" becomes an issue only in the presence of the new ideology. They had been Armenians and Turks for centuries hence, but "living space" had never been an issue, until the new ideology made the presence of Armenians amongst them intolerable. Again, I am at a loss as to why you don't see the directionality of cause-and-effect here. The reason why a multi-ethnic state was discarded as an option by the Young Turks was precisely because of the new ideology. The Turkish "racism" is fundamentally different from the German one; it seeks to assimilate "lesser" elements into the identity that it wants to glorify. It subjugates other ancestries into the dominant "Turkish" one; basically saying "it is the only one that really counts" (that is why I prefer to call it "arrogance" rather than "racism"). Young Turks knew whom they could impose that charade, and who they couldn't. Armenians had to go. Again, in the German case, the Germans simply could not tolerate the Jews living amongst them. All of a sudden the Jews appeared too alien to tolerate. You feel like you can't breathe if you are stuck in a room with someone that you intensely hate. All of a sudden the room becomes "too small for the two us", not because it is really too small but because you cannot tolerate the other person.

 

Again, "living space" is a symptom, not a cause.

 

TB

 

[ March 27, 2002, 11:36 AM: Message edited by: Twilight Bark ]

[Guest Fadi]

"They had been Armenians and Turks for centuries hence, but "living space" had never been an issue, until the new ideology made the presence of Armenians amongst them intolerable."

 

TB, I do not see where you desagree with me... THATS EXACLLY WHAT I AM SAYING... The living space was the consequences of many facors and major central ones(The nationalisation for example), the impossibility of this nationalisation was directly linked with the Armenians, the Young-Turks at that time felt that the Armenian presence was the problem and made impossible their plan, these is cause and consequences... all my analyse on the subject is based on that, you are in fact the first person that is accusing me of not analysing the causes and consequences when I have been accused from the beggining of centering my opinion on it, and ignore the result.

 

I havnt said that the living space was existant before, it it would have been the cases, then other genocides could have happened before, it is when the Young-Turks realised that all Turkish ideals were impossible with the presence of the Armenians, the NEED of "air" apeared... and this is specifically the living space, the need to bread, the Armenians were like the opposition, the mass on their foot restrcuting them to walk correctly.

 

You say the exact same thing, then come here and desagree with me, to the point that I wonder if you just answer me for the plesure of desagreing with me. Do not take what I say wrong please, but I really fail to see where you desagree, you answer me and what you bring, is exacly what i am saying here.

 

But again, the Pan-Turanism could not have been one of the centrals of the genocide, central mean without it, the genocide could not have happened... without the Pan-Turanism, the genocide was possible and even expected... the Pan-Turanism served only as a plus for conquering other territories and killing other Armenians, but one main and real reason of the Armenian genocide was not Pan-Turanism.

 

[ March 27, 2002, 11:44 AM: Message edited by: Domino ]

[Guest Fadi]

"Again, "living space" is a symptom, not a cause."

 

Thats right, and it is specifically what I am saying.

[Twilight Bark]

I am saying that the new, pan-Turanic self-view, was the reason why they felt the way they did. Without it, they would not view the Armenians as alien, and the genocide would not occur. Stealing something is "beneficial" only if you steal it from "someone else"; as it would be silly to steal it from yourself or a member of your family. The reason why they stole the land and wealth from the Armenians was that the Armenians became "alien" in the new pan-Turanic self-view of the Young Turks. Before then, the Armenians were viewed as part of the "Ottoman family", however dysfunctional it may have been.

 

I agree that we are stating essentially the same facts, and yet at the very end of our arguments we are somehow coming to divergent conclusions. Strange.

[Guest Fadi]

TB... could you say that without the Pan-Turanism the genocide would not happen ? Really ? Here I am not talking about Pan-Turkism that is different then Pan-Turanism. The Pan-Turanism was not needed, Armenians were already considered as not like Muslim Turks, the prosperity was already a cause of hate against them, the young-Turk arrvived with some new plans, and above all their first aim was nationalisation, after the Balkan war two major milleties were left, the Armenians and the Arabs(the Kurds were not considered), Armenians being Christian and prosperous, every eyes were turned on them... and this had nothing to do with Pan-Turanism, The Turks felt they were not master of their own nation, here is the point, the nationalisation was impossible with the presence of the Armenians, Pan-Turanism died very early in the war, when the Turks were defeated at Russian front... it was then that the order of extermination has been given, it is similair to the NAZI order against the Jews after their failure in Soviet Campagn.

 

The Pan-Turanism ideal was not possible, the nationalisation could have been impossible without the presence of the Armenians, and they could not only take Armenian belongings, it is the Armenians themselves that were the problems, this may be Pan-Turkism, but had nothing to do with Pan-Turanism that is different, killing Armenians and taking their proterties, one would permit this nationalisation(pursued by the Kemalists later), and second, it will maintain it without the presence of the Armenians... Pan-Turanism happened early in the war and at the end of the war, not on the middle of the genocide where the majority of the Armenians died, so Pan-Turanism can not explain the genocide, because the Turks had many reason to hate the Armenians, and didn;t needed this Pan-Turanist ideal in order to take their decision, but on the other way the nationalisation was at the Hearth of the problem, it meant for the Turks, to be master of their own nation, and the presence of the Armenians was making that impossible.

 

Well, I have to let you now... have a course...

 

PS: funny to fight against an Armenian conserning the genocide, have never been habituated of this kind of conflict.

[Twilight Bark]

As I said earlier, we have differing definitions, and furthermore we assign different depth and breadth to those terms. I do not define pan-Turanism by its superficial manifestation of trying to actually conquer other Turkic lands and form a Turkic empire. I define it as the newly conjured up, romantic self-image of a Turkish identity distinct from the mixed, Ottoman identity. And without such a new consciousness the genocide would not occur. So I merge your "pan-Turkism" and "pan-Turanism" into one ideology. I define it as the hostile, exclusivist glorification of the Turkish element in the empire, fuelled by the romantic fantasies of Turan. We seem to have terminologies that are incompatible for a fruitful discussion. In any case, thanks for bearing with me.

[Boghos]

Dear Ali,

 

It seems to me that your case in what concerns the Genocide was based on the accpetance of it as a historical truth, but with mitigating circumstances, such as the "decisive" influence of German ideology on carrying it on. Not only that but going as far as stating that were not that to have happen, most likely the Genocide wouldn't have taken place and Armenians would have been living happily alongside Turks ever since. TB has done a good job in demistifying this theory, if we can call it that, so I won't go further than saying that this typically Middle Eastern sort of conspiracy theory mindset is removed from the truth. Believeing that the Ottoman Empire was an example of tolerance and respect for human and ethnic rights is akin to believeing that the Easter Bunny will be at your doorstep shortly.

 

Now you come up with a rehash of already tired nonsense such as "the Armenians were not loyal" (and the typical implication that they probably deserved their fate) and a new but completely groundless theory that oil had anything to do with the Genocide. Do you also believe that all the Balcan nations were very happy living under Ottoman yoke and were it not for Russia they would have remained under the Ottoman's magnaminous umbrella ?

 

Dear Ali, it is not only Turkey's recent record in human rights that is a disaster (you are still looking at the European Union through very powerful binoculars, I am afraid), it has been so from the very beginning.

[aurguplu]

 

[ March 28, 2002, 03:10 AM: Message edited by: aurguplu ]

[aurguplu]

tb,

 

you say it should not matter by whom they were inspired. by the same logic, usama bin ladin is irrelevant.

 

regards,

[Boghos]

Inspiration is irrelevant if it is taken as a determining factor. One thing is saying that Germany had a role, which is not under dispute whatsoever, the other is to use that as an explanation for what is essentially a domestically inspired, executed and even popular accepted state crime. There is no sense of shame or guilt in Turkey, as there is no shame or guilt towards Kurds or Alevis for that matter.

 

When talking about human rights I am not interested in comparing the Ottoman Empire to other cruel and imperialist endeavours, but rather saying that the tradition of Turkish cruelty and mistreatment of minorities has continued in the republic, it is just natural.

 

Turkey is not a victim of its geopolitical situation, but rather one of the very few winners. Just imagine what it would be without the almost non-stop support from the United States and all the multilateral organizations under its control. It probably would have disintegrated by now or in permanent civil war.

 

Now as to the national liberation struggle, you say:

 

1. have you read boghos noubar, or others, claming how they had sided with the allied powers since the beginning of the war, and that therefore they deserved a state of their own. or, more to the point perhaps, are you not aware of the activities of the armenian patriarchate that go back to 1878 (if i remember the date correctly). or, even more to the point, would you say that the ottoman armenians in the late 19th century - before the hamidian massacres - had not harboured ideas of independence and not taken some inspiration from the greek and other balkan struggles? was the concept of an independent armenia completely new to the armenians prior to the 1890s or 1915? were there no societies that promoted the idea, no written material printed by the patriarchate and distributed across anatolia, no maps in armenian showing a dismembered ottoman state and an independent armenia emerging out of it (i saw some of these myself)? please do not get me wrong. i do not "accuse" armenians of treason. you have every moral right to rebel against a government that is not legitimately yours and treating you in a horrible fashion. you cannot "accuse" a nation for wanting to be independent, but accusing the state that governs them to attempt to protect its very existence is also tricky: imagine that you are a white american citizen. you respect human rights and deplore the plight of the native americans. at that time, one indian nation forms about ten per cent of the total american population. they have managed to keep their ethnic identity, have not forgotten what the whites had done to them, they were sophisticated, and at that time america had grown weak and was attacked by enemies who promised these natives (and all other disaffected non-whites) their own piece under the sun. the natives are inspired by the dissolution of the soviet union and how their natives got their independence. so they form societies and secretly prepare for a rebellion to ultimately throw off the white yoke and get their land back. the move gets widespread to the point that something must be done about it, and remember, the usa is not any longer what is was decades ago.

 

you are the compassionate white american (preferably wasp) with power. what would you do, boghos?

 

you have a moral right to prepare for a fight, but wouldn't it be naive to expect that the state in question would not take any measures? do we see that in history? is that what the french, the british, the dutch, the germans, the spanish, the portuguese, the americans are recorded to have done with their subject peoples? to see them get organised for rebellion and watch with folded arms?

 

Yes, I am very familiar with all these. What's your point ? Have the Dutch, English, Portuguese, Spaniards and French deported a whole population from its historical lands and in the process killed hundreds of thousands of people, the Armenians have disappeared from Anatolia, have you forgotten that ?

 

As to the "oil" theory, I am not saying that it is new, but rather that you, with the appropriate use of a disclaimer have brought it to this forum. It is just irrelevant in what concerns the Genocide, but of course you or anybody else can claim otherwise.

 

There is very little else to be said about the Genocide. It is true that scholarship has improved markedly. Dadrian being, in my view, a major move forward. But the fact is that the objective truth had already been well established already. Genocide is genocide, all other aspects are merely icing on the cake.

[aurguplu]

dear boghos,

 

i think i am getting slightly misunderstood. i fear you are thinking that i) i am trying to find justifications for a genocide, and ii) i am trying to shift the burden of genocide from turkish shoulders onto german ones. both are incorrect, and i am sorry if i came across implying that sort of thing.

 

now re the points:

 

1. we all know how minorities are being treated in turkey, but we would be mistaken to conclude that this attitude is a continuation of the old ottoman habits merely because it is cruel. i would concede that the oppression of the alevis in turkey harks back to the times of yavuz sultan selim (reg. 1512-1520), but in the case of the kurds, it appears to be a typically western form of oppression, a kind of cultural genocide, of the type implemented by the english on the celts, the americans on the native americans, the russians on the non-russians, the chinese on the tibetan etc. this form of cultural genocide, where the target is not people in flesh and blood, but an identity, a culture, a way of life, appears to me to be a relatively recent (last 200 years) development from the west. the turks were not quite that sophisticated. what they wanted was obedience, they couldn't care less about the language you spoke, the god you worshipped (as long as you paid the cizye) and the name by which you called yourself. you see, the ottomans regarded it as only natural that a state was composed of different nations, and they even took great pride in that: after conquering istanbul, mehmed ii gave the local greeks to stay or leave (they could retain their customs and religion if they chose to stay), and when many chose to leave, the sultan brought greeks from sinope and had them settled in istanbul!). they did cherish variety, they made quite good use of it, and they were also proud that they ruled over so many different nations and called emperor in so many different languages. the republican turks, however, are afraid of the very existence of foreign elements in turkey lest they side with enemies of turke to break the country apart, so they try to assimilate them as much as they can. this is more compatible with the notion of a nation state and ethnic lines, as opposed to religious ones, dividing peoples, itself a european idea. so the oppression of the kurds (it is coming to an end now, hopefully). is a new type of phenomenon, it would be inaccurate to compare it to pre-abdulhamid type of oppression in turkey.

 

2. the british organised the irish famine in the 19th century, and the americans did deport the entire cherokee nation from northeastern usa to middle america, during which trail (the famous cherokee trail) the majority of the nation perished. they did that with a good many native maerican tribes, with the result that about three quarters of the native languages spoken in the americas at the time of contact have gone extinct. the american policy with the indians have become so "successful" that it is estimated that none (NONE) of the native languages (and hence, in the long run, identities) will survive yet another century. an entire branch of humanity is slated for extinction. the same holds true for the australian aborigines.

 

one of my english teachers was an irishman. this is what he told us about the disappearance of irish gaelic from ireland: "irish children were compelled to attend schools set up by the english, where any irish child who first spoke a word of gaelic during the day was given a belt to wear across his shoulder. the belt would then pass on to the second child who spoke a gaelic word, and so on until the end of the day. the last child to wear the belt would be flogged publicly in front of all the other children". he told us that in 1983, and he had seen it happening when he was a child.

 

boghos, i know that what happened to your nation was a shame on humanity's record, and especially my nation's record, but you are not the only ones who suffered it, and many people whom you expect to defend your position and rights are guilt of the same type of crimes. this is of course not a pretext for us going on the way we have, but everytime i see a european or american calling us barbarians because of it, i see a pot calling a kettle black.

 

cheers,

[Boghos]

I entirely agree that the Kurdish question is much more an issue of Ataturk´s ideology than anything else. The reference to the Ottomans is just that the tendency to solve things by the sword has remained.

 

Languages have disapeared all over the world, it is a result of what some people call "cultural genocide", but I find that quite extreme, languages will disappear, change, etc as a result of cultural imperialism, or in more neutral terms: the prevalence of a culture over another for whatever reason. All languages are full of Americanisms. Is that bad ? I don´t see why, it is foolish to fight against that. If states concentrated in giving proper education to their people, that would be enough, but you cannot stop the tide. Language is a living entity, not something confined to a glass redome. Naturally, the imposition of another language is quite different and you have mentioned the example of the Irish.

 

The Cherokee trail of tears: as unfortunate as it might have been it was not done with the same intention or cruelty as the Armenian Genocide. Look there were no Americans rejoicing while young Cherokee girls were made to dance naked while people abused them, there were no burnt churches with the faithful inside, there were no unthinkable rapes and other forms of terrible abuse against women and children, and the list goes on.

 

There has never been, by any colonial power or otherwise, an effort of the scale of the Armenian Genocide. The holocaust comes next. This is a fact. Colonial powers were often very cruel to their subject population, but they never tried to anihilate a population on the scale of the Armenian Genocide. This is your heritage, I am afraid, it is not shared by all the other European countries, or America, Canada, and even latin America. It is just not the same. Cruelty is an integral part of history, but some nations are especially good at it.

 

[ March 28, 2002, 06:49 AM: Message edited by: Boghos ]

[Guest Fadi]

Ali, sorry can not answer you know, its not because what you bring is not important, to the contrary, but I am working specifically on that now with some new findings I made, I agree and desagree with you on the same time, one day you will find on the web, specially what you just brough, can't tell you more about this sorry.

[aurguplu]

[Boghos]

Literature is one thing, state sponsored genocide is another. Peoples of the world share many similarities and a few dissimilarities.

 

I maintain that Turks have a special place on the Pantheon of atrocities. I do not deny all the other atrocities commited by other people, even against its own people, like the terrible situation of North Korea. But what the Turks did is only at par with what the Holocaust.

 

As to the Christian crimes against Muslims, I never denied or diminished their importance. But don´t forget that the Turks and hence the muslims were never gracious guests in those parts of the world.

 

The fact is that the Turks are essentially a warrior nation, up to this day ruled by military, and hence what they brought to the world was either the wealth of the conquered people or imperialism of a miltary nature.

 

Don´t be ridiculous comparing the Cherokee experience with the Armenian Genocide. Or misquoting me.

 

I sense in your comments a guarded hostility towards Armenians that reappears over and over on this "you are not the only victims, blah, blah, blah". If this is what you have to say about the Genocide your message has come across. so rest your case. In the meantime try to sound less like an omniscient. Yor bluffs have been unmasked several times.

 

[ March 28, 2002, 11:25 AM: Message edited by: Boghos ]

[Guest Fadi]

Ali, Boghos has a point...

 

In fact, the Armenian massacres were very different then any massacres that happened before or during that period.

 

One of the main difference is the destruction of the circulation permits, we can find these references still from the Turkish foreign affairs official archival releases. The Armenians had no right to leave the Ottoman, had no right to go other places then where they were sent, because their circulation right has been taken away. While the Muslim in the Balkans and the Muslims in the Russian empire were killed and expulsed, they were pulled off from these respectif frontiers... it was not the case with the Armenians, and that makes the Armenian case so unique, because this action prove without dough that there was a genocidal policy, it could only be compared with the anti-Imigration plan in NAZI Germany destinated to Isolate the Jews, by removing their right to circulate and leave the country, or the borders controled by the NAZI.

 

The Armenians were sent in the desert, and other area's, and had no right to leave these places, then food and water supply was blocked to them, foreign help was blocked, by admitting that they wish nothing to be done that could prolong their lives... only this alone is enough prove of the extermination policy, it was unique of its kind, the extermination of the children, by fatal injection, mass drowning are well documentated cases of mass killing, the extermination of the orphans and the forced assimilation of the other part of them that are "too young to remember" are unique for the Armenian cases.

 

Many hundreds of thousands of Muslims died and were killed in the Balkans and Russian empire, you have a point, but here again, these people were deported on the exterior, while the deportation of the Armenians was done on the interior, by isolating them.

 

Now what I can ask you is to go at the Turkish official foreign ministry site and read the manipulated archives, all of them, and read them carefully, even if many part are hidding or many others are manipulated, some of these archives that the Turkish republic didn;t found anyhing interesting to destroy them, proves that there is something wrong in them, if you read them carefully you will find it, go and read please Ali, at least one time, and tell me what is wrong... here is where you will find the difference between any crimes of that period, something that the Turkish republic was not able to understand in order to destroy them.

 

Regards

 

[ March 28, 2002, 08:29 AM: Message edited by: Domino ]

[Twilight Bark]

Guilt is not a "limited resource". In other words, if there is someone that inspired, aided, or facilitated a crime, that someone has commited a crime in addition to the crime being discussed.

Bin Laden is irrelevant in determining the guilt (or extent thereof) of the killers. A terrorist cannot say in court "but he inspired me; so that's 10 years off my sentence, and 10 years added to his". The terrorist is fully responsible for his crime.

[aurguplu]

dear tb, dear Domino,

 

in the above discussion, several key issues are being overlooked as far as i can see:

 

1. russia. the ottoman turks were very wary of the danger that russia posed. it was known from before that the russians wanted to descend to the warmer seas (the mediterranean), and the only realistic way they could do this was through the ottoman empire. their agitation of the balkan minorities to the west, most of whom, with the exception of the albanians and the greeks, were slavic, and the armenians to the east, can - and was - seen as a two-pronged move to provide russia with direct access to the mediterranean. in the balkans, all major non-muslim communities (with the notable exception of thessaloniki jews) were orthodox christians, so were many of the armenians in the east. now it is very easy, once you get the armenian highlands in eastern anatolia, to sweep across the cilician plain, which had a substantial armenian population anyway, and wash your boots in the mediterranean. the turks were - and still are - aware of this, and therefore that territory was vital, and the armenians prior to the genocide and even prior to the hamidian massacres of the 1890s, had formed revolutionary committees, which are known to have been at some relation to the patriarchate in istanbul (to the best of my knowledge the armenians themselves do not deny this), and therefore they could not be trusted, at least in the eyes of the young turks. now of course how much weight these committees carried with the armenian public in general, and how much unity of purpose and action they showed are of course matters of debate (which i shall not engage in due to my lack of expertise), but that these trends existed and were a source of grave concern for the ottoman administration is a settled fact. this appears to me to have been one of the main reasons why the eastern territories were vital and why the armenians could not be trusted neighbours.

 

2. oil: armenia lies northwest of azerbaijan and iran, and north of present-day iraq (roughly), both known oil-producing regions at the time. everybody wanted these places for the oil. the armenians stood in the way of germans, russians, and the british as a small but capable nation with unreliable loyalties. you needed a pretext to get rid of the turk in these regions, and what better pretext than to create the conditions which would lead the barbaric muslim to do away with a captive christian nation (the first to accept christianity, on top of it all) in the (relative) proximity of the holy land? that would immediately turn turkey into an international pariah and would provide tremendous popular support to "throw the turk bag and baggage out of europe (gladstone)".

 

i do not claim that the above is the truth, the only truth, and nothing but the truth, but i think it should be taken into account. i shall address a few other points in forthcoming posts.

 

cheers,

[Guest Fadi]

TB, you touched the hearth of the problem I think, justifications accusing others and saying that they have been inspired by him or them etc... is irrelevant, and many denialists do this, by accusing what happened on some sort of inspiration of the French revolution, Pan-Germanism, or even more Pan-Slavism etc... all this is irrelevent, it is not because a sick watch a film on TV and on the film someone kill his wife, that this will justify that the sick watching the film was inspired and killed his wife... could this be used on court ? Of course not... There is some other denialists that find theories such as Pan-Armenism, or the "Greater Armenia" and allege that Turks have been inspired by this, you imagine, the Young-Turks exterminating the people that they say having been inspired to commit this act...

 

Well I will not continue and enter in some vague subject, in order to not risk a divergence with you

 

[ March 28, 2002, 03:29 PM: Message edited by: Domino ]

[sen_Vahan]

Ali,

 

"this is my heritage, i am afraid, and i have to learn to live with it, and yes, it is shared by many

countries: germany (as we have seen), sweden (eugenics programmes in force until the 1970s - can you imagine?) france (algeria) china (tibet, sinkiang), russia (the list is too long) england, usa,australia."

 

Germany, sweden, Russia,..... All that cases are very different and the comparison is irrelevant and I do not see why one should compare. did Algerians disappear from their homeland? Russia with the long list (?) - would you please give an example that could be in comparison with armenian case (done by russians). Tibet? They still "fight" for the independence which means there are people that could do that.

 

" too bad. note that i am not trying to deny the fact that we have that heritage, nor am i trying to "justify" or "mitigate" it in any way, i myself would be the first to oppose that (in fact i am doing this over here)."

 

Thank you, Ali.

 

but to be portrayed as the embodiment of all evil as if we were the only, or the greatest, evil on earth, and especially by evils in no way smaller and possibly much greater than ourselves, no, i cannot accept that, i am sorry.

 

Some armenians think about turks in that way, as well as some jews think about germans. But if one considers the armenian case to be special it deos not mean turks are of "special evil".

 

Vahan

[aurguplu]

tb you misunderstood me.

 

of course i am not saying that the terrorist is not fully responsible (or more accurately, that he has a right to a lesser sentence because he was inspired by someone else) for his crime: after all, all mentally normal free persons have independent judgement, they can judge the morality, outcome, and consequences of their actions. this is the case with the young turk government. the entire world might have conspired to kill the armenians, but that doesn't lessen turkish culpability. but turks were not the only ones, as is becoming clearer now. i am no legal expert, but as far i i know, in a case of gang rape, the sentence is not divided by the number of the assailants, is it?

 

the relevance of the source of inspiration is important for us if we want to understand the whys and hows of the genocide in addition to condemning it. condemning is right, but it is easy once you have the facts in front of you and a sincere conscience. it is the understanding part that is difficult: it is more akin to an investigation. and to any criminal inspector, the source of inspiration is important because it can lead to further clues regarding the case. consider a street shootout between two drug-pushing gangs with casualties. if you stop your investigation at the trigger-pullers, you will not have gotten to the root of the problem, i.e. the drug barons. what you have to do is carry it on till you get to the source of it. this is what i was trying to say, because i believe the main point in studying a genocide would be to find ways of prevention for possible future genocides. if we don't do that, we will just have condemned one criminal, and waiting for the next with folded arms.

 

i hope this clarifies a bit.

 

cheers,

[aurguplu]

Domino

 

we must observe the important distinction between explanation and justification. i am trying to explain (or rather understand), not justify. if i were the type of person who would attempt to justify a genocide i would not have been in this forum. what would i be saying to you guys? "we killed you alright, but we were right in doing so, you had deserved it blah blah blah?"

 

no. but there are facts that must be taken into account and given due weight in the discussion of the subject if we want to understand it, and not merely condemn it. it is true that some denialist or apologist is going to use the said facts to prove his point, but as we all know that the genocide did indeed happen, and that it is wrong to kill innocent people for whatever reason (i am against killing people altogether, but there seems to be no consensus in the world on that yet), what he says will say more about him than the genocide.

 

that certain facts do not fully support our version of the events should not make us ingore, or worse still, deny them. that would put us on the same level as the denialists or apologists.

 

cheers,

[Boghos]

Dear Ali,

 

You imply that I portray the Armenian Genocide as a crime of larger importance than all other atrocities because of my emotional attachment or lack of objectivity. Nothing could be farther from the truth. It is exactly the opposite. The analysis of countless other episodes in history has convinced me of what I wrote and maintain: that Turks have a special place in the pantheon of atrocities in history. In practical terms it doesn't change anything, it is simply recognizing history.

 

I did not grow up brainwashed by a weak state. In my family there was never mention of the Turks or Turkey in derogatory terms. I have no anti-Turkey bias. I have never felt the prejudice that Turks feel in Europe. I can understand your defensive posture and even your anti-European Middle Eastern stand. I just think that you are wrong in the way you analyze the Genocide. And that indeed you have spoken about several subjects that you seem to understand little about. I have seen that in other threads but I could mention, for example, your comment about the Jews in Germany not feeling attached to the land.

 

I think ad hominem attacks are of course ridiculous. And I have had my share of them. I do not want this to evolve into a shouting match. Absolutely not. Nor do I want to convince you of my point of view, since I see that your answers most often distort what I write rather than focusing on its essence.

 

Dear Ali, I very much welcome your presence here, a fellow UWC graduate of all things. Please understand that for me the Genocide is much more a Turkish problem than an Armenian one.

 

Cheers,

 

Boghos

 

[ March 29, 2002, 03:23 AM: Message edited by: Boghos ]

[aurguplu]

dear boghos,

 

i was not implying lack of objectivity on your part, i simply thought - sincerely - that you had a special "attachment" to the armenian genocide because you are an armenian yourself. i do not think that there is anything wrong with that, by the way, who could accuse you of anything for having a special stance about things that happened to your own people? but you say that in your judgement no emotion is involved, o.k. i take your word for it.

 

what i disagree with is the special place in the pantheon of atrocities you give my nation to. that we have a place, and probably a distinguished place, in that pantheon i do not doubt (if i did i would not be here). but if we have that special place, then the germans, the americans, the british, the spanish and the portuguese occupy equally special places in my opinion and i do cling to that opinion of mine. i have also read countless other atrocities, including ours (the armenian one is not the only one) and that reading gave me the conviction that we are not alone. please bear in mind that this "we are not alone" is not a mitigating factor, nor do i intend to use it that way: hitler was not alone, there was stalin, but that does not make him any less evil. the mongols and turks had attila the hun, genghis khan and tamerlane, amongst others, the spanish the inquisition and the conquistadores (pissarro and cortes, then diego de landa who destroyed the entire pre-columbian mayan literary heritage in a single bonfire), the americans had slave trade and the plight of the natives, the aussie the plight of the aborigines, and institutionalised racism is the collective guilt of "civilised" europe, from which the middle east can largely be claimed to have been free. we did not treat people according to the colour of their skin. we did not wonder for two hundred years whether other races were quite as human as we were. it did not take us years to realise that "the natives had souls that could be saved (catholic church). there were no cases of african pygmies being exhibited in cages in zoos because we thought they were a species of animal (the pygmy in question spoke passable english)(this in an american zoo in the 19th century). these are western crimes. we didn't have those. we had others. ours are huge, and many other crimes pale in comparison with ours, but some don't. the above is a small sample of those that don't. this

is why i reject the notion that we have a "special" place in the history of atrocities.

 

i am not quite sure that my posture regarding the genocide can be called defensive. this for the following reasons:

 

i. i accept that what transpired was a genocide.

ii. i take no justification or defense for a genocide. there cannot be a legitimate reason to kill an entire nation. period.

iii. i accept that it was us who carried it out. this is important because some of those (apologists) who recognise the genocide - or, rather the killings themselves - try to shift at least some of the blame on the shoulders of the kurds because they were the ones who actually carried out the butchery. no. we are squarely to blame. but we were not the only ones. talat and enver deserve the highest possible punishment for what they did, but they were not the only ones who did. what about wangenheim? what about those german officers who assisted the turks in i) concealing it, and ii) in actually carrying it out? and if we deserve a trial (we do) we can at least get a fair one where all the suspects are lined up. this is only now taking place with the german archives being opened.

 

as for my anti-european stance, i have been educated at european schools, studied the middle east in europe, lived both in turkey, in europe, and in the middle east, enjoy, cherish and respect certain elements in both cultures, and resent, abhor and despise others, again in both cultures. i try to keep an even balance to the best of my ability. i am not an advocate of the middle east, nor - and i think that is more to the point - that of europe, i try to point out the rights and wrongs of both.

 

i may have spoken about certain subjects beyond my current level of expertise, i concede. it is not something that i defend, and if you recall, i had actually taken back some statements i had made re that subject and others, when i was convinced that the explanation provided by the others was more convincing.

 

i was in no way intending to distort your posts to "prove" a certain point, in fact i was trying to get to the essence. i may have misunderstood you, but if this was the case, then it wasn't intentional. i took to mean that the essence of your last few posts was that the turks had a special place in the pantheon of atrocities, that there was something about the armenian genocide that set it apart from all other disasters like the ones i mentioned above save the holocaust, and even in the case of the holocaust, it was inspired by the armenian genocide (this last i agree with in fact). this is what i disagreed with, wit no intention to mitigate our crime: we have the genocide ok, but we have no institutionalised racism. no nation, however small, got totally extinct because of us. we never doubted that other humans were just as human as us. we hated, we tortured, we killed our enemies, but we never doubted they were people like us. i think the inability - or reluctance - of the europeans to recognise other members of their own species is the epitomy of all human crimes (and incidentally, the armenian genocide was perpetrated not by the islamic-oriented clergy but by the western-trained military and bureaucracy. the clergy tried to stop it several times, and in some small cases, they succeded). ours is of an order of magnitude just a notch (not more) below that. we knew you were people like us, and we knew that we were killing our fellow men. the europeans failed to see their fellow men in men of colour. that is the difference, and no amount of explantaion can convince me that it isn't the most significant one.

 

dear boghos, i enjoy being here as mch as you enjoy having me here. we are of course going to have our differences of opinion and sometimes hot debates about them, but as long as the intentions are good, it will be all right.

 

cheers,

[Boghos]

As you said, we see many things in the very same or similar light. Please accpet my apologies if I ever went overboard.

 

I do believe that the Armenian Genocide has some singular characteristics. It doesn't make it more "important" than others. To be quite frank, in what concerns me everything has already been said about the Genocide. I am not interested in the minute details or in who were the accessories to the crime. The verdict is obvious.

 

My interests reside in the policies of the Republic of Armenia going forward and the related complexity of interaction among the various assymetric players. The Genocide and all its implications are but a part of this issue.

 

Best regards,

 

Boghos