0001) Armenian Falsified Genocide - Introduction

For many years in American media, the Indian was portrayed as the savage "bad guy." Certainly, native Americans hardly had anyone speaking on their behalf, and it was natural for the public to unquestioningly accept a one-sided version of events. Finally, as the indisputable truth became reported more and more (especially following the1960s publication of Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee), the real version of this historical conflict became widely accepted. Ironically, the formerly accepted "good guy" side was revealed to have been the actual dishonorable ones (having broken every treaty) and the ones significantly engaged in heartless slaughters, coupled with, at times, campaigns of systematic extermination.

For nearly a century, the Western World has wholeheartedly accepted that there has been an attempt by the Ottoman Turks to systematically destroy the Armenian people, comparable to what the Nazis committed upon the Jews during World War II. Many Armenians who have settled in America, Europe and Australia (along with other parts of the world, known as "The Armenian Diaspora") have clung to the tragic events of so long ago as a form of ethnic identity, and have considered it their duty to perpetuate this myth, with little regard for facts... at the same time breeding hatred among their young. As descendants of the merchant class from the Ottoman Empire, Armenians have been successful in acquiring the wealth and power to make their voices heard... and they have made good use of the "Christian" connection to gain the sympathies of Westerners who share their religion and prejudices.

Turks characteristically shun propaganda, and have chosen not to dwell on the tragedies of the past, forging ahead to build upon brotherhood — not hate. This is why the horrifying massacres committed upon the Turks, Kurds and other Ottoman Muslims by Armenians have seldom been heard. When such reports are heard, Westerners can be callously dismissive... Turkish lives are apparently as meaningless to them as Indian lives were to most early Americans.

(The following is an excerpt from Dr. Leon Picon, reviewing the book, "THE ARMENIAN FILE"):

How successfully the Turks could have warded off the resultant stigma through counter-propaganda will never be known. But it is certain that in 1922 Sultan Mohammed Vl put it quite succinctly and pointedly, when he told the American writer E. Alexander Powell:

“If we sent one, your newspapers and periodicals would not publish an article written by a Turk, if they published it, your people would not read it, if they read it, they would not believe it. Even if we sent a qualified person to America, to convey to you in your language, the Turkish point of view, would he find an impartial audience?� [Gurun, File, p. 37]

It's amazing that whenever the "Armenian Genocide" is referred to in Western media, journalists seem to fall all over themselves in presenting the perspective totally from the Armenian propaganda machinery. Whenever there is an attempt to present "the other side," the passage is usually preceded by "The Turkish Government claims..." Keeping in mind we all know how dishonest spokespeople from any government can be. (And reinforcing the erroneous view that only the Turkish Government objects to the Armenian version of history.)

"A lie travels round the world while Truth is putting on her boots" (Used by C.H. Sturgeon, famed English preacher of the 19th century)

No person of Turkish heritage would accept what the Turkish Government has to say about this issue, as the final word. Just like no person of Armenian heritage should care about what the Armenian side has to say. What every person needs to do is look at the facts. If there were REAL proof of government- sponsored evil planned against the Armenians, a people who peacefully lived with and prospered beside the Turks for over five centuries, it would be Turks crying out against such horrors before most everyone else... one's humanity and integrity should ideally supersede loyalty to one's ethnic tribe.

What Dr. Joseph Goebbels, Nazi Minister of Propaganda, swore by is unfortunately very true: If you tell a lie... especially a big lie... enough times, people will believe it. The often told "Armenian Genocide" tale... a tale told hardly with any opposition in nations sympathetic to the "Christian" Armenians... has been so ingrained within people's belief systems that any attempt to shed light on the actual truth is often violently rejected. Why, everyone knows those Turks were bloodthirsty savages!


"Give a lie twenty-four hours start, and it will take a hundred years to overtake it." (C.F. Dixon-Johnson, British author of the 1916 book, "The Armenians," appalled over the deceitful practices of his book's subject.)


This web site will present evidence — mostly from Western sources (not easy to supply, as few Westerners cared about seeking out the truth back then... a situation which has barely improved with the passage of the years) — in as impartial a way as possible*, so that visitors can make up their own minds. (Assuming, of course, that the visitor is not beyond hope and not totally brainwashed, like most Armenians... everything is a "lie" with them, no matter what the source.) Was there an Armenian Genocide? None of us who are rational and reasonable can say with absolute certainty. However, all we can rely on are cold, hard FACTS. Certainly, Armenians got killed as a result of massacres... often by their Muslim neighbors, in reprisal for the murderous acts committed by the Armenians (when they sided with the Russian enemy in hopes of carving out their own independence); but anybody who calls acts of massacres a "genocide" doesn't know the meaning of the word. (At least the way most of us perceive the meaning, as with what Hitler did to the Jews; the legal definition of genocide is essentially meaningless, and can be applied to almost any conflict.) If a genocide is how you like to describe what happened to the Armenians, then you need to refer to what American soldiers committed in My Lai as a "genocide."

Ironically, if anyone acted genocidally, with the intention of systematically wiping out people because of their ethnic or religious identity, it was the people who are traditionally accepted as the victims of this conflict. Another irony is that while Armenians have been doing their utmost to portray Turks as Nazis (in an effort to equate themselves with Holocaust victims, the one group best known to have fallen prey to genocide), Turks did their best to save Jews during World War II... while Armenians actively supported the Nazi cause.

Since the Turkish perspective is attempting to undo nearly ninety years (and well beyond) of the unopposed one-sided view that has permeated Western minds, also having to contend with charges of "revisionism" and "denial"... defensiveness unfairly becomes part of the picture. While the aim of this site is to present mostly impartial views to get people to question what they have unthinkingly accepted, what this entails is that the Turks are put in the uncomfortable position of having to prove a negative — a difficult, if not impossible task... on the order of attempting to prove God does not exist. The issues are whether there was a state directed policy of extermination (that is, genocide... with the provision that there must be intent — backed up by tangible, no-buts-about-it evidence — as defined by the 1948 United Nations rule... and also whether Armenians constituted a political group, unprotected by another article from the U.N. Convention on Genocide)... and whether the Armenians and other minorities were the sole victims of massacres.

"(This) one-sided and unreliable information (about any people) after a long period of unchallenged time, would create hostility and hatred that would not be easily overcome.� (Cyrus Hamlin, co-founder of the American missionary college in Istanbul [Robert College], opining on anti-Turkish propaganda, late 19th-Century.)

If anyone is familiar with the 1957 movie "Twelve Angry Men" (based on a television play, starring Henry Fonda and Lee J. Cobb... later remade with Jack Lemmon and George C. Scott)... you might remember how eleven jurors accepted at the outset the "obvious" guilt of the young man on trial, perpetuated by the race of the accused. The message of the film was that things are not always what they seem... and the Henry Fonda character, through logic and facts, turned around the opinions of each of his co-jurors. Quite a task lay before him, since the other co-jurors were motivated by other factors instead of the pertinent one at hand (i.e., Justice), but ultimately truth prevailed... as will inevitably occur one day with the Armenian "genocide," once people put their prejudices aside, and look at the validity of the evidence offered on both sides. We are now in the first fifteen minutes of the movie, and the Turks are in the Henry Fonda role... and the Armenians are in the Lee J. Cobb role. (The one difference in the way our play will work out is that Armenians will never accept that there was no genocide... as the genocide has become too much a reason for the Armenians' existence, and facts become irrelevant, or conveniently altered.)

Innocent until proved guilty beyond reasonable doubt should be the legal principle at work here, and ideally it should not be up to the Turks to prove that they did not commit genocide but for Armenians and their Turk-hating supporters to prove that the Turks did. This "trial" has already historically taken place, as you will soon see... and the resulting "acquittal" hasn't made any difference in the eyes of those who will condemn the Turks, regardless of the facts.



"Condemnation without hearing both sides is unjust and un-American"

Arthur Tremaine Chester, "Angora and the Turks," The New York Times Current History, Feb.1923


"...Matter sent to the papers by their correspondents in Turkey is biased against the Turks. This implies an injustice against which even a criminal on trial is protected."

Gordon Bennett, publisher, The New York Herald, circa 1915


"No Englishman worthy of the name would condemn a prisoner on the evidence of the prosecution alone, without first hearing the evidence for the defence."

C.F. Dixon-Johnson, British author, from his 1916 book, "The Armenians."


"There is no crime without evidence. A genocide cannot be written about in the absence of factual proof."

Henry R. Huttenbach, history professor who appears to support the Armenian viewpoint exclusively, as do... curiously... nearly all so-called "genocide scholars"; The Genocide Forum, 1996, No. 9


"It is... time that Americans ceased to be deceived by (Armenian) propaganda in behalf of policies which are... nauseating..."

John Dewey, Columbia University professor, "The Turkish Tragedy," The New Republic, Nov. 1928

First, take a look at a brief background as to what went on, in an American professor's words... followed by an important scenario. Last, you'll be guided to what should be the often ignored end-all argument.

---

© Holdwater
http://www.tallarmeniantale.com

---

Tall Armenian Tale is a site that has much to do regarding Armenia, and the genocide that is found so captivating by Armenians. This is known as the Armenian genocide. It involves massacre (or massacres), deportation, atrocities, and is a kind of holocaust. Turkey is not quick to embrace this view. During the days of the Ottoman Empire, in the region known as Anatolia, and before Ataturk came to power, the Young Turks ruled the land. In the curriculum of many schools, you won't learn much about this. What you might learn is that they were responsible for Armenian massacres, generally in the year 1915. The Near East Relief was there to help out, particularly after the Armenian deportations came into full force. This was during the years of World War One, but these events continued after World War I. Was this a genocide? Should the curriculum of schools have genocide studies? And what about human rights..? This Armenian question was one that weighed heavily in plenty of minds. For example, Henry Morgenthau. Man, did he love the Armenians. Perhaps not as much as President Woodrow Wilson, however. They painted Enver Pasha as a villain, but the real evil fellow was Talaat Pasha... so they say. Jemal Pasha didn't get much respect. Admiral Mark Bristol, had other ideas.... particularly after the Treaty of Sevres failed to get ratified, and the Lausanne treaty took its place. Karabakh is another troubled area involving Armenians, better known as Nagorno-Karabakh, where Ethnic Cleansing of Azeris took place within the Occupied Azerbajani Territories. Ararat can be seen from Armenia. Heath Lowry is a professor the Armenians hate, with Justin McCarthy following close behind. However, they love Richard Hovannasian, much more than they do Dennis Papazian... but maybe not as much as Vahakn Dadrian. Bernard Lewis won't win any popularity contests with the Armenians, and they positively hate Sam Weems. Armenians feel much more comfortable with lies and deceit, involving forged documentation by the likes of Aram Andonian, and books like The Forty Days of Musa Dagh, written by Franz Werfel. Forget about books from Erich Feigl, such as The Myth of Terror. Forget even testimony from Armenians like Boghos Nubar, if they don't affirm the Armenian Genocide. They much prefer to cuddle up to Turcophobes like Britain's Lloyd George.

---

Brief Background

The history of the Armenian-Turkish conflict is complicated and contentious, impossible to describe accurately in statements of one-sided guilt such as that presently before Congress.


Ethnic conflict between Turks and Armenians actually began more than 100 years before World War I. Actions of the Russian Empire precipitated the conflict. In 1800, Armenians were scattered within and beyond a region that now encompasses Armenia, Georgia, Azerbaijan, and Eastern Turkey. In all but small districts, Armenians were a minority which had been under Muslim, primarily Turkish, rule for 700 years. The Russian Empire had begun the imperial conquests of the Muslim lands south of the Caucasus Mountains. One of their main weapons was the transfer of populations — deportation. They ruthlessly expelled whole Muslim populations, replacing them with Christians whom they felt would be loyal to a Christian government. Armenians were a major instrument of this policy. Like others in the Middle East, the primary loyalty of Armenians was religious. Many Armenians resented being under Muslim rule, and they were drawn to a Christian State and to offers of free land (land which had been seized from Turks and other Muslims). A major population exchange began. In Erivan Province (today the Armenian Republic) a Turkish majority was replaced by Armenians. In other regions such as coastal Georgia, Circassia, and the Crimea, other Christian groups were brought in to replace expelled Muslims. There was massive Muslim mortality”in some cases up to one-third of the Muslims died.


The Russians expelled 1.3 million Muslims from 1827 to 1878. One result of this migration, serving the purposes of the Russians, was the development of ethnic hatred and ethnic conflict between Armenians and Muslims. Evicted Muslims who had seen their families die in the Russian Wars felt animosity toward Armenians. Armenians who hated Muslim rule looked to the Russians as liberators. Armenians cooperated with Russian invaders of Eastern Anatolia in wars in 1828, 1854, and 1877. When the Russians retreated, Armenians feared Muslim retaliation and fled. Hatred grew on both sides.


The situation was exacerbated by rebellions of Armenian revolutionaries in the 1890s in which cities in Eastern Anatolia were seized and many Muslims and Armenians were killed. Intercommunal warfare between Turks and Armenians in Azerbaijan during the Russian Revolution of 1905 added to the peoples' distrust of each other. Muslims and Armenians were now divided into sides, antagonists. Each group believed that in a war they would be killed if they did not kill first, a classic self-fulfilling prophecy. Most Muslims and most Armenians had no wish to be a part of this, but they were caught in the awful consequences of their expectations and their history.


Intercommunal war erupted when the Ottoman Empire entered World War I. Armenian revolutionaries, many trained in Russia, attempted to seize main Ottoman cities in Eastern Anatolia. They took the city of Van and held it until Russia invaders arrived, killing all but a few of the Muslims of the city and surrounding villages. In the countryside, Muslim tribesmen killed the Armenians who fell into their hands. Armenian and Kurdish bands killed throughout the East, and massacre was the rule of the time. Russian and Ottoman regular troops were less murderous, but they too gave little quarter to those viewed as the enemy. Some of the worst civilian deaths of Turks and Armenians came at the end of the war. The killing went on until 1920. Many more died of starvation and disease than from bullets.

The results were among the worst seen in warfare. More than forty per cent of the Anatolian Armenians died; similar mortality was the fate of the Muslims of the war zone. In the province of Van, for example, 60% of the Muslims were lost by war’s end.

During the war, each side engaged in de facto deportations of the other. When the Russians and Armenians triumphed, all the Muslims were exiled, as were all the Armenians when the Ottomans triumphed. The Ottoman government also organized an official deportation of Armenians in areas under their control. None of these deportations was wholly justified by wartime necessity, but the deportations were not acts of one-sided genocide on the part of either Turks or Armenians.


A One-Sided Accusation

It is the Muslim actions against Armenians that have been called genocide, an accusation that is primarily based on counting only the Armenian dead, not the Muslim dead. I do not believe the Ottoman government ever intended a genocide of Armenians. This conclusion is based on both evidence and logic:

Of the masses of secret deportation orders seen to date, not one orders murder. Instead, they order Ottoman officials to protect deported Armenians. It has been argued that the Ottomans must have sent out another set of secret orders, contradicting the first set of secret orders, which were a subterfuge. This assumes that the Ottomans deliberately confused their own officials in wartime so that future historians would be fooled—a more than unlikely proposition.


Large Armenian populations, such as those of Istanbul and other major cities, remained throughout the war. These were areas where Ottoman power was greatest and genocide would have been easiest. To decide whether genocide was intended, it is instructive to compare this to the Nazi genocide of the Jews. The Jews of Berlin were killed, their synagogues defiled. The Armenians of Istanbul lived through the war, their churches open.


Another telling argument against genocide is that hundreds of thousands of Armenians survived deportation to the Arab World. If genocide were intended, it must be believed that the Ottomans could not manage to kill them, even though these Armenians were completely under Ottoman control for three years. This is not believable.


It was in fact in the regions where Ottoman control was weakest that columns of Armenian deportees suffered most. The stories of the time give many examples of columns of hundreds of Armenians guarded by perhaps two government guards. When the columns were attacked by tribesmen or bandits Armenians were robbed and killed. It must be remembered that these tribes were those who had themselves suffered greatly at the hands of Armenians and Russians. Were the Ottomans guilty? They were guilty of not properly protecting their citizens. Given the situation of the time, with Turks and Kurds fighting for their lives against Russians and Armenians, this is understandable, although it is never excusable for a government not to protect its people. Conditions are best illustrated in the Van province, where Muslim mortality was greatest. The central government ordered the Van governor to send gendarmes, rural policemen, to guard columns of Armenian deportees. He responded that he had 40 gendarmes at his disposal”all the others were fighting at the Russian Front. The 40 gendarmes were protecting Muslim villages against Armenian attacks. He refused to let the Muslims be killed by Armenians so that Armenians could be protected from Muslims.

While Ottoman weakness should be censured, should we not also ask how well Armenians and Russians protected the Turks and Kurds who fell under their control? The answer is that in provinces such as Van, where intercommunal fighting was fiercest, Muslims who could not escape from Armenian bands were killed. Virtually the entire Muslim population of southeast and far eastern Anatolia either became refugees or died. Like the deportation of Armenians, this too was a deportation with great mortality. It should also be recorded when the evils of deportation are considered.

Few of the historical questions raised by the Muslim-Armenian conflict can be answered in a short description such as the above, nor can they be answered by Congressional votes. Why then has the Congress sometimes in the past voted condemnation of one side in the conflict?

A World of Black and White


One reason is that we have all been conditioned to expect a world of heroes and villains, or victims and villains. This feeling has sometimes caused Americans to misinterpret events, particularly in the Middle East. However, it is the Holocaust of the Jews that has most deeply and properly affected us. Our remembrance of the evils of Nazi Germany has unfortunately caused us to see other events of history through the glass of the Holocaust. In the Holocaust, an innocent people was persecuted and annihilated. There was no Jewish threat to the German State. Yet the full force of a modern state was mobilized to slaughter the innocent. We naturally think of the Holocaust when we evaluate other examples of inhumanity. But no event of history can compare to the Holocaust. Indeed, in history most loss of civilian life, has taken place in wars in which both sides were armed, both sides fought, and both sides were victims. World War I in Anatolia was such a war.


Assuming one-sided evil has led to an unfortunate approach to the history of the Armenians and the Turks. Instead of investigating the history of the time without prejudice, all the guilt has been attached to one side. Once the Turks were assumed to be guilty, the search was on to find proof. The process has been one of assertion and refutation. It was asserted that Talat Pasha, the Ottoman Interior Minister, had written telegrams ordering the murder of Armenians, but these proved to be forgeries. It was asserted that statistics supposedly "from the Armenian Patriarchate" proved that Armenians were a majority in Eastern Anatolia, but these statistics were found to have been created, without reference to any actual records, by a writer in Paris. It was asserted that letters published during World War I by the British Propaganda Office showed Turkish guilt, but these have proven to have been sent by missionaries and Armenian revolutionaries, both of whom were less than neutral sources. It was asserted that courts-martial by a post-war Turkish government proved that Turks had engaged in genocide, although careful examination of the records shows that the charges were included among long lists of "crimes" brought by a government under control of British occupiers”lists that include all sorts of actions that are demonstrably false and include anything that would please the conquerors.


The problem with these assertions is that the accusations have been given wide distribution, while the reputations have been generally known only to historians, For example, so few have seen actual population statistics that it is commonly believed that Armenians were a majority in what is still called Armenia, even though Muslims actually outnumbered Armenians three to one. The British propaganda descriptions of Armenian deaths, all of them from anonymous sources, has often been reprinted, with no mention that the Armenian revolutionary parties were a source. Nor is it mentioned that history have proven that the British propagandists routinely invented their "evidence." Those who speak of supposed evidence from the period when the British occupied Istanbul neglect to mention that the British themselves, who had complete control over all Ottoman official records, were forced at the time to admit that they could find no evidence of an organized genocide against Armenians.


Wrapping It Up for the U.S. Congressmen

There is no time in this short statement to consider all the effects of prejudice and the power of ethnic groups in America. It can simply be said that few wished to consider any but anti-Turkish statements. The Turks themselves, busy for decades with reconstruction of a war-torn country, long paid little attention to what was being said of them in America. Only recently have studies questioning conventional beliefs begun to appear. Generations of Americans had been raised with one set of beliefs, and those who have brought up opposing views have been vilified, their arguments unconsidered. Sadly for those of us who firmly believe that the Holocaust took place, some scholars of the Genocide of the Jews have attacked any reconsideration of Armenian-Turkish relations out of a fear that this will somehow give comfort to those who, against all evidence, disavow the Holocaust. It must also be admitted that we academics have been unwilling to undertake studies of Armenian-Turkish relations, because of problems with career advancement and even physical dangers.


Should what I say here prove to the United States Congress that Turks were not guilty of one-sided genocide against Armenians? No. Nor should the statements of those with opposing views convince the Congress that their views are correct. The historical questions are too involved for easy answers or quick condemnations. History should be determined by the normal procedures of historians. We should write our books and engage in debates until we gradually come to accepted conclusions. Turkish scholars, Armenian scholars, and those of us who are neither Turks nor Armenians should not feel that Congress has decided that the issue is resolved, when we know that this is not the case. Such action can only hinder real investigation of the historical question. There is a very real threat to scholarship when one group of scholars must face the awful and undeserved title of "genocide deniers" when they do their proper work.


There is a statement on the Turkish-Armenian conflict that Congress can justifiably pass, but it is a general humanitarian statement. The lesson to be learned from the World War I experience of the Turks and the Armenians is not that one group was evil, one good. The lesson is that good people, whatever their ethnic group or religion, can be driven by events, their environment and their history to do evil, because they believe, they have no choice. In the history of war, that is all too often the case. The moral to be drawn is not that one side, one ethnic group, should be blamed. That is an historical error and a wrong that perpetuates the ethnic hatred that caused the disaster of the Armenians, as well as the disaster of the Turks. The events of World War I should be honored and mourned as a human, not an ethnic tragedy. If the Congress is to make a statement on the events of World War I, I would hope it would be a statement of pity for all those who suffered that terrible history.


From Armenian Allegations: Myth and Reality” The preceding is a transcript of a testimony delivered by Prof. Justin McCarthy before the House Committee on International Relations on May 15, 1996.

NOW, THEN.

Imagine the following scenario....

---

© Holdwater
www.tallarmeniantale.com/background.htm

---

Scenerio

Imagine the following scenario....


Let's say the United States of America is on her last legs. The whole world has gotten jealous of this only superpower of the world and has decided to gang up on her, before she really gets too big for her britches. War is being fought on every front. Manpower and resources are at a minimum, the country's infrastructure is crumbling, and famine, disease and poverty face most people every day.

Mexico figures it's about time to pay back the gringos for stealing some southwestern states way back when. Mexico figures an effective strategy would be to hit the embattled U.S. army from the back. Mexico appeals to the sizable Armenian community in California... promising the Armenian-Americans half of California, when California is "liberated"... making it "New Armenia."

The opportunistic Armenian-Americans rejoice. They know the other "New Armenia" which is known as "Armenia" (New, because Armenia barely existed as a non-vassal, independent country before the 20th Century, save for periods of Russian weakness) is turning out to be a disaster as a nation... so many people have been emigrating out of Old New Armenia. Wouldn't it be great to start anew with New New Armenia?

Quickly, the Armenian-Americans arm themselves. Loyal Armenian-Americans don't want anything to have to do with the treacherous plan... after all, they have lived and prospered in the U.S.A., the land they love... but they fully know the historic price for non-compliance with Armenian revolutionaries, so most of the loyal ones also go along (albeit unwillingly).

The revolting Armenians harass the U.S. Army's supply lines, and engage in hit and run tactics... sometimes engaging in full blown battles, the rare times they can stomach facing American soldiers. Meanwhile, Armenian leaders figure it would be wise to clear out Southern California of their fellow Americans, so that New Armenia can be as ethnically pure as possible. With many of the men away at war, villages are easy pickings, as American women, children and older men are mercilessly murdered.

WHAT DO YOU THINK THE PEOPLE'S RESPONSE WOULD BE?

Given the dogmatic nature of many Americans... the kind who violently took out their furies on Iranian-Americans during the hostage crisis, say... you can bet the local Americans would get plenty steamed over what their fellow Americans of Armenian origin treacherously decided to embark upon during America's dark hour. You can bet notions of civility would be rare to find among Americans whose beloved family members have been systematically slaughtered by the Armenians.

Let's say the American government realizes something must be done to stem the horrible hemorrhaging caused by the Armenian Benedict Arnolds. The government is aware that the cycle of hatred has grown out of control, as reprisals for each massacre turns out to be yet another massacre.


WHAT DO YOU THINK THE GOVERNMENT'S RESPONSE WOULD BE?

The government decides to relocate the Armenians far away from the area of calamity. Since so many Armenians are sympathetic to the cause of "New Armenia," it would be impossible for the government to separate the loyal Armenians from the disloyal... especially during desperate wartime, where resources and manpower are scarce. So the American government rounds up all the Californian Armenians and forces them to march part of the way to South Dakota. (Unfortunately, the European and Chinese militias have blown up most of the rails and roadways, and the few operating trains and vehicles need to be prioritized for the war effort.)

With manpower so scarce, few soldiers are assigned to protect the Armenians during the march. Some of them can't find it in their hearts to forgive the Armenians' betrayal, and take it out on the innocent Armenians. However, most of the American soldiers are noble, and do the best they can to give the food and medicine allocated to them, and to protect the Armenians from blood-feuding fellow citizens. It's too bad those gangs from Los Angeles' South side have been coordinating attacks on the marching Armenians, out of revenge for what the Armenians had done to their families.

Luckily, most of the Armenians make it to South Dakota. There have been deaths along the way... famine, disease and massacres at the hands of fellow citizens have taken some toll.

America survives the ordeal, and some seventy years later, Armenians claim 1.5 million of their numbers have been systematically murdered (curiously surpassing the figure of their entire population in California, based on various neutral censuses/sources), in a repulsive act of "genocide"... making up all kinds of reasons in a desperate attempt to find motives, such as the Americans were xenophobic, or that the Americans needed to blame their crumbling empire on a scapegoat, or that the Americans were after their money... while the Armenians took it like lambs awaiting slaughter, just like the Jews of World War II.


Let us all pity the poor Armenian victims!

You don't have to be an American to Imagine the described scenario.... just imagine any ethnic minority in your land turning treacherous during your country's desperate hour of need. Let's say you're from France. (Boy, the French almost unwaveringly support the Armenians.) Let's say it's Germany among France's attacking nations that incites a sizable French ethnic minority to stab France in the back (France has a huge Armenian community, so let us again use them as an example). What if the Germans say, Armenians! We fought side-by-side in WWII as fellow Aryans... come join us! Since Armenians create their own history, and their historians have little regard for the facts, let's say a few historians "discover" France was a real Armenian ancient homeland 7,000 years ago (long before the Armenians were documented as a people, of course), before the Armenians started migrating to the Anatolian region... taking their cue from actual Armenian professors/authors who have claimed Switzerland as their ancient homeland [see "QUOTES" section for source] or that the British are descended from or related to the Armenians [see "Reference" under "Articles"]); French Armenians rise by hitting the on-its-last-legs French Army in the back, and begin to slaughter fellow French, to make room for their New Armenia... with the words of William Saroyan to inspire them. ("When two Armenians meet anywhere in the world, see if they will not create a New Armenia.")

Brrr! How do you think the French government would react? The French people?

The described scenario is almost exactly what took place in the Ottoman Empire


And the Ottoman Turks were clearly at fault for not being able to fully protect the innocent Armenians of the march. Given the desperate circumstances (bankruptcy, famine, disease, limited resources/manpower, war on five fronts), would your country have been able to do better?

Do not forget, the Armenians from other parts of the Ottoman Empire were untouched. Some Turkish soldiers lost their lives defending the relocating Armenians, and some who were caught committing crimes against the Armenians were actually EXECUTED by the Ottoman government (After, and DURING the war. [See "Questions," under "Sections" for sources].) What kind of a "genocide" is that?

Do not forget as well that the causes claiming Armenian lives were the same that claimed Turkish ones, in considerably greater numbers. [See "Census," under "Sections" for sources]


Holdwater does not take the credit for this scenario; he merely
embellished the scenario from an article written in 1923, "Angora and the Turks," which you can find in the ARTICLES section ("West" Accounts).
There is an "end all" argument against the Armenian Genocide...

...That is, one that should have ended the argument many years ago. It's really stupefying how few people pay attention to this absolutely convincing argument.


It appears obvious that the Turkish authorities, anxious for the safety of their lines of communication, had no other alternative than to order the removal of their rebellious subjects to some place distant from the seat of hostilities, and their internment there.

The enforcement of this absolutely necessary precaution led to further risings on the part of the Armenians. The remaining Moslems were almost defenceless, because the regular garrisons were at the front as well as the greater part of the police and able-bodied men. Already infuriated at the reports of the atrocities committed at Van by the insurgents, in fear for their lives and those of their relatives, they were at last driven by the cumulative effect of these events into panic and retaliation and, as invariably happens in such cases, the innocent suffered with the guilty.

C.F. Dixon-Johnson, British author of the 1916 book, "The Armenians." ("West" Accounts, under "Articles.")



"I could see that [the Armenians'] well-known disloyalty to the Ottoman Government and the fact that the territory which they inhabited was within the zone of military operations constituted grounds more or less justifiable for compelling them to depart their homes."

Robert Lansing, United States Secretary of State, November 1916

Next ...
The "End All" argument against the Armenian "Genocide"

---

© Holdwater
www.tallarmeniantale.com/scenario.htm

---

The "End All" argument against the Armenian "Genocide"

There was a "Nuremberg" Trial

It's World War I. The Ottoman Empire was close to entering the war on the side of the Allies, but (among other reasons) the British pull a fast one by not delivering on a warship paid for by the common folks, down to the pennies of poor Turkish schoolchildren. (War broke out, and the Brits figured they could make better use of their goods on hand... so they reneged on the deal.) Meanwhile, Germany smells blood and brilliantly steps in by making a pseudo-gift of a couple of warships. Result: the road is better paved for the Ottoman Turks to join the Central Powers, a decision that will ultimately seal the fate of the centuries-old empire.

The British were noted for demonizing the enemy... the Germans were referred to as "Huns," for example. Certainly, the Ottoman Turks were not let off the hook... it must not have been too tough to demonize an enemy that easily lent itself to demonization, since the days of the Crusades.


You'd think there would be a little originality in the American demonizing campaign

The HUN Attacks!

The usually false reports of massacres were a great foundation to build upon. (Armenians well learned the value of exploiting the "Christian" connection, accusing their Ottoman society — a society that was among the most tolerant of nations — of killing for religious reasons). American missionaries, unable to convert the Turks, shrieked these rumors of massacres... British journalists and historians ate it up. Those Armenians, especially, were being slaughtered right and left.

(After the war, some British historians such as Arnold Toynbee would somewhat apologize for being a little too hysterical on the issue. Unfortunately, the British government has not yet apologized to the Turkish government for the Britons' discredited Blue Book... even though Great Britain apologized to Germany in 1936 for the Britons' German version of the Blue Book.)

The war is over. The Versailles Treaty, as everyone knows, was terribly unfair, to the extent of sowing the seeds of Hitler's rise some dozen years later. As unfair as this treaty might have been for Germany, the Ottoman Turks had it far worse. Their right of self-determination... flying in the face of Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points... would be taken away from them!

The Allies planned to carve out the remains of the Ottoman Empire amongst themselves. (Even decades before WWI had broken out.) The plan for the Turks was to live in what amounted to an Indian reservation. (Luckily for the Turks, this particular parallel to the American Indian did not come true.)

The fellow who mostly had it in for the Turks was Great Britain's Lloyd George. (A convinced pro Hellene who could have used anything as propaganda against the Turks in support of Venizelos and the Greek invasion of Turkey... just as Gladstone inflated the Bulgarian "massacres" out of all contact with reality for domestic political reasons. Curiously, Lloyd George, at the expense of his political career, ultimately did not.) Maybe it was the chance for the British to get even for being humiliatingly held off at Gallipoli.

Regardless, memories of those awful massacres being reported in the British press couldn't go unanswered. Especially now that the British were occupying what was left of the Ottoman Empire. Every governmental document to prove evil wrongdoing was at their fingertips.

Consider: the British were no friends of the Turks at this time. (They planned to figuratively wipe the Turks off the face of the earth.) Any evidence of a genocide that existed was at their full disposal, as an occupying force. To make sure the research efforts would be as zealously thorough as possible, they enlisted the services of a crack team of Armenian scholars, led by Haigazn K. Khazarian.

The British locked up close to a hundred and fifty Ottoman officials... fifty-six in the island of Malta... while they attempted to dig up the incriminating evidence.

They dig... and dig.... and dig. The process takes nearly two-and-one-half years, and even their Armenians weren't coming up with the necessary goods. (All the propaganda from the war years were dismissed as the malarkey they were.) In their frustration, they actually appealed to the shores of America for proof. What did they come up with?

ZILCH!

To the immense credit of the British and their respect for the rule of Law, they released every single one of the Ottoman officials. It would have been enormously easy to make up the evidence, in an attempt to save face.

This was the precursor to the Nuremberg Trials. The Ottoman Turks were found INNOCENT.

The case was closed beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Isn't it mysterious that this rare example of a human tragedy actually winding up in court and getting cleared continues to still get tried... when countless other human tragedies that have occurred since have long been forgotten?

---

© Holdwater
www.tallarmeniantale.com/3-trial.htm

---