The Boston Globe published an article, basically praising the Worcester School for naming Taner Akçam, a Turk living in Western countries for decades already, as chairman of Armenian genocide studies. Akçam is one of the few Turks who say that what happened to the Armenians during World War I constitutes genocide, which is why he’s a hero to Armenian radicals.
Sadly for the Worcester School and for the Boston Globe, however, there are some ‘buts‘ as a reader was kind enough to e-mail me.
Firstly, although the BG calls Akçam a historian, he’s anything but. He studied sociology, not history.
Secondly, the article says the following about Akcam:
Taner Akçam, who was imprisoned in Turkey in the 1970s for his work on the slaughter of Armenians at the end of the Ottoman period in Turkey
Sadly, the truth is slightly less romantic; Akçam was part of a Marxist revolutionary group, who wanted to overthrow the Turkish (and democratically elected) government by the use of force. This group has been responsible for several terrorist acts.
This ‘mistake’ in the article is so gigantic, that the Globe should issue a retraction or clarification and apology ASAP.
Same goes for the ‘mistake’ about how Akçam regained his freedom; according to the article, the government released him. The facts, as I understand them, are slightly different however; according to sources, he wasn’t released, he escaped from prison.
Furthermore, Akçam is not exactly an objective observer: he hates the Turkish government and possibly Turkey because of the above paragraphs. He had to flee from Turkey, after which a famous Armenian ’scholar’ (Dadrian) took him under his care and, suddenly, Akçam became an ‘expert’ on the Armenian genocide… That’s after he had to flee from Turkey, and after Armenians and Armenian organizations were willing to pay him money for his ‘research’ on the events of 1915.
O, and he wasn’t a professor at the U. of Minnesota either; he was a researcher.
I expect the BG to issue an apology, and a clarification. Soon.
June 2, 2008
Comments »
1
Richard
June 2, 2008
As the article states, Taner Akcam has been appointed a professor at Clark University which is in Worcester, MA and not at the "Worcester School". At the University of Minnesota he was a visiting professor of history.
www.clarku.edu/academiccatalog/facultybio.cfm?id=722
2
JanJan
June 2, 2008
How could you get so many facts wrong in your little missive, starting with the slightly important (lol) name of the institution?! Were you in such a rush that you let all these slip by or are you showing once again that you don’t know half of what you’re talking about here. I don’t even know how you misconstrued the name as the "Worcester School" if you truly read the article for more than two lines, presumingly a prerequisite in writing a correction of it.
After a couple months of silence, your anti-Armenian propaganda mill is back up and running faster than ever. Might I ask what has caused this sudden escalation?
3
hyola
June 2, 2008
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taner_Ak%C3%A7am
1) He is a historian, sociologist and author
2) Akcam worked in solidarity with the Kurds, who want a right to survive and have their own country. Amazing how they are vilified for their endeavors for self-determination. And most of those 30,000 dead spewed out by Turkish-government-supporting State Department folks and provincial Turkish news agencies were Kurds. Amazing how their own dead are used to vilify them. Just amazing.
3) He did escape, and was given asylum by Germany which shows what they thought of the idea of him leaving (they approved and understood he was in danger).
4) He was a Visiting Professor at Minnesota.
Instead of wasting your time with this, why don’t you join Ara Sarafian and other historians at the Turkish archives where huge portions of archival material have been vanishing lately - maybe you can research that and explain why eastern Anatolian cities, universities and other bastions of civilization are gone (interestingly enough all in the areas where Armenians had significant populations).
Focusing on almost all non-1915/1916 events and armed rebellions in 1894 and 1921 does not quite get the job done in denying the Armenian Genocide.
4
Lucrèce
June 2, 2008
Mr. Akçam was a member of the terrorist, marxist-leninist, group Devrimci Sol (today DHKP-C), who was (is?) an ally of PKK. This group has butchered more civilians that the Rote Armee Fraktion or the italian terrorists groups of far right and far left.
The ATAA has published a scholar critic of Mr. Akçam’s book, A Shamful Act :
www.ataa.org/reference/pdf/akcam.pdf
Mr. Akçam is not an historian, only a sociologist. History is not, theorically, his business.
5
Lucrèce
June 3, 2008
Focusing on almost all non-1915/1916 events and armed rebellions in 1894 and 1921 does not quite get the job done in denying the Armenian Genocide.
OK.
www.eraren.org/index.php?Lisan=en&Page=DergiIcerik&IcerikNo=134
British diplomatic sources reported that in preparation for war, in 1913, the Armenian revolutionary groups met and agreed to coordinate their efforts against the Ottomans. The British reported that this alliance was the result of meetings with “the Russian authorities.” The Dashnak leader (and member of the Ottoman Parliament) Vramian had gone to Tiflis to confer with the Russian authorities. The British also reported that “[The Armenians] have thrown off any pretence of loyalty they may once have shown, and openly welcome the prospect of a Russian occupation of the Armenian Vilayets.” [5]Even Dashnak leaders admitted the Dashnaks were Russian allies. The Dashnak Hovhannes Katchaznouni, prime minister of the Armenian Republic, stated that the party plan at the beginning of the war was to ally with the Russians.Since 1910 the revolutionaries had distributed a pamphlet throughout Eastern Anatolia. It demonstrated how Armenian villages were to be organized into regional commands, how Muslim villages were to be attacked, and specifics of guerilla warfare.Before the war began, Ottoman Army Intelligence reported on Dashnak plans: They would declare their loyalty to the Ottoman State, but increase their arming of their supporters. If war was declared, Armenian soldiers would desert to the Russian Army with their arms. The Armenians would do nothing if the Ottomans began to defeat the Russians. If the Ottomans began to retreat, the Armenians would form armed guerilla bands and attack according to plan. The Ottoman intelligence reports were correct, for that is exactly what happened.WARThe Russians gave 2.4 million rubles to the Dashnaks to arm the Ottoman Armenians. They began distributing weapons to Armenians in the Caucasus and Iran in September of 1914. In that month, seven months before the Deportations were ordered, Armenian attacks on Ottoman soldiers and officials began. Deserters from the Ottoman Army at first formed into what officials called “bandit gangs.” They attacked conscription officers, tax collectors, gendarmerie outposts, and Muslims on the roads. By December a general revolt had erupted in Van Province. Roads and telegraph lines were cut, gendarmerie outposts attacked, and Muslim villages burned, their inhabitants killed. The revolt soon grew: in December, near the Kotur Pass, which the Ottomans had to hold to defend against Russian invasion from Iran, a large Armenian battle group defeated units of the Ottoman army, killing 400 Ottoman soldiers and forcing the army to retreat to Saray. The attacks were not only in Van: The governor of Erzurum, Tahsin, cabled that he could not hold off the Armenian attacks that were breaking out through the province; soldiers would have to be sent from the front.By February, reports of attacks began to come in from all over the East—a two-hour battle near Muş, an eight-hour battle in Abaak, 1,000 Armenians attacking near Timar, Armenian chettes raiding in Sivas, Erzurum, Adana, Diyarbakır, Bitlis, and Van provinces. Telegraph lines to the front and from Ottoman cities to the West were cut, repaired, and cut again many times. Supply caravans to the army were attacked, as were columns of wounded soldiers. Units of gendarmerie and soldiers sent to reconnect telegraph lines or protect supply columns themselves came under attack. As an example of the enormity of the problem, in the middle of April an entire division of gendarmerie troops was ordered from Hakkâri to Çatak to battle a major uprising there, but the division could not fight through the Armenian defenses.Once careful preparations had been made, Armenians revolted in the City of Van. On April 20, well-armed Armenian units, many wearing military uniforms, took the city and drove Ottoman forces into the citadel. The rebels burned down most of the city, some buildings also being destroyed by the two canons the Ottomans had in the citadel. Troops were sent from the Erzurum and Iranian Fronts, but they were unable to relieve the city. The Russians and Armenians were advancing from the north and the southwest. On May 17 the Ottomans evacuated the citadel. Soldiers and civilians fought their way southwest around Lake Van. Some took to boats on the Lake, but nearly half of these were killed by rebels firing from the shore or when their boats ran aground. Some of the Muslims of Van survived at least for a while, put in the care of American missionaries. Most who did not escape were killed. Villagers were either killed in their homes or collected from surrounding areas and sent into the great massacre at Zeve.The ensuing suffering of the Muslims and Armenians is well known. It was a history of bloody warfare between peoples in which all died in great numbers. When the Ottomans retook much of the East, the Armenian population fled to Russia. There they starved and died of disease. When the Russians retook Van and Bitlis Provinces, they did not allow the Armenians to return, leaving them to starve in the North. The Russians wanted the land for themselves. It is also well known that Armenians who remained, those in Erzurum Province, massacred Muslims in great numbers at the end of the war.My purpose here is not to retell that history. I wish to demonstrate that the Ottomans were right in considering the Armenians to be their enemies, if further proof is needed. The map shows proof that the Armenian rebels in fact were agents of Russia. The Armenians of the Ottoman East rebelled in exactly those areas that were most important to the Russians. The benefit of the rebellion in Van City, the center of Ottoman Administration in the Southeast is obvious. The other sites of rebellion were in reality more important: Rebellion in Erzurum Province cut the Ottoman Army off from supplies and communications. The rebellion was directly in the path of the Russian advance from the North. The Armenians rebelled in the Saray and Başkale regions, at the two major passes that the Russians were to use in their invasion from Iran. The Armenians rebelled in the region near Çatak, at the mountain passes needed for the Ottomans to bring up troops to the Iran frontier, the passes needed for the Ottoman retreat. The Armenians rebelled in great numbers in Sivas Province and in Şebinkarahisar. This would seem to be an odd place for a revolt, a region where the Armenians were outnumbered by the Muslims ten to one, but Sivas was tactically important. It was the railhead from which all supplies and men passed to the Front, basically along one road. It was the prefect site for guerilla action to harass Ottoman supply lines. The Armenians also rebelled in Cilicia, the intended site for a British invasion that would have cut the rail links to the South. It was not the fault of the rebels that the British preferred to attempt the madness at Gallipoli instead of an attack in Cilicia that would surely have been more successful.All these regions were the very spots a military planner would choose to most damage the Ottoman war effort. It cannot be an accident that they were also the spots chosen by the rebels for their revolt. Anyone can see that the revolts were a disaster for the Army. The disaster was compounded by the fact that the Ottomans were forced to withdraw whole divisions from the Front to battle the Armenian rebels. The war might have been much different if these divisions had been able to fight the Russians, not the rebels. I agree with Field-Marshall Pomiankowski, who was the only real European historian of World War I in the Ottoman Empire, that the Armenian rebellion was the key to the Ottoman defeat in the East.Only after seven months of Armenian rebellion did the Ottomans order the deportation of Armenians (May 26-30, 1915).
6
P. Connolly
June 3, 2008
It is significant to note that Akcam is quoted in the article saying that he expects to be opposed by "Turkish Nationalists". Akcam knows very well that the people who oppose his activities are not "Turkish Nationalists". They are ordinary Turkish Citizens both in Turkey and abroad who object to his long pattern of anti-social conduct and misrepresentations of fact. He was involved with a terrorist organization ("Dev Yol") that killed innocent people in the 1970’s. His involvement was not peripheral; by his own admission he fraternized with individuals at the highest levels of that terrorist organization. Instead of openly repenting of his past involvement with a criminal element in the land of his birth he fled the country and has ever since allied himself with propagandists who spread hatred and misinformation against the same culture he now presumes to represent. Is it any wonder that ordinary Turkish Citizens -not "Turkish Nationalists"- are outraged by his pretentions?Appealing to the Kurdish issue as an excuse is absolutely unacceptable. It’s not uncommon for terrorist movements to press for gains and ends that are at least partially justified and understandable. What they don’t understand is that the end doesn’t justify the means.
Instead of repenting of his past, Akcam has allied himself with the Armenian Diaspora which has its own recent record of funding legal support for terrorists -who attack and kill innocent people, mostly Turks- and treating them like heroes. Then they hold up Akcam as an example Turk and expect all of us to go along with this charade !!
7
hyola
June 3, 2008
Caucasus and Iran - hmmm - that does not sound like the Ottoman Empire to me… So in other words, because of these activities taking place there - it (deportation and massacre) was basically justified you are saying…
Keep trying - it’s actually fun playing the history game because deniers lose that one. Stick to the national security argument at least you have a chance of staving off the inevitable for at least a bit more time when deniers threaten American troops and supply lines… although maybe that one might run out too when the US grows tired of it… not sure how you should proceed on that one… Turkey is playing with fire already…
good luck!
8
Kemal
June 3, 2008
"at the Turkish archives where huge portions of archival material have been vanishing lately"
Proof? Where’s your proof hyperbole? Or should we just call you the liar that you are?
As for archives, Armenian state archives and the Dashnak archives are closed. Why? What’s to hide if your "story" is so undisputable?
If Armenian Dashnaks and their revolutionaries did not constitute a security threat, those archives will prove it… but we all know what’s there, the grand scheme: ethnically cleanse eastern Anatolia of all but Armenians.
9
hyola
June 3, 2008
No need for accusations and ad hominem attacks (that means accusing folks of lying, etc.) Remember we are not in Turkey where there is article 301 - we can speak freely without intimidation and aggressive language. Although there is a silent majority forming that knows what happened in Turkey - I am hopeful that one day things will be out in the open - most importantly in Turkey where the healing will be heavily needed and the psychological devastation will be most severe.
Regarding the missing materials - Ask Ara Sarafian and Hilmar Kaiser, they are two historians who go there. Sarafian recently stated, in public, that large swaths of materials are missing… Turkish historians have even acknowledged this (albeit reluctantly)…
Here is a story discussing the somewhat ridiculous offer to pay for "opening" archives:
www.worldbulletin.net/news_detail.php?id=22557
Here is a response discussing the archives being open:
www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=105568
Also - wanting to see archives of a country that did not exist at the time of the Genocide is rather inane and not very useful. Of course there were political party archives of activities in the Caucasus, Iran, and Georgia/Russia - which would be irrelevant to what was happening internally in the Ottoman Empire, regarding mass deportations and slaughter before most of those archives were even written. Unless you believe that a population, mostly consisting of peasants and farmers with no guns or real power was plotting to take over the world from their headquarters in their little huts in Erzerum and Kharpert…
It appears that l there is this great desire, as if opening these magical archives with a rich collection of fantastic documents explaining away the Armenian Genocide will absolve the perpetrators of this crime - but it will only prolong this further - to obfuscate and deny and never get to the core of the issue - which is that genocide was committed. Knowingly and with seeming arrogance and disdain by those in charge of the government at the time.
Let’s recognize it and move on as brothers in this world.
10
Kemal
June 3, 2008
We are to believe your assertions because you claim Sarafian, a paid mouthpiece for the Armenian diaspora, says so? Couldn’t you come up with anything better than that?
Keep your archives closed, Russia is now allowing access to their archives which also contain documents authored by Dashnak and other Armenian revolutionary leaders before and during WWI. All the information on their plans to ethnically cleanse southeastern Anatolia, as they did Khojaly more recently, are there.
Also there are Russian commanders’ orders to Armenian revolutionary military leaders to stop plundering and massacring the civilian Ottoman Muslim population, and the Armenian response, which was along the lines of "we’ll do as we please."
Too bad you can’t read Russian, but I’m sure they will soon be translated into English and then you too can read them.
Once you "genocide" proponents acknowledge the failure of your Armenian leadership to win its war against the Ottoman Empire, acknowledge the atrocities they committed against the unarmed civilian Ottoman Muslim population, issue an apology to the families of Turkish diplomats and innocent civilians slain by Armenian terrorist thugs, we can move on as brothers in this world.
301? Poor you, don’t you know that there is a vast Turkish Diaspora and we know our history, and yours, better than you? Have you read the work of Dasnabedian? Or how about Edward Erickson’s most recent article that outlines in detail all of the Armenian revolutionaries’ efforts to sabotage the Ottoman’s defense against the Russians’ invasion during WWI? Or how about Pasdermajian’s publications? How about Katchaznouni?
If not, perhaps you should. They don’t portray the Armenians of WWI as weak helpless victims– of course, they wrote their publications before Armenians learned that genocide claims might get you some land a la the Jewish Holocaust.
11
hyola
June 3, 2008
We are to believe your assertions because you claim Sarafian, a paid mouthpiece for the Armenian diaspora, says so? Couldn’t you come up with anything better than that? Sarafian is not a paid mouthpiece - neither is Kaiser. You conveniently didn’t acknowledge Kaiser - of course I can see how non-Armenians (23 countries, numerous genocide historian organizations, etc.) would not conform to your rationale. FYI - Sarafian recently went to Turkey to defend the honor of the Blue Book. Apparently the Turkish parliament, in its infinite wisdom (as if it has nothing better to do) asked the British government to rescind the Blue Book of 1916. He was the only ethnic Armenian historian who went to the conference. Lunacy I tell you!
Keep your archives closed, Russia is now allowing access to their archives which also contain documents authored by Dashnak and other Armenian revolutionary leaders before and during WWI. All the information on their plans to ethnically cleanse southeastern Anatolia, as they did Khojaly more recently, are there. They are not my archives. Bravo to Russia - they have already acknowledged the Armenian Genocide on various occasions - opening up archives is great - if they have relevant or irrelevant documents that is tremendous. Question - what does Khojaly have to do with the Armenian Genocide? Another attempt to get away from the main issue? Just checking.
Also there are Russian commanders’ orders to Armenian revolutionary military leaders to stop plundering and massacring the civilian Ottoman Muslim population, and the Armenian response, which was along the lines of "we’ll do as we please." Too bad you can’t read Russian, but I’m sure they will soon be translated into English and then you too can read them.Thank you for the translations. I eagerly await them. Once you "genocide" proponents acknowledge the failure of your Armenian leadership to win its war against the Ottoman Empire, acknowledge the atrocities they committed against the unarmed civilian Ottoman Muslim population, issue an apology to the families of Turkish diplomats and innocent civilians slain by Armenian terrorist thugs, we can move on as brothers in this world.Hmmm there we go again talking about war which was years later after Armenian Genocide… interesting theme that keeps popping up. Of course, everyone can agree that terrorism is terrible and should be condemned and innocents that were killed should all be mourned and remembered. So you are saying you want Armenians, almost all of whom did not support those activities - to apologize for something hotheads did? Kind of like the crazies that took over the Ottoman Empire in 1915? Of course that was a different scale of mayhem…
301? Poor you, don’t you know that there is a vast Turkish Diaspora and we know our history, and yours, better than you? Have you read the work of Dasnabedian? Or how about Edward Erickson’s most recent article that outlines in detail all of the Armenian revolutionaries’ efforts to sabotage the Ottoman’s defense against the Russians’ invasion during WWI? Or how about Pasdermajian’s publications? How about Katchaznouni?
What does 301 have to do with everything else you just wrote above?
If not, perhaps you should. They don’t portray the Armenians of WWI as weak helpless victims– of course, they wrote their publications before Armenians learned that genocide claims might get you some land a la the Jewish Holocaust.We find ourselves back to the original theme. Armenians lived in different empires and countries much like others and participated in various countries’ institutions (such as the military). It also goes without saying that Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire were Ottoman citizens - entitled to protection and safety under the law - not labor camps, deportation, death marches and massacre. Was Hitler and the Nazi regime justified in creating conditions that resulted in mass death because there were Jews who fought in the Russian army and plotted the overthrow and downfall of Nazi Germany? Please take a moment and understand what you are saying.
Good day.
12
Michael van der Galien
June 3, 2008
Was Hitler and the Nazi regime justified in creating conditions that resulted in mass death because there were Jews who fought in the Russian army and plotted the overthrow and downfall of Nazi Germany?
O, God, there we go again. They started fighting against Germany after Germany started persecuting Jews, etc. Nazis started it. With the Armenians the roles are reversed: first the Armenians tried to ethnically cleanse the lands and, when Russians entered Anatolia, helped the Russians by attacking Ottoman forces from behind. Entire villages were massacred by the merry Nazi Armenians, who believed that Turks were an inferior race and who wanted to create an Armenia in lands whwere Muslims formed the majority.
Nice try though. Jews and Armenians are as similar as apples and polar bears.
Of course there are more differences, such as there’s no proof that the Ottoman government made the decision to systematically kill Armenians. No proof. Nada. Instead, when the forced the Armenians of Anatolia to be relocated to Syria, which was then part of the Ottoman Empire as well, they instructed the army to protect the Armenians. 1300 Ottoman Turks were later punished by the Ottoman government for not protecting Armenians well enough, forsaking their duty, killing Armenians, etc. By their own government.
Stop the comparison between the holocaust and 1915. They are not even almost the same. You should be ashamed of yourself for using the holocaust as a political tool.
13
Global Hero
June 3, 2008
Edited by MvdG: I have had enough of words like “denialist.” Every comment containing such a word will be deleted… in its entirety.
14
Lucrèce
June 3, 2008
Monsieur van der Galien, vous pouvez ajouter qu’entre les pogromes polonais de 1648 et la Shoah, seuls les Cosaques des armées blanches russes ont tué plus de Juifs que les révolutionnaires arméniens. Ces braves gens, adulés par les associations de la diaspora et les partis au pouvoir à Erevan, ont massacré au moins 10 000 Juifs ottomans, puis trois mille Juifs d’Azerbaïdjan.
www.todayszaman.com/tz-web/detaylar.do?load=detay&link=18582
www.today.az/news/politics/25410.html
www.tallarmeniantale.com/jews-of-turkey.htm#mount
Un des héros officiels de l’Arménie pour la Première Guerre mondiale, le général Kanayan (dit Dro), a commandé le 812e bataillon arménien de la Wermacht, dont le principal fait d’arme fut de rafler des Juifs, remis ensuite aux Einsatzgruppen :
www.ataa.org/reference/nazi-ozer.html
15
Lucrèce
June 3, 2008
« les révolutionnaires arméniens »
Erratum : pas les révolutionnaires arméniens en général, mais les dachnaks en particulier ; je ne connais de pogromes attestés dont les auteurs seraient des membres du Hintchak ou de l’Armenakan/Ramkavar.
16
Lucrèce
June 3, 2008
« La race mongole, funeste et traîtresse [les Turcs], attaque une fois encore, mais avec plus de violence, un des peuples les plus purs et les meilleurs de la race aryenne [les Arméniens] […]. Ces luttes qui continuent depuis des siècles sous différentes formes ne sont autre que l’assaut d’une nation restée dans les ténèbres contre une autre qui ayant déjà parcouru le cycle des progrès sociaux, s’avance vers la lumière.
Ou nous, ou eux !… Cette lutte ne date ni d’une année ni d’un siècle. La nation arménienne a toujours bravement résisté à cettc race qui a eu comme ligne de conduite la trahison et le crime.
Le monde doit être débarasse de ce fléau et, pour le repos et la tranquilité de l’univers, la nation turque doit être supprimée.
Nous attendons la tête haute et armés de la foi en la victoire. »
Hayasdan, organe de la Fédération révolutionnaire arménienne, branche bulgare, 19 août 1914 (louisville.edu/a-s/history/turks/comites_armeniens.pdf).
« Ayant des hommes, nous avons pu former des bandes de
volontaires arméniens et les envoyer au théâtre de la guerre. Nous avons pu ainsi exprimer notre haute gratitude à la Russie qui nous a témoigné tant de bienveillance. L’organisation de volontaires arméniens continuera. […]
Le plus grand devoir qui nous incombe est de régler et d’étendre cette organisation et de la maintenir jusqu’à la fin de la guerre. Les Arméniens seront de ceux qui asséneront le coup de grâce à la Turquie agonisante dans ses derniers moments. La Turquie en mourant doit voir ceci de ses propres yeux et lire cette page de son nistoire maudite avant de les fermer.
Aujourd’hui notre principal ennemi, c’est le Turc. Ceux qui,
ouvertement ou en cachette, sont contre l’organisation de volontaires ou cherchent à limiter cette force, doivent être considérés comme les ennemis du dedans. »
Inkenavar Hayasdan, organe du parti révolutionnaire arménien Hintchak, 19 juin 1916.
No comment.
17
Global Hero
June 3, 2008
Michael, well then Turkey’s state sponsored denial is hitting a snag by Turkey’s dismissal of Prof. Donald Quataert, Associate Professor of History at the University of Houston from the Institute of Turkish Studies because he uttered the G word. Turkey by clearly violating the academic freedom of a prominent American scholar has created a scandal of immense proportion with yet to be seen ramifications.
18
hyola
June 3, 2008
If you want to talk chronology please be my guest… I guess the mass slaughter by the bloody sultan in 1894-96 at Adana and 1909 doesn’t count? (in the hundreds of thousands). Who started something is not really salient - disproportionate response is something they teach in law school criminal law classes? Have you attended? Basically if someone looks at you in a mean way and you decapitate them you are still in trouble, even if you say you were provoked…
The Armenians tried to ethnically cleanse lands! My sides hurt… where is the evidence?And I think it’s foolish for those who don’t accept the reality of the Armenian Genocide to argue the history - you lose there - instead it’s better to argue national security - haven’t you learned that already (that one will be a loser one day too).
19
armenians genocide
June 3, 2008
[…] to the armenians during World War I constitutes genocide, which is why he??sa hero to Armenian poligazette.com/2008/06/02/boston-globe-makes-itself-look-ridiculous/”Raphael Lemkin??s Dossier on the Armenian Genocide” published PanARMENIAN.NetThis timely book is […]
20
Lucrèce
June 3, 2008
If you want to talk chronology please be my guest… I guess the mass slaughter by the bloody sultan in 1894-96 at Adana and 1909 doesn’t count? (in the hundreds of thousands).
About the incidents of 1894-1896 and 1909:
www.eraren.org/index.php?Lisan=en&Page=DergiIcerik&IcerikNo=91
Armenian rebellions took place in Eastern Anatolia in the 1860s and earlier. But it was in the 1890s that the Armenian revolutionary organizations truly began to put their plans into effect.In 1894, Armenians in the Sasun region rebelled against the government. Large rebel bands concentrated their attacks on symbols of the Ottoman State-tax collectors, government officials, official buildings. They also fought battles with Kurdish tribesmen, There had always been animosity between the Armenians and the Kurdish tribes. This much is understandable. Whether or not one approves of Armenian rebellion, it is understood that rebels attack the government and their old enemies. What happened next is not in any way excusable. The Ottoman army advanced on the rebels. As the rebels retreated they slaughtered the Muslim inhabitants of the villages in their path, In response, the army and local Muslims killed Armenians.It was not the Muslims who began to kill Armenians. It was Armenians who began to kill Muslims. The result was horrible for both.The actions of Armenian rebels in Zeytun and Maraş in 1895 were all too similar. Their rebellion was a mass murder of Muslims of the region. The Armenian leader himself claimed to have killed 25,000 Muslims. The Ottoman army was not even allowed to punish the murderers. The European Powers protected them.In Van in the same year the rebels, and many innocent Muslims and Armenians, died when the Armenian nationalists once again rebelled, In Adana in 1909 it was the same; Armenians rebelled, confident of European support that never came. Although the Armenians suffered the greater mortality, Armenian rebel forces unquestionably began the conflict. The Turks responded. They were not only protecting their state; they were protecting their people.In Sasun, in Van, in Zeytun, in Maraş, and in Adana, it was Armenian rebels who began the slaughter. It was the Armenian rebels who began to murder their fellow Ottoman citizens. It was not the Turks who attacked the Armenians. It was the Armenians who attacked the Turks.
www.tbmm.gov.tr/yayinlar/yayin1/4-McCarty(65-85).pdf
Figures as high as 300,000 dead have been given for the period, but such massive mortality would have left denuded regions and demographic effects that would be most noticeable and were not, in fact, present. Gürün’s estimate may, in fact, be an underenumeration, and the actual numbers mayhave reached 30,000. There is, however, no way to establish this, and it is only aneducated guess. It seems better to use Gürün’s figures, admitting the possibility of anunderestimation.
See also:
www.eraren.org/index.php?Lisan=en&Page=YayinIcerik&IcerikNo=216
www.ttk.org.tr/templates/resimler/File/fulltext/Belleten_Makale/bel201-1291_1338.pdf
Plus William L. Langer (The Diplomacy of Imperialism, New York, Knopf, 1960), Stanford Jay Shaw (History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey, New York/Londres, Cambridge University Press, vol. II, 1978), François Georgeon (Abdülhamid II, le sultan calife, Paris, Fayard, 2003) and Guenter Lewy (The Armenian Massacres in Ottoman Turkey. A Disputed Genocide, Salt Lake City, University of Utah Press, 2005).
21
hyola
June 3, 2008
THE MASSACRES OF OTTOMAN ARMENIANS Donald Quataert The Massacres of Ottoman Armenians and the Writing of Ottoman History Donald Bloxham, The Great Game of Genocide: Imperialism, Nationalism, and the Destruction of the Ottoman Armenians (New York, Oxford University Press, 2005) 344 pp. $39.95 In the late 1960s (when I entered graduate studies), there was an elephant in the room of Ottoman studies—the slaughter of the Ottoman Armenians in 1915.1 This subject continued to be taboo for a long time to come. To the best of my knowledge, no one ever suggested that the so-called “Armenian question” not be studied. Rather, a heavy aura of self-censorship hung over Ottoman history writing. Other topics—as diverse as religious identities, or the Kurds, or labor history—were also off limits. The Armenians were not alone as subjects of scholarly neglect and avoidance, nor as victims of state-sanctioned violence and discrimination within the Ottoman Empire. As Ottomanists remained largely silent, other writers were offering Armenians’ points of view, using both the oral testimony of Armenian survivors or the records of European and American diplomats and missionaries who witnessed, at greater and lesser distances, the atrocities of 1915. Journals, memoirs, and village reconstructions appeared in relatively substantial numbers and presented, usually in anger or sorrow, the stories of the victims, and sometimes their communities, before their disappearance. Much of this work was initially by Armenians in the ªrst generation of their diaspora and more recently by scholars who often, but not always, were Armenian-Americans. In the 1980s, another body of writing began to emerge, in both Turkish and English, using Ottoman sources, with titles like Documents on Ottoman Armenians.3 It quickly became evident that the authors were not writing critical history but polemics that moved along two fronts. Many of their works were directly sponsored and published by the Turkish government and offered either English or modern Turkish translations and sometimes reproductions of Ottoman documents. Overall, these translations were intended to demonstrate that after the Ottoman government ordered the deportation of the Armenians from the eastern Anatolian war zones in the spring of 1915, the regime went to considerable trouble to protect the lives and properties of its departing subjects. More or less simultaneously, a second body of Ottomanist literature appeared. These studies added to the account that the years from 1911 to 1922 witnessed a terrible bloodletting for all Ottoman subjects and that Muslims died in greater numbers than did Christians during the conflaagrations. After the long lapse of serious Ottomanist scholarship on the Armenian question, it now appears that the Ottomanist wall of silence is crumbling. In 1998, for example, the Armenian Forum published articles by several Ottomanists, as well as Armenian specialists, in which the scholars actually talked to, instead of past, one another; they sought to engage in constructive dialogues on the massacres and not simply to speak to their own constituencies. A remarkable set of events, perhaps even a permanent break in the wall, occurred in late 2005. A Turkish university managed to hold a two-day conference exploring the events of 1915. The Turkish government had blocked several earlier efforts. This time, however, despite ofªcial intimidation and public harassment, Turkish historians and other Turkish academics debated and discussed this once-forbidden subject. Such is the backdrop for a discussion of Bloxham’s The Great Game of Genocide. Although the book has many faults and short-comings, it is intellectually honest and makes important contributions to shattering the taboos that still prevail. The author has strong biases, but readers will detect the presence of a scholar struggling with complex political, economic, and moral issues. From this reviewer’s perspective—as expressed in The Ottoman Empire (Cambridge, 2000)—Ottoman civil and military personnel in 1915 committed mass murders of Armenian subjects, persons whom they were sworn and bound to protect and defend. As I wrote in the second edition to my book, however, debate that centers around the term genocide may degenerate into semantics and deºect scholars from the real task at hand, to understand better the nature of the 1915 events. My concern about the term genocide is partly a reflection of the current state of debate among Ottomanists and the reluctance of both these professional historians and the Turkish government to consider the fate of the Armenians. These politics mean that use of genocide creates more heat than light and does not seem to promote dispassionate inquiry. Moreover, genocide evokes implicit comparisons with the Nazi past, which precludes a full understanding of the parameters of the Ottoman events. Nonetheless, I use the term in the context of this review. Although it may provoke anger among some of my Ottomanist colleagues, to do otherwise in this essay runs the risk of suggesting denial of the massive and systematic atrocities that the Ottoman state and some of its military and general populace committed against the Armenians. Indeed, as I state in the second edition, accumulating evidence is indicating that the killings were centrally planned by Ottoman government officials and systematically carried out by their underlings.[/b] Bloxham sometimes offers inadequate evidence to buttress his arguments concerning the central planning of the massacres. For example, he documents a spring 1915 decision to deport “all of the Armenians” from an area in western Anatolia by citing a Berlin newspaper, Berliner Tageblatt, of 4 May 1916 (78, n. 88). Citing a secondary source dated a year after an event is not presenting sufficient historical evidence and does not make a convincing case. Nonetheless, what happened to the Armenians readily satisfies the U.N. definition of genocide. Furthermore, Bloxham is correct to say, “The 1915–16 genocide was a one-sided destruction of a largely defenceless community by the agents of a sovereign state” Leaving aside any reservations about using the term genocide, which did not become part of the international lexicon until after World War II, to describe events during World War I, the question remains: How do we frame discussions of the systematic widespread slaughters that have occurred in the past? The Armenians had coexisted in relative peace for most of the period during which they were under Ottoman administration. The Armenian massacres of the mid-1890s, 1909, and World War I were not the inevitable outcome of preexisting primordial divides but were historically contingent events. What caused them? Bloxham’s book is divided into two parts. In the ªrst, he surveys late Ottoman history and the genocide (he has no qualms about using this term coined in the late 1930s). He then devotes slightly more than half of his work to exploring the complicity of the Great Powers in the perpetration of the Ottoman atrocities of 1915 and in supporting the denials of the Turkish Republic following the elimination of the Ottoman Empire. Bloxham offers a study of imperialism in the Near and Middle East and its consequences for the peoples of the region. Toward the end of the book, he summarizes his own contribution as “the sorry history of the manipulated aspirations of supplicant peoples by the Great Powers” (225). Bloxham describes his goal as “an analysis of the way that the Armenian question continued periodically and tragically to intersect with the greater imperial and military policies of the powers” (133). The book is much stronger in Parts II and III, in which he discusses the involvement of the Great Powers and presents considerable original research. The earlier chapters in Part I are weaker, at least partly because Bloxham did not utilize much of the new scholarship on Ottoman history that would have provided him with richer insights into the structure of Ottoman society and the state.
22
P. Connolly
June 3, 2008
Response to post #15 by "Global Hero":
I don’t believe the Turkish People -or the Turkish Government- are "In Denial" about the events of 1915. Generally they acknowledge the deaths; they only object to the use of the word "Genocide" in describing them. If Dr. Quataert sincerely believed that the Turkish Government was Denying a genocide - which is a very serious thing to do - why was he connected in any way with a department that was receiving a research grant from the Turkish Government? I am referring to a quote from page 258 of his Journal Article in which he said: "To his credit, Bloxham also places the denials of the republican Turkish state in the eighty years since its formation in historical context. [followed by discussion of the gov’t position on the issue]". This clearly shows to me that Dr. Quaetaert was insinuating that the Turkish Government has been denying -all this time, all these 80yrs- something very terrible; most likely a real genocide, especially in view of the fact that the "Denial" charge is the formost word in the slanderous vocabulary of the Armenian Propagandists and the self-proclaimed genocide "scholars". So if you can explain to me why Dr. Quataert worked even one day, even one hour, in a program which received all or part of its funding from a government that he believed to be in such "denial", I’ll be happy to discuss the rest of the article with you and the issue of the dismissal.
23
hyola
June 3, 2008
Maybe he realized what was going on…
Is the International Association of Genocide Scholars "self-proclaimed"? - they are experts on genocide and study it all day night and have an organization that does so…
How about the Institute on the Holocaust and Genocide? And the Institute for the Study of Genocide?
It is what it is (denial) - it’s not slanderous - it’s actually an accurate description of what is going on. It was what it was (genocide). And please don’t tell me the word didn’t exist at that time - the word didn’t exist at the time of WWII too either - does that mean the Jewish case does not qualify?
24
Lucrèce
June 4, 2008
Le compte-rendu de Norman Stone, un grand historien qui mérite encore d’être qualifié ainsi, contrairement à Donald Quataert :
www.tallarmeniantale.com/book-review.htm
The latest public body to have given at least gingerly ‘recognition’ was, of all things, Edinburgh City Council. It was guided in its wisdom by David Bloxham, author of the rather oddly-entitled Great Game of Genocide. Page one of his introduction firmly states ‘Armenian genocide…one million Armenians died’. Later in the book there are descriptions of the process, plus some asides as to how the Germans confined themselves to verbal protests while the British cared more for the Greeks. Later on no-one held Turkey to account because she ‘mattered’, and the modern-day Turks were therefore allowed to get away with ‘denialism’. We take a tour round some by now very familiar arguments and sources. This is all fairly standard stuff, though Bloxham does protest at exaggerations by some of his allies. One of them, V.Dadrian, even tries quite hard to show that the Armenians had the same fate as the Jews, including equivalents of the SS and the medical-experiments doctors of Auschwitz (in 1915 the Turks hardly had any nurses, let alone doctors). Bloxham refers to Dadrian often enough, but at least does not accept this fanciful line. To his credit he also chides present-day Armenians for the ethnic cleansing of Karabakh. There have been several hundred thousand Azeri refugees — a curious descant on 1915. However, Bloxham himself does say ‘genocide’ (shall we call him an ‘acceptionist’?) , and gives a figure for 1,200,000 Armenian dead.
But there is another side to the story: no genocide, and 700,000 dead, mostly from disease and starvation, such as affected the entire population of Anatolia at the time. This side has most recently been represented by Guenther Lewy, the senior historian in the USA of the Nazi persecution of the Jews, and recently retired from a chair at the University of Massachusetts. He does not think that there was a ‘genocide’ of the Armenians in 1915. There were killings, yes, but they were in a sense provoked, because Armenian legionaries were fighting for the French and for the Russians. The Ottoman government of the time feared that there would be a general uprising of Armenians, not just in the front-line areas, but in the interior, where railways and telegraph lines might be sabotaged, and it decreed that there should be a deportation of the Armenian population (with certain exceptions). But the locals could sometimes not be controlled: there were killings, and foreign observers concluded that there was a plan to exterminate the Armenians. Was there ? Despite Bloxham’s certainty, there is, Lewy shows, no evidence of such a plan. There are forgeries, nowadays almost universally accepted as such (Dadrian being an exception) and when the British were in occupation of Istanbul between 1918 and 1922, they found no incriminating evidence in the archives. They released several dozen Turks whom they were holding in Malta. Why ? Dadrian claims, because the Turks were themselves holding British hostages. Bloxham thinks that there just was not, at the time, a mechanism for international trial of war-crimes. He does not even mention that the British Law Officers themselves just said that they did not have the evidence for a satisfactory prosecution; they asked the Americans if they had such evidence, and were told, no. So the Turks were released. There are other similar cases. For instance, a commission went round the orphanages to rescue Armenian children. Halide Edip Adivar, a famous Turkish feminist, was part of it. An Armenian source says she tried to keep the children Islamic. A Turkish biography says she tried to rescue children from being kidnapped, shrieking, by Armenians. Who is right ? It is very difficult for an outsider to judge, and would a decent woman have behaved as cruelly as Bloxham’s Armenian source claims ? It would have been fair-minded of Bloxham just to recognize that there are two sides to such stories. Time and again, when some anti-Turkish evidence comes up, he quotes Dadrian, the most extreme jumper-up-and-down on the Armenian side. Lewy is a great deal more balanced, and he also has the considerable merit of showing that Dadrian’s scholarship is itself full of holes - documents selectively quoted in pursuit of his thesis that the Armenian massacres can be put on the same level as the Holocaust. Since Lewy reads German as well as Dadrian does, he is in a very good position. Lewy’s book, incidentally, will not offer much comfort to Turkish nationalists, either. However, until such time as we have an historian able to deal with Ottoman, Armenian and Russian (since Russian documents are now becoming available) Lewy’s establishes itself as the most serious account. It is, besides, much easier to read than Bloxham’s, which is rather muddled in lay-out and self-important in tone.
25
Lucrèce
June 4, 2008
Is the International Association of Genocide Scholars "self-proclaimed"? - they are experts on genocide and study it all day night and have an organization that does so…
www.commentarymagazine.com/viewarticle.cfm/genocide–11140?page=2
I am less than impressed by the unanimous vote of the International Association of Genocide Scholars that the Armenian case “was one of the major genocides of the modern era.” The great majority of these self-proclaimed experts on Ottoman history have never set foot in an archive or done any other original research on the subject in question.
26
hyola
June 4, 2008
I see there is a lot of the whole "look this was so serious and this accusation is so grave that by virture of how serious it is, it cannot be true, must be false, and therefore is slanderous…"
Don’t take the LSAT unless you are ok with a low score.
Some reading:
www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?aid=933http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?aid=935http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?sid=430http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?sid=431
27
hyola
June 4, 2008
From the same excerpt you just pasted…
"The reports of diplomats and missionaries on the scene document the horrors of the deportation process, but contain little solid information about who carried out the killings or who ordered them. Given the very large number of deaths and the observed complicity of many local officials in the murders, it is not surprising that not a few of these witnesses concluded that the high death toll was an intended outcome of the deportation decision. Still, well-informed as many foreign officials were about the events unfolding before their eyes, their insight into the mindset and the real intentions of the Young Turk leadership was necessarily limited. Indeed, to this day the inner workings of the Young Turk regime, and especially the role of the triumvirate of Enver, Talaat, and Djemal, are understood only very inadequately.
So basically he concedes that everyone saw government officials leading deportations and massacres…
I am inventing a machine - it is called the "read the minds of genocidal government planners machine".
28
P. Connolly
June 4, 2008
"Maybe he realized what was going on" is not nearly a suitable explanation as to why one would be working for an organization that he believed was denying genocide. The context makes it clear that this is not some kind of new discovery he has ventured on and that he’s felt this way for some time.
Real scholars are careful to prove their assertions before venturing into any assesment of the character of their ideological opponents. The self-proclaimed genocide "scholars", however, only display their weak incompetence when they repeatedly attack their opponents as "denialists" and "David Irving" before having sufficiently established the validity of their arguments. The issue here is the provocation of the Armenian Revolutionaries before 1915. When confronted with this thorny issue, the Armenian Propagandists and their henchmen, the self-proclaimed genocide "scholars", constantly resort to attacks on their opponents invoking the full vocabulary of "denial" invective which they themselves have invented specifically for the purpose of attacking their opponents and deflecting attention from the fact that their position is untenable.
29
hyola
June 4, 2008
It’s been proven over and over again.
Those who do not accept the facts seek to take events out of context far away and use those as blame for mass premeditated deportation and slaughter.
Please see above posts regarding killing a whole ethnic group of people because one may think a small separate group far away may be causing trouble.
30
P. Connolly
June 4, 2008
Also, I’m not placing Dr. Quataert in the same category with the propagandists and self-proclaimed genocide "scholars". But his stated views seem ireconcilable with his choice of employment given the seriousness of the charge.
31
hyola
June 4, 2008
So that would mean then that if you are employed by a certain group or institution you must not speak truthfully and call a spade a spade - but stick to "company policy" and in this case continue not accepting the facts? Why are his "stated views" irreconcilable? He said what he said and he worked for he worked for. All the more intriguing… I guess that is why he was forced to resign as Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Institute of Turkish Studies (ITS).
32
R
June 4, 2008
The Huffington Post reviews the Quataert scandal.
www.huffingtonpost.com/harut-sassounian/turkish-ambassador-dismis_b_104996.html
Interestingly Donald Quataert was a signator to the infamous 1985 ad in the New York Times paid for by the ATAA.
33
Lucrèce
June 4, 2008
So basically he concedes that everyone saw government officials leading deportations and massacres…
Not everyone, but a part of the eyewitness. And some of this eyewitness have made mention to the punishment of criminal officials and the help to the deportees.The Armenian-American James K. Sutherland, relocated in Aleppo, described Djemal Pasha as “a great man,” who was “responsible the saving of a half-million armenians in the part of Turkey subject control” (Adventures od an Armenian Boy, Ann Arbor Press, 1964, quoted in Guenter Lewy, The Armenian Massacres in Ottoman Turkey. A Disputed Genocide, Salt Lake City, University of Utah Press, 2005, p. 196).
Since the publication of Mr. Lewy’s book, the TTK has published new ottoman documents, establishing that the action of Djemal was just the application of Talat’s orders. For example:
"September 09, 1915
Ottoman Government
Ministry of the Interior
General Directorate of Security
Secret
Cipher message to the Governorate of Konya:
Ahmet from Siroz and his friend Halil have been sent to Konya today, to be prosecuted by the Military Court of the 4th Army for the crimes of murdering the Armenians and usurping their possessions. The said individuals should definitely not be permitted to escape and they should be kept imprisoned in Konya, until receiving the request and written note of Djemal Pasha in that regard.
September 09, 1915
The Minister [Talat Pacha]"
Hikmet Özdemir and Yusuf Sarinay, Turkish-Armenian Conflict Documents, Ankara, 2007, page 261.
Ahmed and Halil were sentenced to death, and hanged.
34
Lucrèce
June 4, 2008
The Huffington Post reviews the Quataert scandal.
The ultra-nationalist and rabid Mr. Sassunian as arbiter of good taste? Haven’t you got anything better in stock?
35
P. Connolly
June 4, 2008
Response to #27 above:
If you are Chairman of the of the Board of Governors of the Institute of Turkish Studies and -after some 40 years as an Ottomanist you suddenly come to the conclusion that the Turkish government has been in "Denial" for some 80 years up to the present day about a "accumulating evidence… indicating that the killings were centrally planned by Ottoman officials and systematically carried out by their underlings. (p. 251 of the journal article)", and that board or that institute is receiving funding from this same Turkish government which is in "Denial" about "genocide", it seems highly irregular for such a chairman to continue to accept funding from such a supposedly corrupt regime. The charge of concealing genocide -as I have previously stated- is a very serious charge. He has a right to his views, and he has a right to state his views, but there comes a point at which one has to ask the question: "If you felt that way about the Turkish Government, then why were you allowing the continued acceptance of the funding?". Furthermore, taking it a step further, if the Turkish Government had not said anything about this incident an outsider could have said: "Look, their own best scholars funded by research grants which they themselves have sponsored have determined that it was a genocide and STILL they (ie. the Turkish Government) are DENYING it!!". It seems to me that Quaetaert can’t have it both ways. If he wanted to be recognized as a man of his convictions he should have handled it differently - and I don’t intend this as a slur on his character, perhaps decisions were made quickly without full consideration to all ramifications or there could be other circumstances we’re not aware of. Either way, the argument that he was forced out because he told the truth simply doesn’t add up.
36
Richard
June 4, 2008
The Quataert dismissal raises a number of issues:
1) The ITS bills itself as an independent institute with no agenda and vaunts its location at the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University.
From its web page: "…the Institute of Turkish Studies (ITS) is the only non-profit, private educational foundation in the United States exclusively dedicated to the support and development of Turkish Studies in American higher education. The Institute is an independent, tax exempt organization and does not seek to influence legislation nor advocate particular policies or agendas. ITS currently benefits from the location of its offices at the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service on the campus of Georgetown University, the oldest and largest school of international affairs in the country." www.turkishstudies.org/about.html
How can an independent institute located at a prominent American university be subjected to the pressure of a foreign ambassador?
2) Given that the ITS avowedly has no agenda and is interested in objective scholarship why does it matter if one of its members, a prominent scholar in the field, changes his approach?
3) If the Turkish government is genuinely interested in objective scholarship doesn’t this send a terrible signal that dissenting views wont be tolerated?
37
Lucrèce
June 4, 2008
Very funny. The ITS is, according to the Balakian-Hovannisian gang, an infamous pro-Turkish lobby, when he as Mr. Lowry for president; but it’s a respectable and independent association of scholars when Mr. Quataert repeat parrot fashion the Armenian lies.
38
hyola
June 4, 2008
www.huffingtonpost.com/harut-sassounian/turkish-ambassador-dismis_b_104996.html
I guess the joint commission talk really is just smoke and mirrors to prolong and obfuscate and never get to the core issue. Here we had a guy disagree with the "party line"…
39
P. Connolly
June 4, 2008
Yes, it sounds like this Quaetart issue is turning out to be quite a Pandora’s box.
"If the Turkish government is genuinely interested in objective scholarship doesn’t this send a terrible signal that dissenting views wont be tolerated?" (post #32 above)
Yes this is the question that has been raised. I see no conflict here however. The fact that the Turkish government has called for objective scholarship does not at all carry with it the corollary that they are obligated to fund the opposition. The charge of this being an "infringement of academic freedom" is without merit. As stated previously, a chair of Board of Governors of ITS can’t have it both ways. It was one thing for him to take a position regarding recent findings in connection with certain massacres. But for him to then venture off into charging the Turkish Government with "Denial" of "Genocide" while still a member of an organization receiving a substantial endowment from the Turkish Government is problematic. For us as Americans, perhaps the question could become clearer if we consider a corollary in American culture. If a group of historians is studying World War II, the provocations of the Japanese, the subsequent non-combatant deaths in Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the awareness of President Truman and his circle, of the fact that huge numbers of non-combatants would certainly die and be dreadfully mutilated for life it’s one thing for them to state their findings based on historical evidence in this area. But for them to then state that the action of Truman and his cabinet constituted "Genocide" and that henceforth anyone who "Denies" this "Genocide" shall be regarded as a "Genocide Denier" would be something completely different.
40
Global Hero
June 4, 2008
admin: accusing all those who disagree with you of bribery = deletion. Respond to substance with substance or don’t respond at all.
41
hyola
June 4, 2008
Sorry - couldn’t resist this one either:
www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?sid=430
Here is an interesting piece - of course this does not prove genocidal intent - right?
The documentary evidence of the genocide includes a 1915 telegram to a Turkish provincial official from Behaeddin Shakir, one of the leaders of the secret organization created to plan and carry out the genocide, which included death squads staffed by criminals released from prison for that purpose. "Are the Armenians, who are being dispatched from there, being liquidated?" Shakir wrote. "Are those harmful persons being exterminated, or are they merely being dispatched and exiled? Answer explicitly."
42
hyola
June 5, 2008
www.todayszaman.com/tz-web/detaylar.do?load=detay&link=143941
680news.com/news/local/article.jsp?content=20080603_081016_8132
Interesting stories regarding the Toronto situation.
43
hyola
June 5, 2008
Yes, it sounds like this Quaetart issue is turning out to be quite a Pandora’s box.
Yes indeed.
"If the Turkish government is genuinely interested in objective scholarship doesn’t this send a terrible signal that dissenting views wont be tolerated?" (post #32 above)Yes this is the question that has been raised. I see no conflict here however. The fact that the Turkish government has called for objective scholarship does not at all carry with it the corollary that they are obligated to fund the opposition. The charge of this being an "infringement of academic freedom" is without merit. As stated previously, a chair of Board of Governors of ITS can’t have it both ways. It was one thing for him to take a position regarding recent findings in connection with certain massacres. But for him to then venture off into charging the Turkish Government with "Denial" of "Genocide" while still a member of an organization receiving a substantial endowment from the Turkish Government is problematic. For us as Americans, perhaps the question could become clearer if we consider a corollary in American culture. If a group of historians is studying World War II, the provocations of the Japanese, the subsequent non-combatant deaths in Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the awareness of President Truman and his circle, of the fact that huge numbers of non-combatants would certainly die and be dreadfully mutilated for life it’s one thing for them to state their findings based on historical evidence in this area. But for them to then state that the action of Truman and his cabinet constituted "Genocide" and that henceforth anyone who "Denies" this "Genocide" shall be regarded as a "Genocide Denier" would be something completely different.
That means the institute’s default position is that, no matter what the evidence may say, genocide did not occur. Of course they are not obligated to fund anyone they don’t want to fund - but the message this sends to the public is unmistakable.
44
Kemal
June 5, 2008
"but the message this sends to the public is unmistakable."
So is the new argument now is that refusal to fund someone who accuses you of a crime that has not been proven in a court of law is evidence that you committed that crime?
How ridiculous is that?
How many historians that conclude no genocide occurred has Armenia or the Armenian diaspora funded?
None.
So, by your logic, that sends an unmistakable message to the public that no genocide occurred.
45
hyola
June 5, 2008
Not exactly the best logical extension there. But it’s ok this is fun it’s like ping pong!
It was not refusal to fund him - it was firing him because of what he said that is the egregious act at issue.
Speaking of courts of law (I mean you did bring it up after all), weren’t Talaat and a bunch of others in his cabal tried in absentia for their crimes (and found guilty) - or is that western interference and propaganda? Not the perfect forum to assess the severity of what happened and how to punish the perpetrator and provide restitution to the victims - but it was a start!
Regarding funding - Armenia has not needed to fund historians en masse like the Turkish government since nearly all historians, for decades, just went off the facts and history and called it what it was (a genocide). The "new interpretations" started when Turkey woke up and realized that it was being portrayed, largely by historical terms in a very accurate manner, to be a genocidal and denialist state. Turkey made what most would call a poor decision, instead of confronting it, acknowledging it, moving on and promoting a healthy and honest national psyche - it opted to deny and create this schizophrenic condition for its population. This prolongs and complicates matters even further…
What will happen when Turkey gets its EU membership? Is Turkish society ready to absorb the pain and scars of all the lies and deceit when Armenians from all over the world file lawsuits in Turkey under EU laws demanding old homes and lands with deeds and title proving ownership by their ancestors in hand? Is that what will "prove" the genocide to the Turkish government? Only time will tell…
As a poster above noted, these are serious charges - but they are also backed up by serious evidence.
Side note: Armenia doesn’t have much money thanks in part to this blockade thing going on… not that they would spend whatever they had in a grandiose fashion on propping up historians (can’t say for sure but they sure as heck are not financing anyone right now).
If you are the underdog with money and national security and power - at least the truth keeps you afloat… (let’s remember it’s the US and Turkish governments that both work to stop any legislation in the US that recognizes the Armenian Genocide, on top of multi-million dollar lobbying and elite PR firms that do Turkey’s bidding on this issue). This Armenian Diaspora that Turkey refers to is quite comically overstated - it is a bunch of American Armenians (here as descendants and refugees of guess what event?) who write letters to their Congressmen - nowhere near the collective might of the denialist machine.
Try again!
46
P. Connolly
June 5, 2008
Response to post #39:
"That means the institute’s default position is that, no matter what the evidence may say, genocide did not occur."
No, it means that the purpose of the institute is to uncover the historical facts -whatever they may be-, not to decide on whether the Turkish government is guilty of "Genocide Denial". The facts speak quite clearly for themselves. Facts like the provocation of the Armenian Revolutionaries. If the Chairman of the ITS Board of Governers chooses to take the position publicly that Millions and Millions of Turkish People and the Turkish Government are all committing the very serious offense of "Denial" of genocide then yes, the Turkish Government has the right to say "We see your evidence but NO we don’t think it was genocide because we know what Armenian Revolutionaries did in the years leading up to 1915 (and after) and by your ‘genocide’ assessment you are ignoring it …and we’re not going to continue to allow you to hurl such insults in our face while collecting such a generous grant.".
"Of course they are not obligated to fund anyone they don’t want to fund - but the message this sends to the public is unmistakable."
People are starting to see Armenian Propaganda for what it is and they will be able to see what’s going on here.
47
hyola
June 5, 2008
"No, it means that the purpose of the institute is to uncover the historical facts -whatever they may be-"
I rest my case.
48
hyola
June 5, 2008
http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/intrep.jsp?iid=45
49
Kemal
June 5, 2008
Amazing how you slip and slide about hyola.
First, Armenia and the Armenian Diaspora fund "genocide scholars" to the tunes of millions. For example, Taner Akcam has been funded by the Zoryan Institute and the Cafesjian Family Foundation.
Second, the implication that Turkey must join the EU for Armenians to file lawsuits is beyond ridiculous. If that is what was necessary for Armenians to file lawsuits, why are they fighting tooth and nail, to the point of obsession, to keep Turkey out of the EU and using their genocide claims as a reason to keep Turkey out? Doesn’t really make sense, but then much of what genocide proponents argue never does once you scratch below the surface.
While you claim Armenia doesn’t have "much money", the new president has already proclaimed that genocide claims will receive renewed focus by the state. Despite what you may think, Armenia seems to think it has plenty of time, money and resources to waste on these claims.
Also, the ITS does not employ researchers, it provides funding. Quataert was employed by the University of Houston, not ITS. Thus, he was not fired by ITS a you claim.
While you wrap yourself in a cloud of "righteous indignation" in defense of "academic freedom", you still cannot come to grips with several facts:
You insist that the government of Turkey must fund researcher who accuse it of a crime that has never been proven or else be condemned as guilty of that crime. A ridiculous notion.
Not only that, Armenia and Armenians are exempt from your ridiculous notion. Hypocrisy!
Armena and Armenians have never and do not fund, much less even allow, scholars of Ottoman history access to Armenian state or the Dashnak archives.
Armenians praise, celebrate and lobby for laws that criminalize free speech, debate, academic discourse and discussion of the dispute that Armenian genocide claims are deeply mired in.
Of course they do, because it does not help to have the forgeries and falsifications Armenians rely on so heavily to "prove" their claims continually exposed by the most preeminent scholars of Ottoman history. More hypocrisy!
Not only that, the one scholar of Turkish origin (a doctoral candidate at Duke) that Armenia thought might deny, but it was not certain he would deny, Armenian genocide claims, was arrested and imprisoned in Armenia and all of his research, his paper and computer confiscated and not returned to him when he was finally let go months later.
So what are we to take away from this?
That Armenian genocide proponents scream and yell about academic freedom and free speech when it comes to their pundits, while at the same time they do all in their power to restrict and forbid freedom of speech and academic freedom when it comes to those who dispute their claims and expose their fake documents.
Again, How many historians that conclude no genocide occurred has Armenia or the Armenian diaspora funded?
None.
Using the same logic, that sends an unmistakable message to the public that no genocide occurred
How many historians who have concluded no genocide occurred has been granted access to the Armenian state or Dashnak archives?
None.
Once again, using the same logic, the fact that Armenians continue to conceal archives relating to Armenian revolutionary activity against the Ottoman Empire and massacres committed against Ottoman civilians during WWI also sends an unmistakable message to the public that no genocide occurred.
All of this also sends the message that your claims are not credible.
If Armenain genocide claims are so indisputable they could survive robust debate that Armenian genocide proponents so desperately avoid and be proven in a court of law.
It is because they are not "indisputable" that Armenians fight so hard to restrict access to their archives, which contain evidence of their intent to ethnically cleanse southeastern Anatolia to establish an ethnically pure Armenian territory, and avoid having to prove their claims with credible evidence that can withstand legal scrutiny.
50
R
June 5, 2008
#45
1) Donald Quataert was and is a professor of Ottoman History at the State University of New York at Binghampton.
www.binghamton.edu/history/faculty/quataertd.htm
He has been there since 1987 prior to which he was at the University of Houston.
2) He was also the Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Institute for Turkish Studies from 2001 - 2006.
3) Officials in Turkey threatened to revoke funding for the ITS unless Professor Quataert retracted his review of Donald Bloxham’s book or resigned from the Chairmanship: www.mesa.arizona.edu/about/cafmenaletters.htm#May27Turkey
This amounts to firing him.
51
Lucrèce
June 5, 2008
Here is an interesting piece - of course this does not prove genocidal intent - right?
Unfortunaly for you and for Armenian claims, this alleged telegram, as the rest of Andonian materials, has been shown to be a crude forgerie:
www.eraren.org/index.php?Lisan=en&Page=YayinIcerik&SayiNo=15
www.ataa.org/reference/andonian-ataov.html
www.meforum.org/article_print.php?id=748&v=1389662121
52
Lucrèce
June 5, 2008
For example, Taner Akcam has been funded by the Zoryan Institute and the Cafesjian Family Foundation.
That’s right:
armenians-1915.blogspot.com/2008/05/2464-it-is-official-taner-akcam-is-paid.html
53
hyola
June 5, 2008
How about the IAGS and the various other genocide scholarly groups? They don’t count? Armenians/Armenia does not fund them. The ones you mentioned are institutes set up by the Armenian Diaspora. Millions? You make it sound like the lottery.
It is not a MUST situation for Turkey when it joins the EU - just pointing out how when/if Turkey does join - it will be a difficult situation for the country to deal with legally as its system will be required to adhere to EU customs and law - which we both know - and not cynically now - is quite a tall order. You "overresponded" on this one so to speak - what does this reality have to do with lobbying groups opposed to this?
The new Armenian president did proclaim that recognition would be supported by Armenia - but does that mean Armenia has hired DLA Piper, the Livingston group (since moved onto Libya - what an upgrade) and Fleishman Hillard aside from exploiting otherwise good relationships with Jewish American lobbying giants like Turkey? No - simply because it does not have the funding. Do your research before making baselass illogical connections.
Please see post #47 regarding "not being fired".
I didn’t insist they must fund him ("overresponding again") - just pointing out how firing a researcher who acknowledges it was genocide underscores the extreme irony of the situation - I think we can all understand that quite easily.
Maybe the funding appears that way because only those funded or in cohoots with Turkey deny the Armenian Genocide - while Armenian scholars AND scores of non-Armenian, non-funded, etc. scholars acknowledge - or is that another secret conspiracy all to make Turkey look bad?
See above posts regarding Armenian archives - this has been address already.
Which court would you suggest these claims be brought? And are you really ready to take that step - to have the whole world read about (again) the eyewitness accounts of ruthless slaughter, deportation and Ottoman high-level leaders telling western missionaries and diplomats to "stay out of it"…? That’s some good PR right there…
54
zekiye
June 5, 2008
It is true that the Armenians are incredibly intolerant to anti Armenian thesis or any thesis even in partial discrepancy with their own. And it is a fact that books which have such characteristics (like the book of Katchaznouni, the first prime-minister of the Armenian state, ?Dashnagzoutiun Has Nothing to do Anymore?, the book of K.S.Papazian, ?Patriotism Perverted?, the book of Samuel Weems , ?A Terrorist State: Armenia?) are banned in Armenia.
But more unacceptable attitute of the Armenians is their approach to people who do not think like them: The home of American Professor Stanford Shaw of the University of California-Los Angeles was firebombed in retaliation for his academic courage in disputing the Armenian genocide claim, in 1977 (washingtontimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071016/COMMENTARY).Sixty nine academicians who specialized in Turkish, Ottoman and Middle Eastern studies from 44 different American universities and colleges published a declaration in The New York Times on May 19, 1986 and declared: ???.No signatory of this statement wishes to minimize the scope of Armenian suffering. We are likewise cognizant that it cannot be viewed as separate from the suffering experienced by the Muslim inhabitants of the region. The weight of evidence so far uncovered points in the direction of serious inter-communal warfare (perpetrated by Muslim and Christian irregular forces), complicated by disease, famine, suffering and massacres in Anatolia and adjoining areas during the First World War. Indeed, throughout the years in question, the region was the scene of more or less continuous warfare, not unlike the tragedy which has gone on in Lebenon for the past decade. The resulting death toll among both Muslim and Christian communities of the region was immense. But much more remains to be discovered before historians will be able to sort out precisely responsibility between warring and innocent, and to identify the causes for the events which resulted in the death or removal of large numbers of the eastern Anatolian population, Christian and Muslim alike???? ?the history of the Ottoman-Armenians is much debated among scholars, many of whom do not agree with the historical assumptions embodied in the wording of H.J.Res.192. ?.Such a resolution, based on historically questionable assumptions, can only damage the cause of honest historical enquiry, and damage the credibility of the American legistlative process.?
The producers of the "historical documentary film Sari Gelin www.sarigelinbelgeseli.com) suggested to interview some of these academicians. However they were rejected because these academicians and their families were threatened by the Armenians, via telephone calls and letters, in 1986 for signing this declaration. The Armenians sued Bernard Lewis, the French historian famous for his Middle Eastern and Ottoman studies, in France, in 1993 just because he wrote in Le Monde that ‘the 1915 events were not ?genocide?.American judge Samuel Weems?s life was threatened by the Armenians since he published his book ?A terrorist State: Armenia?. In Netherlands, Turkish origined party members who told that they did not agree with the Armenian thesis were discharged from the party, because of the pressure of the Armenian voters of the country.Additionally, Turkish university students studying in the USA are under threat of Armenian students, just because they reject the Armenian claims. In some universities it reaches to such an extreme point that one young university student needs police escort. And at present saying what happened in 1915 is not genocide could be life threatening in Republic of Armenia. Imagine giving a conference with Turkish academicians there. And did you hear any Armenian who attempted to hold a conference advocating that Armenian genocide did not occur, in Armenia or in Europe, USA? In spite of all these facts, the Armenians continuously claim that nobody can talk about Armenian thesis in Turkey, since freedom of speech is absent in Turkey. Could anybody tell me, if Armenian thesis were banned in Turkey, then how could Armenian Ara Sarafyan give a conference on the thesis of Armenian genocide in ?stanbul and discuss them with the Turkish citizens? http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=102831 And as a most important point, Turkish historians, Turkish prime minister and Turkish Assembly several times suggested Armenia to discuss these events together with historians from both sides and historians from other countries. Everybody in Turkey knows very well that those who advocate the Armenian thesis most passionately are the Armenians themselves. Could anybody tell me again if in Turkey the Armenian thesis were banned, then why did Turkish prime minister and Turkish Assembly several times call on Armenia to discuss these events in joint commissions consisting of Armenian, Turkish historians and historians from other countries, in other words with historians whoever the Armenians have chosen for themselves?No wisdom can overlook this Armenian hypocrisy.
55
hyola
June 5, 2008
56
Lucrèce
June 5, 2008
these academicians and their families were threatened by the Armenians, via telephone calls and letters, in 1986 for signing this declaration
Justin McCarthy’s family had to get police protection. Prof. McCarthy himself was threatened with losing his job if he continued his research.
turkishweekly.net/comments.php/id2418/top/comments.php?id=594
See also:
www.tallarmeniantale.com/69histors-charny.htm
www.tallarmeniantale.com/intimidate.htm
57
P. Connolly
June 5, 2008
Is Dr. Quaetaert Protesting this whole transaction himself also ? If so where can I see a statement from him ?
58
hyola
June 6, 2008
admin: deleted for plagiarism (large-scale quoting without attribution)
59
hyola
June 6, 2008
admin: deleted for plagiarism
60
hyola
June 6, 2008
Ok it won’t post it keeps coming up as a blank - what is wrong?
61
Kemal
June 6, 2008
How about the IAGS and the various other genocide scholarly groups? They don’t count? Armenians/Armenia does not fund them.
Prove it hyola. This so-called "International Association of Genocide Scholars" is rather secretive about their organization and their incorporation. Where do they obtain their funding hyola?
but does that mean Armenia has hired DLA Piper,
Of course not. The Armenian diaspora buys politicians. During the past 9 years, two individual Armenians in the U.S. donated close to $500,000 to individual candidates for office from various states, democrats, republicans, the democratic and the republican party election funds. Why? Because these two individuals live in all 50 states? BS
And, that total doesn’t include the thousands of other donations made by the Armenian diaspora to politicians and to media PACs. Yes, that’s right. Armenians also donate funds to political action committees for the media.
ARMENIANS are BUYING INFLUENCE directly and skipping lobbyists altogether.
And, if you doubt this, all you need to do is to go the Federal Elections Commission’s website and look up a few names and you will find all the information there because it is required by law to be publicly disclosed.
Do your research before making baselass illogical connections.
You make me laugh.
because only those funded or in cohoots with Turkey deny the Armenian Genocide
Another logical fallacy on your part.
Funding doesn’t result in a conclusion. If it did, then all of those so-called Armenian genocide scholars, starting with Akcam, are paid mouths for hire who are not credible and are in cahoots with Armenia. What does that leave Armenian genocide proponents with? NOTHING.
And are you really ready to take that step
Understand this: we are all ready.
The question for Armenian genocide proponents is this: Credibility in a court of law is paramount. Once your credibility is called into question by outright lies and falsifications, everything you say and present will be subject to scrutiny at the granular level.
How will Armenians defend their notorious Andonian forgeries? Or, parading around as depicting the "Armenian genocide" a painting from the mid-1800s?
Or how about the false Hitler quote? Poor Schiff was caught with his pants down citing Hitler when it has been proven time and again, even by Armenian historians, that there is no basis for the Armenians’ Hitler quote.
Or, how about the claim that Ataturk admitted the genocide? That has also been proven false by an Armenian, no less. Still, Armenians parade this "admission" about.
Or, how are Armenians going to reconcile the published admissions by Boghos Nubar, Garegin Pasdermajian and Hovhannis Katchaznouni which explain that close to 200,000 Armenians took up arms and declared all out war against the Ottoman Empire in 1914, long before any relocation orders issued? That proudly proclaim that Armenians were belligerents from they very outset and had announced they intended to side with the Entente Powers against the Ottoman regime?
Do you know that more Armenians took up arms against the Ottoman Empire than there are U.S. troops in Iraq? How are Armenians going to explain that?
How will Armenians explain away Russian archival material in which Russian commanding officers ORDER Armenian militias to stop plundering and massacring unarmed Ottoman civilians? And, what about the response back from Armenian military commanders which basically state "F*&% off, we’ll do as we please"?
Yes, and what about the claims by the three aforementioned Armenian Dashnak leaders who announced at the Paris Peace Conference that the majority of Armenians relocated remained and wanted to return to Anatolia?
Or, what about Articles 6-8 of the Treaty of Alexandropol in which Armenia and Turkey renounced all claims against each other arising out of WWI and Turkey’s ensuing war of independence if they were not brought within one year?
That, my friend, is called a statute of limitations. Turkey may waive its right to assert the defense that the statute of limitations agreed to by treaty has passed, but if Turkey does, it will only be on condition that Armenia waive its right to assert the statute of limitations against Turkey.
Then, Armenia and Armenians will be made to pay for the hundreds of thousands of civilian Ottomans massacred by Armenian revolutionaries and all of the property destroyed by them.
Not only that, it’s time Armenia pay for its unabashed support of terrorism against Turkey and Turks.
We want reparations for the 40+ Turkish diplomats ruthlessly murdered by Armenian terrorists ASALA and the Justice Commandos who are treated as "heroes" by the Armenian government, the Armenian church and the Armenian diaspora to this day. We will also seek reparation for the properties they destroyed by bombing them.
Who knows, France may join in and ask for reparations for the bombing of the Orly airport by Armenians too. Are you ready for that?
We will also seek reparations for the destruction wrought by PKK terrorists which have been given funds, sanctuary and support by Armenia.
Are we ready? Damn straight we are.
62
Jason
June 6, 2008
The whole "funding = biased = not credible" is a set of questionable presumptions. Sure, sometimes funding leads to bias, but it does not always mean that bias is present or, even if it is, that the research findings lose ALL credibility as a result.
Scholars routinely seek grants. Does that mean that all scholars who do receive grants are biased and not credible because they received a grant? Does every researcher who gets funding get "bought"?
Maybe people should debate the substance instead of just hurling presumptions at each other.
63
P. Connolly
June 6, 2008
"The whole "funding = biased = not credible" is a set of questionable presumptions"
Yes, exactly …and I’d like to add to this that "ethnicity=biased=not creditable" is another invalid argument that we often see in discussions of this issue. The fact that a source is Turkish does not instantly make that source unreliable just as the fact that a source is Armenian does not instantly make that source unreliable. The difference between an historian and a propagandist is that an historian marshalls irrefutable proofs in support of his arguments whereas a propagandist is an expert at identifying those key areas that 99% of his audience won’t bother researching.
64
Michael van der Galien
June 6, 2008
Are we ready? Damn straight we are.
Exactly. Turks are more than ready for this, as are others who believe that what happened doesn’t constitute genocide.
All we want is get this thing out in the open, and to give room to both sides. Once that happens, the world will come falling down on the Armenian propagandists and their country will be financially destroyed by the reparations it has to pay.
65
Victory for the Truth
June 6, 2008
"Are we ready? Damn straight we are."
"All we want is get this thing out in the open, and to give room to both sides. Once that happens, the world will come falling down on the Armenian propagandists and their country will be financially destroyed by the reparations it has to pay."
Wow, it’s this kind of unbridled optimism in the face of reality which can only make one laugh, or shake their head. Not only will Turkey avoid reparations but Armenia will be CRUSHED under reparations to Turkey? What kind of bizarre world do you live in? Is anyone actually reading this blog anymore for insights to reality re: the Armenian-Turkish issue? And seeing that as you have pointed out before most of the Armenians in Armenia are the "good guys" who don’t really push the genocide issue unlike their evil cousins in the diaspora why are you cheering for an already impoverished country to be destroyed?! Have you finally let your antagonism for Armenians (while claiming you aren’t racist against them) slip to the realm of actually wishing an entire country of innocent people harm? Shame on you.
66
Lucrèce
June 6, 2008
Some precisions after the good comment of Kemal:
1) The figure of 200,000 Armenians, who joined the Russian army, include Russian Armenians. The exact number of Ottoman Armenians who deserted is today unknown.
The first Armenian revolt in WWI (Zeytun) began in summer 1914, before the entry into war of the Ottoman Empire.
2) The Armenian terrorists have killed around 70 innocent victims. In this total, the Turkish diplomats, the Turkish diplomat relatives/staff, and the members of her family are around 30. The others are, for most, victims, Turkish and non Turkish, of blind bombings. For example, there was 2 in Roma (1979), 10 in Ankara (1982) and 8 in Orly (1983).
3) France may ask for reparations for the bombing of the Orly, certainly, but also for many other bombings, and for assassinations, by ASALA (alone, or in collaboration with other groups, like CSPPA).
67
Hally
June 6, 2008
"What kind of bizarre world do you live in?"
Ummm, Vic, what kind of bizarre world do you live in?
Is it one in which Armenians are free to do as they please, commit crimes, support terrorists and not be held responsible for any of their actions? Sounds like it.
It seems that the point of the post which you find "bizarre" is that Armenian genocide proponents should beware what they wish for because they are not nearly as innocent or without liability as they think.
It’s a point worth pondering.
68
hyola
June 10, 2008
69
hyola
June 10, 2008
Again not posted (#65) - I can see how open and fair this is… although the comment about Armenia paying reparations is quite comical. Denialism has some funny effects on people!
70
hyola
June 10, 2008
If the Turkish government is ready and so "outraged" by these "allegations" - why don’t they file in an international court accusing Armenians of everything you are saying Armenians did?
Sorry catching up on the lunacy as I was unfortunately away for a few days…
71
hyola
June 11, 2008
humanrightsdoctorate.blogspot.com/2008/06/us-government-position-on-armenian.html
This was in 1951 before the Turkish government weighed in with money and lobbying firms and before the Armenian Diaspora had any real power - so how do you explain this one? The United States in its pleadings refers to Turkish massacres of Armenians as a case of genocide…
Are they out to get Turkey too? Are they liars too? Is it all just a big hoax designed to ruin Turkey?
Or is it simply true?
72
Lucrèce
June 11, 2008
True or false? It is unimportant. All the European belligerents of the WWI were accused of ethnic extermination, i. e. genocide avant la lettre. I do not not of books in English on this issue, only in French: Stéphane Audoin-Rouzeau, « Au cœur de la guerre : la violence du champ de bataille pendant les deux conflits mondiaux », in Stéphane Audoin-Roseau, Annette Becker, Christian Ingrao et Henri Rousso (ed.), La Violence de guerre, 1914-1945, Bruxelles-Paris, Complexe, 2002, pp. 72-97, and especially the page 88. The allegations of genocide avant la lettre against the German army in Belgium were made by the Lord Bryce’s gang, with other crude forgeries, as the stories of Belgian children in the hand amputated by German soldiers. All this tales were a response to the German propaganda, who denounced the (real) atrocities of Russian army against Russian Jews. Unlike the Belgian stories, the tales about the war in Anatolia were never refuted adequately, despite the courageous effort of some writers, like Pierre Loti, Claude Farrère, Léon Rouillon, Gaston Gaillard (the English translation of his book Les Turcs et l’Europe : http://louisville.edu/a-s/history/turks/The%20Turks%20and%20Europe.pdf), or, in US, Prof. John Dewey: http://www.ataa.org/reference/tragedy_dewey.html Turkey were, until the 1980’s, a distant country, little known, for US public and politcians, like in France or other Western states. The clichés and tales die hard. Anyway, your text refers to the "persecutions" of christians in Roman Empire as a case of genocide, and that is obviously ridicule.
73
hyola
June 11, 2008
It’s not my text - it’s the government of the United States of America.
Your links are from Louisville and the ATAA - not exactly great resources.
True or False unimportant you say - I thought the whole point is to speak openly about the truth - not about various other incidents that have nothing to do with the Armenian case.
74
Lucrèce
June 11, 2008
If the Turkish government is ready and so "outraged" by these "allegations" - why don’t they file in an international court accusing Armenians of everything you are saying Armenians did?
The so-called "international comunity" were not even capable of enforcing international law in the Armenian-Azeri conflict. A country has been able to invade another, with impunity. UN has created a international tribunal for Yugoslavia, but not for the atrocities of 1991-1994 in Western Azerbaidjan.
Armenian terrorism against Azerbaijan is also unpunished.
www.mns.gov.az/terroractspart5_en.html
The Interpol convention were systematically violated by European country, until 2000’s: they refused to extradite the terrorists of the PKK and DHKP-C.
www.meforum.org/article_print.php?id=1060&v=0567123121
European governments long avoided confronting the PKK. Various PKK leaders, including Hıdır Yalçın, Rıza Altun, Zübeyir Aydar, former Kurdish nationalist deputy in the Turkish parliament, and Ali Haydar Kaytan all live in Europe. Many call Belgium home. These PKK activists coordinate fund-raising for the organization, often through extortion, kidnappings, and political campaigns.[37] Only in May 2002 did the EU designate the PKK as a terrorist group, and then only after the group said it had dissolved, changing its name to KADEK.[38] In April 2004, the EU designated Kongra-Gel as a terrorist group. Seven months later, Dutch security forces shut down a PKK training camp in Liempde, arresting twenty-nine people who were, according to Dutch authorities, training to conduct attacks in Turkey.[39] And, on September 5, 2005, the German Interior Ministry shut down E. Xani Presse und Verlags, publisher of the pro-PKK Özgür Politika newspaper although Germany’s federal administrative court overturned the decision the following month.[40] On September 19, the German authorities shut down Welat Press Verlag, operator of the Mezopotamia-Nachrichtenagentur news agency (MHA) and the websites of Roj Online.[41] Still, several EU countries continue to tolerate the PKK and its fronts.
The United Kingdom is the European exception.
No, my dear, there are two weights, two measure, in international law.
75
Lucrèce
June 11, 2008
More about PKK’s and DHKP-C’s impunity:
www.todayszaman.com/tz-web/detaylar.do?load=detay&link=130926
76
hyola
June 12, 2008
New York Times
March 20, 1915 WHOLE PLAIN STREWN BY ARMENIAN BODIES - Turks and Kurds Reported to Have Massacred Men, Women and Children. LONDON, March 19.-Appalling accounts of conditions in Armenia have reached the officials in London of the Armenian Red Cross Fund and have been given out by them. The latest recital is from an Armenian doctor named Derderian, who says that the whole plain of Alashgerd is virtually covered with the bodies of men, women and children. When the Russian forces retreated from this district the Kurds fell upon the helpless people and shut them up in mosques. The men were killed and the women were carried away to the mountains. The organizers of the Red Cross Fund say there are 120,000 destitute Armenians now in the Caucasus. PETROGRAD, March 19.-A telegram from Urumiah, Northwestern Persia, says that prior to the evacuation of towns between Julfa and Tabriz the Turks and Kurds, who were retreating before the Russian advance, pillaged and burned the villages and put to death some of the inhabitants. At Salmaz, Pagaduk, and Sarna orders are said to have been given by the Turkish Commissioner for the destruction of the Towns. All the Armenian inhabitants of Antvat were collected and, according to this message, 600 males were put to death, and the women, after being compelled to embrace the Mohammedan faith, were divided into parties and sent to various interior towns.
77
hyola
June 13, 2008
TDSB approves high school course on genocide
Friday, June 13, 2008
By: 680News staff
Toronto - A controversial high school course on genocide has been unanimously approved by the Toronto District School Board.
The Globe and Mail reports about 50 protestors waved Turkish flags and picket signs outside the board’s North York office Thursday night objecting to the inclusion of the Armenian genocide as one of the course’s three-case studies.
Meanwhile, a group of Ukrainian-Canadians sat in meeting to support the inclusion of the Ukrainian genocide.
Board members say they hope the new course will help promote cross-cultural understanding and awareness of the dangers of stereotyping and prejudice
http://680news.com/news/local/article.jsp?content=20080613_064328_4920
——————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————-
Genocide course irks ethnic groups
TheStar.com
June 13, 2008
DANIEL DALE
STAFF REPORTER
Toronto District School Board made only minor changes to a new Grade 11 genocide course at a special meeting last night, sending dozens of protestors home unhappy.
More than 40 Ukrainian-Canadians and 60 Turkish-Canadians picketed before the meeting, then packed the board’s gallery seats.
The Ukrainian Canadian Congress wanted the 1932-1933 forced famine in Soviet Ukraine used as the course’s fourth case study with the Nazi Holocaust, 1994 Rwanda genocide and 1915 mass murder of Ottoman Empire Armenians.
The Federation of Canadian Turkish Associations and Council of Turkish Canadians sought the removal from the curriculum of the Ottoman killings, which the government of Turkey contends did not constitute genocide.
The International Association of Genocide Scholars, like the government of Canada, does deem them genocide. The Ottoman case was not mentioned at the meeting, and no trustee proposed adding the Ukrainian famine as a core case.
The board, however, passed two amendments. The first allows teachers to spend significant time on genocides other than the three core case studies as they "see fit." The second notes the curriculum’s exclusion of specific genocides does not imply the board believes those events are of "lesser significance."
Trustee Mari Rutka said she planned to propose at a regular board meeting that material on the Ukrainian famine be added to the curricula of other courses in 2009-10 and proposed a school system-wide famine remembrance day.
The Muslim Canadian Congress also expressed disappointment over the board’s decision to include a "one-sided" view of the Armenian genocide in the curriculum without including pre-WWI "ethnic cleansing of Muslims from the Balkans and southern Europe."
http://www.thestar.com/News/GTA/article/442651
78
hyola
June 13, 2008
Genocide course sparks controversy in Toronto
Curriculum to cover Holocaust, Armenia and Rwanda
Natalie Alcoba, National Post Published: Friday, June 13, 2008
TORONTO - The Toronto public school board approved last night a controversial new highschool course about genocide, one of the first of its kind in Canada to explore the topic of mass killing around the world.
Genocide and Crimes Against Humanity will be an optional Grade 11 course in Toronto schools come September. It will focus on three case studies from the 20th and 21st centuries: the Holocaust, Armenia and Rwanda.
The government-approved course description says students will "examine identity formation and how "in groups" and "out groups" are created, including an analysis of how "bias, stereotypes, prejudice and discrimination impact on various groups." They will also learn about the roles of perpetrators, victims, bystanders, rescuers, opportunists and resisters.
But it is the inclusion and exclusion of certain mass killings that has generated considerable public debate among different ethnic communities. The Ukrainians have agitated for a fourth module on the famine of the 1930s, and members of the Turkish community have lobbied for a change because they, like their national government, dispute that the killing of an estimated 1.5 million Armenians between 1915 and 1923 amounts to a genocide.
School officials said yesterday there simply are not enough hours in the year to branch beyond three core case studies, but assured that the Ukrainian famine, and other atrocities such as Darfur, will be studied in the genocide course. It will be offered at first in 12 of 110 high schools.
The committee of Toronto District School Board officials and university academics that reviewed the complaints insists that politics has no place in this debate. "Disagreeing about the appropriateness of the label of genocide is not the same as denying that the killings occurred," committee members said in a report that was submitted to Toronto school trustees. "Genuine historical controversies do belong in a highschool curriculum and can be beneficial in giving students an in-depth understanding of complex events and in teaching students critical thinking."
Academics contend that history, by its very nature, is controversial terrain, but certainly among the most fraught aspects of any history are those that involve conflicts between and within nations. It was on display last night at the Toronto school board, as local Turks waived their homeland’s red flag and decried "hate propaganda" — all part of a campaign that Armenians claim was "orchestrated overseas." Twenty years ago, a similar course proposal — which never received the endorsement of the Education Ministry — was shelved in Ottawa after the federal government intervened and asked the school board not to proceed.
In the United States, the Armenian genocide is taught in a number of states, including California, Massachusetts and New Jersey, but also not without controversy. A lawsuit was filed against the Massachusetts Department of Education in 2005 after it removed from the lesson plan the dissenting views of historians and Turkish groups. Education officials said at the time that it would be wrong to dispute the genocide in the classroom when the state law acknowledged it. The outcome of the lawsuit was not known.
The Turkish government contends that the deaths were a result of war-time fighting, and has reacted with frosty condemnation at any acknowledgment of a genocide by any government, including Canada.
The Toronto school board review committee sided with "the vast majority of scholars" who concur that what happened to the Armenians was a genocide. But it said teachers should also include analysis of the works of reputable scholars who disagree, such as U. S. historians Guenter Lewy and Bernard Lewis — a move that was lamented by one respected Canadian academic.
"In every single case of genocide, the perpetrators have denied they intended to commit a genocide," said Frank Chalk, a Concordia University history professor who is director of the Montreal Institute for Genocide and Human Rights Studies. "Including the deniers on the reading list is not something that I would have counseled."
But it was done, in part, to show concerned Turks that voices of dissent will be seen and heard, said Nadine Segal, system superintendent of programs at the TDSB.
Still, Lale Eskicioglu worried about how the "vilification and slander" of her homeland will affect young Turkish students.
"They are trying to make the events of 1915 look as if it was the same thing as the Holocaust, the worst thing that has ever happened on this Earth," said Ms. Eskicioglu, an Ottawa engineer who is now the executive director of the Council of Turkish Canadians. "We want debate, we want this to be talked about it."
Aris Babikian, head of the Armenian National Committee of Canada, said that opposition comes from a small group of "nationalists," while support of a course on the Armenian genocide stretches from city councillors to Stephen Lewis to respected historians.
"It’s not the intention of the course to villainize or create any hatred of any community," said Mr. Babikian, who said his grandfather survived the genocide thanks to the goodwill of a Turkish neighbour.
http://www.nationalpost.com/news/canada/story.html?id=583150&p=2
Source: PoliGazette
