Why do not the Turks love Armenians? The Armenian Genocide of 1915

Do you think the Turks recognized the Armenian Genocide? No, nobody wants to kindle ethnic strife. In this article we will try to find out what happened in the distant 1915.

Negative attitude

Many of those who encountered Armenians on work or in everyday life, envy their cohesion. Some say that Armenians live in a small territory, that no one understands their language. Therefore it is considered: that is why the people are well organized.

Negation

Why do not the Turks love Armenians? Why do not they recognize the genocide of this people? We will find out what happened in Turkey in 1915. Soon after the country entered the First World War, all law enforcement officers, as well as Armenian servicemen, were arrested and then shot together with members of their families (an old Eastern tradition).

The same fate befell all well-known Armenians living in Istanbul. After this, the mass annihilation of the people scattered throughout the Turkish lands began. The country was swept by pogroms, the result of which was the murder of half a million people.

It is known that the Western Armenia also belonged to the Ottoman Empire, on the territory of which one and a half million Armenians lived. All of them were killed. The slaughter was carried out under the motto: "It is necessary to destroy people, and you can not touch gardens and crops".

The gardens of the Turks were preserved for the Kurds, who subsequently settled on these lands. As a result, Western Armenia completed its existence and became part of Turkish Kurdistan. And the eastern one turned into modern Armenia.

After Ataturk, the savior of peoples and specific people, came to power, a commission was established to investigate the Armenian Genocide. In the course of her work, the following conclusions were drawn:

• Residents of Western Armenia were carved, but the territory remained. According to the norms of world law, these lands must be returned.
• In Turkey there were few Armenians (a maximum of two hundred thousand). The war began, and this people, treachery and dirty maneuvers in whose blood, provoked numerous skirmishes.
• The patient Turkish people are people of a broad soul, instantly forgetting grievances. In the Ottoman Empire in those days, a single multinational family built a new beautiful society. That is why there can be no talk of genocide.

It is known that in Turkey it is forbidden to mention the existence of Western Armenia. Under Turkish law, public statements about it are considered a criminal offense. This point of view is the official position of the country from the time of Ataturk to the present day.

The Armenian Genocide

Many can not answer the question why the Turks do not like Armenians. The genocide was prepared and implemented in 1915 in the regions supervised by the top of the Ottoman Empire. The destruction of people was carried out by deportation and physical destruction, including the displacement of civilians in an environment that leads to inevitable death.

Why is Armenia's Memory Day the most important date? We will discuss this issue further, and now we will describe in detail the terrible events of those years. The Armenian Genocide was committed in several stages: the disarmament of soldiers, the selective deportation of people from the border areas, the mass expulsion and extermination of residents, the introduction of a law on resettlement. Some historians include the actions of the Turkish army in Transcaucasia in 1918, the murder of the 1890s, the massacre in Smyrna.

The organizers are the leaders of the Young Turks Jemal, Enver and Talaat, as well as the head of the "Special Organization" Shakir Behaeddin. In the Ottoman Empire, along with the genocide of the ancient people, the destruction of the Pontic Greeks and Assyrians took place. A large part of the world Armenian diaspora was formed from people who fled from the Ottoman Empire.

At the time, the author Lemkin Rafael proposed the term "genocide", which served as a synonym for the mass killing of Armenians in Turkish territory and Jews on lands captured by German Nazis. The destruction of Armenians is the second act of genocide after the Holocaust in history. In the Collective Declaration of May 24, 1915, the union countries (Russia, Great Britain and France), this mass annihilation for the first time in the annals was recognized as a crime against philanthropy.

Conditions

And now we will find out what historical preconditions preceded the genocide of the ancient people. The Armenian ethnos ripened to the sixth century BC. E. On the lands of Armenia and eastern Turkey, in the area encompassing Lake Van and Mount Ararat. By the II century BC. E. Armenians under the rule of Tsar Artashes I united, forming the state of Great Armenia. The largest territory it had during the reign of Emperor Tigran II the Great, when the cordon of his power moved from the Euphrates, Palestine and the Mediterranean Sea in the west to the Caspian Sea in the east.

At the beginning of the IV. N. E. (Generally accepted date is 301), this country (the first in the world) officially adopted Orthodoxy as a state religion. The Armenian alphabet was created in 405 by the scientist Mashtots Mesrop, and in the 5th century the Bible was written in a new language.

The establishment of Orthodoxy was the decisive factor that linked the Armenian ethnos after the loss of the state system, and the Apostolic Church became the most important institution of national life.

In 428 the Great Armenia completed its existence, and until the 7th century the Byzantines ruled its western lands, and the Persians - the eastern ones. From the middle of the 7th century, the Arabs controlled an impressive part of this country. The Armenian kingdom in the 860's under the rule of the Bagratid dynasty restored its sovereignty. Byzantines in 1045 captured Ani - the capital of this country. Prince Ruben I in 1080 founded the Cilician Armenian state, and Prince Levon II in 1198 took the title of king.

The Egyptian Mamluks captured Cilicia in 1375, and the independent power ceased to exist. The church conflict of Armenians, who did not want to abandon Christianity during the multiple incursions of Muslims (Persians, Oguz Turks and Seljuks, Arab Abbasids) into the territory of historical Armenia, mass resettlements and devastating wars led to a decrease in the number of people on these lands.

The Armenian Question and Turkey

And yet: why do not the Turks love Armenians? Living in the Ottoman Empire, they were not Muslims and were therefore considered to be a Zimi, a second-rate subject. Armenians paid colossal taxes, they were not allowed to carry arms. And the one who accepted Orthodoxy had no right to testify in court.

Of course, it is difficult to answer the question why the Turks do not like Armenians. It is known that 70% of the people persecuted by them, who lived in the Ottoman Empire, consisted of poor peasants. However, among Muslims, the image of a successful and cunning Armenian with an impressive commercial talent extended to all representatives of nationality, without exception. Hostility was aggravated by the struggle for resources in the agricultural sector and unresolved social tasks in the cities.

These actions were hampered by the influx of Muslims from the Caucasus - the Muhajirs (after the Turkish-Russian and Caucasian wars of 1877-78) and from the newly emerged Balkan countries. Refugees, expelled by Christians from their territories, tore evil at the local Orthodox. The Armenians' claims to collective and personal security and the parallel deterioration of their position in the Ottoman Empire led to the appearance of the "Armenian question" as part of a more general Eastern problem.

Turks and Armenians are warring nations. In Erzurum region in 1882, one of the first associations of Armenia was established - the "Agricultural Society", designed to protect the people from looting committed by Kurds and other nomads. The first political party "Armenakan" was established in 1885. Its platform assumed the acquisition of local self-determination of people through propaganda and enlightenment, as well as military specialization to combat state terror.

In 1887, a Social Democratic bloc "Hnchakyan" appeared, which, with the help of the revolution, sought to liberate Turkish Armenia and create an independent socialist state. In Tiflis in 1890, the first congress of the most radical union, the Dashnaktsutyun, was held, the program of which stipulated autonomy within the borders of the Ottoman Empire, equality and freedom of all inhabitants, and in the social segment referred to the establishment of peasant communes as the basic elements of a new society.

The Extermination in 1894-1896

The mass killing of Armenians began in 1894 and continued until 1896. There was a massacre in Istanbul, Sasun and Van district, the pretext for which were indignation of the settled Armenians. In all regions of the empire in 1895 hundreds of thousands of souls were destroyed. The least studied and most bloody is the second stage. The percentage of the administration's involvement in the development of murders to this day is the subject of angry discussions.

Preparation of the extermination of Armenians

Perhaps, the Turks started the genocide of Armenians, because they needed to look for a new identity after the Ittihat revolution, which occurred in 1908. Imperial Ottoman unity was undermined by the constitution, which equalized the rights of various citizens of Porta and deprived the Turks of great-power status. In addition, this ideology fell before the aggressive principles of Islamic doctrine and pan-Turkism. In their turn, the positions of the Islamic worldview were undermined by the atheistic views of the leaders of "Ittihat" and the existence of the nearby Shiite country of Persia.

Poet and sociologist Gökalp Zia formulated the principles according to which the Ottoman Empire took part in the First World War. It was he who was the most authoritative ideologue of the Young Turks. His views extended to the country of Turan, which was inhabited by Turkish-speaking Muslims. He believed that the territory of Turan was supposed to contain the entire area of the Turkic ethnos. This teaching actually excluded tattoos not only from the government, but also from civil society. It was inadmissible for Armenians and other national minorities in Turkey.

For the main inhabitants of the empire the most convenient was pan-Turkism, which as basic rules was adopted by almost all the leaders of "Ittihat." Armenians identified themselves, first of all, with a religious position. Probably they were wrong, believing that Turkism is better than Islam.

During the Balkan War of 1912, this people mostly bowed to the principles of Ottomanism, and Armenian soldiers (more than 8,000 volunteers) played an important role in the Turkish army. Most of the warriors, according to the stories of the English ambassador, showed extraordinary courage. In addition, the Armenian blocs "Dashnaktsutyun" and "Hnchakyan" began to adhere to the anti-Ottoman point of view.

Turks do not want to recognize the Armenian Genocide. And how did it start? In 1914, on August 2, Turkey entered into a secret agreement with Germany. One of its conditions was the transformation of the eastern borders. This nuance was necessary for the formation of a corridor leading to the Islamic peoples of Russia, which hinted at the destruction of the Armenian stay in the reformed possessions. This policy was voiced with the whole people by the Ottoman leadership after entering the war in 1914, on October 30. The appeal contained an order for the unconfined merger of all representatives of the Turkish race.

A couple of hours after the signing of the secret German-Turkish military treaty, "Ittihat" reported on a general mobilization, which resulted in the call of almost all healthy Armenian men to the army. Further, after entering the First World War, the Ottoman Empire was drawn into hostilities on many fronts. The raid of the Turkish army on the lands of Persia and Russia increased the range of violence against Armenians.

The first deportations

Turks, Armenians, 1915 ... What happened at that distant time? In mid-March 1915, French-British forces attacked the Dardanelles. In Istanbul, preparations began for the movement of the capital to Eskisehir and the evacuation of local residents. The leadership of the Ottoman Empire feared the merger of the Armenians with the allies, therefore decided to deport all the hated population between Eskisehir and Istanbul.

At the end of March, the "Special Organization" began to prepare for the massacre of this people in Erzurum. She sent the most radical emissaries "Ittihat" to the provinces, who were supposed to conduct anti-Armenian agitation. Among them was Reshid Bey. It was he who with extremely inhuman means, including detention and torture, sought out weapons in Diyarbakir, and then turned into one of the most unbridled killers.

The eviction of Armenians began on April 8 from the city of Zeitun, whose inhabitants enjoyed partial independence for centuries and were in confrontation with the Turkish authorities. Their expulsion gives an answer to the main question related to the timing of the preparation of the genocide. A small part of the Armenians was deported to the city of Konya, located near Iraq and Syria - places where the rest of the people were later evicted.

The murders were accompanied by a wave of looting. Merchant Mehmet Ali testified that Azmi Jemal (the governor of Trebizond) and Asenth Mustafa appropriated jewels worth 400,000 gold Turkish pounds (about 1,500,000 US dollars). The US Consul in Aleppo informed Washington that there was a monstrous plan of embezzlement in the Ottoman Empire.

The Consul in Trebizond reported that every day he sees how a rag of children and Turkish women goes after the police and captures everything that can be carried away. He also said that the house of the commissioner "Ittihat" in Trebizond was littered with jewels and gold, obtained as a result of the sharing of the stolen.

By the end of the summer of 1915, most of the Armenians who inhabited the empire were killed. The Ottoman authorities tried to hide this, but refugees who reached Europe reported on the extermination of their people. In 1915, on April 27, the Armenian Catholicos urged Italy and the United States to intervene to stop the murders. The Armenian massacre was condemned by the Allied Powers, but in times of war they could not help the long-suffering people.

In England, after an official inspection, a documentary book entitled "Attitudes towards Armenians in the Ottoman Empire" was published, in the United States and Europe, people began to raise funds for refugees. The liquidation of Armenians in western and central Anatolia continued after August 1915.

The conspirators

We practically found out why the Turks killed Armenians. In Boston in 1919 at the Ninth Congress of the "Dashnaktsutyun" it was decided to exterminate the leaders of the Young Turks taking part in the murders. The operation was named after the ancient Greek goddess of vengeance of Nemesis. Most of the conspirators were Armenians, who managed to escape from the genocide. They were eager to avenge the death of their families.

The operation "Nemesis" operated quite effectively. The most famous victims were one of the members of the Turkish triumvirate Talaat Pasha and Minister of the Interior of the Ottoman Empire. Talaat, along with the other leaders of the Young Turks, fled to Germany in 1918, but was liquidated in Berlin by Taylirian Sogomon in March 1921.

The legal side

The Ottoman Empire and the Republic of Armenia were interested in the whole world by their opposition. The Collective Declaration of May 24, 1915 of the Allied countries is a confirmation.

The recognition of genocide is the most important goal of the Armenian lobbying organizations, and, in addition to the recognition itself, the demand for payment of reparations by Turkey and territorial claims were announced. To reach acceptance, lobbyists involve influential persons and parliamentarians, founded institutions that deal with this problem, exert pressure on the leadership of different countries, and widely publicize this issue in society. Almost all the members of the Armenian Diaspora are direct descendants of the victims of the genocide. This organization has sufficient material resources, with the help of which it can withstand the pressure of Turkey.

America adopted resolutions on the mass annihilation of Armenians three times. This genocide is recognized by the European Parliament, the parliamentary coalition of South American countries, the UN Sub-Commission on the Protection and Prevention of Minority Discrimination, the Parliament of Latin America.

Recognition of the destruction of the Armenian people is not a mandatory item for Turkey's accession to the EU, but some experts believe that it will have to fulfill this condition.

Important date

The day of memory of victims of the Armenian Genocide in Turkey was appointed on April 24 by the European Parliament in 2015. In Armenia, this date is a non-working day and is of great importance. Every year, on the anniversary of the expulsion of the Armenian intelligentsia from Istanbul, millions of people around the world pay tribute to the memory of the dead.