2008 Woodie Awards
The Armenian genocide did happen
Robert Berra
Staff Writer
Issue date: 10/15/07 Section: Opinion
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While recognizing it is the right thing to do, the ultimate outcome of doing so is minor. Some say recognizing the genocide would even be detrimental.
NPR gives a good description of the accepted facts about the Armenian genocide, which are these: "Animosity between Turks and Armenians stretches back over centuries. A key factor is religion: Armenians are mostly Christian, Turks mostly Muslim. During the Ottoman Empire, Christians were treated as second-class citizens, and when the empire began to crumble in the 19th century, an Armenian resistance movement took hold in what is now eastern Turkey. Armenian nationalists sided with Christian Russia during the Russo-Turkish war of 1877 and later formed separatist groups.
Turkish accounts of the situation sound eerily like U.S. military accounts of the insurgency in Iraq. They say the resistance was incited by outsiders, Armenians from the Russian side of the border who wanted to undermine the Ottomans by stirring up unrest. When Turkey and Russia faced off again during World War I, many Turks saw the Armenians as terrorists and traitors. Turkish accounts of the run-up to the war claim that Armenian guerrillas, armed by Russia, attacked Muslim villages and massacred their inhabitants.
In 1915, the Turkish government passed a law allowing it to deport Armenians from eastern Turkey as a national security risk. Turkish troops killed resisters and herded tens of thousands of Armenians on forced marches to camps in northern Syria and Iraq. Accounts by U.S. and British diplomats of the time say the Turkish troops and paramilitaries robbed, raped and murdered deportees along the way, leaving the survivors to die without food or shelter in the desert. Turks counter that these allegations were wartime propaganda by the countries arrayed against Turkey and its World War I allies, Germany, Austria-Hungary and Bulgaria."
If the House passes the resolution, it would call on the president "to ensure that the foreign policy of the United States reflects appropriate understanding and sensitivity concerning issues related to human rights, ethnic cleansing, and genocide … and calls upon the president in the president's annual message commemorating the Armenian genocide … to accurately characterize the systematic and deliberate annihilation of 1.5 million Armenians as genocide and to recall the proud history of United States intervention in opposition to the Armenian genocide."
NPR gives a good description of the accepted facts about the Armenian genocide, which are these: "Animosity between Turks and Armenians stretches back over centuries. A key factor is religion: Armenians are mostly Christian, Turks mostly Muslim. During the Ottoman Empire, Christians were treated as second-class citizens, and when the empire began to crumble in the 19th century, an Armenian resistance movement took hold in what is now eastern Turkey. Armenian nationalists sided with Christian Russia during the Russo-Turkish war of 1877 and later formed separatist groups.
Turkish accounts of the situation sound eerily like U.S. military accounts of the insurgency in Iraq. They say the resistance was incited by outsiders, Armenians from the Russian side of the border who wanted to undermine the Ottomans by stirring up unrest. When Turkey and Russia faced off again during World War I, many Turks saw the Armenians as terrorists and traitors. Turkish accounts of the run-up to the war claim that Armenian guerrillas, armed by Russia, attacked Muslim villages and massacred their inhabitants.
In 1915, the Turkish government passed a law allowing it to deport Armenians from eastern Turkey as a national security risk. Turkish troops killed resisters and herded tens of thousands of Armenians on forced marches to camps in northern Syria and Iraq. Accounts by U.S. and British diplomats of the time say the Turkish troops and paramilitaries robbed, raped and murdered deportees along the way, leaving the survivors to die without food or shelter in the desert. Turks counter that these allegations were wartime propaganda by the countries arrayed against Turkey and its World War I allies, Germany, Austria-Hungary and Bulgaria."
If the House passes the resolution, it would call on the president "to ensure that the foreign policy of the United States reflects appropriate understanding and sensitivity concerning issues related to human rights, ethnic cleansing, and genocide … and calls upon the president in the president's annual message commemorating the Armenian genocide … to accurately characterize the systematic and deliberate annihilation of 1.5 million Armenians as genocide and to recall the proud history of United States intervention in opposition to the Armenian genocide."
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