The Armenian Genocide

Greg BedianGenocide Education Network of Illinois

What we’ll cover today

• Genocide overview• Armenia overview• Armenian Genocide

– Moving toward genocide– Implementation– Facts and figures– Aftermath– What’s happened since– What’s happening now

• Resource review

Where did the word Genocide come from?

• Greek genos (race) + Latin -cida (killer) • Raphael Lemkin coined the word “genocide” in

1943"I became interested in genocide because it happened so many times…first to the Armenians, then after the Armenians, Hitler took action."

• Lemkin was the driving force behind the Genocide Convention, which was adopted by the UN in 1948“One million Armenians died, but a law against the murder of peoples was written with the ink of their blood and the spirit of their sufferings”

Historic Armenia

Republic of Armenia

• Location: Southwestern Asia• 29,800 sq km (smaller than

Maryland)• Population: 3 million• Capital: Yerevan• Independent nation since 1991

Present Day Armenia

Background on Armenia• Over 4000 years old• Has its own language, alphabet• Has distinctive architecture • First nation to adopt Christianity, 301 AD• The location of the Garden of Eden and Mt.

Ararat, where Noah’s ark landed

Armenian Genocide Overview

• The first genocide of the 20th Century• Occurred in the Ottoman Empire, 1915-1923• More than 1.5 million Armenians killed

– 2 million lived in the Ottoman Empire at that time– Nearly every Armenian lost a family member

• Perpetrated by the Young Turk Government• Main reason for genocide: “Turkification” • Pretexts for genocide

– Religious differences– Economic differences– Scapegoat for WWI military losses

Seeds of Genocide

• The Ottoman Empire was in decline, losing territory, wealth, and influence

• Nearly 500,000 Muslim refugees created by Balkan War settled in and around Constantinople

• Armenians were frequently subjected to massacres, kidnapping, rape and robbery

• As Christians, Armenians were second class citizens in Ottoman Turkey

• Some Armenians resisted this mistreatment and agitated for reforms

Preparation for the Genocide

• Special groups of Turks and Kurds, often made up of released prisoners, were created to carry out the massacres

• Most Armenian men were drafted into the army, then disarmed and put into labor camps

• Government officials, Muslim clerics and others spread rumors of Armenians betraying Turkey, calling for punishment of the infidels

• Community leaders arrested on April 24, 1915, and put to death soon after

Perpetrators of the Armenian Genocide

Talaat PashaInterior Minister

Enver PashaMinister of War

Jemal PashaMinister of the Navy

Leaders of the Committee of Union and Progress, or Young Turks

April 24, 1915• Hundreds of Armenian

intellectuals in Constantinople, Symrna, and elsewhere are arrested and later killed

• With its able-bodied men in the Army, and without its leadership, the Armenian population was defenseless

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Use of new technologies• Women, children, and the elderly

were loaded onto trains and relocated, unable to return to their homes

• Refugees by the hundreds were forced into caves, fires were lit at the entrance and those inside were killed by asphyxiation in primitive gas chambers

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Implementing the Genocide• Armed groups would come to a village, and

take remaining able-bodied males to the outskirts of town and massacre them

• Women, children and elderly then ordered to prepare for deportation, valuables were registered and stored for safe keeping

• Caravans preyed upon by marauding bands, stole remaining valuables, raped and killed

• Girls carried off, children enslaved or raised as Kurds or Turks

• Starvation and disease, exposure, brutality, massacre

• Most of those that make it to the desert are killed

Map of Deportation Paths and Killing Zones

Bursa

January 15th, 1916

To the Government of Aleppo:

We are informed that certain orphanages which have opened also admitted the children of the Armenians.

Should this be done through ignorance of our real purpose, or because of contempt of it, the Government will view the feeding of such children or any effort to prolong their lives as an act completely opposite to its purpose, since it regards the survival of these children as detrimental.

I recommend the orphanages not to receive such children; and no attempts are to be made to establish special orphanages for them.

Minister of the Interior,TA

September 16, 1916.To the Government of AllepoIt was at first communicated to you that the government, by order of the Jemiet, had decided to destroy completely all the Armenians living in Turkey… An end must be put to their existence, however criminal the measures taken may be, and no regard must be paid to either age or sex nor to the conscientious scruples.Talaat Pasha, Talaat Pasha, Minister of the Interior

August 22, 1939.Accordingly, I have placed my death-head formation in readiness—for the present only in the East—with orders to them to send to death mercilessly and without compassion, men, women, and children of Polish derivation and language. Only thus shall we gain the living space (Lebensraum) which we need. Who, after all, speaks to-day of the annihilation of the Armenians? Adolf Adolf HitlerHitler

Reaction to Genocide

• Armenians– Most didn’t know what was happening until it was too late– Church leaders urged villagers not to give in to

provocations– Some organized self-defense or fled

• Turks, Kurds and others – Many took advantage of the situation - looting, killing, etc.– Some risked their lives to help save Armenians

• Foreigners– Many news reports, diplomatic protests– Some were able to save Armenians– No real action taken to stop genocide by foreign

governments, neither Turkey’s enemies nor its allies

Over 145 articles about the genocide

were printed in 1915 alone

Pre-Genocide: 1914Sivas 225,000Erzerum 215,000Mamuret-Ulaziz 204,000Bitlis 198,000Van 197,000Diyarbakir 124,000

Post-Genocide: 1926Sivas 5,100Erzerum <100Mamuret-Ulaziz 5,000Bitlis <100Van <100Diyarbakir <100

Armenian Population by Province2,000,000 125,000

Aftermath

• In 1914, there were 2,538 Armenian churches, 451 monasteries, and nearly 2,000 schools

• Today, outside of Istanbul, Armenians possess six churches, no monasteries, and no schools

• Nearly all moveable property was either confiscated by the government, looted by mobs or seized during death marches

“The sum of five million Turkish pounds, (around 33 tons of gold) deposited by the Turkish government at the ReichsBank in Berlin in 1916 was … in large part, perhaps wholly Armenian money."

– Sir James Baldwin, the former British prime minister

Post-Genocide

• Armenia to become US Mandate, US did not accept this mission

• Aid activities to help survivors were prominent in American society

NEAR EAST RELIEF

First international US Red Cross Mission $117 Million raised (over $1 Billion today!) Remember the starving Armenians Setup orphanages, clinics and schools for

the Armenians

What happened to the perpetrators?

• Genocide organizers tried in abstentia and found guilty, but never pursued

• Armenian assassins hunted down and killed the main perpetrators

• On March 15, 1921, Soghomon Tehlirian shot and killed Talaat Pasha in Berlin• During the trial, details of the Armenian Genocide were discussed and Tehlirian was acquitted

• Intrigued by the case, Raphael Lemkin began studying what happened to the Armenians. His work later resulted in the Genocide Convention

Armenian Genocide Today

• Armenians dispersed all over the world• Only about 55,000 Armenians left in Turkey, most

in Istanbul, far from historic Armenia • The Armenian names of cities, villages, mountains,

rivers, and even animals have been changed to Turkish names

• Ancient churches and other historic sites are being intentionally neglected or destroyed

• Much of Armenian culture has been lost• Nearly all traces of 4000+ years of Armenian

existence on those lands are being eliminated

Ongoing Genocide

Genocide Denial

• To this day the Turkish Government is actively and aggressively engaged in Genocide denial

• Turkey passed a law in 2004 known as Article 301 which makes it a criminal offense to mention the Armenian Genocide in Turkey– Hrant Dink, Orhan Pamuk, and other prominent Turks

have been arrested for violating Article 301.

• Turkey currently pays millions to US lobbying and PR firms to plan and implement its denial campaign with the US government and in the US media

• Turkey has funded Turkish studies chairs at prestigious universities like U of Chicago and Princeton to promote the “Turkish view” of the history

What they say…

• The number of Armenian deaths is grossly inflated

• More Muslims died during the same period • Armenian American evidence of genocide is

derived from dubious and prejudicial sources• The Armenian deaths do not constitute genocide • The British convened the Malta Tribunal to try

Ottoman officials for crimes against Armenians and all of the accused were acquitted

• The Holocaust bears no meaningful relation to the Ottoman Armenian experience

Things to Remember

1. Genocide can happen anywhere

2. Genocide usually occurs during times of crisis or war

3. Genocide denial is a continuation of genocide, “killing the victims twice”

4. Genocide is a crime against all of humanity, not just the victims

Learn More About GenocideWebsites• www.teachgenocide.org• www.historyplace.com/worldhistory/genocide/• www.unitedhumanrights.org/ • www.genocide1915.info/history/• www.anca.org• www.cambodian-association.org• www.savedarfur.org • www.genocideintervention.net• www.hmfi.org• 20voices.com

Books• The Road From Home, by David Kherdian• A Problem from Hell, by Samantha Powers• The Burning Tigris, by Peter Balakian• A Shameful Act: The Armenian Genocide and the Question of Turkish

Responsibility, by Taner Akcam

The End

Speak Up! Stand Against Genocide!

In Germany, they first came for the communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a communist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew.

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Catholics and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Catholic.

Then they came for me -- and by that time there was nobody left to speak up.

– Martin Niemoller

20th Century’s Legacy of Genocide

1915-1923 Turkish Genocide of Armenians, Assyrians, and Pontian Greeks

1932-1933 Ukrainian Famine-Genocide1938-1945 Nazi Holocaust of Jews, Poles, Gypsies1975-1979 Cambodia1994 Rwanda1995 Bosnia

Today DarfurTomorrow ????