WHAT REALLY HAPPENED in 1915 TURKS WHO HAD THE MASS KİLLİNGS THAN ANY OTHERS...
Friday, May 30, 2008
Thursday, May 8, 2008
Pro-Turkish Comments from mainly non- Turkish intellectuals (4) [ for Nancy Pelosi stumbles over Armenian resolution]
Turks and Armenians are old friends: They lived in the same lands for 900 years. They shared the same food, the same land, and even the same songs for centuries.
For the old times' sake, I think the diaspora should think twice before acting with an arrogance and let the centuries old friendship between the peoples rejuvenate.
· How about the Turkish Parliament passing a resolution condemning the genocide perpetrated by the American military and settlers against Native Americans over 100+ year period? As far as I know, the US government has never officially recognized our systematic policies to eradicate the Indians as genocide.
· Armenian Diaspora spent over a billion dollars just to pass this resolution.
· If the Turks have a long ways to go before they are ready to join the European Union, but that also depends on whether the Europeans - who have recently shown disturbingly racist tendencies towards the Turks - ever let them in.
· Let historians decide what happened not lobby groups or politicians whose only interest is re-election.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/soundoff/comment.asp?articleID=335534
Pelosi stumbles over Armenian resolution
For the old times' sake, I think the diaspora should think twice before acting with an arrogance and let the centuries old friendship between the peoples rejuvenate.
· How about the Turkish Parliament passing a resolution condemning the genocide perpetrated by the American military and settlers against Native Americans over 100+ year period? As far as I know, the US government has never officially recognized our systematic policies to eradicate the Indians as genocide.
· Armenian Diaspora spent over a billion dollars just to pass this resolution.
· If the Turks have a long ways to go before they are ready to join the European Union, but that also depends on whether the Europeans - who have recently shown disturbingly racist tendencies towards the Turks - ever let them in.
· Let historians decide what happened not lobby groups or politicians whose only interest is re-election.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/soundoff/comment.asp?articleID=335534
Pelosi stumbles over Armenian resolution
Pro-Turkish Comments from mainly non- Turkish intellectual (3) [ for Nancy Pelosi stumbles over Armenian resolution]
· The Ottoman Empire found itself in WW1 thanks to the idiocy of Enver Pasha, and was under attack from practically all sides. Armenians, influenced by the nationalistic movements of the era, decided they wanted to establish an independent Armenian state and this was a golden opportunity for them to accomplish that dream.
So they collaborated with the Allies, especially the Russians and later with the French, and attacked Ottoman forces from within.
Tashnaks had been a relatively powerful guerilla group and, emboldened by the weakness of the Ottoman Empire, the so-called sick man of Europe, they cooperated with the Russians.
The Ottoman Empire comprised of dozens of nationalities, who co-existed relatively peacefully for centuries. Talat Pasha, the Interior Minister, was understandably furious about the Armenian betrayal, especially because Armenians were long regarded as a "faithful nation." Furious, he ordered a temporary relocation of Armenians to the southern provinces of the empire, away from the Russian border.
Many Armenians were killed on the way by thugs, and many died in the deserts from starvation, poor living conditions, epidemics etc. If one sees only the sufferings of Armenians, one immediately concludes this was genocide, period. But if one also considers the sufferings of the entire population, then one begins to get the real picture. Just to give a sense of how bad the conditions were in the Ottoman Empire at the time, in 1914, 90,000 Ottoman soldiers froze to death in a single night in Sarikamis in northeastern Turkey, because they didn't have winter clothes in mid-December in -30 degree weather.
...And their commander who forced them to march was none other than Enver Pasha, one of the three pashas that ruled the Ottoman Empire at the time. Enver was a total incompetent, a total idiot who put the Ottoman Empire into WW1, eventually causing it to completely collapse. I suppose no one would claim that Enver was performing genocide on his own army.
When asked later how his 90,000 soldiers died, he is rumored to have said, "What difference does it make. They would have died some day wouldn't they" The relocation of the Armenian population to the southern provinces, was, entirely in the spirit of the internment of the Japanese in the US and Canada during WW2.
The big difference was that Ottoman Empire was in ruins, so much so that it could not supply winter clothes to even its army.
So logistics was out of question, and the three Pashas were just too indifferent to the needs of people anyway, be they Turks, soldiers in the Turkish army or Armenians. I think this is the hardest part for Armenians to accept. They think they were systematically murdered, when in fact nothing, nothing in the Ottoman Empire was systematic in those days. There was poverty and chaos everywhere.
Those Armenians, who, despite the odds, were able to make it to Syria, either enlisted in the French army to fight the Ottomans, or left for America or Europe. Some who were able to survive, did indeed come back to Turkey after the war. There is an interesting book titled "The World is enough for all of us" by a Turkish-Armenian writer Sarkis Cerkezyan, who returned to his hometown after the war.
I especially recommend the book, because it conveys a very good sense of the chaos of the time and shows that things are not as black and white as some people are led to believe. There was quite a bit of suffering on the Turkish side as well.
Picture this: Suppose you are a native American living in a reservation, and suppose skinheads, KKK and sick people of that vein from neighboring towns decide to attack the reservation, late at night. The men in the reservation grab their arms and a gunfight begins. They are attacking from every which direction. You begin feeling overwhelmed because they have better guns and they are so many. Suddenly, you see that your neighbor isn't shooting at them but he is shooting at you.
Remember it's a life-and-death fight. So you storm your neighbor's house because this guy is killing your people. But during that fight your traitor neighbor's little babies get killed too.
Obviously you didn't mean to kill the babies, but that's what happened. If somebody calls you a "baby-killer" how do you react?
Technically, the bullet in the baby's head is from your gun so you killed the baby. But are you a "baby-killer" ? You definitely feel sorry that the babies got killed, but then you know that you had to defend yourself. You also know that you'd never kill your neighbor's baby, so you feel you don't deserve that characterization.
It may be very tempting to simplify things to the "good guy bad guy" scheme where madmen like Hitler & Co exterminate defenseless Jews. Add the few hundred thousand votes that could be won/lost in next year's elections, and you have the recent theatrical voting in the US congress. So should those tragic events be labeled genocide? I am not a lawyer and I don't have a sense as to what, technically the word genocide means.
They were certainly tragic events, but seeing only one side of the tragedy and ignoring the rest, is not a stance, that I would characterize as fair and ethical. The Ottoman empire collapsed as a result of WWI, nearly half the territory was lost, millions of Turks died, 250,000 just in Gallipoli, coincidentally enough in 1915 as well. My father was born in 1908 in Saloniki near the Dojran lake, now in Greece, and they too were forcefully emigrated to Asia Minor and lost all their lands in Saloniki. My grandfather fought for nearly 10 years and died penniless. WWI brought disaster to millions of people.
Americans interned some 120,000 Japanese-Americans, Canadians interned 20,000, even though, to my knowledge not a single case of betrayal was documented by these people. After the war, the Japanese-Americans were released of course and returned to their homes.Personally I believe a similar scenario would have taken place for Armenians, had the circumstances been suitable after WWI. But imagine how Americans would have reacted, if the Japanese had invaded mainland US and the Japanese-Americans had joined the Japanese army to establish an independent Japanese state, say in Seattle and California!
Trying to draw a parallel between the Hitler/Jews case and Ottoman/Armenian case is absurd. Turks NEVER thought of Armenians as "inferior" people. On the contrary, Armenians enjoyed the esteemed sympathy of Turks in the Ottoman empire.
Had the purpose of internment of the Armenians been genocide in order to accomplish the "Turkification" of Anatolia, then why wasn't the same internment applied to the Greek and the Jewish populations in Anatolia?
Sometimes a little logic goes a long way.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/soundoff/comment.asp?articleID=335534
So they collaborated with the Allies, especially the Russians and later with the French, and attacked Ottoman forces from within.
Tashnaks had been a relatively powerful guerilla group and, emboldened by the weakness of the Ottoman Empire, the so-called sick man of Europe, they cooperated with the Russians.
The Ottoman Empire comprised of dozens of nationalities, who co-existed relatively peacefully for centuries. Talat Pasha, the Interior Minister, was understandably furious about the Armenian betrayal, especially because Armenians were long regarded as a "faithful nation." Furious, he ordered a temporary relocation of Armenians to the southern provinces of the empire, away from the Russian border.
Many Armenians were killed on the way by thugs, and many died in the deserts from starvation, poor living conditions, epidemics etc. If one sees only the sufferings of Armenians, one immediately concludes this was genocide, period. But if one also considers the sufferings of the entire population, then one begins to get the real picture. Just to give a sense of how bad the conditions were in the Ottoman Empire at the time, in 1914, 90,000 Ottoman soldiers froze to death in a single night in Sarikamis in northeastern Turkey, because they didn't have winter clothes in mid-December in -30 degree weather.
...And their commander who forced them to march was none other than Enver Pasha, one of the three pashas that ruled the Ottoman Empire at the time. Enver was a total incompetent, a total idiot who put the Ottoman Empire into WW1, eventually causing it to completely collapse. I suppose no one would claim that Enver was performing genocide on his own army.
When asked later how his 90,000 soldiers died, he is rumored to have said, "What difference does it make. They would have died some day wouldn't they" The relocation of the Armenian population to the southern provinces, was, entirely in the spirit of the internment of the Japanese in the US and Canada during WW2.
The big difference was that Ottoman Empire was in ruins, so much so that it could not supply winter clothes to even its army.
So logistics was out of question, and the three Pashas were just too indifferent to the needs of people anyway, be they Turks, soldiers in the Turkish army or Armenians. I think this is the hardest part for Armenians to accept. They think they were systematically murdered, when in fact nothing, nothing in the Ottoman Empire was systematic in those days. There was poverty and chaos everywhere.
Those Armenians, who, despite the odds, were able to make it to Syria, either enlisted in the French army to fight the Ottomans, or left for America or Europe. Some who were able to survive, did indeed come back to Turkey after the war. There is an interesting book titled "The World is enough for all of us" by a Turkish-Armenian writer Sarkis Cerkezyan, who returned to his hometown after the war.
I especially recommend the book, because it conveys a very good sense of the chaos of the time and shows that things are not as black and white as some people are led to believe. There was quite a bit of suffering on the Turkish side as well.
Picture this: Suppose you are a native American living in a reservation, and suppose skinheads, KKK and sick people of that vein from neighboring towns decide to attack the reservation, late at night. The men in the reservation grab their arms and a gunfight begins. They are attacking from every which direction. You begin feeling overwhelmed because they have better guns and they are so many. Suddenly, you see that your neighbor isn't shooting at them but he is shooting at you.
Remember it's a life-and-death fight. So you storm your neighbor's house because this guy is killing your people. But during that fight your traitor neighbor's little babies get killed too.
Obviously you didn't mean to kill the babies, but that's what happened. If somebody calls you a "baby-killer" how do you react?
Technically, the bullet in the baby's head is from your gun so you killed the baby. But are you a "baby-killer" ? You definitely feel sorry that the babies got killed, but then you know that you had to defend yourself. You also know that you'd never kill your neighbor's baby, so you feel you don't deserve that characterization.
It may be very tempting to simplify things to the "good guy bad guy" scheme where madmen like Hitler & Co exterminate defenseless Jews. Add the few hundred thousand votes that could be won/lost in next year's elections, and you have the recent theatrical voting in the US congress. So should those tragic events be labeled genocide? I am not a lawyer and I don't have a sense as to what, technically the word genocide means.
They were certainly tragic events, but seeing only one side of the tragedy and ignoring the rest, is not a stance, that I would characterize as fair and ethical. The Ottoman empire collapsed as a result of WWI, nearly half the territory was lost, millions of Turks died, 250,000 just in Gallipoli, coincidentally enough in 1915 as well. My father was born in 1908 in Saloniki near the Dojran lake, now in Greece, and they too were forcefully emigrated to Asia Minor and lost all their lands in Saloniki. My grandfather fought for nearly 10 years and died penniless. WWI brought disaster to millions of people.
Americans interned some 120,000 Japanese-Americans, Canadians interned 20,000, even though, to my knowledge not a single case of betrayal was documented by these people. After the war, the Japanese-Americans were released of course and returned to their homes.Personally I believe a similar scenario would have taken place for Armenians, had the circumstances been suitable after WWI. But imagine how Americans would have reacted, if the Japanese had invaded mainland US and the Japanese-Americans had joined the Japanese army to establish an independent Japanese state, say in Seattle and California!
Trying to draw a parallel between the Hitler/Jews case and Ottoman/Armenian case is absurd. Turks NEVER thought of Armenians as "inferior" people. On the contrary, Armenians enjoyed the esteemed sympathy of Turks in the Ottoman empire.
Had the purpose of internment of the Armenians been genocide in order to accomplish the "Turkification" of Anatolia, then why wasn't the same internment applied to the Greek and the Jewish populations in Anatolia?
Sometimes a little logic goes a long way.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/soundoff/comment.asp?articleID=335534
Pro-Turkish Comments from mainly non- Turkish intellectual (2) [ for Nancy Pelosi stumbles over Armenian resolution]
“ There is no evidence of a decision to massacre. On the contrary, there is considerable evidence of attempts to prevent it, which were not very successful.
Yes there were tremendous massacres, the numbers are very uncertain but a million may well be likely,[24] ...[and] the issue is not whether the massacres happened or not, but rather if these massacres were as a result of a deliberate preconceived decision of the Turkish government... there is no evidence for such a decision.[25] ” Lewis thus believes that "to make [Armenian Genocide], a parallel with the Holocaust in Germany" is "rather absurd."[24]
In an interview with Haaretz he stated: “ The deniers of Holocaust have a purpose: to prolong Nazism and to return to Nazi legislation. Nobody wants the 'Young Turks' back, and nobody wants to have back the Ottoman Law.
What do the Armenians want? The Armenians want to benefit from both worlds.
On the one hand, they speak with pride of their struggle against the Ottoman despotism, while on the other hand, they compare their tragedy to the Jewish Holocaust. I do not accept this. I do not say that the Armenians did not suffer terribly. But I find enough cause for me to contain their attempts to use the Armenian massacres to diminish the worth of the Jewish Holocaust and to relate to it instead as an ethnic dispute.[26] ·
The more idiotic resolutions passed from western countries the farther Armenia and Turkey is gonna be from a real solution.
Turkey has been suffering from a terrible terror problem while it is trying to survive as a secular democracy in the middle of the most problematic geo-politic territory of the world, surrounded by Syria, Iraq, Iran, and Russia the countries that US considers threat from 7,000 miles away! Turkish public is full of anger and frustration than ever. And western world keeps pushing Turkey to the dark side of the divide everyday.
If US and Europe lose Turkey to Iran-Russia Inc this will not be the best interests of US, Turkey and Armenia. · the events in 1915 were tragic events, both for Turks and Armenians living in Turkey at the time.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/soundoff/comment.asp?articleID=335534
Pelosi stumbles over Armenian resolution
Yes there were tremendous massacres, the numbers are very uncertain but a million may well be likely,[24] ...[and] the issue is not whether the massacres happened or not, but rather if these massacres were as a result of a deliberate preconceived decision of the Turkish government... there is no evidence for such a decision.[25] ” Lewis thus believes that "to make [Armenian Genocide], a parallel with the Holocaust in Germany" is "rather absurd."[24]
In an interview with Haaretz he stated: “ The deniers of Holocaust have a purpose: to prolong Nazism and to return to Nazi legislation. Nobody wants the 'Young Turks' back, and nobody wants to have back the Ottoman Law.
What do the Armenians want? The Armenians want to benefit from both worlds.
On the one hand, they speak with pride of their struggle against the Ottoman despotism, while on the other hand, they compare their tragedy to the Jewish Holocaust. I do not accept this. I do not say that the Armenians did not suffer terribly. But I find enough cause for me to contain their attempts to use the Armenian massacres to diminish the worth of the Jewish Holocaust and to relate to it instead as an ethnic dispute.[26] ·
The more idiotic resolutions passed from western countries the farther Armenia and Turkey is gonna be from a real solution.
Turkey has been suffering from a terrible terror problem while it is trying to survive as a secular democracy in the middle of the most problematic geo-politic territory of the world, surrounded by Syria, Iraq, Iran, and Russia the countries that US considers threat from 7,000 miles away! Turkish public is full of anger and frustration than ever. And western world keeps pushing Turkey to the dark side of the divide everyday.
If US and Europe lose Turkey to Iran-Russia Inc this will not be the best interests of US, Turkey and Armenia. · the events in 1915 were tragic events, both for Turks and Armenians living in Turkey at the time.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/soundoff/comment.asp?articleID=335534
Pelosi stumbles over Armenian resolution
Greeks and even the Colombians were remembered but not Turks.
· I am a United States veteran and served in The US Air Force. I still have friends in Iraq fighting for our freedom. I can tell you that I have never known a nation more underrepresented and discredited more than Turkey. Turkish troops were clearly the heroes of the Korean War, ask any Korean veteran but yet when the 50th anniversary of Korean War was being celebrated noone heard Turks getting credit for their bravery.
Greeks and even the Colombians were remembered but not Turks. Why not? I tell you why. Armenians and Greeks have done a wonderful job on preventing any positive image of Turkey in The United States. I am an Irish-American who happened to dig deep since I have noticed what Turks have been facing due to having some close Turkish friends.
Once I started digging and conducting a lengthy research I was shocked to find out how well Armenians have been playing that Christian card. Anyways, this resolution shouldn't pass because there was no government-ordered genocide. I am not denying that Armenians didn't suffer as a result of the war but also many Turks suffered, too. Also did anyone know why Antonio Banderas planned on playing Ataturk in a Hollywood movie and backed out in the last minute? Well, research it like I did. It will open your eyes and give you an idea what Turks face.
I can recommend a website which i would call a one-stop shop with full of unbiased information. http://www.tallarmeniantale.com/ Yes Pelosi indeed puts her personal interests above American interests by pushing for the passing of this resolution just like Armenian-Americans who I think are Armenians first and Americans second unfortunately.. · Hrat Dink wasn't the only one who defended the genocide allegations there are tens of journalists and historians in Turkey taking Armenian side very openly. They write their books, and articles, they organize conferences in Turkish universities.
Hrat Dink got killed, god knows by whom, because he was all for dialogue.
That's why Diaspora hated him more than Turks. That's why Armenian and Turkish graduate students in Rhode Island tried to organize a joint concert dedicated to Dink but Diaspora prevented it at the last moment using every possible way including threatening the musicians and Armenian students who involved. What I know is that murder of Hrat Dink made Diaspora Armenians go "yessss" and I'll never make sure who was behind the curtain!!! · just because he was proud of his Turkish citizenship. During Mr Dink's funeral there were thousands of Turks chanting "We are all Hrank Dink". Of course there are extremist Fascists present in Turkey - similar to every other country but that is another problem. ·
PS: Orhan Pamuk was never thrown in jail, never claimed that there was a "genocide" - his suggestion being Turkey should not be afraid to openly debate the issue- and lastly he is not exiled out of the country. His books are still among the best sellers in Turkey.
· Some questions:
1. Why won't the Armenians (Armenian Diaspora) join the Turkish government in a fact-finding committee so they can examine ALL the facts?
2. Why have the Armenians actually REFUSED outright every offer the Turkish government has made for an examination of all the records?
3. Who is the "recent US Ambassador to Turkey" who used the word "genocide" and then was fired and had to "recant" his/her words? · http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernard_Lewis
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/soundoff/comment.asp?articleID=335534
Pelosi stumbles over Armenian resolution
Greeks and even the Colombians were remembered but not Turks. Why not? I tell you why. Armenians and Greeks have done a wonderful job on preventing any positive image of Turkey in The United States. I am an Irish-American who happened to dig deep since I have noticed what Turks have been facing due to having some close Turkish friends.
Once I started digging and conducting a lengthy research I was shocked to find out how well Armenians have been playing that Christian card. Anyways, this resolution shouldn't pass because there was no government-ordered genocide. I am not denying that Armenians didn't suffer as a result of the war but also many Turks suffered, too. Also did anyone know why Antonio Banderas planned on playing Ataturk in a Hollywood movie and backed out in the last minute? Well, research it like I did. It will open your eyes and give you an idea what Turks face.
I can recommend a website which i would call a one-stop shop with full of unbiased information. http://www.tallarmeniantale.com/ Yes Pelosi indeed puts her personal interests above American interests by pushing for the passing of this resolution just like Armenian-Americans who I think are Armenians first and Americans second unfortunately.. · Hrat Dink wasn't the only one who defended the genocide allegations there are tens of journalists and historians in Turkey taking Armenian side very openly. They write their books, and articles, they organize conferences in Turkish universities.
Hrat Dink got killed, god knows by whom, because he was all for dialogue.
That's why Diaspora hated him more than Turks. That's why Armenian and Turkish graduate students in Rhode Island tried to organize a joint concert dedicated to Dink but Diaspora prevented it at the last moment using every possible way including threatening the musicians and Armenian students who involved. What I know is that murder of Hrat Dink made Diaspora Armenians go "yessss" and I'll never make sure who was behind the curtain!!! · just because he was proud of his Turkish citizenship. During Mr Dink's funeral there were thousands of Turks chanting "We are all Hrank Dink". Of course there are extremist Fascists present in Turkey - similar to every other country but that is another problem. ·
PS: Orhan Pamuk was never thrown in jail, never claimed that there was a "genocide" - his suggestion being Turkey should not be afraid to openly debate the issue- and lastly he is not exiled out of the country. His books are still among the best sellers in Turkey.
· Some questions:
1. Why won't the Armenians (Armenian Diaspora) join the Turkish government in a fact-finding committee so they can examine ALL the facts?
2. Why have the Armenians actually REFUSED outright every offer the Turkish government has made for an examination of all the records?
3. Who is the "recent US Ambassador to Turkey" who used the word "genocide" and then was fired and had to "recant" his/her words? · http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernard_Lewis
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/soundoff/comment.asp?articleID=335534
Pelosi stumbles over Armenian resolution
Pro-Turkish Comments from mainly non-Turkish intellectuals - [ for Nancy Pelosi stumbles over Armenian resolution]
· It would be a real shame if the US and the Europeans turn their backs on 70 million moderate, democratic and secular-minded Muslims. Turkey has been a stalwart ally to the US, sending troops to fight with UN forces in Korea, allowing the US to station nuclear missiles on Turkish soil during the Cold War, and use Turkish air bases.
· Congress screwed Turkey when they did not have the guts to stand up to President Bush and instead allowed a war that brought chaos and terrorism to Turkey's long southern border with Iraq. It would be adding insult to injury if Congress now passes this resolution on the Armenian genocide.
· This is one country which, albeit its shortcomings, is a beacon of democracy and secularism in the Balkans and the Middle East (look at the rest of them!) and an ally who has stood with us ever since the Korean War. The rest of the countries in the region already hate us and we were simply dying to have the only remaining ally (except Israel) hostile to us, weren't we?
· The fact that every single time the Turks have invited the Armenians to work with them to go through all the records (as the Turks have already done) is also problematic. But it is only problematic for the Armenians, because they have resolutely refused every offer the Turkish government has made at such a collaboration. · Yes, there was a calculated effort by the Ottoman Empire to rid itself of Armenians. Not because they were CHRISTIANS, but because they were separatists who were trying to get a slice of what we now call Turkey.
· That's the rub... The Armenians want it to be a CHRISTIAN genocide, and they want it to be the Republic of Turkey who was solely responsible in the end. Those are not the fact.
· This is a very old issue, here in Europe. Nothing "suddenly" about it. Turkey is having its membership to the EU blocked by this, as well as the Cyprus problemm.It is racism against Turks which is blocking EU-Turkey accession process.
· There are 10 times as many Muslims as Armenians. · These atrocities occurred during the Ottoman Empire, not The Turkish Republic. Blaming Turkey is like blaming Spanish Empire for wiping out the Aztecs..
· All major papers clearly ran editorials talking up how this was a tactic to keep Turkey out of the EU in France. The head of Sarkozy's party is an ethnic Armenian and Sarkozy and him don't want Turkey in the EU even if Turkey said it was responsible for the great potato famine in Ireland. · France is still in denial about what it truly did in Algeria.
· Frankly, I don't buy the argument that politicians were pandering to half a million Armenians - besides, there are 10 times as many Muslims as Armenians."
· Do you know that Sarkozy called Erdogan before the initial vote and said that, in return for some concessions, he would withdraw the text. (Such as opening the border with Armenia. However that border is closed because Armenia invaded and occupied neighboring Azerbaijan 15 years ago, not because of what happened in 1915) Isn't that political?
· Armenian groups went even so far as to sue the Turkish ambassador! Not to mention the fact that they also sued Bernard Lewis, emeritus professor at Princeton, who doesn't agree with the genocide thesis.
· Maybe there needs to be more empathizing the other way around. Did you know that half of Turkey's current population are the descendants of Turks and other Muslims who were driven off from the "Christian lands" between 1820-1924? (an attitude which continued until the 90s in Bosnia and Albania and Nagarno Karabagh) All the Turks see are double-standards.
· US Invasion of Iraq kills 600K+ people but whaam, this bill comes along from the very committee whose bills led to those deaths and says "oh btw, never mind Iraq or Palestine, but you Turks were such baaaad boys a century ago" ·
2. The Soviet Union: 1929 to 1953, 20 million dissidents rounded up and killed during Uncle "Joe" Stalin's purge trials. Never met a "refusnik" (sp?) he didn't like (to wack).
3. Germany: 1939 to 1945, over 13 million Jews, gypsies, homosexuals, mentally ill, union leaders, Catholics and others rounded up by Hilter's SS and killed.
Did you know that Uncle "Adolph" was an animal rights guy? He cried when he saw films of lions and elephants being shot in Africa. Sort of took it out on everyone else, as it were.
4. China: 1948 to 1952, between 20-23 million potential dissenters rounded up by Marxist Mao Zedone and executed. Imagine Nancy, over half the Lieutenant Governors in the United States said they thought this was a good, effective, constituency control policy.
5. Cambodia: 1975 to 1977, over one millon "educated" people rounded up under the Pol Pot regime and executed. Really didn't pay to get a "higher" education over there. Like, no "educator" left behind
. 6. Guatemala: 1964 to 1981, 100,000 Mayan Indians rounded up and killed because they were on the wrong side of Marxism. Think about that one over your next cup of Latte. I think they also "popped" Jaun Valdez and his mule too, he should have stayed in Columbia! 7. Uganda: 1970 to 1975, 300,000 Christians rounded up and executed under Marxist Dictator Idi Amin. Hollywood made a movie, "Last King of Scotland" in honor of this poor, mis-understood maniac buffoon. Of course, as far as Hollywood was concerned, it was only the Christians that got "wacked," and they had it coming. Hollywood seems to forget that we all got it coming!
· Turkey has opened their archives to the world long time ago and called Armenia to do the same thing. I wonder why they deny it. Armenian population was 1,294,851 in 1915 based in Boghos Nubar (Armenian)'s letter to France Department of Foreign. And relocated Armenians are only half of it, 600,000. IF all of them were died, do you think dead people gave birth and now they are talking about 1,800,000 Armenian dead?
Please, a little logic!!! Armenians in the east at that time were relocated, nobody touched any Armenian in the west. Because they were the only ones who co-operated with Russians to stub Ottoman Empire on the back.
Didn't USA put Japaneese people in the camps in WWII? History is Historian's job bot the politician's. Turkey is ready to face a serious study of historians?
· Diaspora Armenian should help starving Armenia with those money not the politicians in USA. Turkey is ready to open the border with Armenia IF this comes to a peaceful intention.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/soundoff/comment.asp?articleID=335534
· Congress screwed Turkey when they did not have the guts to stand up to President Bush and instead allowed a war that brought chaos and terrorism to Turkey's long southern border with Iraq. It would be adding insult to injury if Congress now passes this resolution on the Armenian genocide.
· This is one country which, albeit its shortcomings, is a beacon of democracy and secularism in the Balkans and the Middle East (look at the rest of them!) and an ally who has stood with us ever since the Korean War. The rest of the countries in the region already hate us and we were simply dying to have the only remaining ally (except Israel) hostile to us, weren't we?
· The fact that every single time the Turks have invited the Armenians to work with them to go through all the records (as the Turks have already done) is also problematic. But it is only problematic for the Armenians, because they have resolutely refused every offer the Turkish government has made at such a collaboration. · Yes, there was a calculated effort by the Ottoman Empire to rid itself of Armenians. Not because they were CHRISTIANS, but because they were separatists who were trying to get a slice of what we now call Turkey.
· That's the rub... The Armenians want it to be a CHRISTIAN genocide, and they want it to be the Republic of Turkey who was solely responsible in the end. Those are not the fact.
· This is a very old issue, here in Europe. Nothing "suddenly" about it. Turkey is having its membership to the EU blocked by this, as well as the Cyprus problemm.It is racism against Turks which is blocking EU-Turkey accession process.
· There are 10 times as many Muslims as Armenians. · These atrocities occurred during the Ottoman Empire, not The Turkish Republic. Blaming Turkey is like blaming Spanish Empire for wiping out the Aztecs..
· All major papers clearly ran editorials talking up how this was a tactic to keep Turkey out of the EU in France. The head of Sarkozy's party is an ethnic Armenian and Sarkozy and him don't want Turkey in the EU even if Turkey said it was responsible for the great potato famine in Ireland. · France is still in denial about what it truly did in Algeria.
· Frankly, I don't buy the argument that politicians were pandering to half a million Armenians - besides, there are 10 times as many Muslims as Armenians."
· Do you know that Sarkozy called Erdogan before the initial vote and said that, in return for some concessions, he would withdraw the text. (Such as opening the border with Armenia. However that border is closed because Armenia invaded and occupied neighboring Azerbaijan 15 years ago, not because of what happened in 1915) Isn't that political?
· Armenian groups went even so far as to sue the Turkish ambassador! Not to mention the fact that they also sued Bernard Lewis, emeritus professor at Princeton, who doesn't agree with the genocide thesis.
· Maybe there needs to be more empathizing the other way around. Did you know that half of Turkey's current population are the descendants of Turks and other Muslims who were driven off from the "Christian lands" between 1820-1924? (an attitude which continued until the 90s in Bosnia and Albania and Nagarno Karabagh) All the Turks see are double-standards.
· US Invasion of Iraq kills 600K+ people but whaam, this bill comes along from the very committee whose bills led to those deaths and says "oh btw, never mind Iraq or Palestine, but you Turks were such baaaad boys a century ago" ·
2. The Soviet Union: 1929 to 1953, 20 million dissidents rounded up and killed during Uncle "Joe" Stalin's purge trials. Never met a "refusnik" (sp?) he didn't like (to wack).
3. Germany: 1939 to 1945, over 13 million Jews, gypsies, homosexuals, mentally ill, union leaders, Catholics and others rounded up by Hilter's SS and killed.
Did you know that Uncle "Adolph" was an animal rights guy? He cried when he saw films of lions and elephants being shot in Africa. Sort of took it out on everyone else, as it were.
4. China: 1948 to 1952, between 20-23 million potential dissenters rounded up by Marxist Mao Zedone and executed. Imagine Nancy, over half the Lieutenant Governors in the United States said they thought this was a good, effective, constituency control policy.
5. Cambodia: 1975 to 1977, over one millon "educated" people rounded up under the Pol Pot regime and executed. Really didn't pay to get a "higher" education over there. Like, no "educator" left behind
. 6. Guatemala: 1964 to 1981, 100,000 Mayan Indians rounded up and killed because they were on the wrong side of Marxism. Think about that one over your next cup of Latte. I think they also "popped" Jaun Valdez and his mule too, he should have stayed in Columbia! 7. Uganda: 1970 to 1975, 300,000 Christians rounded up and executed under Marxist Dictator Idi Amin. Hollywood made a movie, "Last King of Scotland" in honor of this poor, mis-understood maniac buffoon. Of course, as far as Hollywood was concerned, it was only the Christians that got "wacked," and they had it coming. Hollywood seems to forget that we all got it coming!
· Turkey has opened their archives to the world long time ago and called Armenia to do the same thing. I wonder why they deny it. Armenian population was 1,294,851 in 1915 based in Boghos Nubar (Armenian)'s letter to France Department of Foreign. And relocated Armenians are only half of it, 600,000. IF all of them were died, do you think dead people gave birth and now they are talking about 1,800,000 Armenian dead?
Please, a little logic!!! Armenians in the east at that time were relocated, nobody touched any Armenian in the west. Because they were the only ones who co-operated with Russians to stub Ottoman Empire on the back.
Didn't USA put Japaneese people in the camps in WWII? History is Historian's job bot the politician's. Turkey is ready to face a serious study of historians?
· Diaspora Armenian should help starving Armenia with those money not the politicians in USA. Turkey is ready to open the border with Armenia IF this comes to a peaceful intention.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/soundoff/comment.asp?articleID=335534
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
Armenians were belligerents
Letters Blog May 03, 2008 7
by Prof.Dr. Turkkaya Ataov (Emeritus of international relations)
Comments
VICKEN Babkenian (Armenia’s angels’’, Opinion, 25/4) states that “at the time the Australian troops landed at Gallipoli another event of historical importance was taking place in Turkey’’.
It’s true that a tragedy occurred in Turkey then, but in a way much different than the one stressed by Babkenian.
British authors Stephen Pope and Elizabeth-Anne Wheal, in their joint military classic Dictionary of the First World War, state that between 1 and 1.5 million Armenians were living in Turkey in 1914, that the Armenian nationalists ``slaughtered an estimated 120,000 non-Armenians while the Turkish Army was preoccupied with mobilisation’’, that ``2500 rebels took (the city of) Van in April 1915 and proclaimed a provisional government’’, and that armed Armenians ``resumed control in late 1917 killing perhaps another 50,000 non-Armenians’’.
The commanders of the Armenians, such as Armen Garo Pasdermadjian, confess in their published memoirs that they bore arms, organised large forces and fought against the Turks in several fronts. The title of Pasdermadjian’s book proudly asserts thatArmenian participation was ``A Leading Factor in the Winning of the War’’ by the Allies.
Published documents prove, beyond reasonable doubt, that Armenians committed violent assaults, armed terrorism, destruction, rape, assassinations and wholesale murder of various Muslim groups. Such misdeeds were condemned as contrary to the rules of war even by the Tsarist Russian and French officers who had provided them with uniforms,weapons and all kinds of support.
Many Armenian, British, US, French, Russian and Turkish sources indicate that the Armenians were not as helpless,
unprotected, un-armed and non-belligerent as mainstream opinion claims them to have been.
Turkkaya Ataov
Professor emeritus of international relations
Ankara University, Turkey
Copyright 2007 News Limited. All times AEST (GMT +10).
http://blogs.theaustralian.news.com.au/letters/index.php/theaustralian/comments/armenians_were_belligerents
Vicken Babkenian
April 25, 2008
AT the same time as Australian troops landed at Gallipoli on April 25, 1915, another event of historical importance was taking place in Turkey: the Armenian genocide. The Gallipoli landing took place one day after the mass arrest of Armenian leaders in Istanbul, which is known as the beginning of the genocide. "Who, after all, remembers the annihilation of the Armenians?" were Adolf Hitler's famous words before he embarked on his heinous crime of the Holocaust.
One group who remember the Armenians are a handful of Australians who were at the forefront of the relief effort, yet their stories have been largely hidden. Not one Australian historian has devoted any attention to these remarkable Australians, who have been forgotten along with the "forgotten genocide". For example, Edith Glanville from Haberfield, Sydney, lost her son Leigh, from the 1st Battalion, who died in battle at Gallipoli. Thus began her extraordinary journey with the Armenian people.
Glanville was the first woman justice of the peace in NSW and founded both the Quota and Soroptimist clubs in Australia. Most notably she was honorary secretary of the Armenian Relief Fund of NSW from 1922, and became a driving force in raising more than $100,000 worth of supplies (about $19 million in today's value) within months. Other members of the relief fund included Charles Lloyd Jones, the first chairman of the ABC; and Oscar Lines, the general manager of the Bank of NSW. Glanville was so concerned about the plight of the Armenians that she ended up adopting an Armenian orphan. Former Menzies cabinet minister and British high commissioner Thomas White was a prisoner of war during World War I in Turkey. As a witness to the Armenian genocide, he later returned home and joined the Armenian relief effort. Another prominent Australian, the Rev J.E.Cresswell from Adelaide's Congregational Church (now the Uniting Church), was national secretary of the Armenian Relief Fund of Australasia in the 1920s. Witnessing the plight of Armenian refugees in Syria in 1923, Cresswell said: "Over 6000 are here. The sights within these caves are beyond words. No words seem adequate to describe the misery that must be the portion of these poor people." He oversaw relief programs from port to destination, including setting up an Australian-funded orphanage for 1700 children who survived the genocide in Antelias, Lebanon. That site is now one of the holiest for Armenians, the Catholicosate of Cilicia. In 1918, Sydney mayor James Joynton Smith set up the Armenian Relief Fund, which included prominent philanthropists and business people such as the Griffith brothers, one of the largest suppliers of tea and coffee in Australia, and the Elliot brothers, one of the nation's biggest pharmaceutical groups. This fund, with the help of many Sydneysiders, raised hundreds of thousands of dollars to help the Armenians, all when Australians were already sacrificing so much during World War I.
Even prime minister Billy Hughes promised that free freight would be provided by commonwealth steamers for any contribution to the fund. These are just some of the hundreds of Australian stories of generosity, hope and moral decency that have been unearthed. In the words of Robert Manne: "In world history there is an intimate connection between the Dardanelles campaign and the Armenian genocide." So, as we reflect on the sacrifices of brave Australians who landed on those distant shores, let's also remember those Australians who lost loved ones and, through the kindness of their hearts, were able to save others. Vicken Babkenian is director of the Australian Institute for Holocaust and Genocide Studies.' http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23594423-21147,00.html
by Prof.Dr. Turkkaya Ataov (Emeritus of international relations)
Comments
VICKEN Babkenian (Armenia’s angels’’, Opinion, 25/4) states that “at the time the Australian troops landed at Gallipoli another event of historical importance was taking place in Turkey’’.
It’s true that a tragedy occurred in Turkey then, but in a way much different than the one stressed by Babkenian.
British authors Stephen Pope and Elizabeth-Anne Wheal, in their joint military classic Dictionary of the First World War, state that between 1 and 1.5 million Armenians were living in Turkey in 1914, that the Armenian nationalists ``slaughtered an estimated 120,000 non-Armenians while the Turkish Army was preoccupied with mobilisation’’, that ``2500 rebels took (the city of) Van in April 1915 and proclaimed a provisional government’’, and that armed Armenians ``resumed control in late 1917 killing perhaps another 50,000 non-Armenians’’.
The commanders of the Armenians, such as Armen Garo Pasdermadjian, confess in their published memoirs that they bore arms, organised large forces and fought against the Turks in several fronts. The title of Pasdermadjian’s book proudly asserts thatArmenian participation was ``A Leading Factor in the Winning of the War’’ by the Allies.
Published documents prove, beyond reasonable doubt, that Armenians committed violent assaults, armed terrorism, destruction, rape, assassinations and wholesale murder of various Muslim groups. Such misdeeds were condemned as contrary to the rules of war even by the Tsarist Russian and French officers who had provided them with uniforms,weapons and all kinds of support.
Many Armenian, British, US, French, Russian and Turkish sources indicate that the Armenians were not as helpless,
unprotected, un-armed and non-belligerent as mainstream opinion claims them to have been.
Turkkaya Ataov
Professor emeritus of international relations
Ankara University, Turkey
Copyright 2007 News Limited. All times AEST (GMT +10).
http://blogs.theaustralian.news.com.au/letters/index.php/theaustralian/comments/armenians_were_belligerents
Vicken Babkenian
April 25, 2008
AT the same time as Australian troops landed at Gallipoli on April 25, 1915, another event of historical importance was taking place in Turkey: the Armenian genocide. The Gallipoli landing took place one day after the mass arrest of Armenian leaders in Istanbul, which is known as the beginning of the genocide. "Who, after all, remembers the annihilation of the Armenians?" were Adolf Hitler's famous words before he embarked on his heinous crime of the Holocaust.
One group who remember the Armenians are a handful of Australians who were at the forefront of the relief effort, yet their stories have been largely hidden. Not one Australian historian has devoted any attention to these remarkable Australians, who have been forgotten along with the "forgotten genocide". For example, Edith Glanville from Haberfield, Sydney, lost her son Leigh, from the 1st Battalion, who died in battle at Gallipoli. Thus began her extraordinary journey with the Armenian people.
Glanville was the first woman justice of the peace in NSW and founded both the Quota and Soroptimist clubs in Australia. Most notably she was honorary secretary of the Armenian Relief Fund of NSW from 1922, and became a driving force in raising more than $100,000 worth of supplies (about $19 million in today's value) within months. Other members of the relief fund included Charles Lloyd Jones, the first chairman of the ABC; and Oscar Lines, the general manager of the Bank of NSW. Glanville was so concerned about the plight of the Armenians that she ended up adopting an Armenian orphan. Former Menzies cabinet minister and British high commissioner Thomas White was a prisoner of war during World War I in Turkey. As a witness to the Armenian genocide, he later returned home and joined the Armenian relief effort. Another prominent Australian, the Rev J.E.Cresswell from Adelaide's Congregational Church (now the Uniting Church), was national secretary of the Armenian Relief Fund of Australasia in the 1920s. Witnessing the plight of Armenian refugees in Syria in 1923, Cresswell said: "Over 6000 are here. The sights within these caves are beyond words. No words seem adequate to describe the misery that must be the portion of these poor people." He oversaw relief programs from port to destination, including setting up an Australian-funded orphanage for 1700 children who survived the genocide in Antelias, Lebanon. That site is now one of the holiest for Armenians, the Catholicosate of Cilicia. In 1918, Sydney mayor James Joynton Smith set up the Armenian Relief Fund, which included prominent philanthropists and business people such as the Griffith brothers, one of the largest suppliers of tea and coffee in Australia, and the Elliot brothers, one of the nation's biggest pharmaceutical groups. This fund, with the help of many Sydneysiders, raised hundreds of thousands of dollars to help the Armenians, all when Australians were already sacrificing so much during World War I.
Even prime minister Billy Hughes promised that free freight would be provided by commonwealth steamers for any contribution to the fund. These are just some of the hundreds of Australian stories of generosity, hope and moral decency that have been unearthed. In the words of Robert Manne: "In world history there is an intimate connection between the Dardanelles campaign and the Armenian genocide." So, as we reflect on the sacrifices of brave Australians who landed on those distant shores, let's also remember those Australians who lost loved ones and, through the kindness of their hearts, were able to save others. Vicken Babkenian is director of the Australian Institute for Holocaust and Genocide Studies.' http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23594423-21147,00.html
Saturday, May 3, 2008
"We considered the Azerbaijani Turks as Tatars, yet they were a good people. Armenians on the other hand, are provocateurs in a single word." Frunze, Red Army commander
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"I have yet to meet a foreigner living in this part of the world and unbiased by politics, religion or pecuniary benefits from condemning the Turks, who has not most empathically stated that of all the races represented in the population of the old Turkish Empire, the Turks by far are the best people." E. Alexander Powell, American journalist and author,"The Struggle for Power in Moslem Asia," 1923
...................................................................................................................
"Nearly everyone who touches upon the kernel of the nation learns to respect and love Turks, to humiliate Greeks, to hate and despise Armenians... Everywhere justifies the proverb, that the Greek defrauds 2 Jews, but the Armenian defrauds 2 Greeks. Certainly, if you have been defrauded in Anatolia, so you had a business with an Armenian"
"When I had business with Turks, I didn't need a written document, because his vow was enough. When I had business with Greeks, I was in need to sign the written document, because it is important for them. But when I had business with Armenians, I didn't sign any documents, because even the written document can't provide a barrier for their mendacity and intrigue"
German traveler, from the book "Outlines of Anatolia," p..6, p.188-191
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"I have yet to meet a foreigner living in this part of the world and unbiased by politics, religion or pecuniary benefits from condemning the Turks, who has not most empathically stated that of all the races represented in the population of the old Turkish Empire, the Turks by far are the best people." E. Alexander Powell, American journalist and author,"The Struggle for Power in Moslem Asia," 1923
...................................................................................................................
"Nearly everyone who touches upon the kernel of the nation learns to respect and love Turks, to humiliate Greeks, to hate and despise Armenians... Everywhere justifies the proverb, that the Greek defrauds 2 Jews, but the Armenian defrauds 2 Greeks. Certainly, if you have been defrauded in Anatolia, so you had a business with an Armenian"
"When I had business with Turks, I didn't need a written document, because his vow was enough. When I had business with Greeks, I was in need to sign the written document, because it is important for them. But when I had business with Armenians, I didn't sign any documents, because even the written document can't provide a barrier for their mendacity and intrigue"
German traveler, from the book "Outlines of Anatolia," p..6, p.188-191
"The tolerance shown to foreign beliefs and hostile faiths by the Ottoman law and Ottoman officials which enabled them to establish their own religious institutions and to shape their own education was such that the thousand year old liberty reigning in France in the field of sects and beliefs, dating from the times of the ancient Gaul, could not be compared with it." Talcot Williams, Turkey, A World Problem of Today, New York, 1922, p. 194
....................................................................................................................
"In the interest of truth I will also affirm that you saw little of the cruelty you fasten upon the Turks. Besides that you have killed more Armenians than ever lived in the districts of the uprising. The fate of those people was sad enough without having to be exaggerated as you have done."
"Apart from that he (Enver Pasha) was in no respect what you picture him. Of course, if we are to take it for granted that we of the West are saints, then the Turk is any good. You will agree with me, no doubt, that the Turks count among the few gentlemen still in existence....
Ultimately truth will prevail." George A. Schreiner, distinguished war and political correspondent having served in Turkey from February through the end of 1915, in a no-holds-barred, extremely critical December 11,1918 letter to ex-Ambassador Henry Morgenthau, regarding the latter's unethically falsified, ghostwritten book (Ambassador Morgenthau's Story)
............................................................................
"...In the absence of unequivocal evidence that the Ottoman administration took a specific decision to eliminate the Armenians under their control at that time, British governments have not recognized those events as indications of genocide... Nor do we believe it is the business of governments of today to review events of over 80 years ago, with a view to pronouncing on them..." Baroness Ramsay of Cartvale, Foreign Office spokesperson, on April 14, 1999; the PA News from London... reporting on yet another Armenian bid to get the British Government to recognize its "genocide."
....................................................................................................................
"In the interest of truth I will also affirm that you saw little of the cruelty you fasten upon the Turks. Besides that you have killed more Armenians than ever lived in the districts of the uprising. The fate of those people was sad enough without having to be exaggerated as you have done."
"Apart from that he (Enver Pasha) was in no respect what you picture him. Of course, if we are to take it for granted that we of the West are saints, then the Turk is any good. You will agree with me, no doubt, that the Turks count among the few gentlemen still in existence....
Ultimately truth will prevail." George A. Schreiner, distinguished war and political correspondent having served in Turkey from February through the end of 1915, in a no-holds-barred, extremely critical December 11,1918 letter to ex-Ambassador Henry Morgenthau, regarding the latter's unethically falsified, ghostwritten book (Ambassador Morgenthau's Story)
..................................................................................................................
"The Osmanli (Ottoman) has yet to be heard." (The English have) "heard stories ad nauseam of massacres, of pillages, of the ravishing of women, but none of these stories have been corroborated by a single European eyewitness." Captain Charles Boswell Norman, "The Armenians Unmasked" (1895)
............................................................................
"...In the absence of unequivocal evidence that the Ottoman administration took a specific decision to eliminate the Armenians under their control at that time, British governments have not recognized those events as indications of genocide... Nor do we believe it is the business of governments of today to review events of over 80 years ago, with a view to pronouncing on them..." Baroness Ramsay of Cartvale, Foreign Office spokesperson, on April 14, 1999; the PA News from London... reporting on yet another Armenian bid to get the British Government to recognize its "genocide."
"Neither political nor legal or material claims against present-day Turkey can be derived from the recognition of this historical event as an act of genocide." European Parliament, 1987 Resolution
"It is only fair to acknowledge that, judged from a humane point of view, the methods of warfare pursued by the Turks are vastly superior to those which have disgraced their German masters."
Lord Kitchener, Official Report on Gallipoli as Minister of War, August 9, 1915.
...................................................................................................................
"Ottoman Armenians were completely free in the Ottoman Empire and the Turks were the Armenians' only shelter against Russia guaranteeing their traditions, religion, culture and language in comparison to Russian oppression under the Czars."
Vartanian, Armenian historian, "History of the Armenian Movement
....................................................................................................................
"Few Europeans realized that the Turkish Ottoman Sultan Suleiman was the head of the most democratic government of their time."
Harold Lamb, American historian and novelist, noted for his biographies of Genghis Khan, Alexander, and Hannibal
"It is only fair to acknowledge that, judged from a humane point of view, the methods of warfare pursued by the Turks are vastly superior to those which have disgraced their German masters."
Lord Kitchener, Official Report on Gallipoli as Minister of War, August 9, 1915.
...................................................................................................................
"Ottoman Armenians were completely free in the Ottoman Empire and the Turks were the Armenians' only shelter against Russia guaranteeing their traditions, religion, culture and language in comparison to Russian oppression under the Czars."
Vartanian, Armenian historian, "History of the Armenian Movement
....................................................................................................................
"Few Europeans realized that the Turkish Ottoman Sultan Suleiman was the head of the most democratic government of their time."
Harold Lamb, American historian and novelist, noted for his biographies of Genghis Khan, Alexander, and Hannibal
"The Turk is the brother of the Armenian and they know it." William Saroyan, Antranik of Armenia, From "Inhale and Exhale," 1935; the "they" refers to forces... likely the great powers... that beg the question Saroyan goes on to ask: Why do they want them to kill one another?
What good does it do anybody? "America should feed the half million Turks whose hinterland was willfully demolished by the retreating Greeks, instead of aiding the Greeks and Armenians who are sitting around waiting for America to give them their next meal.
The stories of Turk atrocities circulated among American churches are a mess of lies. I believe that the Greeks and not the Turks are barbarians."
Colonel William Haskell, the American Red Cross; returning from a tour of investigation in the Near East. Source: The Turkish Myth, 1923. Here is what the colonel thought of the Armenians, according to Dr. Richard Hovannisian
What good does it do anybody? "America should feed the half million Turks whose hinterland was willfully demolished by the retreating Greeks, instead of aiding the Greeks and Armenians who are sitting around waiting for America to give them their next meal.
The stories of Turk atrocities circulated among American churches are a mess of lies. I believe that the Greeks and not the Turks are barbarians."
Colonel William Haskell, the American Red Cross; returning from a tour of investigation in the Near East. Source: The Turkish Myth, 1923. Here is what the colonel thought of the Armenians, according to Dr. Richard Hovannisian
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