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/ 37Gunter: No Armenian Genocide

Turkey, Past and FutureWhat Is Genocide?The Armenian Case

by Michael M. Gunter

Shortly after the World War II, genocide was legally defined by the U.N. Geno-cide Convention as “any... acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or inpart, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such.”1 The key word from the

perspective of this article is “intent.” For while nobody can deny the disaster wrought onthe Armenians by the 1915 deportations and massacres, the question is whether or not itcan be defined as genocide—arguably the most heinous crime imaginable.

Michael M. Gunter, professor of political sci-ence at Tennessee Technological University, wassenior Fulbright lecturer at the Middle East Tech-nical University in Turkey.

THE AMBIGUITYOF GENOCIDE

The strict international law definition of geno-cide has not prevented its application to virtuallyevery conflict involving a large number of civiliandeaths from the Athenian massacre of the inhab-itants of Milos in 416 B.C.E., to the Mongol sack-ing of Baghdad in 1258, to the fate of the nativeNorth American Indians, to Stalin’s induced fam-ine in the Ukraine in the early 1930s, to the recentconflicts in Bosnia, Burundi, Chechnya, Colom-bia, Guatemala, Iraq, Sudan, and Rwanda, whichis not to deny that some of these cases do indeedqualify as genocide.

The liberal use of the term has naturallystirred numerous controversies and debates. Is-rael Charny offers little help by arguing that any

massacre constitutes genocide, even the 1986Chernobyl nuclear meltdown.2 At the other endof the spectrum, Stephen Katz views the Holo-caust as the only true genocide in history.3 Inbetween these two polar definitions, Ton Zwaanhas attempted to distinguish between “total” and“complete” genocide and “partial” genocides.4

Even the U.N. definition suffers from someambiguities owing to being a compromise amongall signatories. Thus, the convention legally pro-tects only “national, racial, ethnic, and religiousgroups,” not those defined politically, economi-

1 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime ofGenocide, 78 U.N. Treaty Series (UNTS) 277, adopted by theGeneral Assembly, Dec. 9, 1948, entered into force, Jan. 12,1951.2 Israel W. Charny, “Towards a Generic Definition of Genocide,”in George J. Andreopoulos, ed., Genocide: Conceptual and His-torical Dimensions (Philadelphia: University of PennsylvaniaPress, 1994), pp. 64-94.3 Stephen Katz, The Holocaust in Historical Context, vol. 1(New York: Oxford University Press, 1994).4 Ton Zwaan, “On the Aetiology and Genesis of Genocides andOther Mass Crimes Targeting Specific Groups,” Office of theProsecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for the FormerYugoslavia, Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies, Univer-sity of Amsterdam/Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sci-ences, Nov. 2003, p. 12.

38 / MIDDLE EAST QUARTERLY WINTER 2013

cally, or culturally, giving rise to varying interpre-tations of its intentions. For example, while theInternational Criminal Tribunal for the FormerYugoslavia convicted seven Bosnian Serbs ofgenocide for their role in the July 1995 Srebrenicamassacre of some 8,000 Bosnian Muslims,5 theInternational Court of Justice, in its judgment in

Bosnia vs. Serbia, fo-cused on Serbia’s “in-tent” rather than “out-come” regarding the mur-der of Bosnian Muslims,absolving it of the chargeof genocide.6 Clearly,these contradictory deci-sions have added to theconfusion of what geno-cide legally constitutes.

Likewise, the debatewhether the Darfur events constituted genocidecontinues apace. U.S. secretary of state ColinPowell characterized Darfur as a case of genocidebased on a U.S. government-funded study, whichhad surveyed 1,136 Darfur refugees in neighbor-ing Chad.7 By contrast, a study commissionedby U.N. secretary-general Kofi Annan concludedthat while the Darfur events should be referred tothe International Criminal Court (ICC) for crimesagainst humanity, they did not amount to geno-cide.8 Amnesty International and Human RightsWatch also declined to characterize the violencein Darfur as genocide while the Arab League andthe African Union took a similar position, empha-sizing instead the civil war aspect of the conflict.

For their part EU, British, Canadian, and Chineseofficials, among others, have shied away from call-ing it genocide. Samantha Power, the author of aPulitzer Prize winning study on genocide, favoredthe term ethnic cleansing to describe what wasoccurring.9

When in July 2008, ICC chief prosecutor LuisMoreno-Ocampo accused Sudanese presidentOmar Bashir of genocide and asked the court toissue an arrest warrant, many in the Arab Leagueand the African Union criticized the genocidecharge as biased against their region.10 It remainsto be seen how wise the ICC has been in bringinggenocide charges in this case. Clearly, there wasa lack of agreement on what did or did not consti-tute genocide in Darfur. Such a situation illus-trates the ambiguity surrounding the concept ofgenocide.

In an attempt to alleviate these problems,scholars have offered such additional detailedconcepts as “politicide” to refer to mass murdersof a political nature, “democide” to describe gov-ernment-perpetrated mass murders of at least onemillion people, ethnocide, Judeocide, ecocide,feminicide, libricide (for the destruction of librar-ies), urbicide, elitocide, linguicide, and culturicide,among others.11 In addition we now have suchconcepts as crimes against humanity, war crimes,and ethnic cleansing.

Why this semantic disarray? HenryHuttenbach has argued, “Too often has the ac-cusation of genocide been made simply for theemotional effect or to make a political point, withthe result that more and more events have beenclaimed to be genocide to the point that the termhas lost its original meaning.”12 Jacques Semelinhas similarly explained: “Whether use of the word‘genocide’ is justified or not, the term aims to strikeour imagination, awaken our moral conscience

5 David Rhode, Endgame: The Betrayal and Fall of Srebrenica,Europe’s Worst Massacre since World War II (New York: Farrar,Straus and Giroux, 1997), p. 167; Jacques Semelin, Purify andDestroy: The Political Uses of Massacre and Genocide (NewYork: Columbia University Press, 2007), pp. 34-5, 65-6, 138-9,195-8, 213-20, 245-6; “Report of the Secretary General Pursuantto General Assembly Resolution 53/35: The Fall of Srebrenica,”U.N. doc. no. A/54/549, Nov. 15, 1999.6 The Application of the Convention on the Prevention andPunishment of the Crime of Genocide (Bosnia and Herzegovinavs. Serbia and Montenegro), case 91, International Court of Jus-tice, The Hague, Feb. 26, 2007.7 “Documenting the Atrocities in Darfur,” Bureau of Democracy,Human Rights, and Labor, and Bureau of Intelligence and Re-search, U.S. Department of State, Washington, D.C., Sept. 2004.8 The Guardian (London), Feb. 1, 2005.

Intent orpremeditationis important indefining genocide;a large loss of lifeis not in itselfproof of genocide.

9 Scott Straus, “Darfur and the Genocide Debate,” ForeignAffairs, Jan.-Feb. 2005, pp. 128, 130.10 Public Radio International, July 28, 2008; Voice of America,July 22, 2010.11 Semelin, Purify and Destroy, pp. 319-20.12 Henry R. Huttenbach “Locating the Holocaust under theGenocide Spectrum: Toward a Methodology of Definition andCategorization,” Holocaust and Genocide Studies, 3 (1988): 297.

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and mobilise public opin-ion on behalf of the vic-tims.” He adds: “Underthese circumstances, any-one daring to suggest thatwhat is going on is not ‘re-ally’ genocide is immedi-ately accused of weaknessor sympathizing with theaggressors.” Thus,

The term genocide can beused as a propaganda toolby becoming the hinge fora venomous rhetoricagainst a sworn enemy.Given the powerful emo-tional charge the wordgenocide generates, it canbe used and re-used in allsorts of hate talk to heapinternational opprobriumon whoever is accused ofgenocidal intent. … Theobvious conclusion: Theword is used as much as asymbolic shield to claimvictim status for one’s people, as a sword raisedagainst one’s deadly enemy.13

Intent or premeditation is all important in de-fining genocide “because it removes from con-sideration not only natural disasters but also thoseman-made disasters that took place without ex-plicit planning. Many of the epidemics of com-municable diseases that reached genocidal pro-portions, for example were caused by unwittinghuman actions.”14 Although some would dis-agree, the fate of the North American indigenouspeople is a case in point as they died largely fromdisease, not intent. Therefore, a large loss of lifeis not in itself proof of genocide. Ignoring intentcreates a distorted scenario and may lead to in-correct conclusions as to what really occurred.

THE ARMENIANS

What then of the Armenian case? Unfortu-nately, as the well-known journalist and scholarGwynne Dyer concluded more than thirty-fiveyears ago, most Turkish and Armenian scholarsare unable to be objective on this issue resultingin a situation of “Turkish falsifiers and Armeniandeceivers.”15

The main purpose of this discussion, there-fore, is not to deny that Turks killed and expelledArmenians on a large scale; indeed what hap-pened might in today’s vocabulary be called warcrimes, ethnic cleansing, or even crimes againsthumanity. To prove genocide, however, intent orpremeditation must be demonstrated, and in theArmenian case it has not. It must also be borne in

Gunter: No Armenian Genocide

The liberal use of the term “genocide” has stirred numerouscontroversies and debates. Despite an international law definition,the word has been applied in some questionable instances. Thedeliberate murder of more than a million Cambodians by the KhmerRouge, some of whose victims are pictured here, was undoubtedlya horrific crime, but does it fit the definition of genocide?

13 Semelin, Purify and Destroy, pp. 312-3.14 Kurt Jonassohn, “What Is Genocide?” in Helen Fein, ed.,Genocide Watch (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992), p.21.

15 Gwynne Dyer, “Turkish ‘Falsifiers’ and Armenian ‘Deceiv-ers’: Historiography and the Armenian Massacres,” Middle East-ern Studies, Jan. 1976, pp. 99-107.


mind that what occurred was not a unilateral Turk-ish action but part of a long-term process in whichsome Armenians were guilty of killing as manyTurks as they could in their attempt to rebel. Chris-topher de Ballaigue argues that “what is neededis a vaguer designation for the events of 1915,avoiding the G-word but clearly connoting crimi-nal acts of slaughter, to which reasonable schol-ars can subscribe.”16

Arnold Toynbee, the renowned historianwho coedited the Blue Book compilation of Turk-ish atrocities during World War I,17 later wrote:

“In the redistribution of Nearand Middle Eastern Territo-ries, the atrocities which haveaccompanied it from the be-ginning have been revealedin their true light, as crimesincidental to an abnormal pro-cess, which all parties havecommitted in turn, and not asthe peculiar practice of onedenomination or national-ity.”18 Indeed, in his finalstatement on the subject,Toynbee declared: “Arme-nian political aspirations hadnot been legitimate. … Theiraspirations did not merelythreaten to break up the Turk-ish Empire; they could not befulfilled without doing graveinjustice to the Turkishpeople itself.”19 In addition,Adm. Mark Bristol, U.S. highcommissioner and then-am-bassador to Turkey afterWorld War I, wrote in a longcable to the State Departmentin 1920: “While the Turks

were all that people said they were, the other sideof the coin was obscured by the flood of Greekand Armenian propaganda painting the Turks ascompletely inhuman and undeserving of any con-sideration while suppressing all facts in favor ofthe Turks and against the minorities.”20

More recently, Edward J. Erickson, a militaryhistorian, concluded after a careful examination:“Nothing can justify the massacres of the Arme-nians nor can a case be made that the entire Ar-menian population of the six Anatolian provinceswas an active and hostile threat to Ottoman na-

Bosnian Serbs sit behind their defense lawyers prior to a sessionat the U.N.’s International Criminal Tribunal for the FormerYugoslavia in The Hague, May 11, 1998. The tribunal convictedseven Bosnian Serbs of genocide for the Srebrenica massacre ofsome 8,000 Bosnian Muslims. However, the International Courtof Justice, another U.N. organ, focused on Serbia’s “intent” ratherthan the “outcome,” absolving it of the charge of genocide in thecourt’s judgment in Bosnia vs. Serbia. Clearly, these contradictorydecisions have added to the confusion about what legallyconstitutes genocide.

16 Christopher de Ballaigue, Rebel Land: Among Turkey’s For-gotten Peoples (London: Bloomsbury, 2009), p. 104; M. HakanYavuz, “Contours of Scholarship on Armenian-Turkish Rela-tions,” Middle East Critique, Nov. 2011, pp. 231-51.17 James Bryce, compiler, “The Treatment of Armenians in theOttoman Empire, 1915-16,” Parliamentary Papers Miscellaneous,Great Britain, no. 31 (London: Joseph Cavston, 1916).

18 Arnold J. Toynbee, The Western Question in Greece andTurkey: A Study in the Contact of Civilizations (Boston and NewYork: Houghton Mifflin, 1922), pp. vii-viii.19 Arnold J. Toynbee, Acquaintances (London: Oxford Univer-sity Press, 1967), p. 241.20 Laurence Evans, United States Policy and the Partition ofTurkey, 1914-1924 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1965), p.272.

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tional security.” This said, Erickson added: “How-ever, a case can be made that the Ottomans judgedthe Armenians to be a great threat to the 3rd and4th [Ottoman] Armies and that genuine intelligenceand security concerns drove that decision. It mayalso be stated that the Ottoman reaction was es-calatory and responsive rather than premeditatedand pre-planned.”21

On the other hand, Taner Akçam, a Turkishsociologist who has prominently broken with hiscountry’s official narrative, concluded after com-piling weighty evidence that the “Ottoman au-thorities’ genocidal intent becomes clear.”22 Thisconclusion was challenged by Turkish researcherErman Sahin who accused Akçam of “dishon-esty—which manifests itself in the form of nu-merous deliberate alterations and distortions, mis-leading quotations and doctoring of data—castsdoubt on the accuracy of his claims as well as hisconclusions.”23 In a later critique of Akçam’s sub-sequent work, Sahin concluded: “These are sub-stantive matters that raise serious concerns as tothe author’s theses, which appear to be based ona selective and distorted presentation of Otto-man archival materials and other sources. ... Sucherrors seriously undermine the author’s and thebook’s credibility.”24

More recently, Akçam claimed that despiteTurkish attempts to “hide the evidence” throughsystematic “loss” and destruction of documents,his new work in the Ottoman archives “clearlypoints in the direction of a deliberate Ottomangovernment policy to annihilate its Armenianpopulation.”25 Maybe, but maybe not. Equallylikely is that any destruction of documents at

the end of World War I was simply designed toprotect military secrets from falling into enemyhands, something any government would wantto do. More to the point, Akçam also states that“the clearest statement that the aim of the [Ot-toman] government’s policies toward the Ar-menians was annihilation is found in a cable of29 August 1915 from interior minister Talat Pa-sha” in which he asserted that the “Armenianquestion in the eastern provinces has been re-solved. ... There’s noneed to sully the nationand the government[’shonor] with furtheratrocities.”26 This docu-ment, however, does notprove genocidal intentexcept to those deter-mined to find it. Rather,Talat’s statement mightsimply mean precisely what it states: The Arme-nian deportations, although resulting in manyatrocities and deaths, have solved the issue.

In a carefully nuanced study, historianDonald Bloxham concluded that what happenedwas premeditated and therefore genocide.27

Though stating in an earlier article “that therewas no a priori blueprint for genocide, and thatit emerged from a series of more limited regionalmeasures in a process of cumulative policyradicalization,”28 he, nevertheless, used the termgenocide because of the magnitude of what hap-pened and because “nowhere else during theFirst World War was revolutionary nationalismanswered with total murder. That is the crux ofthe issue.”29 At the same time, he wondered“whether recognition [of genocide] is really go-ing to open the door to healing wounds and


21 Edward J. Erickson, “The Armenians and Ottoman MilitaryPolicy, 1915,” War in History, no. 2, 2008, p. 167.22 Taner Akçam, A Shameful Act: The Armenian Genocide andthe Question of Turkish Responsibility (New York: Henry Holtand Co., 2006), p. 187.23 Erman Sahin, “Review Essay: A Scrutiny of Akçam’s Versionof History and the Armenian Genocide,” Journal of Muslim Mi-nority Affairs, Aug. 2008, p. 316.24 Erman Sahin, “Review Essay: The Armenian Question,”Middle East Policy, Spring 2010, p. 157.25 Taner Akçam, The Young Turks’ Crime against Humanity:The Armenian Genocide and Ethnic Cleansing in the OttomanEmpire (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2012), pp. 19,27.

26 Ibid., p. 203.27 Donald Bloxham, The Great Game of Genocide: Imperial-ism, Nationalism, and the Destruction of the Ottoman Arme-nians (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005); Ronald GrigorSuny, “Truth in Telling: Reconciling Realities in the Genocideof the Ottoman Armenians,” American Historical Review, Oct.2009, pp. 930-46.28 Donald Bloxham, “The Armenian Genocide of 1915-1916:Cumulative Radicalization and the Development of a DestructionPolicy,” Past & Present, Nov. 2003, p. 143.29 Ibid., pp. 143, 186.

The conceptof genocide didnot exist until itwas formulatedduring WorldWar II.


reconciliation, as we are often told, or whetherit is a means of redressing nationalist griev-ances. Is it an issue of historical truth, moralityand responsibility, or of unresolved politicaland material claims?”30

Finally, it should be noted that the Arme-nian claims of genocide are encumbered by in-trinsic legal and philosophical problems. Thisis due to the fact that any finding under inter-

national law of genocidein the Armenian case atthis late date would con-stitute a legally unten-able ex-post-facto proc-lamation, namely: Makea crime of an actionwhich, when originallycommitted, was not acrime. The concept ofgenocide did not evenexist until it was formu-lated during World War

II by Raphael Lemkin, while the genocide con-vention only entered into force in 1951.

THE MANIFESTO OFHOVHANNES

KATCHAZNOUNI

Hovhannes Katchaznouni was the firstprime minister (1918-19) of the short-lived Arme-nian state following World War I. It is useful toturn to his April 1923 address to the Armenianrevolutionary and nationalist Dashnak partycongress, held in the Romanian capital ofBucharest. While not gainsaying “this unspeak-able crime ... the deportations and mass exilesand massacres which took place during the Sum-mer and Autumn of 1915,”31 Katchaznouni’sspeech constitutes a remarkable self-criticism bya top Armenian leader. No wonder that many

Armenians have done their best to remove thistelling document from libraries around the world.It is, therefore, useful to cite what Katchaznounihad to say at some length:

In the Fall of 1914, Armenian volunteer bandsorganized themselves and fought against theTurks because they could not refrain them-selves from fighting. This was an inevitableresult of psychology on which the Armenianpeople had nourished itself during an entiregeneration. … It is important to register onlythe evidence that we did participate in thatvolunteer movement to the largest extent. …

We had embraced Russia wholeheartedlywithout any compunction. Without any posi-tive basis of fact, we believed that the Tsaristgovernment would grant us a more or lessbroad self-government in the Caucasus andin the Armenian vilayets liberated from Tur-key as a reward for our loyalty, our efforts,and assistance.

We overestimated the ability of the Armenianpeople, its political and military power, andoverestimated the extent and importance ofthe services our people rendered to the Rus-sians. And by overestimating our very modestworth and merit was where we naturally exag-gerated our hopes and expectations. …

The proof is, however—and this is essential—that the struggle began decades ago against theTurkish government [which] brought about thedeportation or extermination of the Armenianpeople in Turkey and the desolation of Turk-ish Armenia. This was the terrible fact!32

K.S. PAPAZIAN’SPATRIOTISM PERVERTED

A decade after the publication ofKatchaznouni’s speech, but still much closer tothe events of World War I than now, Kapriel

30 Ibid., p. 232.31 Hovhannes Katchaznouni, “The Armenian RevolutionaryFederation (Dashnagtzoutiun) Has Nothing To Do Anymore,”Arthur A. Derounian, ed., Matthew A. Callender, trans. (NewYork: Armenian Information Service, 1955), p. 2. 32 Ibid., pp. 2-3.

Revelationsby Armenianwriter Papazianindicate that theArmenians werefar from innocentvictims inwhat ensued.

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Serope Papazian produced amost revealing critique of theDashnaks’ perfidy, terrorism,and disastrous policies thathad helped lead to the eventsin question. Written by anArmenian who bore no lovefor the Turks, but hushed up,ignored, and virtually forgot-ten by many because its self-critical revelations do notmesh with the received Ar-menian thesis of innocentvictimization, Papazian’sanalysis33 calls for closescrutiny.

Authored just after thenotorious Dashnak murderof Armenian archbishopLeon Tourian in New YorkCity on Christmas Eve1933,34 Papazian began byexpressing disdain for thegroup’s “predatory inclina-tions” before examining the“terrorism in the Dashnaks’ early [1892] program,”which sought “to fight, and to subject to terror-ism the government officials, the traitors, the be-trayers, the usurers, and the exploiters of all de-scription.” Having analyzed the movement’s ideo-logical and operational history, Papazian exploredwhat actually transpired during World War I:

The fact remains, however, that the leaders ofthe Turkish-Armenian section of theDashnagtzoutune did not carry out their prom-ise of loyalty to the Turkish cause when theTurks entered the war. … Prudence was thrownto the winds … and a call was sent for Arme-nian volunteers to fight the Turks on the Cau-casian front.

Thousands of Armenians from all over theworld flocked to the standards of such famousfighters as Antranik, Kery, Dro, etc. The Ar-menian volunteer regiments rendered valuableservices to the Russian Army in the years of1914-15-16.

On the other hand, the methods used by theDashnagtzoutune in recruiting these regi-ments were so open and flagrant that it couldnot escape the attention of the Turkish au-thorities … Many Armenians believe that thefate of two million of their co-nationals inTurkey might not have proved so disastrousif more prudence had been used by theDashnag leaders during the war. In one in-stance, one Dashnag leader, Armen Garo, whowas also a member of the Turkish parliament,had fled to the Caucasus and had taken activepart in the organization of volunteer regimentsto fight the Turks. His picture, in uniform,was widely circulated in the Dashnag papers,and it was used by Talat Paha, the arch assas-sin of the Armenians, as an excuse for hispolicy of extermination.35


Historian Edward Erickson: “Nothing can justify the massacresof the Armenians … However, a case can be made that theOttomans judged the Armenians to be a great threat to the[Ottoman] Armies and … that the Ottoman reaction wasescalatory and responsive rather than premeditated and pre-planned.” These Armenian fighters, pictured in the late 1890s,lend support to the Ottoman fear of a potential fifth column.

33 Kapriel Serope Papazian, Patriotism Perverted: A Discussionof the Deeds and the Misdeeds of the Armenian RevolutionaryFederation, the So-Called Dashnagtzoutune (Boston: BaikarPress, 1934).34 See Christopher Walker, Armenia: The Survival of a Nation(New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1989), p. 354; Maggie Lewis,“Armenian-Americans,” The Christian Science Monitor (Bos-ton), Nov. 18, 1980.


What then should be made of Papazian’sPatriotism Perverted? Without denying that theTurks played a murderous role in the eventsanalyzed, his long-ignored and even suppressed

revelations indicate thatthe Armenians were farfrom innocent victims inwhat ensued. Indeed,Papazian’s text makes itclear that incompetentbut treacherous Arme-nians themselves werealso to blame for what hadbefallen their cause. It is

unfair to fix unique blame upon the Turks.

GUENTER LEWY’S CRITIC

A major contribution to the debate over theArmenian atrocities, Guenter Lewy’s The Arme-nian Massacres in Ottoman Turkey,36 rejects theclaim of a premeditated genocide as well as theapologist narrative of an unfortunate wartime ex-cess, concluding that “both sides have usedheavy-handed tactics to advance their cause andsilence a full and impartial discussion of the is-sues in dispute.” In his view, “the key issue inthis quarrel is not the extent of Armenian suffer-ing, but rather the question of premeditation: thatis, whether the Young Turk regime during the FirstWorld War intentionally organized the massacresthat took place.”

Lewy questions the authenticity of certaindocuments alleged to contain proof of a premedi-tated genocide as well as the methods of VakhaknN. Dadrian,37 one of the foremost current Arme-nian scholar-advocates of the genocide thesis,whom he accuses of “selective use of sources …

[which] do not always say what Dadrian alleges”and “manipulating the statements of contempo-rary observers.”

As for the argument that “the large num-ber of Armenian deaths ... [offers] proof thatthe massacres that took place must have beenpart of an overall plan to destroy the Armenianpeople,” Lewy counters that it “rests on a logi-cal fallacy and ignores the huge loss of lifeamong Turkish civilians, soldiers, and prison-ers-of-war due to sheer incompetence, neglect,starvation, and disease. All of these groups alsoexperienced a huge death toll that surely can-not be explained in terms of a Young Turk planof annihilation.”

So how does Lewy explain what happenedto the Armenians? “The momentous task of re-locating several hundred thousand people in ashort span of time and over a highly primitivesystem of transportation was simply beyond theability of the Ottoman bureaucracy. … Under con-ditions of Ottoman misrule, it was possible for thecountry to suffer an incredibly high death tollwithout a premeditated plan of annihilation.”38

Lewy’s book was reviewed prominently andpositively in two leading U.S. journals of MiddleEast studies. Edward J. Erickson noted the find-ing that “both camps have created a flawed sup-porting historiography by using sources selec-tively, quoting them out of context, and/or ignor-ing ‘inconvenient facts,’” concluding that “sim-ply having a large number of advocates affirmingthat the genocide is a historical fact does not makeit so.”39 Robert Betts, while claiming that “for theTurkish government to deny Ottoman responsi-bility for the Armenian suffering makes no sense,”also stated that “what emerges from Lewy’s studyis the dire state of the empire and its population in1915 and its inability to protect and feed its ownMuslim citizenry, let alone the Armenians.”40

35 Papazian, Patriotism Perverted, pp. 7, 13, 15, 21, 38-9.36 Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 2007.37 For examples of Guenter Lewy’s critiques of Dadrian’s writ-ings, see “Revisiting the Armenian Genocide,” Middle East Quar-terly, Fall 2005, pp. 3-12; idem, The History of the ArmenianGenocide: Ethnic Conflict from the Balkans to Anatolia to theCaucasus (Providence and Oxford: Berghahn Books, 1995); idem,Warrant for Genocide: Key Elements of Turko-Armenian Con-flict (New Brunswick and London: Transaction Publishers, 1999).

The Ottomanssaw theArmeniansas treasonoussubjects.

38 Lewy, The Armenian Massacres, pp. ix, 47, 51, 83-6, 250,253, 258, 282.39 Edward J. Erickson, “Lewy’s ‘The Armenian Massacres,’”Middle East Journal, Spring 2006, p. 377.40 Robert Brenton Betts, “The Armenian Massacres in Otto-man Turkey: A Disputed Genocide/The Armenian Rebellion atVan,” Middle East Policy, Spring 2008, p. 177.

/ 45Gunter: No Armenian Genocide

As Christians,the Armeniansfound asympatheticaudience inthe West.

Moreover, such distinguished scholars of Ottomanhistory as Bernard Lewis,41 Roderic Davison,42 J.C. Hurewitz,43 and Andrew Mango,44 among oth-ers, have all rejected the appropriateness of thegenocide label for what occurred. On May 19,1985, sixty-nine prominent academics in TurkishOttoman and Middle Eastern studies (includingLewis) published a large advertisement in TheNew York Times and The Washington Post criti-cizing the U.S. Congress for considering the pas-sage of a resolution that would have singled outfor special recognition “the one and one half mil-lion people of Armenian ancestry who were vic-tims of genocide perpetrated in Turkey between1915 and 1923.” Instead, they argued that suchquestions should be left for the scholarly com-munity to decide.

Indeed, the Armenian massacres of 1915 didnot come out of the blue but followed decadesof Armenian violence and revolutionary activ-ity that elicited Turkish counter violence. Thereis a plethora of Turkish writings documentingthese unfortunate events, just as there are nu-merous Armenian accounts.45 The Armenians,of course, present themselves as freedom fight-ers in these earlier events, but it is possible tounderstand how the Ottomans saw them as trea-sonous subjects.

Moreover, throughout all these events, theArmenians were never more than a large minorityeven in their historic provinces.46 Yet they exag-gerated their numbers before World War I andtheir losses during the war. Had the Armenian

fatality figures been correct, very few would havesurvived the war. Instead, the Armenians man-aged to fight another war against the nascent Turk-ish republic in the wake of World War I for mas-tery in eastern Anatolia. Having lost, many Arme-nians claimed that what transpired after WorldWar I was a renewed genocide. As Christians, theArmenians found a sympathetic audience in theWest whereas the Muslim Turks were the West’shistoric enemy. Add to this the greater Armenianadroitness in foreign languages—hence theirgreater ability to present their case to the world—to understand why the Turks consider the geno-cide charge to be grossly unfair, especially sincethe Armenians have adamantly rejected any cul-pability on their part in this tragic event.

CONCLUSION

Without denying the tragic massacres andcountless deaths the Armenians suffered duringWorld War I, it is important to place them in theirproper context. When this is done, the applica-tion of the term “genocide” to these events isinappropriate because the Turkish actions wereneither unilateral nor pre-meditated. Rather, whattranspired was part of along-continuing processthat in part started withthe Russo-Turkish war of1877-78, which triggeredan influx of Balkan Mus-lims into Anatolia withthe attendant deteriora-tion of relations with theindigenous Christian Armenians.47

To make matters worse, Patriarch Nerses, anOttoman subject and one of the leaders of theArmenian community, entered into negotiationswith the victorious Russians with an eye toachieving Armenian autonomy or even indepen-dence. This was followed in coming decades by

41 See, for example, Bernard Lewis, The Emergence of ModernTurkey (London: Oxford University Press, 1968), p. 356.42 The New York Times, May 19, 1985.43 Ibid.44 Andrew Mango, Atatürk: The Biography of the Founder ofModern Turkey (Woodstock and New York: The Overlook Press,1999), p. 161.45 See, for example, Louise Nalbandian, The Armenian Revolu-tionary Movement: The Development of Armenian Political Par-ties through the Nineteenth Century (Los Angeles: University ofCalifornia Press, 1963); Garegin Pasdermadjian (Armen Garo),Bank Ottoman: Memoirs of Armen Garo (Detroit: ArmenTopouzian, 1990); James G. Mandalian, ed. and trans., ArmenianFreedom Fighters: The Memoirs of Rouben der Minasian (Bos-ton: Hairenik Association, 1963).46 See Justin McCarthy, Muslims and Minorities: The Popula-tion of Ottoman Anatolia and the End of the Empire (New York:New York University Press, 1983), p. 115.

47 M. Hakan Yavuz with Peter Sluglett, eds., War and Diplo-macy: The Russo-Turkish War of 1877-1878 (Salt Lake City:University of Utah Press, 2011), pp. 1-13.


Armeniancommunities inlarge cities werespareddeportationbecause theywere not in aposition to aidthe Russians.

continued Armenian nationalist agitation, accom-panied by the use of terror, aimed at provokingretaliation, which they hoped would be followedby European intervention. When World War Ibroke out, some Armenians supported the Rus-sian enemy. Kurdish/Muslim-Armenian animosi-ties also played a role in this process.48

As for the necessaryattribute of premeditationto demonstrate genocide,there are no authenticdocuments to such ef-fect. Although there arecountless descriptions ofthe depravations suf-fered by the Armenians,they do not prove intentor premeditation. The so-called Andonian docu-ments that purport todemonstrate premedita-tion are almost certainly

a fabrication.49 And in response to the Armeniancontention that the huge loss of Armenian lives

48 See Janet Klein, The Margins of Empire: Kurdish Militias inthe Ottoman Tribal Zone (Stanford: Stanford University Press,2011), pp. 50, 131, 183.49 Aram Andonian, ed., The Memoirs of Naim Bey: TurkishOfficial Documents Relating to the Deportations and Massacresof Armenians (London: 1920. Reprinted, Newtown Square, Pa.:Armenian Historical Research Association, 1964). For the case

illustrates premeditation, what then should besaid about the enormous loss of Turkish livesamong civilians, soldiers, and prisoners-of-war?Were these Turkish deaths also genocide or ratherdue to sheer incompetence, neglect, starvation,and disease? And if the latter were true of theethnic Turkish population, they were all the moreso in respect to an ethnic group that had incurredupon itself suspicion of acting as a fifth columnin a time of war.

Even so, Armenian communities in such largeWestern cities as Istanbul and Smyrna were largelyspared deportation probably because they werenot in a position to aid the invading Russians. Isit possible to imagine Hitler sparing any Jews inBerlin, Munich, or Cologne from his genocidalrampage for similar reasons? If, as the Armeniansallege, the Turkish intent was to subject their Ar-menian victims to a premeditated forced marchuntil they died of exhaustion, why was this tacticnot imposed on all Armenians? Therefore, with-out denying outright murders and massacres thattoday might qualify as war crimes, it seems rea-sonable to question the validity of referring tothe Armenian tragedy as genocide.

against the authenticity of these documents, see Sinasi Orel andSureyya Yuca, The Talat Pasha Telegrams: Historical Fact orArmenian Fiction? (Nicosia: K. Rustem and Bros., 1986). Forthe counterclaim that newly found Ottoman archival source mate-rial vindicates the Adonian documents see, Akçam, The YoungTurks’ Crime against Humanity, p. xviii, fn. 22.

Family ValuesSaudi Style

The Arabic reads:“Please, entrance isforbidden to womenwithout a guardian

[lit. a male withwhom sexualactivity is by

definition neverallowed].”