Journal Gazette, IN
Oct 14 2007

Historians write history, not Congress

WASHINGTON – On the one hand is righteous indignation and disputed
historical facts. On the other is geopolitical realism and a snub of
a U.S. ally in an uncertain part of the world.

Indignation won last week as the House Foreign Relations Committee
voted to condemn mass killings of Armenians in Turkey 92 years ago as
genocide. Turkey insists the Armenians died from conflicts tied to
World War I, not genocide, and contends that fewer than 600,000
people died, not the 1.5 million claimed by Armenia.

President Bush and eight former secretaries of state pleaded for the
panel to sidestep a vote on the non-binding resolution or defeat it.
`Its passage would do great harm to our relations with a key ally in
NATO and in the global war on terror,’ Bush said.

Rep. Mike Pence was one of the few committee members who were
persuaded, saying he believed genocide occurred, but `with American
troops in harm’s way, dependent on critical supply routes available
through an alliance that we enjoy with the nation of Turkey, I submit
that at this time, this is not the time for this nation to speak on
this dark chapter of history.’

Rep. Dan Burton, also a committee member, agreed with Pence’s view.
Unlike Pence, he did not have to change his position to vote against
the resolution. Burton has opposed similar bills the many times they
have been proposed in the past 20-some years.

`There’s no question that thousands and thousands of people were
killed during the time period we’re talking about,’ Burton said.
`That was over 90 years ago. And right now there’s a conflict in
Afghanistan, there’s a conflict in Iraq, there’s a conflict that’s
going on – off and on – in Lebanon and the West Bank. All over that
area it’s a tinderbox. And right next door, we’ve got Iran who’s
trying to develop a nuclear capability.

`Our strongest ally in the area, and has been for 50 years, is
Turkey. I just don’t understand why we’re going to cut our nose off,
shoot ourselves in the foot at a time that we need this ally.’

To which Rep. Mark Souder, not a committee member, says Turkey is
trying to deny an historical fact so it doesn’t have to pay
reparations to the survivors of the people who were massacred.

He also thinks the argument that Turkey is such a vital ally is bogus
because when the U.S. wanted to use the NATO base in Incirlik,
Turkey, during the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Turkey said no dice.

`Why are we allowing ourselves to be bullied?’ he said, suggesting
that `Arabists’ in the State Department have exaggerated the possible
consequences of insulting Turkey.

That’s a fair enough question. But there are other questions that
also deserve to be asked: How is it in the best interests of the U.S.
to have a formal position? If Congress passes this resolution, will
it make the dead Armenians any less dead?

What happened in the former Ottoman Empire nearly a century ago is
not America’s sin to be atoned for. Deciding not to choose sides in
this lingering anguish is not the same as condoning those killings
(or whitewashing history, as Souder says) or accepting present-day
genocide in Darfur.

Here’s the U.N. definition of genocide: `Any of the following acts
committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national,
ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: killing members of the
group; causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life, calculated
to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing
measures intended to prevent births within the group; forcibly
transferring children of the group to another group.’

One might well argue that European settlers committed genocide in
this country.

The U.S. government has never acknowledged it as such, and
resolutions to apologize to American Indians for `the many instances
of violence, maltreatment and neglect inflicted on native peoples by
citizens of the United States’ have never passed Congress.

Would it be appropriate for, say, Germany, Japan or Brazil to take
formal government action labeling the U.S. government’s policies and
action toward American Indians `genocide’ and demand that the current
U.S. government apologize?

I think most Americans would react rather emphatically.

The U.S. does not have an excess of good will in the world these
days. We are perceived as presumptuous, arrogant and all too eager to
demand that things be our way (thanks, Mr. President). Without at all
disrespecting the deaths of the Armenians, it might be better to sit
out this dispute.

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