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The Armenian Weekly; Volume 74, No. 30; August 2, 2008
Features:
1. Reaching Beyond the Wire
One Armenian-American Soldier Speaks out for Iraq’s Persecuted Christians
By Andy Turpin
2. Westward Ho! Backwards through Prussia
Bohjalian’s ‘Skeletons at the Feast’ Illustrates the WWII Eastern Front in
Moral Shades of Gray
By Andy Turpin
***
1. Reaching Beyond the Wire
One Armenian-American Soldier Speaks out for Iraq’s Persecuted Christians
By Andy Turpin
On July 16, upon his return from serving his second tour in Iraq as a civil
affairs soldier, U.S. Army sergeant John Merguerian spoke to the Weekly
about his experiences in Iraq, the reconstruction work he conducted with the
Iraqi-Armenian community in Baghdad, and the current situation facing Iraq’s
Christian minorities.
After graduating with degrees in Arabic and political science from UCLA, in
a joint program with the University of Egypt, Merguerian volunteered as a
teacher’s aid at Blackstone Elementary School with City Year, Boston’s urban
peace corp, from 1992-93. From 2000-02, Merguerian served with the Armenian
Volunteer Corps teaching English to disadvantaged villagers in Armenia.
A.W. What made you want to join the military? Where have you been posted
beyond Iraq?
J.M. Well, I have a younger brother and he joined in 1997. The following
year I decided to do the same thing. I thought it would be a good way to pay
for my schooling and get some good experience. Pretty much the only place I’ve
been to is Iraq. The tour I just completed was my second tour there. I was
there in 2003-04, during the invasion.
A.W. As an Armenian-American soldier in Iraq, tell us about your
interactions with the Iraqi Armenian community or the Armenian UN
peacekeepers there.
J.M. Oh sure. I had some interaction with the Iraqi Armenian community when
I was there in 2003-04. I actually went to their community in Baghdad. I
also started an Iraqi-Armenian fund. One of the churches in the U.S. helped
me with sending toys and books.
A.W. When were your last interactions with that Iraqi-Armenian community?
J.M. This current tour, from 2007-08. Because of the security situation, I
couldn’t reach out to the community, but I did try to help them out. They
had built a new Armenian school this year next to the St. Gregory Church. It
got into their jurisdiction because there are no more Iraqi-Arabs going to
their school.
The person who really helped me get things off the ground with helping the
community was Nubar Hovsepian, who is the head of the Iraq-Armenian
community in Glendale. He helped me with sending items to the school in
Baghdad. I only got to communicate through phone because they [in Baghdad]
had to come to the base to pickup all the items. The army didn’t want me to
go out there because of the security situation.
A.W. What part of Baghdad does the Iraqi-Armenian community reside in?
J.M. The majority of them are in the Camp Sarah district, which is what I’m
going to go ahead and call the "Christian Sector" of Baghdad because it’s
mainly the Armenians, the Assyrians, and the Chaldeans that live in big
communities there. The main, big church is the St. Gregory Armenian Church,
located right in the center of Baghdad, which is not at all a safe area
right now. That’s where the school is and from what I understand, the
parents take their kids there with a great deal of anxiety. It’s scary. I
also want to say that St. Gregory’s was closed for quite a time.
A.W. Has it since reopened?
J.M. They do sporadic services there from what I understand, but the
community now mainly uses the St. Garabed Church in the Camp Sarah district
for their services. Insurgents are also targeting a lot of Assyrian
churches. One of the head priests that was in charge of the Assyrian
community in Mosul was kidnapped, tortured, and killed.
To give you one story: When I was a soldier in Iraq from 2003-04, I met an
Iraqi-Armenian named Vartan Hamalakiyan. I met him after the invasion when
things calmed down at what was then the Saddam International Airport. After
we took over the airport, he was there to help the Americans get it running
again. He was a very nice man, he told me his wife had passed away maybe
four or five years ago from cancer. He was taking care of his two kids – one
boy was 13, the other was 11.
When I went back for this last tour in 2007-08, I was near the airport and
went there one time and met another Iraqi-Armenian. I asked, "Do you know
where Vartan is? I’ve tried to look for him. "The man said, "Have you heard
what happened to him?" What happened was, because he was working with
Americans, insurgents kidnapped him, tortured him, and then killed him. They
threw his body out into the street. The Armenian told me his children are
now living with their grandparents.
I also heard about two Iraqi-Armenians who were driving in the center of the
city in Baghdad and were accidentally killed by an Australian private
security contactor. It was two women who were driving and the Australian had
thought they were insurgents.
A.W. How do you feel about the representation of Armenian-Americans serving
in the U.S. military today? Do you feel Armenians are under-represented in
the military?
J.M. In this past tour I think I met only one and he was a captain from
Glendale. But in the first tour I met a few. I met another captain,
Martirosian, who was born in Armenia and moved to America. He decided to
join the army and became an officer. The other Armenian I met was a sergeant
named Hratch from Lowell, Mass. I’ve met a few here and there. They all seem
to enjoy serving their country.
A.W. What are your feelings about your service in Iraq?
J.M. I enjoy serving out there. I was very proud as an Armenian-American
that I could go out there and help the Iraqi-Armenian community. That was a
huge plus for me and I would hope that more Armenians and Armenian-Americans
could go out there, learn about the Iraqi-Armenian community, and help them
out. They’re in such desperate need.
A.W. So Armenian-Americans are a great resource to Iraq when they’re there?
J.M. Right. Well, I knew about the community in Baghdad and that was able to
convince my colonel to see and help-as a minority community. The main
question when we’re there as U.S. military civil affairs people is, How do
we help the Iraqi majority, the Sunnis and Shiite Muslims? The question
rarely involves the minorities that live there because they don’t know much
about them.
A.W. When you’re in Iraq, what does an average day for you consist of as a
civil affairs officer with an Armenian and Arabic background?
J.M. Well, which tour do you want to talk about, the first or second? During
my first tour, because it was a safer environment (the invasion was over),
we were ready to go out and do reconstruction. We would go out, practically
on a daily basis with the colonel, and help interpret with the local Iraqis
in the field and ask, "What needs to be done?" in terms of water, schools,
what’s going on in the city, what’s going on in the country, etc. The second
tour, again because of security reasons, I hardly ever got to go outside the
wire. I was mainly in charge of managing Iraqi interpreters and doing a lot
of documentation for the colonel, translating documents and also teaching
civil affairs classes to the Iraqi Special Operations forces and the Iraqi
army. That was all behind the wire.
A.W. When you say "behind the wire, "what do you mean?
J.M. Within the base, my base is Camp Liberty, which is near the airport. It’s
a secure base. The Iraqi army and Special Operations forces are also on the
same base with us. Because they work with Americans and because they’re part
of the Iraqi army, they don’t go out either. They’re targeted by the
insurgents and they home-school their kids on the base because they’re
getting threats all the time that [the insurgents] are going to kidnap and
kill their kids.
A.W. In the Metrowest Daily News, you’re quoted as saying," [Iraq] can’t be
democratized. "How do you view your day-to-day job there in Iraq as a civil
affairs soldier? What actually keeps you going when you’re there?
J.M. I think I was misquoted on that and it may have been my mother
speaking. But what keeps me going is a sense that we’re there, this is the
reality, and we have to make the best of what’s available there. Maybe
[Iraq] is not a democracy that we as Americans envision, but it’s their
country and they have to decide what’s best for them. [The U.S.] can just
help them facilitate that process through good communication and good civil
affairs work.
A.W. As someone who has daily social and logistical interaction with various
strata of Iraqi society, do you feel that the truth about the situation in
Iraq is reaching the U.S. public – either through the media or through
soldiers’ letters home? And is it accurate information?
J.M. It is accurate regarding the violence that’s going on there. However,
there’s more to it than that. There are a lot of safe areas where soldiers
are going out and [the media] doesn’t focus on a lot of the interactions
that are going on between the American soldiers and the Iraqi public, and
the partnerships they’re forming together. Things like basic humanitarian
aid to the schools, maintaining water pipes, maintaining electricity to the
medical facilities there. A lot of army doctors are opening up new clinics
with the Iraqis and the media isn’t focusing much on that. They’re mostly
focusing on "Howmany folks got killed today?" or the violence.
A.W. In your view, what should both the average soldier and American
civilian be doing to better the situation in Iraq?
J.M. Well, everyone’s under a command there and I trust our leaders and
commanders from General Petraeus down. I think as long as soldiers follow
their command, do what they’re told to be doing, and follow the leadership,
I think that’s the best a soldier can do to make a difference there. I can’t
speak for young Armenian-American activists – they have to form their own
opinions on whether this is a just war or not – but in my opinion I support
what we’re doing there. I support what the soldiers are doing there. So I’d
rather see Armenian-Americans saying, "Let’s support our soldiers, let’s
support the effort that is going on in Iraq." One thing I’d like more
Armenian-American activists to do is to know about the Iraqi-Armenian
community there, see how they can help them, because they do need a lot of
help. I recently talked to Nubar Hovsepian from Glendale and he told me that
just among his Iraqi community there’s a lot of activism, but that other
Armenians don’t know that there’s a community in Iraq. He said, "We don’t
get a whole lot of support." And many of our U.S. congressmen don’t know
about the Iraqi-Armenian community either. When they do their congressional
tours in Iraq, they mainly focus on the current government there, meeting
leaders and finding out what’s happening to the main Iraqi Muslim
population. I don’t think they even know about the minority communities
there. The only minority community they know about is the Kurdish community.
So the opportunity is with activists to write to a congressman, or if they
meet a congressman, to tell them about the Armenian community there and what’s
going on – that there are kidnappings! In 2006, they opened the new Armenian
school in Baghdad and right away there were already threat letters from
insurgents saying, "If you bring your kids to school, we will kidnap them."
A.W. Do you think that supporting the Armenian community in Iraq, and the
other Christian communities there is something that congressmen with more
ties to the evangelical lobby might be interested in getting involved with?
Do you see that in the future?
J.M. I do, I do, yes. I’m trying to push that right now. More than anything
else I’m trying to push for that. I have a friend here who’s a Glendale city
clerk friendly with the congressman and I want to see what we can do about
finding a Christian organization, maybe evangelical, who’d like to help out.
A.W. Would the Christian community in Iraq welcome such support?
J.M. I think they need all the support they can get.
——————————————— ——————–
2. Westward Ho! Backwards through Prussia
Bohjalian’s ‘Skeletons at the Feast’ Illustrates the WWII Eastern Front in
Moral Shades of Gray
By Andy Turpin
WATERTOWN, Mass. (A.W.)-A beautiful 18-year-old iron-willed Prussian girl,
her strapping Scottish POW lover (reminiscent of a ginger-haired Sean
Connery), an aging aristocratic mother with her Hitler Youth castoff son,
and a death camp survivor who kills Nazis to steal their identity are all
part of the motley crew cast of characters in author Chris Bohjalian’s
lastest novel, Skeletons at the Feast (Shaye Areheart Books, 2008).
The setting is Poland and the Eastern Front in the last days of World War II
amidst a Western Europe in the wake of the Allied invasion of France and an
Eastern Europe in the grip of military chaos and a wave of refugees fleeing
the horrors of the ever-impending Red Army.
Caught in the tide of war and racing against the Soviet barbarian hordes
determined on taking brutal revenge for the Battles of Stalingrad and
Leningrad out on German and Polish civilians are the Emmerichs.
The Emmerichs are a noble Prussian family that represents all that is good,
kind, and chivalrous in a once-great Germany whose legacy has been forever
perverted by the Third Reich and its perpetrated Holocaust. Their quest,
like a Teutonic John Ford Western, is to stay one step ahead of Ivan and
reach the surrender and safety of the American and British lines encroaching
from Berlin and France.
In the literary vein of Joseph Kanon’s The Good German and the tradition of
Sam Peckinpah’s 1976 controversial cinematic tale of the Eastern Front Cross
of Iron, Bohjalian’s Skeletons at the Feast is a deftly crafted and
empathetically woven novel of survival and hope told from a German
perspective often negated or neglected by other novelists.
Today few are taught in schools what an abject corner of hell the Eastern
Front was during the Second World War. Certainly writers like Jerzy Kozinsky
and Elie Wiesel have written about the infernos of the death camps, but
overshadowed in the U.S. are the legitimate fears of death and gruesome
reprisal the civilian populations of Eastern Europe faced at the hands of
the Red Army (especially if you were at all German).
Prussian and ethnic German enclaves from the banks of the Volga to the
hinterlands of Latvia and Lithuania suffered rape and tortuous death at the
hands of Stalin’s legions. Much of the carnage went underreported due to the
Soviet Union’s Allied allegiance during the war.
As recently as last year, former Russian Federation president Vladimir Putin
re-opened old wounds wrought by the Soviet army upon civilians in the Baltic
when he protested Estonia’s removal of a memorial statue (of the Soviet
liberation from Nazi occupation) in the capital city of Talinn.
Many ethnic Russian communities are wrongfully subject to abuse and
persecution by local Eastern European populations because of the remembered
war crimes of the Red Army during the World War II and Soviet eras. With the
gross exception of those Holocaust survivor communities, more people in
Eastern Europe seem to remember the atrocities of the Russian army over
those of the Nazis-a disturbing and morally ambiguous historical sore that
festers in many former Soviet republics and calls out for more stories like
Skeletons at the Feast to be written so that a greater number of people
understand the realities of the Eastern Front, and that time and place.