ON THE MANIFESTATION OF TURKISH STATE POLICY IN REGARD TO THE ARMENIANS
"Noravank" Foundation
30 November 2009
The theme of the splinters of the Armeniancy (both Islamized and
Christian) which still exist in Turkey is one of the insufficiently
explored and studied issues. The researches devoted to their
current conditions are rather rare. The problem of assimilated or
crypto-Armenians living in various regions of Turkey remained unknown
not only in the scholastic circles but also among the Armenians of
Istanbul and in consequence of various processes going on in present
the Armenians of Istanbul discover a lot of interesting. One of the
factors boosting that process is that there are many Armenian children
from provinces who are on different levels of assimilation coming to
study in the Armenian schools of Istanbul. According to the competent
people the Armenians from provinces are zealous for the issues
that their children should study in the Armenian schools. They face
different obstacles which, anyway, do not affect seriously their will.
The interest in their mother tongue and thus in their roots is
observable phenomenon especially in the context of the current
educational situation in the Istanbul community when the number of
pupils attending Armenian schools is decreasing.
Lately there has been "9th Mndzurian Festival" arranged in Dersim in
which song and dance companies participated. An Armenian from Istanbul
Bagrat Esdugian ("Akos" contributor) while speaking about the presence
of the Armenians in Dersim brings remarkable facts which come to prove
that there are still various undiscovered layers of the converted
and crypto-Armenians problem and, besides, the Amreniancy in Turkey
faces the problems of self-awareness: "I already felt like family to
the people of the city. I knew from what I had read before that there
were many people among them who were of the Armenian origin. But I
have never thought that there were so many of them. It was surprising
that nobody tried to hide their identity. The people were adapted to
present the integrity of Alevi religion, Kurdish political movements
and Armenian identity. For us, the Armenians in Istanbul, it was
difficult to understand but it was rather natural for the people of
Dersim. The "splinters" of the Armeniancy can be met on the territory
of Anatolia. And in Dersim one can meet Armenians. They are neither
crypto, nor apostate; they are just special, unusual" 1.
This ongoing process reveals more and more new pages in the history
of the Armenians who survived the Genocide and the gathering and
systematization of those pages will allow forming the integral
impression about the problems. But all these ask time, skills and
come to prove the groundlessness of the standpoint of those people
who try to make untimely or groundless analyses and conclusions,
which are at the best based on one or two outdated facts.
One of such close or dark pages is the policy of forced Islamization
of the Armenians who in the republican Turkey some episodes of which
have leaked to the pages of the press but we would like to specify
the geography and present some elements of the Islamization policy
carried out in regard to the Armenians in the half of the last century
in Sasun. Let us mention that we wrote down the facts regarding this
personally during the field researches and conversations with people.
But before turning to the definite problem it is necessary to give
general outlines of the repressions and violence in regard to the
Armenians in the Republic of Turkey.
It is known that during the first decades of the existence of the
Republic of Turkey there was a number of Armenians living in the
eastern parts of the country and in Istanbul (according to different
sources 250-300 thousand). The facts show that particularly in
the eastern regions, i.e. on the territory of historical Armenia,
the government of the republican Turkey carried out the policy in
regard to the Armenians which did not differ much from the policy
implemented by the Ottoman Empire and contained the manifestations
of the deportation, exile, forced Islamization. E.g. in summer 1929
and following months about 30 thousand were exiled from Kharberd,
Diyarbekir and Mardin provinces2. The US ambassador to Turkey Robert
Skinner in his March 3, 1934 report to the US State Secretary, which
was classified top secret, brought the facts about the deportations
of the Armenians from the eastern regions of Turkey. Thus, it was
mentioned that since the beginning of 1934 the Turkish government
had moved the Armenians from "Anatolia" to Istanbul. Those Armenians
were compelled to sell their property on a very low price which was
regarded by the ambassador as equal to leaving their property, and
move to Istanbul where Armenian patriarchate and different beneficial
organizations tried to help them. One of the main reasons for the
deportations of the Armenians is supposed to be the fact that they
were successful entrepreneurs, they had good job and they could earn
much which caused Turk’s envy. But the main and important reason was
considered to be the purpose of the Turks to Turkishize "Anatolia"
fully3. The report, prepared by the 9th bureau (which was responsible
for the issues regarding minorities) of the ruling in the 1940s
Democratic-Republican Party, where the attitude of the state machine
towards non-Muslims can be vividly seen, cast light upon all that4.
The following views concerning Armenians were found in that report:
"Armenians: In Anatolia they have turned into a depleted small in
number community and through some political ways they try to increase
their number. We firstly need to "clean" Anatolia of them and move
them to Istanbul thus we will also be able to keep under the control
the population upsurge". In the report we can find grounding for
the deportation of the Armenians to Istanbul based on the historical
experience: "Thereby the growth of their population will be suppressed
and later, if necessary, they all together will be before the eyes
of the state".
Thus, we can see that the state policy tended to resettle the Armenians
from the territory of the historical Armenia as the Armenians who lived
there constituted potential menace to the Turkish state and resettling
them to Istanbul they had neutralized that threat. This policy worked
in a complex and the forced Islamization of the Armenians living in
the territory of historical Armenia was one of component parts of
that policy but in this direction various means were used.
While speaking about the survived Armenians from Sasun it should be
mentioned that there is poor information about them in different
sources which proves that there are Armenians in Sasun who were
forcedly Islamized during the Genocide and part of those Armenians is
crypto-Christians. But there is also information that there are still
Armenians in Sasun who do not hide that they are Christians and the
ways of their survival differed. It is known that the Armenian Genocide
was accompanied with the destruction of the Armenian historical
monuments (Cultural Genocide) and after 1915 the presence of the
Armenian priests in the tumbledown or demolished Armenian churches
was impossible. Under such conditions the Christian Armenians in
Sasun faced serious difficulties in the issue of churching. But even
under the absence of the Armenian priests the Sasunians managed to
retain a number of Christian elements through the centuries and pass
it to the generations. The most vivid example is the pilgrimage to
the ruins of St. Mother of God monastery at the mount of Maruta,
lighting candles, sacrificial offering and etc. Of coarse, it would
be naïve to suppose that in the years following the Genocide the
absence of the priests in Sasun was because of the "indifference"
on behalf of the Armenian patriarchate. It is clear that serious
state control did not allow the visit of the Armenian priests to the
territories of the historical Armenia and some frequent secret visits
were followed by the pressure and repressions.
Back in 1950s under such conditions the wave of Islamization was
initiated in regard to the Christian Sasunians. At the end of 1950s
offices of state appealed to the Armenians in the form of demand to
convert to Islam but a part of the Sasunians opposed to that decision
and refused forced conversion to Islam. But they continued to exert the
pressure involving power structures. As a consequence some Christian
Armenians, though in some cases outwardly, yielded and converted
to Islam. Alongside with the forcible methods Turkish state also
used other ways and the Armenian villages which were left without
priests were visited by the Muslim preachers, sheikhs who tried to
convince the local population to convert to Islam willfully in order
to be able to carry out ceremonies, such as marriages, christening,
funerals and etc. This method also had his effect because Armenians,
having no priest, were forced to do it. It is remarkable that according
to our interlocutors the conversion of their relatives was not taken
unambiguously by the surrounding Armenians who openly criticized the
apostates and sometimes it promoted the stopping of the Islamization
or its reductions. According to some sources the cases of Islamization
of the Armenians had also been recorded later in 1980s.
The continuing repressions made the part of the survived Sasunians
move to Istanbul, part of them to convert to the religion of the
Turkish state and the other became crypto-Christians.
All this comes to prove that the Republic of Turkey continued the
policy of forced Islamization adopted by the Ottoman Empire which in
the end had its results and today in the territory of the historical
Armenia, apart from some separate islands, there are almost no
Armenians who do not hide that they are Christians.