ARMENIAN CRIME AMNESIA?
Bruce Fein
Washington Times, DC
Oct 16 2007
Armenian crimes against humanity and war crimes against the Ottoman
Turkish and Kurdish populations of eastern and southern Anatolia
during World War I and its aftermath have been forgotten amidst
congressional preoccupation with placating the vocal and richly
financed Armenian lobby.
Last Wednesday, the Armenians hectored members of the House
International Relations Committee by a 27-21 vote into passing
a counterfactual resolution convicting the Ottoman Empire and its
successor state, the Republic of Turkey, of genocide. A historically
supportable resolution would have condemned massacres against
Armenians with the same vigor, as it should have condemned massacres
by Armenians against the innocent Muslim populations of the crumbling
Ottoman Empire.
Capt. Emory Niles and Arthur Sutherland, on an official 1919
U.S. mission to eastern Anatolia, reported: "In the entire region
from Bitlis through Van to Bayezit, we were informed that the
damage and destruction had been done by the Armenians, who, after
the Russians retired, remained in occupation of the country and who,
when the Turkish army advanced, destroyed everything belonging to the
Musulmans. Moreover, the Armenians are accused of having committed
murder, rape, arson and horrible atrocities of every description upon
the Musulman population. At first, we were most incredulous of these
stories, but we finally came to believe them, since the testimony was
absolutely unanimous and was corroborated by material evidence. For
instance, the only quarters left at all intact in the cities of Bitlis
and Van are Armenian quarters … while the Musulman quarters were
completely destroyed."
Niles and Sutherland were fortified by American and German missionaries
on the spot in Van. American Clarence Ussher reported that Armenians
put the Turkish men "to death," and, for days, "They burned and
murdered." A German missionary recalled that, "The memory of these
entirely helpless Turkish women, defeated and at the mercy of the
[Armenians] belongs to the saddest recollections from that time."
A March 23, 1920, letter of Col. Charles Furlong, an Army intelligence
officer and U.S. Delegate to the Paris Peace Conference, to
President Woodrow Wilson elaborated: "We hear much, both truth and
gross exaggeration of Turkish massacres of Armenians, but little or
nothing of the Armenian massacres of Turks. … The recent so-called
Marash massacres [of Armenians] have not been substantiated. In fact,
in the minds of many who are familiar with the situation, there is
a grave question whether it was not the Turk who suffered at the
hands of the Armenian and French armed contingents which were known
to be occupying that city and vicinity. … Our opportunity to gain
the esteem and respect of the Muslim world … will depend much on
whether America hears Turkey’s untrammeled voice and evidence which
she has never succeeded in placing before the Court of Nations."
The United States neglected Col. Furlong’s admonition in 1920,
and again last Wednesday. Nothing seems to have changed from those
days, when Christian lives were more precious than the lives of the
"infidels."
Justin McCarthy of the University of Louisville concluded that a
staggering 2.5 million Anatolian Muslims died in World War I and
the Turkish War of Independence. More than 1 million died in the Six
Provinces in Eastern Anatolia, as Armenians with the help of Russia’s
invading armies sought to reclaim their historical homeland.
In contrast, best contemporaneous estimates place the number of
Armenians who died in the war and its aftermath at between 150,000
and 600,000. The Armenian death count climbed to 1.5 million over
the years on the back of political clout and propaganda.
The committee voiced horror over the Armenian suffering, but said
nothing about the suffering Armenians inflicted on the Muslim
population. Nor did the committee deplore the 60 years of Armenian
terrorism in the Ottoman capital Istanbul, including assassination of
the Armenian patriarch and an attempted assassination of the sultan
as he was leaving prayer. Armenian terror was exported to the U.S.
mainland and Europe by fanatics who murdered over 70 Turkish diplomats,
three of them in Los Angeles and one honorary consul general in Boston.
Mourad Topalian, erstwhile head of the Armenian National Committee
of America, a lead lobbying group behind the resolution and major
campaign contributor to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other members,
was sentenced to 36 months in prison for complicity in a conspiracy
to bomb the Turkish mission at the United Nations. Yet Toplain has
escaped a terrorist label by either Armenian-Americans or their echo
chambers in Congress.
The home of the late Professor Stanford Shaw of the University
of California-Los Angeles was firebombed in retaliation for his
academic courage in disputing the Armenian genocide claim. Like Benito
Mussolini, Armenians believe truth is an assertion at the head of a
figurative bayonet.
In parts of Europe, disbelief in the Armenian genocide allegation is
a crime on par with Holocaust denial. But the Holocaust was proven
before the Nuremburg Tribunal with the trappings of due process.
Armenians, in contrast, have forgone bringing their genocide allegation
before the International Court of Justice because it is unsupported
by historical facts.
In contrast to open Ottoman archives, significant Armenian archives
remain closed to conceal evidence of Armenian terrorism and massacres.
If the resolution’s proponents had done their homework and put aside
religious bigotry, they would have reached the same conclusion as
author and Professor Bernard Lewis of Princeton University: "[T]he
point that was being made was that the massacre of the Armenians in the
Ottoman Empire was the same as what happened to Jews in Nazi Germany
and that is a downright falsehood. What happened to the Armenians
was the result of a massive Armenian armed rebellion against the
Turks, which began even before war broke out, and continued on a
larger scale."
Brian Ardouny of the Armenian Assembly of America in a videotaped
interview for a documentary on the Armenian Revolt clucked: "We don’t
need to prove the genocide historically, because it has already been
accepted politically." Congress should reject that cynicism in defense
of historical truth.
Bruce Fein is a resident scholar with the Turkish Coalition of America.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
