THE ARMENIANS, AS A RACE, HAVE NEVER BEEN, AND ARE NOT, A MENACE
TO THE SECURITY OF TURKEY. THEY ARE BLAMELESS OF THE CHARGE OF
DISLOYALTY, WHICH HAS BEEN THE EXCUSE FOR THEIR MASSACRE AND
DEPORTATION.
In commenting upon the report of the American Committee, on Armenian
Atrocities, Djelal Munif bey, the Turkish Consul-General in New York,
declared: “However much to be deplored may be these harrowing events in
the last analysis, we can but say the Armenians have only themselves
to blame.” Djelal Munif bey went on to explain that the Armenians had
been planning a revolution, and were killed by the Turkish soldiers
only after they had been caught “red-handed with arms in their hands,
resisting lawful authority.”
This has been the invariable explanation for the massacre of Armenians
in Turkey. We heard it in 1895-1896 and in 1909. We have been hearing
it again in 1915. But facts to substantiate it have never been given.
On the other hand, there exists overwhelming evidence of the most
convincing character to show how inadmissible it is as an explanation,
how baseless it is as a charge.
I have talked personally with, or have seen letters and reports from,
American missionaries and consular officials of all nations, who were
witnesses of the massacres of 1895 and 1896. At that time, as a result
of unendurable persecution and injustice, certain organizations of
young men, of the type the French call _exaltés_, banded together in
secret societies, an imitation of internal organizations in Russia,
agitated, within the Ottoman Empire and abroad, for a more favourable
treatment of Armenians and other Christians. Some of these _exaltés_
certainly advocated, and tried to work for, the independence of
Armenia. But the propaganda never gained favour in ecclesiastical
circles, nor ground among the great mass of the Armenian population in
Turkey. Except in the _vilayet_ of Van, the Armenians no longer formed
the majority of the population. They were too scattered throughout
the empire to have serious hope of winning independence, such as the
Greeks, Bulgarians, Servians, and Rumanians had succeeded in obtaining
in the Balkan peninsula.[1]
In the 1909 massacre, I was on the ground at the time, and studied
these charges. I demonstrated to my own satisfaction (and to that
of a number of newspaper men, including Germans) the total lack of
foundation of this charge against the Armenians of Cilicia. Not one
Armenian out of a hundred had anything to do with the revolutionary
societies. The lower classes were too ignorant to be affected by such a
propaganda. The Armenian Church denounced the folly of the visionaries.
College professors spoke and wrote against it. The wealthy city classes
frankly let the agitators know that they were not only passively, but
also actively, opposed to the propaganda.
The Turks had nothing whatever to fear from Armenian revolutionaries.
They knew this. More than that, they knew just who the _exaltés_
were. The Turkish Government was well able to assure itself that the
propagandists were not to be feared. If they had feared them, they
could easily have laid their hands on them any time they wanted to. In
Adana, the arrest of from thirty to forty young men would have gathered
into the net all the agitators. Instead of that, six thousand were
massacred there, and half the city burned. Then the Armenian revolution
was trumped up as an excuse!
The hideous miscarriage of justice of the court martial after the Adana
massacre was the beginning of the downfall of the Young Turk régime. It
was a demonstration of the mockery of the Young Turk assertion that the
Ottoman Empire was to be reconstructed on the principles of Liberty,
Equality, and Fraternity. From that day to this, their every act has
given the lie to their profession. I say _hideous_ miscarriage of
justice, because no element in the empire had welcomed more heartily
the advent of the constitutional régime, no element had supported the
Young Turks more loyally than the Armenians. If they erred at all
during those first nine months of the constitutional era, it was in
showing so openly--and so joyously--their touching faith in the men of
Salonika. They accepted the revolution as sincere. Their support of the
new régime was spontaneous and enthusiastic. They believed in the Young
Turks--until they were undeceived by the Young Turks themselves.
After the massacre had stopped, _on word from Constantinople_, I heard
a Young Turk officer address the survivors in the courtyard of the
American Mission at Tarsus. He assured them that the danger was over,
that it had been due to the counter-revolution of Abdul Hamid, and
that now they might feel assured that Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity
were really theirs. He told the Armenians that the Young Turks had
suffered equally with them, and that they had been companions in
misfortune. With sublime faith, sublime even though stupid, the bulk of
the Armenians believed once more. They accepted the explanation of the
massacre, and continued to support the Ottoman Government.
During the four years after Adana, I spent most of my time in
Constantinople, and I was constantly with the leaders of the Armenian
race. Never once did I hear an Armenian ecclesiastic or other Armenian
of weight and reputation speak against the Ottoman Government. I know
positively that they were not working against the Ottoman Government.
On the other hand, I am sure that the Turks knew they could count on
the loyal support and co-operation of the Armenians. The Turks had
proof of Armenian loyalty during the Italian war and the two Balkan
wars. Armenians, enrolled in the Turkish army, fought bravely for the
common fatherland beside their Moslem brethren. In the hour of danger
and humiliation, the Armenians of Turkey stood by their fellow Ottoman
subjects. They gave their blood for Turkey. Unlike the Ottoman Greeks,
they could be suspected of no secret wishes for the success of the
enemy.
It is unfair for the Ottoman Government to cite, as basis for its
charges against its Armenian subjects, the fact that Armenians in large
numbers are fighting in the Russian army. As a result of the war of
1877, Turkey was compelled to cede a portion of Armenia to Russia.
The Armenians of these territories and of the Caucasus have been for
nearly forty years under Russian rule, and are naturally, as Russian
subjects, fighting against Turkey. In giving the fact that there are
Armenians in the Russian armies as a reason for doubting the loyalty
of the Armenians in Turkey, the Turks and their German apologists have
traded upon European and American imperfect knowledge of the history
and geography of the regions beyond Van. The formation of corps of
Armenian volunteers in the Allied armies, and the open support of the
cause of the Allies on the part of Armenian communities in France and
Great Britain have been unfortunate. As individuals who have left
Turkey, these exiled Armenians have a right to do as they choose, as
communities, it would have been--it is now--better for them to keep
quiet. Although they have no justification for doing so, the Turks
and Germans have been using the manifestations made by these small
communities outside of Turkey as reflecting the spirit and intentions
of the Armenians in Turkey, and have succeeded in confusing many
neutrals about the real facts of the Armenian situation.
If the Armenians, during the present massacres and forcible
deportations, have in some places, as they did in Adana in 1909,
defended, arms in hand, their homes and their loved ones, it has been
only when the Ottoman Government failed them, and when they were
convinced that their extermination had been decided upon. Even in these
cases, as at Adana, when they received assurances of protection against
local Moslem fanaticism from the Government at Constantinople, they
trusted once more. In every instance of this kind--again let me remind
my readers that I have authentic eye-witness testimony--their faith
was betrayed. The Ottoman Government officials broke their word, and
butchered the Armenians after they had laid down their arms.
With the possible exception of Van, there was no place where the Turks
had the slightest ground for suspicion that the local attempt of the
Armenians to defend their wives and children was in connivance with
the enemy. _And Van is only one of thirty centres of massacre and
deportation in Asia Minor!_
If the Ottoman Government has facts to establish its contention that
the Armenians of Turkey were plotting against the security of the
empire, let it lay these facts before the world.