The Armenian genocide was the first genocide in the 20th century. It occurred during and after the First World War between 1914 and 1923. The perpetrators of the genocide were the Ottoman Turks who ruled the Ottoman Empire during that time. It is rated as one of the greatest crime against humanity together with the holocaust by the Nazi Germans in the Second World War, which were aimed at elimination a certain race in the society. It is estimated that over one and half million Armenians were killed in Armenia during the massacre. A good number of them were however able to escape and the survivors were forced out of their homeland and have never been able to return to Armenia. This led to the destruction of the history, culture and customs of the Armenian society. Despite the inhumane acts done to the Armenian society, the Turkish government has denied the happening of the Armenian genocide.
The Armenian genocide or the Armenian holocausts refers to the evacuation and the resultant deaths of millions of Armenians in the First World War that was perpetrated by the Young Turks of the Ottoman Empire. However, the Turkey government maintains that the mass death and evacuation was not perpetrated by the administration and was as a result of strife between rival ethnic societies and natural calamities such as diseases and famine and turmoil of the First World War. However, scholars from the rest of the world maintain that indeed there was genocide in Armenia which was sponsored by the administration for ethnic cleansing and elimination of the Armenian ethnic group from the country. Studies have indicated that there was a systematic and organized scheme that was aimed at elimination one ethnic society, the Armenians, from the country. The events of the Armenian genocide is rated as the second most studied genocide in the world history only surpassed by the Nazi Holocaust in the Second World War which was aimed at eliminating the Jews in Europe since they were considered an impure race with abilities of contaminating the pure race.
Back Ground
It is estimated that the population of Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire before the start of the First World War was about two million. Majority of them professed the Armenian apostolic faith while the rest were affiliated to different Christian faith such as the Catholic Church and protestant denominations. In the western Armenia, the population of the Armenians was huge and clustered majority of whom lived in Constantinople. The Armenians were referred to as the loyal nation until the late 19th century. They were recognized by the rulers as one of the non Muslim communities along with other societies such as the Jews and the Greeks. They were therefore considered as second class citizens and entitled to less rights compared to other societies that professed Islamic religion. Armenians for example were not allowed to serve in the military but were forced to pay exemption tax.
Their evidence in the Muslim courts was not admissible against members of the Islamic communities and were not allowed to own weapons. Members of the Armenian ethnic community were also heavily taxed when compared to other societies and were taken as a second class society by the Young Turks. In the eyes of the Islamic society, which was the dominant group in the region, the Armenians were infidels. This was after the suspension of the constitution by Sultan Hamid during his early days of his reign who ruled as he thought it was appropriate. This discrimination and unfair treatment against the Christian communities in Islamic empires continued to increase despite pressure from the European powers to stop the mistreatment.
The first move to eliminate the Armenians from Armenia took place in 1879 after the signing of the Berlin treaty. This was after the Russians who claimed that they wanted to protect the Armenian society won the Russo-Turkish war. Most of the land which was occupied by the Armenians was captured by the Russians but the Turks took it back after the signing of the treaty. The declining powers of the Ottoman Empire made the Armenians believe that they can also attain independence or the status of a dominant ethnic group. This led to the Humidian massacre in the mid 1890s where the protest and unrest brought about by the Armenians as they fought for their rights was met with brutality by the Ottoman Empire administrators. Although there are no accurate statistics, it is estimated that not less than eighty thousand Armenians died in the Humadian massacre between 1894 and 1896 with some historians stating that the figure could be as high as three hundred thousands. Before the start of the First World War, the Ottoman Empire had full control over the rulers of Armenia. The political structures and leadership of Armenian also changed where Armenians through their political organizations supported the leadership of the Young Turks. The Armenians hoped that there would be significant changes in the country as some members of their society were nominated to serve in the government.
However, this political arrangement did not last for long. The government by the Young Turks was faced with numerous problems and slit into parts in the early 1910s where there were two main factions, the liberal union and the committee of union and progress. The liberal union was committed to the establishment of a liberalized nation where they established equality among different societies while the committee of union and progress was more radical and racial. The committee of union and progress assassinated the Minister of War who was a key member of the liberal union and dumped their proposals of a liberalized nation.
The Genocide
Towards the end of 1914, the Ottoman Empire entered the First World War and joined the central powers after their gunboats were attacked by the Russians in the Black Sea. The Minister of War in Armenia launched a military attack in Caucasus against the Russian forces with an aim of gaining back Baku which was now under the Russians. The Ottoman army was almost completely destroyed by the Russian empire when they confronted each other in the Battle of Sarikamis. The part of the army that survived the battle was frozen due to the adverse weather which the Russian soldiers were used to. By the end of the same year, there was propaganda in the Ottoman Empire that the Armenians living in the empire were not only a liability to the empire but also a security threat. The propaganda about the Armenians forming a league with the enemy to take over the country is believed to have emanated from the naval officials in the country.
Following this propaganda, some government officials such as Talaat pushed for the legalization of deportation of all people of the Armenian ethnic community starting with those living in the Russian fronts. By May 1915, the Ottoman government had passed the Temporary Law of Deportation that made the deportation of any one who was sensed to be a threat by the military or the government. Months later, another law, the Temporary Law of Expropriation and Confiscation was enacted which authorized the confiscation of all property belonging to members of the Armenian society. This law was only opposed by one member of the Ottoman parliament, Ahmed Riza who was a member and one of the founders of the Liberal Union. He argued against the confiscation of the Armenians abandoned property yet the owners did not abandon them voluntarily but were forced. He argued that the countrys constitution made the sale of property without the concern of the owner illegal.
The stage for the destruction of the Armenian society seemed to be set when the Minister of War, Enver ordered the disbarment and demobilization of all Armenians working in the Ottoman forces. The Armenian soldiers were believed to be cooperating with the Russians against the Ottoman Empire. These soldiers were transferred to the labor battalions most of whom were old men. The younger members of the Armenian society who had been recruited into the forces were taken to remote areas and executed. This was done by Chetes, an armed squad similar to the Eisatzgruppen in the Nazi holocaust. Those who survived the wrath of the squad were converted into manual military work such as building roads and other constructions but were eventually killed. The Ottoman authorities created levels of bureaucracies that could act outside the constitution establishment without being questioned. There were other administrative positions such as the General Inspector and the Responsible Secretaries which were responsible for ensuring that the orders from the authorities were implemented strictly.
In April 1915, Van was ordered by Jevet Bey to supply four thousand soldiers who were taken by the Armenian society that the authorities wanted to make the city defenseless by massacring all their strong men. The Armenians were aware of the plan to make them defenseless since Jevet Bey had ordered search of weapons in the city prior to this order which had escalated into a massacre. The Armenians supplied only five hundred men which assumed by the administration to be a rebellion. This caused the administration to vow that they would destroy the Armenians society incase they retaliate. The Van resistance was triggered by the killing of two Armenian men by Turkish soldiers when they tried to defend an Armenian woman from harassment.
On the night of 24th of April 1915, all the leaders of the Armenians community living in Constantinople were arrested and taken to holding centers in Ankara through an order from the minister of interior. These leaders were later deported after the Tehcir law was passed a month later. April 24th which is commonly known as the Red Sunday is remembered as the Armenian genocide remembrance day, the day the leaders of the Armenian society were arrested marking the precursor of the genocide. The minister claimed in the arrest order that the move to arrest the Russian Armenians was necessary to attain administration autonomy because they had taken positions against the Ottoman administration. About two hundred and fifty intellectuals and leaders from the Armenian society were arrested in the night of the Red Sunday. These events were not taken lightly by the Triple Entente who sent a warning to the Ottoman administrators that the members of the government and their agents involved in the massacre would be held accountable for the crimes they committed against humanity.
There were various methods that were used in the mass murder of the Armenians with an aim of eliminating them from the Ottoman Empire. This included mass burning where a large population could be taken and burned by the Ottoman army. This was believed to be the fastest and effective method of disposing off women and children in large numbers. This was evident from the witnesses given by the Turkish prisoners to the Russians. A large number of Armenian children were also killed through suffocation by being thrown into the Black Sea. There was also use of poison or overdose of medicated drugs by the Turkish doctors. One of the most commonly used drugs in the genocide was morphine. This revelation was given by some physicians in the hospitals who witnessed the incidences. There were cases where children were taken from schools in large numbers and killed using toxic gasses. Inoculation with typhoid was also a major method used by the Ottoman doctors who participated in the genocide. Medical doctors were therefore directly involved in the genocide where they killed patients and infants and issued certificates that indicated that the victims died from natural death.
After the Ottoman government legitimized the deportation of Armenians through the Temporary Law of Deportation, large number of Armenians died in the death matches. They were matched out of Armenia to Syria and the deserts. During the deportation, the Ottoman Empire did not provide any supplies which could have maintained the large number of Armenians on their way to the deportation camps nor did they provide facilities for survival on when the arrived. It was reported that many of the exiles died on the way with corpses lying on the road and in the Euphrates. Those who survived the journey have very little chances of survival on arrival and were also doomed to death. The acts of the Ottoman army that escorted the exiles confirmed that the Ottoman administration was determined to eliminate the Armenian ethnic society. The troops not only allowed people to rape, kill or steal from the exiles but also committed these acts themselves.
The Armenians were deprived their properties and marched into the desert where they died in hundreds of thousands. The deaths as a result of starvation, diseases and exhaustion were very high which was increased further by brutality from the troops. The starvation of the Armenians in the desert to death has been put forward as one of the basic evidence that the Ottoman government was determined to eliminate the Armenian society and thus the events qualifies to be called genocide. It is estimated that over twenty five concentration camps were established by the Ottoman administrators. Most of the concentration camps were located in the modern day Iraq which was under the rule of the Ottoman in the early 20th century. Other camps were located in the Syrian borders and along the transit routes.
While there are no clear statistics on the number of Armenians who died in the massacre, scholars in the western countries agree that not less than a million individuals died in the massacre between 1914 and 1918. However, the Turkish scholars and administrators maintain that only about three hundred thousand Armenians died while Armenian scholars have placed their estimates at one and half million people.
After the holocaust, various trials were held against some of the government officials who had authorized the massacres and were found guilty in absentia. Some of the perpetrators were however executed by the Armenians. There were also international trials by the Commission on Responsibility and Sanctions which summoned some of the Ottoman administrators for trial. Despite the attempts by the local and international community attempts to prosecute and hold the perpetrators of the genocide accountable for their actions, the issue was not dealt with accordingly. Ineffective prosecution of the perpetrators by the international community is believed to be one of factors that influenced the holocaust by the Nazi Germans in the Second World War. The Nazi Germans were convinced that since they were stronger than the Ottoman Empire, they had the ability to eliminate the Jews.
Today, the Republic of Turkey government has refused to accept the fact that the mass death of Armenians during the genocide was systematically planned by the Ottoman administrators. The government has denied that the evacuation and deportation of the Armenians by the Ottoman administrators was intended to eliminate a part of or the entire Armenian population. Some of the Turkish scholars who maintain that the events in the Ottoman Empire during and after the First World War constitute genocide have received a lot of criticism and termed as insulting Turkishness. Some of these scholars have been summoned by the courts although they were later acquitted by the government. The government of the Republic of Turkey has continuously protested against the international community recognizing these events as genocide. In an attempt to clear the air, in 2005, the Turkish Prime Minister challenged the scholars from Armenia and other countries to form a commission that would establish the real facts about the events that led to the mass deaths of the Armenians. However, the proposal was rejected by the Armenian administration arguing that there was no need of addressing the past which has no impacts on the future.
The Armenian genocide was crimes against humanity committed against the Armenian ethnic community and perpetrated by the Ottoman Empire administration. The events that happed during and after the First World War between 1914 and 1923 were aimed at eliminating the Armenian society from the empire. Scholars from different parts of the world have settled at different numbers of casualties. Turkish scholars have maintained that the figure is about three hundred, western scholars have a figure of about one million while the Armenian scholars maintains that about one and half million Armenians died in the massacre. Although the Turkish government has maintained that the events in the Ottoman Empire did not constitute genocide, it is one of the most studied events in the history of the 20th century.
The Armenian genocide or the Armenian holocausts refers to the evacuation and the resultant deaths of millions of Armenians in the First World War that was perpetrated by the Young Turks of the Ottoman Empire. However, the Turkey government maintains that the mass death and evacuation was not perpetrated by the administration and was as a result of strife between rival ethnic societies and natural calamities such as diseases and famine and turmoil of the First World War. However, scholars from the rest of the world maintain that indeed there was genocide in Armenia which was sponsored by the administration for ethnic cleansing and elimination of the Armenian ethnic group from the country. Studies have indicated that there was a systematic and organized scheme that was aimed at elimination one ethnic society, the Armenians, from the country. The events of the Armenian genocide is rated as the second most studied genocide in the world history only surpassed by the Nazi Holocaust in the Second World War which was aimed at eliminating the Jews in Europe since they were considered an impure race with abilities of contaminating the pure race.
Back Ground
It is estimated that the population of Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire before the start of the First World War was about two million. Majority of them professed the Armenian apostolic faith while the rest were affiliated to different Christian faith such as the Catholic Church and protestant denominations. In the western Armenia, the population of the Armenians was huge and clustered majority of whom lived in Constantinople. The Armenians were referred to as the loyal nation until the late 19th century. They were recognized by the rulers as one of the non Muslim communities along with other societies such as the Jews and the Greeks. They were therefore considered as second class citizens and entitled to less rights compared to other societies that professed Islamic religion. Armenians for example were not allowed to serve in the military but were forced to pay exemption tax.
Their evidence in the Muslim courts was not admissible against members of the Islamic communities and were not allowed to own weapons. Members of the Armenian ethnic community were also heavily taxed when compared to other societies and were taken as a second class society by the Young Turks. In the eyes of the Islamic society, which was the dominant group in the region, the Armenians were infidels. This was after the suspension of the constitution by Sultan Hamid during his early days of his reign who ruled as he thought it was appropriate. This discrimination and unfair treatment against the Christian communities in Islamic empires continued to increase despite pressure from the European powers to stop the mistreatment.
The first move to eliminate the Armenians from Armenia took place in 1879 after the signing of the Berlin treaty. This was after the Russians who claimed that they wanted to protect the Armenian society won the Russo-Turkish war. Most of the land which was occupied by the Armenians was captured by the Russians but the Turks took it back after the signing of the treaty. The declining powers of the Ottoman Empire made the Armenians believe that they can also attain independence or the status of a dominant ethnic group. This led to the Humidian massacre in the mid 1890s where the protest and unrest brought about by the Armenians as they fought for their rights was met with brutality by the Ottoman Empire administrators. Although there are no accurate statistics, it is estimated that not less than eighty thousand Armenians died in the Humadian massacre between 1894 and 1896 with some historians stating that the figure could be as high as three hundred thousands. Before the start of the First World War, the Ottoman Empire had full control over the rulers of Armenia. The political structures and leadership of Armenian also changed where Armenians through their political organizations supported the leadership of the Young Turks. The Armenians hoped that there would be significant changes in the country as some members of their society were nominated to serve in the government.
However, this political arrangement did not last for long. The government by the Young Turks was faced with numerous problems and slit into parts in the early 1910s where there were two main factions, the liberal union and the committee of union and progress. The liberal union was committed to the establishment of a liberalized nation where they established equality among different societies while the committee of union and progress was more radical and racial. The committee of union and progress assassinated the Minister of War who was a key member of the liberal union and dumped their proposals of a liberalized nation.
The Genocide
Towards the end of 1914, the Ottoman Empire entered the First World War and joined the central powers after their gunboats were attacked by the Russians in the Black Sea. The Minister of War in Armenia launched a military attack in Caucasus against the Russian forces with an aim of gaining back Baku which was now under the Russians. The Ottoman army was almost completely destroyed by the Russian empire when they confronted each other in the Battle of Sarikamis. The part of the army that survived the battle was frozen due to the adverse weather which the Russian soldiers were used to. By the end of the same year, there was propaganda in the Ottoman Empire that the Armenians living in the empire were not only a liability to the empire but also a security threat. The propaganda about the Armenians forming a league with the enemy to take over the country is believed to have emanated from the naval officials in the country.
Following this propaganda, some government officials such as Talaat pushed for the legalization of deportation of all people of the Armenian ethnic community starting with those living in the Russian fronts. By May 1915, the Ottoman government had passed the Temporary Law of Deportation that made the deportation of any one who was sensed to be a threat by the military or the government. Months later, another law, the Temporary Law of Expropriation and Confiscation was enacted which authorized the confiscation of all property belonging to members of the Armenian society. This law was only opposed by one member of the Ottoman parliament, Ahmed Riza who was a member and one of the founders of the Liberal Union. He argued against the confiscation of the Armenians abandoned property yet the owners did not abandon them voluntarily but were forced. He argued that the countrys constitution made the sale of property without the concern of the owner illegal.
The stage for the destruction of the Armenian society seemed to be set when the Minister of War, Enver ordered the disbarment and demobilization of all Armenians working in the Ottoman forces. The Armenian soldiers were believed to be cooperating with the Russians against the Ottoman Empire. These soldiers were transferred to the labor battalions most of whom were old men. The younger members of the Armenian society who had been recruited into the forces were taken to remote areas and executed. This was done by Chetes, an armed squad similar to the Eisatzgruppen in the Nazi holocaust. Those who survived the wrath of the squad were converted into manual military work such as building roads and other constructions but were eventually killed. The Ottoman authorities created levels of bureaucracies that could act outside the constitution establishment without being questioned. There were other administrative positions such as the General Inspector and the Responsible Secretaries which were responsible for ensuring that the orders from the authorities were implemented strictly.
In April 1915, Van was ordered by Jevet Bey to supply four thousand soldiers who were taken by the Armenian society that the authorities wanted to make the city defenseless by massacring all their strong men. The Armenians were aware of the plan to make them defenseless since Jevet Bey had ordered search of weapons in the city prior to this order which had escalated into a massacre. The Armenians supplied only five hundred men which assumed by the administration to be a rebellion. This caused the administration to vow that they would destroy the Armenians society incase they retaliate. The Van resistance was triggered by the killing of two Armenian men by Turkish soldiers when they tried to defend an Armenian woman from harassment.
On the night of 24th of April 1915, all the leaders of the Armenians community living in Constantinople were arrested and taken to holding centers in Ankara through an order from the minister of interior. These leaders were later deported after the Tehcir law was passed a month later. April 24th which is commonly known as the Red Sunday is remembered as the Armenian genocide remembrance day, the day the leaders of the Armenian society were arrested marking the precursor of the genocide. The minister claimed in the arrest order that the move to arrest the Russian Armenians was necessary to attain administration autonomy because they had taken positions against the Ottoman administration. About two hundred and fifty intellectuals and leaders from the Armenian society were arrested in the night of the Red Sunday. These events were not taken lightly by the Triple Entente who sent a warning to the Ottoman administrators that the members of the government and their agents involved in the massacre would be held accountable for the crimes they committed against humanity.
There were various methods that were used in the mass murder of the Armenians with an aim of eliminating them from the Ottoman Empire. This included mass burning where a large population could be taken and burned by the Ottoman army. This was believed to be the fastest and effective method of disposing off women and children in large numbers. This was evident from the witnesses given by the Turkish prisoners to the Russians. A large number of Armenian children were also killed through suffocation by being thrown into the Black Sea. There was also use of poison or overdose of medicated drugs by the Turkish doctors. One of the most commonly used drugs in the genocide was morphine. This revelation was given by some physicians in the hospitals who witnessed the incidences. There were cases where children were taken from schools in large numbers and killed using toxic gasses. Inoculation with typhoid was also a major method used by the Ottoman doctors who participated in the genocide. Medical doctors were therefore directly involved in the genocide where they killed patients and infants and issued certificates that indicated that the victims died from natural death.
After the Ottoman government legitimized the deportation of Armenians through the Temporary Law of Deportation, large number of Armenians died in the death matches. They were matched out of Armenia to Syria and the deserts. During the deportation, the Ottoman Empire did not provide any supplies which could have maintained the large number of Armenians on their way to the deportation camps nor did they provide facilities for survival on when the arrived. It was reported that many of the exiles died on the way with corpses lying on the road and in the Euphrates. Those who survived the journey have very little chances of survival on arrival and were also doomed to death. The acts of the Ottoman army that escorted the exiles confirmed that the Ottoman administration was determined to eliminate the Armenian ethnic society. The troops not only allowed people to rape, kill or steal from the exiles but also committed these acts themselves.
The Armenians were deprived their properties and marched into the desert where they died in hundreds of thousands. The deaths as a result of starvation, diseases and exhaustion were very high which was increased further by brutality from the troops. The starvation of the Armenians in the desert to death has been put forward as one of the basic evidence that the Ottoman government was determined to eliminate the Armenian society and thus the events qualifies to be called genocide. It is estimated that over twenty five concentration camps were established by the Ottoman administrators. Most of the concentration camps were located in the modern day Iraq which was under the rule of the Ottoman in the early 20th century. Other camps were located in the Syrian borders and along the transit routes.
While there are no clear statistics on the number of Armenians who died in the massacre, scholars in the western countries agree that not less than a million individuals died in the massacre between 1914 and 1918. However, the Turkish scholars and administrators maintain that only about three hundred thousand Armenians died while Armenian scholars have placed their estimates at one and half million people.
After the holocaust, various trials were held against some of the government officials who had authorized the massacres and were found guilty in absentia. Some of the perpetrators were however executed by the Armenians. There were also international trials by the Commission on Responsibility and Sanctions which summoned some of the Ottoman administrators for trial. Despite the attempts by the local and international community attempts to prosecute and hold the perpetrators of the genocide accountable for their actions, the issue was not dealt with accordingly. Ineffective prosecution of the perpetrators by the international community is believed to be one of factors that influenced the holocaust by the Nazi Germans in the Second World War. The Nazi Germans were convinced that since they were stronger than the Ottoman Empire, they had the ability to eliminate the Jews.
Today, the Republic of Turkey government has refused to accept the fact that the mass death of Armenians during the genocide was systematically planned by the Ottoman administrators. The government has denied that the evacuation and deportation of the Armenians by the Ottoman administrators was intended to eliminate a part of or the entire Armenian population. Some of the Turkish scholars who maintain that the events in the Ottoman Empire during and after the First World War constitute genocide have received a lot of criticism and termed as insulting Turkishness. Some of these scholars have been summoned by the courts although they were later acquitted by the government. The government of the Republic of Turkey has continuously protested against the international community recognizing these events as genocide. In an attempt to clear the air, in 2005, the Turkish Prime Minister challenged the scholars from Armenia and other countries to form a commission that would establish the real facts about the events that led to the mass deaths of the Armenians. However, the proposal was rejected by the Armenian administration arguing that there was no need of addressing the past which has no impacts on the future.
The Armenian genocide was crimes against humanity committed against the Armenian ethnic community and perpetrated by the Ottoman Empire administration. The events that happed during and after the First World War between 1914 and 1923 were aimed at eliminating the Armenian society from the empire. Scholars from different parts of the world have settled at different numbers of casualties. Turkish scholars have maintained that the figure is about three hundred, western scholars have a figure of about one million while the Armenian scholars maintains that about one and half million Armenians died in the massacre. Although the Turkish government has maintained that the events in the Ottoman Empire did not constitute genocide, it is one of the most studied events in the history of the 20th century.
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