Are Armenians Full of Contradictions ?

Armenians are a proud people, and if you aren't Turkish and you don't deny their unproven genocide, they are also a very friendly people. I've met many Armenians over the years, since I am American, they are extremely friendly to me, and for that reason, I do not discuss this topic with them. That is of course, until they google my name and read some of my articles that disagree with the notion of an Armenian Genocide. After which, they will either disassociate themselves with me, or they will come by and either try to convince me or argue with me. I'm sure many of you, no matter where you are from, have encountered Armenians who try to convince you of the genocide.

The reason they try to convince you, is because of their nationalism, this is not a negative trait, it's just the way they were raised and they are proud of working together with other Armenians to convince the world of their genocide. This is how the Armenian Revolutionary Federation saves its face, otherwise they would have to finally admit after 94 years, that they indeed lost World War I to the Central Power, Ottoman forces. They would have to admit that the Allies really did betray them and left them without reinforcements and all their efforts to sabotage the Ottoman war effort would be gone. The Russian and British promise of a Greater Armenia was broken, they were left with a tiny country and they had no economy and many refugees that were starving in their land-locked nation.

Due to human nature, they had to find someone to blame. They tried to blame the Russians and the rest of the Allies, but it didn't help, no one listened, no one cared. However, when the ARF decided to blame the Ottoman Turks, enemies of the Turks, joined in the blame game, because they all had grudges against the Turks. The British had lost 2 significant battles to the Turks, and they lost the Turkish Independence war, giving the new nation Turkey its own land. The Greeks had lost all of Western Anatolia to the Turks during this war. The French lost all of South-Eastern Anatolia to the Turks. The Russians were creating the Soviet Empire and they were no longer interested in Anatolia, but they too felt betrayed by the Turks who accepted their gifts of weapons but did not convert to communism. Although the Allies had won World War I, in the Turkish independence war, they had lost, and they did not like the Turks.

The Armenian Genocide concept, started after this Turkish independence war. It didn't gain traction until the 1950s and 1960s through widespread propaganda by Armenian communities around the world. This is why the founder of Turkey, Ataturk, has never made any comments about the Armenian Genocide or the accusation of any genocide, because such accusations did not exist when he was alive.

Two Armenians in different times tried to convince me of the genocide. One of them, talked about how his grandmother's husband and children were killed. However, said that she was forced to walk all the way to Syria. As a skeptic, I asked why anyone would kill a family, and then let one of them escape scratch free to Syria, which he could not answer (the reason being, the story was fabricated). When I asked him why then there is no evidence that Talat Pasha, one of the leaders of the Ottoman Empire, had no telegrams ordering genocide, he replied "Why would Talat Pasha leave evidence of his own crimes?"

Another Armenian, tried to convince me by telling me how Talat Pasha wrote a "Black Book" (funny), detailing how he committed the genocide and references "Ottoman documents, not allowed to be seen in the Ottoman Archives today." That was funny because the previous Armenian was telling me Talat Pasha left no evidence of his crime and now he's written a whole black book detailing his crimes, very interesting, very improbable.

When I asked where I can have a copy of this black book, he could not produce it, said that it was sold in various places in different countries. Later, I found out, that he apparently, learned about this black book from some Armenian forum. Again, rumors.

This was similar to the one time where I read a Reader's Digest article hilariously entitled "Why I hate the Turks" -- The Armenian that wrote it, discussed how this very old Armenian described a story of how, he and his family and all of his fellow villagers were trapped in a church, and the "evil Turks" used wood to cover up the windows, and then poured kerosene everywhere and lit the church on fire. He told about how he cried with his family and told them they'd be together again in heaven. Then the story cut off--- huh?? -- How did he escape then? Apparently, that miraculous detail was classified. My suspicion is that he was an ARF member who was the one burning Muslim families in a Mosque, and just twisted the story and made himself the victim, I have no proof, but then again, he doesn't have any proof of his story either.

The writer wrote another story about when this old Armenian man, was only 13, "Turkish and Kurdish marauders" came and attacked his village on horseback. I said "Interesting, never knew Turks and Kurds ever worked together" (because they never did, it was more likely they were all Kurdish, but alas, they always want to put the blame on Turks rather than the real killers). The attackers apparently, killed many villagers, and stabbed the boy with a bayonet and then "stole his clothes" (a grown man stole a child's clothes, very interesting). Wait wait, I missed something, a 13 year old boy was stabbed with a bayonet back in 1915, and somehow survived such a wound in a time where there weren't even any hospitals in most villages? Lies.

This is the problem. We need to apply our logic when listening to these eye-witness stories. Even an American Consul in 1915, once said that "These Orientals, they can't help but exaggerate every story" about the Kurds and Armenians.

These stories to Armenians, are a mission, a nationalistic goal, to convince everyone of a genocide, because they cannot admit the losses they suffered in World War I, were the fault of the ARF, a terrorist organization that sided with the Allies and killed, Armenians, Kurds, and Turks, alike who opposed them.

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April 24th: The Day of Justice Or Wheeling And Dealing

In April 24th, 1915, approximately 250 Armenian Revolutionary Federation leaders and high ranking officers were arrested for their roles in the siege and capture of Van, an Ottoman city and their attempt to hand the city over to the Russians (Allies) during desperate hours of the Russian invasion of Ottoman Turkey in World War I.

Contrary to what Armenian Genocide supporters write, the arrests were not made in only Constantinople (present day Istanbul). Contrary to what Armenian Genocide activists say, the arrests were not of academics, clergymen, or "philosophers." These were ARF (Dashnak) members, some of them were Hunchak members as well, another terrorist organization rebelling against the Ottoman Empire and killing civilians in their rabid form of ultra-nationalism and their dream of creating a Greater Armenia. . .

Other sources report that instead of 250, 1,234 ARF and Hunchak members were arrested throughout the Ottoman provinces. Whatever the exact number, what we know for sure is they were indeed rebels.

Armenians claim they were arrested merely for being Armenian. They claim that it was the "start of the genocide." In fact, they celebrate it every year by protesting the Turkish embassy in various countries during that day. Kind of an awkward way to mourn the deaths of ancestors if you ask me. If it was the start of a genocide, then why only 250? Why not thousands and thousands being executed immediately? Why relocate them all the way to Eastern Anatolia or Syria?

Armenians answer such questions by saying that the Ottomans did not want Europeans who had diplomats in the big cities to know what was going on. If that was true, then why did they allow European and US diplomats to visit the relocation camps? US Consul Jackson was walking every day through the relocation camps with full privileges. He was bringing the Armenian families more food and money to help them.

The Ottoman governor of Aleppo Syria, spent a lot of money helping the Armenians rebuild homes and livelihoods in Aleppo. The money was approved by the Ottoman leadership.

Even Djemal Pasha was ordering soldiers to ambush bandits and Kurds who were trying to attack the families who were on route, relocating to Syria.

These are inconvenient facts that do not work for the "Armenian Cause" of recognition of genocide. They need a common enemy, the Turks, to keep themselves as an un-assimilated world-wide Armenian community. They need a reason to keep the ARF alive for 100 years (yes they still exist today). The acceptance of failure of the rebellion in World War I, is too difficult compared to the simple task of blaming the Ottoman government for defending itself during war-time against the ARF who allied themselves with the enemy.

The unfortunate deaths of thousands of Armenians and Turks who were innocent should be mourned on April 24th. However, justice was served against the ARF, but some Armenians are not ready to accept this inconvenient truth.

The Armenians suffered indeed, at the hands of the ARF, not the Ottoman Empire.

04/24/2009

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Nazi Guilt Vs Anti Turkism

The history channel created a documentary discussing Nazi Germany, Hitler, and the story of the Germans who tried to assassinate Adolf Hitler. This documentary was created very recently probably in response to the new Tom Cruise movie Valkyrie directed by Bryan Singer. The idea is conscience versus country. The Nazis had created great crimes against humanity especially against the Jewish people. Armenians try to equate Ottomans and especially Turks to the Nazi Germans even though there is serious doubt, by world renowned historians who study Ottoman History such as Dr. Bernard Lewis, that an Armenian Genocide ever took place.

The Germans have since been vilified all over the world even if they had nothing to do with Nazi Germany. However, unlike the Jews and everyone who blame the Nazis for genocide, the Armenians blame the Turks for genocide rather than simply the Committee of Union and Progress.

Instead of saying "The CUP Ottoman Empire committed genocide," Armenians say "The genocide committed by Turkey" or "Turks". They justify this by saying, "well the Turks still deny it." The problem is, the Holocaust is a proven genocide, but the alleged Armenian Genocide has never been proven.

The reason some people believe it is proven, is because Armenians continue to distribute forgeries to journalists and historians around the world hoping to find someone that will support their cause for reparations. They find many, maybe because the person they find is Islamophobic, maybe has anti-Turkish tendencies already, or simply because of their ignorance of history.

While the Germans still carry the guilt of Nazi Germany, the Turks carry an artificial guilt that is created by Armenian propagandists.

The Armenians find the Armenian Genocide narrative extremely unifying for Armenians, keeping generations of Armenians working toward a common cause and keeping them organized and preventing assimilation of Armenians in Western societies. While the Turks are only beginning to learn about the many organizations of Armenians that have been laying the seeds of propaganda throughout the West. Some Armenians still hope that one day the Turks will accept their version of history, apologize, and pay reparations for losses they believe they received.

The truth is far from it. The delusion is created by their own refusal to come to terms with their loss in World War I as part of the Allies.

Accepting loss is much more difficult then assuming that they are the victims equal to the Jews.

The worst chapter of this story is that the real victims, the Muslim villagers throughout Anatolia who suffered millions of losses at the hands of the Allies and Armenian Revolutionary Federation are being blamed for genocide.

If you wonder why so many people believe in the Armenian Genocide, you should understand that the dead cannot speak, but the ones who survive can. It is because of this reason, that the Armenians have been able to spread their misinformation, because they lost the war, but they survived it in large significant numbers.

They claim they lost millions of lives but in reality those statistics come from migration not of death tolls.

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Who Should Apologize ? Turks or Armenians?

The question has been asked thousands of times, usually by foreigners who do not know the history of Ottoman-Armenian and Turkish-Armenian relations. They do not know who to point to and blame. They see the world in black and white, they are looking for an evil to blame. The Armenians want to blame the Turks for an Armenian Genocide. The Turks want to blame Armenians for a Turkish Genocide. Who's to blame?

Most Europeans and Americans grew up learning about the horrible history of the Holocaust. They saw documentaries, videos, and read books about the horrors of Nazi Germany. They see it and they wish they could stop it but know that it is in the past.

Hence, when they are older, they grow up looking for this evil, trying to find where evil is and pretend they can save the world from it.

When they meet an Armenian who tells them of 1915, describing it like the ARF (Armenian Revolutionary Federation) as a systematic genocide equal to the Holocaust, they become activists they decide they now think they know where evil is. Then the Armenian tells them that the Turks "still deny it to this day," and now they have a new "evil" to fight against, the Turks.

What they don't realize is that they are only hearing a distorted story created in 1915 after a gruesome and tragic WWI loss by the Armenians who's rebel groups sided with the Allies against the Ottomans, as a persuasive essay meant to convince Americans and Europeans to bring aid to the poor Christian Armenians.

Using their gruesome stories (some of them true, some of them distorted or exaggerated, and some of them with misidentified villains), for generations they have convinced churches, diplomats, and even nations to send millions of dollars in foreign aid to Armenians and the country of Armenia.

The problem is, they have not been able to accept their inevitable loss in World War I, some of them still think the war is not over and that the Lausanne Treaty of the 1920s will be voided and the outcome of World War I will be different!

Yes, many Armenian nationalists believe they can still win World War I, in the 2000s. Other Armenians believe they can at least seek revenge on Turkey for 1915 by painting the Turks as evil villains equal to the Nazis.

This hate campaign is nothing more than racism combined with Islamophobia, Anti-Turkism, and revenge. It is also a unifying cause for the Armenians, keeping their culture in tact, making Armenians around the world harder to assimilate into the countries they live in.

They believe this unification created by an ancient common foe, will keep them together.

Armenia, in shambles with poverty and political turmoil needs help, and they use the Armenians around the world to send aid to these countries on the pretext that the Armenians suffered genocide because of their neighbors the Turks.

When the reality of their situation was, they fought a war on the Allied side, and when the Allies abandoned them they suffered at the hands of local inhabitants seeking revenge for the Allied-endorsed slaughter.

Hundreds of thousands of Armenians, Turks, Kurds, and other Muslims died in this conflict. And all by fighting rebels, or each other, or the government. There was no systematic genocide. There were no death camps. There were no weapons of mass destruction. And as with all wars, many innocent people died. Many of them from diseases and starvation.

Even the Ottoman army had to go to war hungry and diseased, the Ottoman government was bankrupted but tried all it could to feed its Armenian and Turkish citizens even the ones that were relocated because of hostility or possible rebellion.

Later the leaders of the Ottoman Empire during that time were assassinated one by one by Armenian assassins seeking revenge for what they were led to believe was genocide. Communication being a problem at the time, rumors always spread fast, and when stories of Armenians being massacred spread, it didn't matter who the perpetrators were, historians conclude it was local inhabitants seeking revenge from Armenian rebels or money/food during a time of crisis, but eventually many of them were falsely led to believe it was murder by the government.

The relocation orders only enforced their beliefs in the rumors, even though it was a standard procedure by all European nations at the time to put down rebellions quickly during war-time.

Hence, today we ask who should apologize? The Turks who were fighting for their survival in World War I and whose government tried their best to keep a multi-ethnic society together and stop an Armenian rebellion at the same time? The Armenians who voluntarily rebelled and the Armenians who were forced to rebel by the rebels (they killed their own people and church leaders who opposed rebellion)? What about the Allied powers whose diplomats and leaders encouraged Armenian rebellions while at the same time demanding more rights for Armenians from the Ottoman leaders?

The reality was this was a war. Massacres were common (on all sides). Disease was common. Food shortages rampant. Disease abundant. Survival of the fittest was the only thing that mattered during these times, if you were alone you were robbed or killed for the few pieces of clothes on your back. It was a troubling tragic time, and it all could have been avoided if someone hadn't killed the Archduke.

The fact is, no one needs to apologize, they simply need to move on. Sure you can blame the British for encouraging Arab and Armenian rebellions, you can blame the Russians for killing the Jews, you can blame the Armenians for killing the Turks and Kurds, and you can blame the Kurds and Turks for killing the Armenians, you can blame the Austrians for starting wars, you can blame the Serbs for assassinating Austrians.

The Europeans and Americans understood this blame game, hence why they let it go and stopped thinking about it.

Though when they did seek revenge and punishment, the Versailles Treaty, well that just created World War II! Hence, before you start World War III, stop blaming each other for the past and move on. Before you cry out "genocide", understand that the Holocaust was a very unique case and that no two wars are the same and genocide is a blanket term that can be applied to any war where innocent people died (which is every war)!

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Why Do The Turks Always Refuse To Admit The Armenian Genocide?

This is a question for a world renowned historian to answer, this very question was asked by Le Monde to Dr. Bernard Lewis an Ottoman and Islamic Historian, a New York Times Best Seller Author:

Ottoman and Islamic Historian, NYT Best Seller Bernard Lewis wrote:

You mean, the Armenian version of the history? There was an Armenian problem for the Turks created by the advance of the Russians, and also there was a population with an anti-Turkish sentiment in the Ottoman Empire who sought independence, and they overtly sympathized with the Russians advancing from the Caucasus. Also, there were Armenian bands, the Armenians bragged about their heroic exploits . . in resistance, and the Turks had trouble to maintain order under the prevailing war conditions. For the Turks it was necessary to take the punitive and preventive measure against a hostile population in a region threatened by foreign invasion. For the Armenians it was liberating their land. However, both parties agree that the repression was geographically limited; for example, those measures did not affect the Armenians who lived in the other parts of the Ottoman Empire.

No one has any doubt that terrible events took place; the Armenians, as well as the Turks suffered and perished in equal measure. Yet, no one will be able to tell what the circumstances were like, and how many people died. Consider, for instance, the case of Lebanon [Beirut] that took place recently and in full view of the entire world. During their [the Armenians] relocation to Syria [an Ottoman province at that time] hundred thousands of Armenians died on account of famine and epidemics. However, when you brought up the question of "genocide", you imply that there was a deliberate policy of extermination, to annihilate systematically the Armenian nation. This is very doubtful. The Turkish documents prove an action of relocation, not extermination.

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