ANGLO-TURKISH (CYPRUS) CONVENTION.
Art. I. If Batoum, Ardahan, Kars, or any of them shall be retained by Russia, and if any attempt shall be made at any future time by Russia to take possession of any further territory of His Imperial Majesty, the Sultan, in Asia, as fixed by the Definitive Treaty of Peace, England engages to join His Imperial Majesty, the Sultan, in defending them by force of arms.
In return, His Imperial Majesty, the Sultan, promises to England to introduce necessary reforms, to be agreed upon later between the two Powers, into the Government and for the protection of the Christian and other subjects of the Porte in these territories; and in order to enable England to make necessary provisions for executing her engagement, His Imperial Majesty, the Sultan, further consents to assign the Island of Cyprus to be occupied and administered by England.
Trebizond.
The Anglo-Turkish Convention having been made June 4th, and the Berlin Treaty not being signed until July 13th, places priority (may we not almost say entirety?) of obligation upon England, which obligation with all that it implies she fully and alone accepted when she accepted the island of Cyprus as a necessary base of operations and a promise and pledge of good faith.
The Berlin Treaty did not release England from this distinct and individual obligation nor did she wish to divide the honor of being the defender of the Armenian Christians. It may be questioned whether she had any right to expect anything more from the other signatory Powers than their moral support in any attempted enforcement of its terms.
Passing by the first part of Art. I. in the Anglo-Turkish Convention the reader is asked to give special attention to the wording of the second part: “In return, His Imperial Majesty, the Sultan, promises to England to introduce necessary reforms to be agreed upon later between the two Powers, into the Government and for the protection of the Christian and other subjects of the Porte in these territories.”
With that clause inserted “to be agreed upon later” how could Lord Salisbury possibly dream, let alone say “that careful provision against future misgovernment has been made”? Absolutely no provision had been made to protect Armenia from Kurd or Circassian or the rapacity and cruelty and outrage of Turkish officials. And none could be made unless these two Powers alone, England and the Porte could agree upon the nature of the reforms and the manner in which they should be carried out. Was any promise, pledge or convention ever written that actually meant less? Was this honest British Statesmanship actually determining that something should be done? or was it shrewd Turkish diplomacy that will promise anything in the bond but withdraw it in the terms of later stipulations? Or was it understood that it was merely dust for the eyes of Christian Europe?
The following incident in the career of Gen. B. F. Butler was given as a newspaper item. In the course of a very spirited conversation one day a gentleman called him a knave. The general smiled and replied, “Well, did you ever hear anybody say that I was a fool?” Somebody was surely fooled by this convention. Who was it? Not Russia and certainly not the Turk. Who then? Salisbury? or England?
There were many men even in England who did not hesitate to express hottest indignation against the policy of the Government regarding her dealings with Turkey. Here are paragraphs from “The Ottoman Power in Europe” by the English historian E. A. Freeman:
“The England of Canning and Codrington, the England of Byron and Hastings has come to this, that the world knows us as the nation which upholds oppression for the sake of its own interests. We have indeed a national sin to redress and atone for. We are verily guilty concerning our brother, in that we saw the anguish of his soul when he besought us and we would not hear. Nay, our guilt is deeper still. We have not merely looked on and passed by on the other side, but we have given our active help to the oppressors of our brothers. We have “upheld” the foulest fabric of wrong that earth ever saw, because it was deemed that the interests of England were involved in upholding the wrong and trampling down the right. * * * *
“Our national crime is that we have upheld the Turk for our own supposed interests. For these we have doomed the struggling nations to abide in their bondage. We have doomed them to stay under a rule under which the life and property of the Christian, the honor of his wife, the honor of his children of both sexes alike are at every moment at the mercy of the savages whom our august and cherished ally honors and promotes in proportion to the blackness of their deeds. We have for our own interests upheld the power which has done its foul and bloody work in Chios, at Damascus and in Bulgaria, which is still doing the same foul and bloody work wherever a victim may be found. We uphold the power whose daily work is massacre and worse than massacre. It matters not whether ten thousand or twenty thousand perish. We are still to uphold the slaughterer, for it is to our interest that he should not be shorn of his power of slaughtering.
“Now if there be any such thing as right and wrong in public affairs, if moral considerations are ever to come in to determine the actions of nations, it is hard to see how there can be deeper national guilt than this. Unjust wars, aggressions and conquests are bad enough, but they are hardly so bad as the calm, unblushing upholding of wrong for our own interests. * * * * We look on, we count the cost, we see how the wrong-doer deals with his victim and we determine to uphold the wrong-doer because we think that to uphold him will suit some interest of our own. There is no question of national glory, no question of national honor; nothing which can stir up even a false enthusiasm. It is a calm mercantile calculation that the wrongs of millions of men will pay.
“The revenue returns of Egypt for 1890 were over $50,000,000. If we knew how large a part of this went to bondholders in London, we would know something about England’s interest in Egypt. If we knew how large a portion of the Turkish debt of above $500,000,000, is held in London, we would know something about the interest the British government has in maintaining the integrity of Turkey.
“England wouldn’t care if that Turkey were carved to-morrow if only she could hold Constantinople and administer on the dead Sultan’s estate until all the obligations she holds should be paid off. She would rather like to occupy Stamboul on those conditions—Armenia, Kurds, Circassians and all.”
But to return from our digression which was meant to show something of the nature of the interest England had in bringing Bulgaria again under Turkish rule and taxation, we remark that with this Cypress Convention already a deed accomplished what other European powers would care a fig about seeing to the execution of possible reforms in Armenia. What happened is notorious. A few ineffectual attempts to agree upon reforms and when agreed upon many excuses for not carrying them out and there the whole matter of reform was practically dropped; but Cypress was retained as counsel fees possibly for securing such a favorable revision of the terms of the San Stefano Treaty in the interests of Turkey—of the Moslem not of the Christian.
For the sake of retaining influence with the Sublime Porte and to outwit the possible plans and intrigues of the Russian Ambassador, scared by visions in the night of some muscovite move towards Constantinople. England for fifteen years connived at a state of things which was decimating and impoverishing the provinces of Armenia, and costing more lives and causing more suffering in the aggregate than the massacres of Sassoun.
Often the question was asked, “Where is England’s guarantee to Armenian and Macedonian Christians now?” The Russian press was not slow to give prominence to these reports of continually increasing oppressions and pillage, of outrage and murder.
But nothing pierced the political-commercial conscience of England until tidings of the most horrible massacres committed three months before began to creep over the mountains of Armenia and find their way to England and America.
When for very shame they could shut their ears to the clamor no longer the British Government demanded a commission—it’s great on commissions. The British Ambassador intimated to the Porte that if steps were not taken to satisfy her Majesty’s Government that the Sultan’s promise (respecting the commission) would be fulfilled, “they might find it necessary to inquire into the treatment of the Armenians, and that they might also be forced to publish the consular reports from the Asiatic provinces which had been so long withheld!”
What fires of shame should burn on cheek and forehead of the English Government that nothing had been done to stop those outrages till indifference and inactivity had given the impression that nobody cared what became of the Armenians.
At last the heart of England flamed out in pity and her conscience fired the brain to hot and earnest and even vehement utterance, and hundreds of public meetings were held. Instinctively all eyes turned to Gladstone to voice the sorrow, the pity or the indignation of a Christian people who felt themselves in some measure responsible for the deliverance of Armenia from further horrors.