Armenia and the War

by A. P. Hacobian

"THE GENTLE AND CLEAN-FIGHTING TURK"[9]

The Allies have declared in their reply to President Wilson that one of their aims is "the turning out of Europe of the Ottoman Empire, as decidedly foreign to Western civilization."

This fact of the Turk being "decidedly foreign to Western civilization," affirmed on the authority and conviction of the Governments of four of the greatest and most advanced nations of Europe, needs no further proof. Nevertheless it seems desirable, in the interests of truth, to endeavour to dissipate the misconception that has been created by the extraordinary myth of "the clean-fighting Turk."

There has been a disposition in this country, natural and intelligible under the circumstances, to attribute the recent (let us hope the last) and most terrible of the Armenian massacres wholly or largely to German influence. That the German Government had it in its power to stop this gigantic crime if it had so wished, there is no doubt. It seems likely also that the Turk applied to his brutal scheme the method and thoroughness he had learned from his German ally. But seriously to assert, as some writers and speakers have done, that German influence instigated the massacres, is to shut one's eyes to the Turk's record ever since he became known to history. One need only turn the pages of his history—a veritable chamber of horrors—to convince oneself that massacre, outrage, and devastation have always been congenial to the Turk.

Without for a moment wishing to absolve the German Government of its responsibility, before God and humanity, for not exerting its influence to save more than a million absolutely innocent human beings from death, slow torture, and slavery: the fact, nevertheless, remains that Hulagu, Sultan Selim, Bayazid and Abdul Hamid were not under German influence, that there were no Germans at the sack of Constantinople or the massacres of Bagdad and Sivas, or, in more recent times, at the butcheries of Chios, Greece, Crete, Batak, Macedonia, Sassoon, Urfa, or Adana. The Turk, in fact, has nothing to learn from his Teutonic ally in "frightfulness"; he has a great deal to teach him. I readily admit that there are some Turks who are gentle and good men. Some of these have risked good positions and even their lives to protect Armenian women and children. But most unfortunately for us, for humanity and for the Turks themselves, such good Turks are few and far between.

It is true that orders for the extirpation of the Armenians were issued from Constantinople, but can any one imagine such revolting orders being carried out by "gentle and clean-fighting" troops and people? I shall be much surprised if any unprejudiced man or woman in any civilized country believes that any but the Turkish populace and soldiery would be capable of carrying out such orders. History at any rate has given us no such evidence.

I believe that, under a just and honest government and better influences, the Turkish peasant will, in course of time, lose his proneness to cruelty, for he has good qualities. But if this war is intended to see the end of tyranny, oppression, brutal religious and political persecution and the discontent and unrest that such conditions always produce; if it is to prevent the possibility of a repetition of the hell that the Turks have let loose in Armenia since they entered the war and so often before the war; then it is clear that never again must the Turk be allowed to possess the power over other races, which he has so abominably abused ever since he "hacked his way through" to the fair, fertile and once highly prosperous country which he has devastated and converted into a charnel-house.

The Armenians of Turkey had no separatist aspirations. They knew that was impracticable. Nothing would have suited them better than a reformed government in Turkey, that would give them security of life, honour and property, the free development of their national and religious institutions and an approach to equality with Moslems before the law. On the promulgation of the Constitution, all the Armenian revolutionary societies were transformed into peaceable and orderly political parties as by magic. They had great hopes of achieving these aims and the regeneration of the Ottoman Empire from within in co-operation with the Young Turks before the war, and they gave the Committee of Union and Progress (was there ever a more incongruous misnomer?) all the support they could, which was by no means negligible; but they had not long to wait to be completely and bitterly disillusioned. The Adana massacres gave their hopes the first blow. The Armenian leaders proved too earnest and sincere democrats for the Committee leaders who, with few exceptions, were actuated, as events proved, more by inordinate personal ambition than the "liberty" and "equality" which they so loudly proclaimed and which have proved such a hideous mockery. The chauvinistic wing soon gained complete ascendancy over the party, which resolved on the covert or forcible "Ottomanization" of all non-Turk races of the Empire (as is proved by the recent exposures of the Grand Sheriff of Mecca), and ended by joining the Germans in the war in the hope of conquering Egypt and the Caucasus.

It is a mistake to think that Germany forced Turkey into the war against her will by the presence of the Goeben and Breslau. Those who had any knowledge of Turkish affairs had no doubt of the existence of a military understanding between Germany and Turkey for some years before the war. The arrival of a military mission at Constantinople under Liman von Sanders left no doubt on that point.

On the outbreak of the European war, the Armenian Dashnakist Party met in congress at Erzerum to determine the attitude to be observed by the Party in relation to the war. Hearing of this, the Young Turks forthwith sent representatives to ascertain the attitude of the Party in the event of Turkey going to war against Russia. (See Blue-book, p. 80.) This took place some weeks before the arrival of the Goeben and Breslau at Constantinople. Nor was the war as unpopular with the Turkish masses at the outset as is thought by many. If that were so there would have been a revolt against the Young Turks, and Turkey would have been detached from the Central Powers long ago. It may be less popular now, because their dreams of conquest have been shattered and the whole country is suffering. No Turk, Young or Old, had any particular objection to the prospects of the conquest either of Egypt or the Caucasus, and many of them aimed at a Moslem Triple Alliance between Turkey, Persia and Afghanistan under German auspices, and even dreamt dreams of an empire that would ultimately embrace India and the whole of Northern Africa![10]