Talaat also began to amuse himself in the same way, and finally the two statesmen dismounted, began shooting in competition and behaving as gaily and as care-free as boys let out of school.
“Have you one of your cards with you?” asked Enver. He requested that I pin it to a tree which stood about fifty feet away.
Enver then fired first. His hand was steady; his eye went straight to the mark, and the bullet hit the card directly in the centre. This success rather nettled Talaat. He took aim, but his rough hand and wrist shook slightly—he was not an athlete like his younger, wiry, and straight-backed associate. Several times Talaat hit around the edges of the card, but he could not duplicate Enver’s skill.
“If it had been a man I was firing at,” said the bulky Turk, jumping on his horse again, “I would have hit him several times.”
So ended my attempts to interest the two most powerful Turks of their day in the destruction of one of the most valuable elements in their Empire!
I have already said that Saïd Halim, the Grand Vizier, was not an influential personage. Nominally his office was the most important in the Empire; actually the Grand Vizier was a mere place-warmer, and Talaat and Enver controlled the present incumbent precisely as they controlled the Sultan himself. Technically, the Ambassadors should have conducted their negotiations with Saïd Halim, for he was Minister for Foreign Affairs. I early discovered, however, that nothing could be accomplished this way, and, though I still made my Monday calls as a matter of courtesy, I preferred to deal directly with the men who had the real power to decide all matters. In order that I might not be accused of neglecting any means of influencing the Ottoman Government, I brought the Armenian question several times to the Grand Vizier’s attention. As he was not a Turk, but an Egyptian, and a man of education and breeding, it seemed not unlikely that he might have a somewhat different attitude toward the subject peoples. But I was wrong. The Grand Vizier was just as hostile to the Armenians as Talaat and Enver. I soon found that merely mentioning the subject irritated him greatly. Evidently he did not care to have his elegant ease interfered with by such disagreeable and unimportant subjects. The Grand Vizier showed his attitude when the Greek Chargé d’Affaires spoke to him about the persecutions of the Greeks. Saïd Halim said that such manifestations did the Greeks more harm than good.
“We shall do with them just the opposite from what we are asked to do,” said the Grand Vizier.
To my appeals the nominal chief Minister was hardly more statesmanlike. I had the disagreeable task of sending him, on behalf of the British, French, and Russian Governments, a notification that these Powers would hold personally responsible for the Armenian atrocities the men who were then directing Ottoman affairs. This meant, of course, that in the event of Allied success, they would treat the Grand Vizier, Talaat, Enver, Djemal, and their companions as ordinary murderers. As I came into the room to discuss this somewhat embarrassing message to this member of the royal house of Egypt, he sat there, as usual, nervously fingering his beads, and not in a particularly genial frame of mind. He at once spoke of this telegram, his face flushed with anger, and he began a long diatribe against, the whole Armenian race. He declared that the Armenian “rebels” killed 120,000 Turks at Van. This and other of his statements were so absurd that I found myself spiritedly defending the persecuted race, and this aroused the Grand Vizier’s wrath still further, and, switching from the Armenians, he began to abuse my own country, making the usual charges that our sympathy with the Armenians was largely responsible for all their troubles.
Soon after this interview Saïd Halim ceased to be Minister for Foreign Affairs. His successor was Halil Bey, who for some years had been Speaker of the Turkish Parliament. Halil was a very different type of man. He was much more tactful, much more intelligent, and much more influential in Turkish affairs. He was also a smooth and oily conversationalist, good-natured and fat, and by no means so lost to all decent sentiments as most Turkish politicians of the time. It was generally reported that Halil did not approve the Armenian proceedings, yet his official position compelled him to accept them, and even, as I now discovered, to defend them. Soon after obtaining his Cabinet post, Halil called upon me and made a somewhat rambling explanation of the Armenian atrocities. I had already had experiences with several official attitudes toward the persecutions; Talaat had been bloodthirsty and ferocious, Enver subtly calculating, while the Grand Vizier had been testy. Halil now regarded the elimination of this race with the utmost good humour. Not a single aspect of the proceeding, not even the unkindest things I could say concerning it, disturbed his equanimity in the least. He began by admitting that nothing could palliate these massacres, but, he added, in order to understand them, there were certain facts that I should keep in mind.
“I agree that the Government has made serious mistakes in the treatment of the Armenians,” said Halil, “but the harm has already been done. What can we do about it now? Still, if there are any errors we can correct, we should correct them. I deplore as much as you the excesses and violations which have been committed. I wish to present to you the view of the Sublime Porte. I admit that this is no justification, but I think there are extenuating circumstances that you should take into consideration before judgment is passed upon the Ottoman Government.”