THE GENOCIDE BILL IN THE CONGRESS (1)

This bill that is titled “Armenian Genocide Resolution”, containing thirty articles, demands (1) the US President to reflect the Armenian incidents as genocide in the foreign policy of the country, and (2) the inclusion of the word “genocide” in the Annual Message of the White House. However, all thirty articles are a combination of the most extreme Armenian opinions entirely.

Ms Pelosi has some personal dreams for herself obviously. The votes she has been seeking go through the financial support and field of influence of Armenians. Although this bill displays an embarrassing unilateralism, turning its back on certain historical facts, it is a political necessity for Pelosi to be unfair to Turks for the sake of her own interests.

The US House of Representatives was submitted a bill containing the words “Armenian Genocide” on January 30, 2007. It is really difficult to find such a document that is on one hand filled with unilateralism, mistakes, exaggerations and prejudices, and does not possess even a single reference to the opposing viewpoint, on the other. This should be an embarrassing document even for an underdeveloped country that lacks its share of democracy. Moreover, this takes place in America which during the Cold War ascribed the title of “the leader of the free world” and has undertaken the effort to embellish the globe with the complete version of the same principles presently.

In reality, it is a product of domestic politics, an initiative to pay debts to a strengthened pressure group, an attempt to distract the American people that expect urgent onward steps in vital problems from unemployment and trade unionism to healthcare and education, and an incompetent way of “acting for appearance’s sake”. In this article, I would like to emphasize, though briefly, that the aforesaid bill is good for nothing for the sake of justice.

It has the signatures of 165 representatives, 21 of them being members of the Council of Foreign Relations and the rest of other councils. 25 members of the Council of Foreign Relations and seven Democrat representatives have not signed the initiative and one Republican representative pulled out his signature. House Speaker and the frontrunner of this bill Nancy Pelosi is from California where the Armenian minority is very powerful. This wealthy and influential power circle was able to have an Armenian named George Dokmeciyan elected as governor there and another governor, Ronald Reagan, was able to move to the White House from there. One of the leaders of the monopolist capital who presented Reagan as a candidate for governor defined him as “the US President of near future”.

Several Armenians, both from the past and present, would not approve these remarks. Let alone the Turkish theses, several Western documents, the previous findings of Americans, new British interpretations and the gradual confessions of Armenians have been enough to show that every one of the views, quotations and figures summed up superficially with a couple of lines in these articles have been opposed. Fair individuals and circles should say: “Let alone exaggeration, a lie cannot be this far; we do not approve it!”. For example, “Agos” newspaper has not shown a sign of mercy. The attitude of the Congress remind us the heavy pressure of the foreign circles that forced verdicts in courts in occupied Istanbul after 1918. The ones who expect political gains rather than justice from this attitude can be pleased, but they will sooner or later realize that relying on a foreign circle dependent on a single viewpoint that does not let the Turks express themselves is not a solution.

To sum up with a few words, this bill is an example of primitiveness. One can write a book or even a series of books containing volumes to present the errors, exaggerations, contradictions, deficiencies and lies of this bill. It has already been written by Turkish and foreign persons. For example, I published several, more than seventy to be exact, books or booklets on this subject. Since late last summer five new books of mine have been published, two of them in New York. Should not the ones who have signed this bill have reviewed at least the several English ones of those? Is not there any information and documents in those that make them suspect the accuracy of the remarks within the bill they have signed or occasionally proves the contrary? What an ignorance, irresponsibility, indifference, selfishness, opportunism and enmity! Isn’t such racism more than shame? Isn’t hiding the other side of the medallion to this extent impudence?

As it was the case in the Ottoman era, when Armenian terrorists murdered Priest Leon Tourian in a church in New York, Kapriel Serope Papazian published his book “Reversed Patriotism” in 1934 in Armenian Baikar Publishing House in Boston. “As it has been proved by the figures given by Turkish, Russian and other censuses of the world, we would like to emphasize that there has never been a land where Armenians constituted the majority within the borders of the Ottoman Empire,” states Papazian in his book (p. 74-75). I published an assessment, summarizing Papazian’s book, in different languages in 1985. Didn’t Patriarch Nerses run to the British Ambassador after the Russian Embassy in Istanbul at the end of the Russian-Ottoman War of 1877-78, that ended in our defeat? When he asked for autonomy for “Armenia”, didn’t the British Ambassador tell him (as stated in the FO document 424/68-639 dated March 17, 1897) that they had never constitute the majority there? Didn’t they and we publish this fact several times (so as to let these 165 individuals to read)? Didn’t the document of the French Foreign Ministry, dated November 19, 1918, clearly indicate that “Armenians had not held the majority prior to 1895 in the provinces that hey called ‘Armenia’”? Wasn’t the ratio of Armenians “13 percent at the most” as it was stated in “The Official Gazette” of France on November 4, 1896 and in the Foreign Ministry document dated January 28, 1918? I published these documents in a book written in English that I presented to the Library of the Congress years ago. Isn’t it obligatory to review these before signing a resolution? Haven’t those 165 individuals read American Professor Justin McCarthy’s book titled “Muslims and Minorities”? To whom does it serve not referring to those documents, at least as a second opinion? Not to the truth and solution, obviously.

Thus, do these 165 people and a handful of organized Armenian combatants behind them have the right to demand anything from anybody? There are also ones that have taken a look at the long history of Eastern Anatolia. An Armenian publisher that has not got his share of scientific approach presents Urartu as an ancient Armenian state. The difference between writing history and comedy is so apparent as it is between night and day. The most famous Russian Urartologist B.B. Piotrovsky, whose wife is of Armenian descent, writes that Armenians cannot be regarded as an extension of the Urartus. Russian N.Y. Marr, associates them with not Armenians, but Georgians. In reality, although the state of Urartu disappeared, people have not only mixed with one but all of the locals with their new generations, not solely with Armenians, nor with Georgians. Urartus’ heritage, as bloodline and civilization, can commonly be seen in eastern Anatolia and the Caucasus in particular. While the Urartu language was an extension of Hurris, Armenian belongs to Indo-European language family. The following limited Armenian baronies or states that were sponsored by the Crusaders and thus dependent on foreign powers were of Armenian descent, in the context of the ruling dynasty. Let alone the fact that this ruling community was exceptionally oppressive, the people itself were from diverse races, languages and religions. Spreading this presence over 2500 years and putting the Armenian stamp on it is nothing but eradicating dignity.

Presenting our War of National Independence as “genocide” is reaching the peak of obstinacy. For America, having a war of independence in its short history, this scope is another crudeness and impudence. The following are the remarks of Hovhannes Katchaznuni, the first Prime Minister of the bourgeois Armenian Republic of 1920s, in his book (I published a summary of it in several languages in 1984 and now the whole text has been translated and published): “We should have used a peaceful language against the Turks. We had no idea on their real power; we had faith in ourselves. This was our basic mistake. When the clashes began, Turks proposed to sit and talk. But we didn’t do that and turned our backs at them. Our army was well-fed and well-clothed… We wanted a huge Armenia from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean, from the mountains of Karabakh to the deserts of Arabia. We were drawing borders on paper, dreaming that this would really be given to us. Doubting that was treason… But there is nothing to do now!” Haven’t these 165 individuals seen this important Armenian source? Can “Agos” newspaper accede to publish the whole Turkish translation of it that was published by Kaynak Publications? Thus, all Armenian, Turkish and Kurdish readers would be informed.

The number of entire Ottoman Armenians was slightly less than 1.3 million. There are certain external sources that raise this number a little. The death and even the murder of 1.5 million is out of question. Hasn’t Bogos Nubar, who visited Paris as the Chairman of the Armenian Delegation after the war stated in his official letter to the French Foreign Ministry on December 11, 1918 that 6-700.000 Armenians were relocated and 390.000 of them reached their destinations in detail? We have repeatedly published this Armenian document, as well. He did not claim that around 260.000 individuals, the number in between, were killed. He should know that due to general war conditions, climate, famine and contagious diseases and also several battles, civil wars and armed clashes in which Armenians took part after 1914 several people lost their lives.

Even the so-called Blue Book (p. 664), that was entirely unilateral, prepared and published by Britain so as to completely weaken the Ottomans against which it was fighting in 1916 at least at three different fronts, states that 989.900 of the relocated Armenians reached their destinations, 150.000 of them stayed in their previous residences, therefore 1.150.000 of them have survived. Haven’t those 165 individuals seen this as a different interpretation, make it right or wrong?

According to the very first article of the US bill, “Armenian genocide” covers 1915-23, that is the whole War of National Independence, around two million Armenians were allegedly relocated, 1.5 million of them were murdered, 500.000 of them were displaced and Eastern Anatolia already belonged to them. Let us put aside Turkish and foreign publications for now, there are certain Armenian sources indicating that these theses are entirely incorrect. According to the other articles, Turkish courts acknowledged the Armenian massacres after 1918; all foreign archives have proven the genocide; all prominent states (including Britain) and several others have recognized the presence of this “genocide”; between 1913 and 1916 the US Ambassador to Istanbul Morgenthau, General Harbord and Hitler mentioned this genocide; the United Nations has a resolution in this regard; the subject has entered the Genocide Museum in Washington; it has been referred by the US Congress in its several resolutions and by former Presidents in their annual addresses; and “Armenian genocide” has been internationally recognized. It is just the reflection of the most extreme Armenian views; nothing else.