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The Great Calamity:

Politics, Religion, &

Genocide in the

Ottoman Empire

Chris Buford

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“Who, after all, speaks today of the annihilation of the Armenians?”

- Adolf Hitler, speaking to his inner circle, regarding the planned Holocaust of the

Jewish inhabitants of Europe.

The Armenian Genocide is often referred to as the “forgotten genocide,”1 but its

survivors and their descendants choose to call it by another name: The Great Calamity. This

phrase speaks volumes about the profound impact that these events had on the minority

populations of the Ottoman Empire, most notably, the Armenians. Since the formation of the

Ottoman Empire, Christian minorities had experienced a strained relationship with the Muslim

majority, which varied from near equality during some periods to outright massacre during

others. The Armenians were hardly the only victims of Ottoman atrocities. Throughout the 19th

century, Ottoman rulers made it a priority to deal with non-Muslims in barbaric fashion. This

period saw 50,000 Greeks killed in 1822, 10,000 Nestorians and Armenians killed in 1850,

11,000 Maronites and Syrians killed in 1860, 10,000 Bulgarians killed in 1876, and 40,000

Armenians killed in the massacres of 1894 and 1895.2 A variety of scholars and others have

taken several positions regarding the cause of these events, with most taking one of two

positions: that the massacres and the genocide were motivated by political reasons, or that these

events stemmed from religious differences. After examining multiple accounts and analyses, it

seems evident that while the modern reader might think these are two separate motivations, to a

contemporary observer these two reasons would be indistinguishable from one another. The

Ottoman Empire did not utilize Sharia Law, as some contemporaries desired, yet targets for

1 Peter Balakian, Burning Tigris: The Armenian Genocide and America’s Response (New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2003), xvii. 2 Frederick Davis Greene, Armenian Massacres or The Sword of Mohammed (1896; repr., Burlington, IA: Sandycroft Publishing, 2016), 54.

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massacre were almost exclusively distinguished by their status as non-Muslims. In order to fully

understand this dynamic, a multi-faceted approach will be employed. First, historic

examinations of both Armenia and The Ottoman Empire must be undertaken for the sake of

context. This will include brief histories of both nations, their interactions with one another, and

notable historic incidents. Second, various witness and survivor accounts will be analyzed to

best describe the events of the massacres and genocide, and determine the true motivations of

perpetrators. Finally, multiple scholarly works will be considered to examine the after effects of

the genocide and its impact on history. This will give attention to how subsequent genocides

were influenced by The Great Calamity and how it still impacts the world today.

A Brief History of Armenia

The history of the Armenian people is a long and storied one. According to tradition, the

Kingdom of Armenia was founded in 2350 BCE by Haik3, one of Noah’s descendants, around

Lake Van. Mount Ararat, the mythic location of the landing of Noah’s Ark, is within this region,

and has been associated with the Armenian people for millennia. Historically speaking, most

scholars believe that sometime in the 8th century BCE, the Armenians crossed the Euphrates river

into Asia Minor and invaded Urartu, where they intermarried and formed a homogenous nation

within 2 centuries. From this point forward, the location of this nation would constantly put it at

odds with the empires of both the eastern and western worlds.

Over the coming centuries, Armenia would change hands multiple times. Alexander the

Great conquered it in 330 BCE, and soon after his death, it passed into Syrian hands. This only

lasted until 190 BCE when Rome defeated the Syrians, which was immediately followed by a

3 Dickran H. Boyajian, Armenia: The Case For a Forgotten Genocide (Westwood, NJ: Educational Book Crafters, 1972), 57.

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declaration of independence by the Armenians. This autonomy would last just over a century

until the ambitious Armenian King Tigranes4 challenged Rome in 69 and 67 BCE. Armenia

would remain a Roman territory until Emperor Nero declared Tiridates the King of Armenia in

66 CE. During the early years of Christianity, it spread to Armenia, thanks to St. Gregory the

Illuminator who brought it to the king of Armenia in 301 CE5, leading most scholars to consider

it the earliest Christian state.

The invasion by Ardashir I of Persia in the third century CE would mark the first instance

of mass-persecution of Christian Armenians. In 387 CE, the kingdom would be split between

Rome and Persia, which, along with the killings would spark fierce ethnic nationalism among the

Armenian people. For the next 500 years, Armenia would be constantly attacked and invaded by

almost every imperial power with a stake in the region, including the Mongols, Persians, Huns,

Arabs, and Byzantines. From 866 CE until 1046 CE, the Armenians enjoyed various degrees of

autonomy until the Byzantine Empire reconquered the region only to lose it to the Turks after the

Battle of Manzikert in 1071.

In 1080, Prince Roupen established The Barony of Cilician Armenia6, which lasted until

1375 when invading Mamluks captured the region. 11 years later, the Mongol conqueror Timur

would take Cilicia from the Mamluks, only for it to fall into Ottoman hands after his death in

1405. This would mark the beginning of centuries of volatile relations with their Ottoman rulers.

4 Reigned 94 – 54 B.C.E.; Dickran Boyajian, Armenia: The Case For a Forgotten Genocide, 61. 5 Dickran Boyajian, Armenia: The Case For a Forgotten Genocide, 63. 6 Dickran Boyajian, Armenia: The Case For a Forgotten Genocide, 71.

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A Brief History of The Ottoman Empire

The Ottoman Empire traces its origins to 1299, when Osman I, leader of a small Turkish

State that resulted from the fall of the Seljuk Turk Sultanate, began absorbing other Turkish

states into his kingdom. The kingdom grew into an empire as subsequent sultans acquired new

territories in Asia Minor, North Africa, and the Balkan peninsula. The reign of Sulayman I7 saw

the peak of the empire in terms of both efficiency and culture, with literature, art, and

architecture flourishing. After his death in the 16th century, corruption began to take hold at all

levels of power, with officials regularly purchasing their positions from the imperial government

and then using those positions to extort greater sums from their subjects.

Perhaps the greatest threat to the empire was the Sultans themselves. From an early

point, there was a great deal of infighting between the heirs of recently deceased Sultans. At

first, this led to a great deal of fratricide from the new Sultans as they eliminated potential

challenges to the throne. Eventually, this practice was thrown out in favor of the eldest sons

being the Heir Designate, but this ended up being even worse for the empire. In order to prevent

their heirs from seizing power from them, the Sultans would usually keep them prisoner in

luxurious accommodations, which left them with almost no experience with the real world, and

often either insane, alcoholic, or both by the time they assumed power. This led to a series of

increasingly unstable, paranoid Sultans who feared more for their personal safety than the state

of their empire. This would reach a fevered pitch in the 19th century when a string of Sultans

would implement multiple massacres against Christian minorities within the empire. The last of

7 1520 - 1566

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these Sultans would be Abdul Hamiid II, who presided over the Armenian Massacres of 1895-

1896.

Abdul Hamiid II’s lack of concern for his empire, increasing paranoia, and loss of

territory eventually lead to several groups rising up to demand reforms. One of these groups

came to be called the Young Turks, and they would end up overthrowing Hamiid and installing

his brother as a puppet Sultan, while they ran the empire from their headquarters in

Constantinople.

The Hamiidian Massacres of 1895 - 1896

Before he was overthrown, Abdul Hamiid II devoted a great deal of his time to dealing

with the “Armenian Question,” which, for Hamiid, meant how to get rid of them. The Ottoman

Empire had grown to formidable size prior to his reign, and included a vast diversity of cultures

and ethnicities. From its inception, the empire had been built and ruled by Muslims, but they

managed to live in relative harmony with the various non-Muslims within their territory. While

the dhimmi,8 as non-Muslims were known, were tolerated, they were in practice lesser citizens.

They were also known as gavur,9 which had the same meaning as dhimmi, but with a negative

connotation. Despite their status, many dhimmi flourished within the empire, becoming wealthy,

civilized members of both their respective communities and the empire as a whole. For some,

these successes threatened their own sense of power, and at various points during the 19th

century, massacres were carried out against multiple groups, resulting in death totals of 120,000

8 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 445. Dhimmi – “or zimmi; Jew, Christian, and member of other religions tolerated by Islam within territory ruled by Muslims.” 9 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 445. Gavur – “or giavour; infidel, unbeliever, heathen, non-Muslim; with negative connotations.”

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by the 1890s.10 Some scholars attribute the specificity of hatred towards the Armenians to their

central location within the Empire. “Where Serbs, Greeks, Bulgars, Egyptians and other subjects

of the Ottoman sultans endured their miseries at a distance from their Turkish masters, the

Armenians were physically within range of the Turks of Asia Minor and such of their half-

savage minions as the Kurdish and Circassian hordes. This physical fact is one of the keys –

perhaps the most important one – to the intensity of their tragedy.11” This bred an air of

uncertainty among these populations, at times to the point of revolution.

The first example of revolution in the Ottoman Empire during this period came from

Greece. Enraged by the massacre of 50,000 Greeks in 1822, the locals rose up, and with

intervention from the major European powers, fought off Ottoman armies and became the first

independent state in the Balkans on February 3, 183012. Over the coming decades, the rest of the

Balkans would follow.

In an effort to quell the revolutionary thinking going on within the empire, Sultan

Abdulmecid I13 enacted Hatt-i Sherif of Gulhane (the Edict of Gulhane) in 1839, the first of

many reforms collectively known as Tanzimat. Its primary effect was to declare all citizens of

the empire equal, regardless of nationality or religion. The second major edict of Tanzimat was

Hatt-i Humayan in 1856, which equalized citizens regarding taxation, justice, government

postings, and military service. For the dhimmi, these were encouraging developments that they

felt would help modernize what they believed was a backwards nation.

10 Greene, Armenian Massacres 54. 11 Dickran Boyajian, Armenia: The Case for a Forgotten Genocide (Westwood, NJ: Educational Book Crafters, Inc., 1972), 30. 12 Davide Rodogno, Against Massacre: Humanitarian Interventions in The Ottoman Empire 1815 – 1914 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2012), 87. 13 1839 - 1861

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Unfortunately for the dhimmi, by the time Abdul Hamiid II became sultan, many of these

reforms had failed to accomplish anything that they had declared. Coupled with the losses in the

Balkans and a series of conflicts with Czarist Russia, dhimmi (especially Armenians, who had a

population in Russia) were at the very least a nuisance as far as Hamiid was concerned, and at

most, a threat that must be crushed. Despite his feelings towards the Armenians, Hamiid signed

the Kanun-I Esasi, a constitution for the Ottoman Empire, in 1876. This would mark the peak of

Tanzimat, and signaled the beginning of the new era of government and society that the

minorities of the empire had been working towards. Unfortunately, it was almost entirely a

symbolic gesture, and Hamiid would end up overturning it two years later.

By 1890, Hamiid had resolved to solve the “Armenian Question,” allegedly saying, “I tell

you, I will soon settle those Armenians. I will give them a box on the ear which will make them

smart and relinquish their revolutionary ambitions.” 14 The reality of what he would attempt

would be far more severe than a “box on the ear.”

To prepare for his solution to the Armenian Question, Hamiid created the Hamidiye

(death squads), which literally means “belonging to Hamiid,”15 in 1890. He filled its ranks with

the troublesome Kurds, creating the double benefit of controlling the Kurds while using them to

kill Armenians, and then blaming it on the Kurds. This would not have been difficult for locals

to believe, since the Kurds roamed in and around Armenian territory and often clashed with

them. Within two years, the ranks of the Hamidiye would swell to thirty-three regiments of five

hundred men each, with more being created each day16. The creation of these death squads made

14 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 35. 15 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 44. 16 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 51.

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an already uneasy population even more fearful, which contributed to a growing sense of anxiety

in the empire.

Given Hamiid’s paranoia, especially regarding uprisings among the minorities, it is not

surprising that he enacted policies to quell any potential revolutionary ideas. As noted scholar

Peter Balakian puts it, “Anyone suspected of sedition – which meant a genuine part of the

population, in a society that was enveloped in the sultan’s network of espionage and surveillance

– was arrested, tortured, killed, or exiled.17” It was in this environment of suspicion that the

Young Turks formed and began to plan their quest for change. Before they could accomplish

that change, however, the Sultan would perpetrate the most violent act against the Armenians in

the Empire’s history up to that point.

Beginning in 1891, tensions began to reach a fevered pitch, starting with a string of

incidents in Sasun. Fed up with the racketeering practices of the Kurds, the farmers of the region

refused to pay their taxes, which prompted a confrontation which left at least one Kurd killed. In

retaliation, Turkish police arrested a member of the Hunchak Party, the political party they

blamed for the incident, and then ordered an invasion of the region. The Armenians fled to the

mountains for safety, where they remained for the entire winter. The following spring, when

they came down, another attempt was made to collect the taxes, which resulted in several more

Kurdish deaths. Claiming to be the victims of armed rebellion, the Turkish zaptiye,18 the

Hamidiye, and Ottoman troops attacked several villages in the region and “wounded and killed,

without regard to age or sex, all who fell into their hands.”19 In Semal, fearing violent

retaliations, the Armenian population, led by their priest, surrendered. The Ottoman colonel

17 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 49. 18 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 445. Zaptiye – “military police” 19 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 55.

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ordered the priest to be seized, and his eyes were gouged out and he was stabbed repeatedly with

a bayonet until he died. That night, the Ottoman forces raped the women, and the next night they

killed all the men, leaving three thousand Armenians dead.20

News of the events in Sasun spread quickly both within the empire and abroad, leading to

outcries from the Governments of Europe and the United States. Within the empire, the

Hunchak Party organized a demonstration in Constantinople to deliver a “Protest-Demand” to

the government. As they made their way to the Sublime Porte, the seat of Ottoman government,

they encountered police and cavalry who ordered them to disband, and then quickly attacked. As

the demonstration devolved into chaos, softas21 began to join in and started killing Armenians in

broad daylight in the streets of Constantinople. The killing in the capital continued the entire

week, and finally ended after all six foreign embassies in the city demanded cessation of

violence.

Following the incident in Constantinople, violence erupted across the empire. From

October 1st 1895, the day of the demonstration, until January 1st 1896, Armenians would be

slaughtered in massive numbers. Sources disagree on the actual death toll, but contemporary and

subsequent estimates ranged from two hundred thousand22 to two hundred and fifty thousand.23

Exact numbers are hard to come by due to the Ottoman government’s policy of destroying

records or not keeping records at all. While the human cost is difficult to assess, property

records are much more accurate. During the Hamiidian Massacres, 47,016 homes and shops

20 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 55. 21 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 59. Softa – “Islamic theological student.” 22 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 110. Estimate by Ernst Jackh, German Foreign Ministry. 23 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 110. Estimate by Pierre Renouvin, French historian.

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were looted and another 12,627 were burned to the ground.24 645 churches and monasteries

were destroyed and another 508 were looted.25

As the massacres ended in 1896, most dhimmi felt the conflicting emotions of relief that

the violence was over, and terror that if the current regime remained, things could get even

worse. Few suspected that the men that would save them from Hamiid would end up doing far

worse.

The Rise of the Young Turks

Even before Sultan Abdul Hamiid II took office on August 31, 1876, reform movements

were being formed to deal with the ongoing problems surrounding Ottoman rulers. One of the

first formed in 1865, and within a year, they would be calling themselves the Young Ottomans.

They came together to oppose then Sultan Abdul Aziz26, who had himself perpetrated several of

the massacres against dhimmi prior to the ascension of Abdul Hamiid II. The Young Ottomans

were merely the first of many groups to form outside of the government, and in many cases,

outside of the empire itself. Within the government, there were progressive movements and

leaders as well. One such individual was Grand Vizier Midhat Pasha, who believed “in

instituting controls over the sultan, ‘especially as regarded the finances,’ and creating a

decentralized ‘national popular Assembly’ that would do away with ‘all distinctions of classes

and religions.’”27 His tenure would be short lived as Grand Vizier, Aziz fired him in 1872 but he

would continue to be involved in the progressive movement for years to come. He would be

24 Greene, Armenian Massacres, 279. 25 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 111. 26 1861 - 1876 27 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 136.

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dismissed as Grand Vizier a second time under Hamiid, shortly after the presentation of the new

constitution to the European Powers in January 1877.

The new constitution would not last long. The first session of the new parliament met in

March 1877 and discovered how bad the situation was within the empire. This revelation

quickly led to disagreements between the members of parliament and the Pashas, the ruling elite

of the empire, and the sultan. Within less than a year, Hamiid dismissed the new constitution

which, much to his chagrin, only succeeded in increasing the popularity of progressive, reformist

ideals.

This revitalized movement would see its next major development take place in the

Imperial Military Medical School in Constantinople in 1889. Like the Young Ottomans before

them, this group employed methods developed by secret societies, specifically the Carbonari of

Italy. They called themselves “Progress and Union” and, like the Young Ottomans, they would

publish several progressive newspapers and journals to disseminate their ideas. These included

La Jeune Turquie (The Young Turk), Hilal (Crescent), and Mechveret (Consultation), which

were all published outside of the empire by expatriates and exiles. One side effect of these

publications was that they eventually made the government aware of the progressives’

organization, which led to arrests and, ironically, to government posts for many of the members.

Feeling secure that the reformists had been dealt with, Hamiid settled into complacency

and resumed his old habits, paying little attention to the growing discord in his own house. Like

the Heirs Designate, Hamiid had most of his family in luxurious, but confined, accommodations.

One such family member was Damad Jelaleddin, a Pasha, who was also the grandson of former

sultan Mahmud II and brother-in-law to Abdul Hamiid. With his wife and children, Damad fled

the empire to Paris. From exile, he would continually denounce Hamiid with impunity, writing

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open letters denouncing his practices and organizing a congress to deal with the problematic

sultan. The congress especially helped ignite the reformist movement, and prompted the

formation of several other secret societies, including Vatan (Fatherland) in 1906 in Damascus

and the Society of Liberty in Salonika.

The Society of Liberty (SoL) grew most quickly within the ranks of the military, which

had degenerated a great deal under Hamiid’s paranoid leadership. Fearing an uprising within the

military, he kept them sparsely equipped and barely paid, and he let the Navy intentionally fall

into disrepair. By 1906, mutinies had become common, and the SoL had changed its name to

“The Committee of Union and Progress,” not to be confused with another group that had called

itself “Progress and Union.” Alongside the mutinies, citizens, Muslim and dhimmi alike, were

also revolting against corrupt local officials. In June 1908, officers from Salonika began to

disappear into the hills of Resne, to plan and prepare their revolution. Before they could mount

their offensive, a Young Turk assassinated Shemshi Pasha, a bureaucrat, in broad daylight in the

city of Manastir. The assassination prompted the 3rd Army to issue an open declaration

demanding the reinstatement of the constitution, and the 2nd Army declared their agreement with

that demand. The sultan dispatched troops to deal with the insurrection, but they too, were

sympathetic to the reformist cause. On July 21, 1908 the CUP delivered their demands to the

sultan via telegraph, and three days later, he acquiesced. He would retain his titles of Sultan and

Caliph, but would wield no political power. For the time being, it seemed as if the relatively

bloodless coup had succeeded and that the constitution would finally reign supreme, with

equality for all citizens, Muslim and dhimmi. In less than a year, the dhimmi would realize that

this was not the case.

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The Armenian Genocide

Shortly after the revolution, as the empire’s citizens were embracing the new reforms,

more trouble in the Balkans quickly set the tone for the months following the exchange of power.

Austria seized control of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and the neighboring territory of Bulgaria

declared its independence from the empire. To those now in power, this was evidence of the

continued problems that the Christian territories and their populations were causing for the

empire. One historian noted that the revolution had been “a ‘patriotic movement of Muslim

Turks, mostly soldiers, whose prime objective was to remove a fumbling and incompetent ruler

and replace him’ with a better government that could defend the empire against what threatened

it,”28 which to the new rulers included the Christian minorities. Interestingly, their first real

challenge to power would not come from Christians at all, but from Muslims.

The Mohammedan Union, created by hojas29 and softas, launched a counterrevolution

against the new constitutional government, demanding the repeal of the constitution and the

implementation of Shari’a law.30 In mid-April, several units from the 1st Army revolted, and

they, with the MU members, began rioting and looting the CUP’s newspaper offices. The chaos

resulted in the resignation of the sitting Grand Vizier, but news of the uprising soon reached

Salonika, where the fiercely loyal “Army of Deliverance” was quartered. They quickly

mobilized and marched to the capital to quell the insurrection. They quickly succeeded in

bringing the violence to an end, but the tensions and differences of opinion that it brought to light

would continue to haunt the new government for years to come.

28 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 145. 29 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 146. – Hoja – “religious teacher” 30 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 146. – Shari’a law – “sacred Muslim law of the Qu’ran”

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The CUP used the counterrevolution as an excuse to implement new laws designed to

consolidate its power and prevent further uprisings. Two in particular would be used during the

genocide to devastating effect. The first was the “Law of Associations,” which banned the

creation of political organizations based on ethnicity, and dismantled existing organizations that

fit that criteria. The second was the “Law for the Prevention of Brigandage and Sedition,” which

created special military units for ending “any forms of rebellion – even any perceived

rebellion.”31 Before these laws could even take effect, the first sign of trouble for the dhimmi

would appear in the city of Adana.

The new rulers were still trying to “fix” their corrupt government, and had installed a new

governor in Adana to replace the notoriously corrupt Bahri Pasha, but the new governor was not

much better. The day of the counterrevolution, a British dragoman named Athanasios Trypanis

sent word to the British vice-consul Doughty Wylie in nearby Mersin that several Armenians had

been killed, and that the situation was worsening. Wylie headed for Adana by train immediately,

but before he could even reach his destination, signs of the violence began to present themselves.

First, he noticed dead bodies lying by the train tracks, then passengers on his train began fleeing

armed Turks in the 2nd class car. Upon reaching Adana, he observed multiple incidents of Turks

slaying Armenians with impunity, with even the soldiers themselves participating. His appeal to

local authorities to intervene fell on unsympathetic ears. They claimed that the Armenians were

revolting, and that they were merely attempting to put an end to the insurrection, but the

incidents of looting and murder of unarmed civilians had convinced Wylie otherwise. After

several days of attempting to stop the killing, and receiving injuries himself, Wylie managed to

send word for a British warship to dock at Mersin and send troops to deescalate the situation.

31 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 147.

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The warship upset the Turks, who feared retaliation, and the fighting ceased, but not before over

two thousand Armenians had been killed.

In response to the situation in Adana the CUP, having recently ended the

counterrevolution, sent its own troops to Adana, but this only served to reignite the violence.

This time, the slaughter was more organized and brutal. The Armenians had disarmed as part of

the agreement to end the fighting days earlier, so they now could offer no resistance to the

massacre. The troops burned schools, killing the students by forcing them to burn to death or by

shooting them as they fled the flames. With the new troops carrying out the killing more

efficiently, the violence soon spread to the entire region. By the time it ended, 4823 houses in

Adana had been burned to the ground, two hundred surrounding villages had been destroyed, and

twenty-five thousand people, almost all Armenians, had been killed.32 The government would

make symbolic, but empty, attempts to punish those responsible, but it was immediately clear to

the dhimmi that their hopes of equality were never going to come to fruition.

Over the next four years, the situation stagnated. While there were no more major

massacres, the dhimmi’s situation did not improve. The government was still unstable, and

troubles in the Balkans had drawn their attention elsewhere. During this period, on January 26,

1913, a faction of the CUP, with nationalist tendencies (as opposed to the liberal tendencies of

the ruling CUP,) stormed the Sublime Porte, the seat of government, assassinated Nazim Pasha,

the Minister of War, and seized power. Six months later, in June, the Grand Vizier was

assassinated and the “Three Pashas” of the nationalist CUP ascended to the most powerful

positions in the government. Talaat Pasha, born Mehmed Talaat, became Minister of the

32 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 154.

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Interior. Enver Pasha, born Ismail Enver, became Minister of War. Jemal Pasha, born Ahmed

Jemal, became Minister of the Navy.

The newly empowered nationalist CUP faction quickly set to work implementing their

ideas of Turkification and Pan-Turkism with a variety of new policies and organizations. One

such organization was the Association for the Promotion of Turkish Strength (Turk Gucu

Cemiyeti). Its mandate was to train the youth of the empire to be the future of the Ottoman

military, something that at least one scholar compares to the Hitlerjugend (Hitler Youth).33

Another was the League for National Defense, which had a similar purpose as the APTS, but

with adults. Historian Jay Winter notes that these organizations helped create “‘the military,

political, and cultural space’ in which genocide also could occur.”34

Another tool that the CUP used to great effect was propaganda. Their Chief

Propogandist, Ziya Gokalp, had actually participated in the Hamiidian Massacres. He was

extremely prolific in his work, which espoused the idea that the empire could only regain its

former glory if it could be relieved of the various dhimmi within it. He also worked with others,

such as physicians Behaeddin Shakir, Mehmed Nazim, and Mehmed Reshid, to add legitimacy to

his claims. Reshid referred to Armenians as “dangerous microbes” and was recorded saying

“Isn’t it the duty of a doctor to destroy these microbes?”35 These notions would be frequently

used, and became a frequent justification for the treatment of dhimmi. Moreover, these

sentiments bely a deeper understanding of how the CUP and its sympathizers felt about the

dhimmi in the empire: they weren’t only lesser citizens, but lesser beings. Ethnic cleansing is

often characterized by the perpetrators describing their victims as lesser peoples, or sub-human,

33 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 163. 34 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 163. 35 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 164.

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but Gokalp and his compatriots took it a step further, implying that the dhimmi were not only far

below them in terms of evolutionary development, but that their presence was in fact a detriment

to the larger, more developed body of the empire. This comparison would be echoed later in an

anonymous letter to the Armenian press, signed only “Islam Young Turks”.

Another move that the Three Pashas made to militarize their empire was to form an

alliance with Germany, signing a secret treaty on August 2, 1914. The Ottoman army was in

desperate need of modernization, and the Germans were eager to help. One of the first things

that they did was a mass cleansing of the officer class. Enver Pasha dismissed, arrested, and

imprisoned eleven hundred officers, including high ranking generals, and replaced them with

loyal members of the CUP. Many of these new officers did not have the training or experience

for their new positions, so the German officers set to work training their Ottoman counterparts.

This lack of experience, both from the new officers and the Three Pashas, would hinder Ottoman

effectiveness in the coming War. The year before the Great War began, German officers became

a common sight in the empire. They held positions in the military and advised the government in

a variety of matters. One matter on which they did not agree, however, was jihad.

Within two weeks of the empire’s entrance into the war, its top cleric, the Sheikh-ul-

Islam, named Mustafa Hayri Bey, formally declared a state of jihad, which quickly led to

nationalist Muslims demonstrating their fervor in the streets. It was a moment that many of the

empire’s citizens had been waiting for, but their new allies were somewhat uneasy about it, even

though they were formally exempt from the jihad. While they were all fighting for their own

reasons, the Ottoman’s were very much in the war to protect their interests and regain territory

that had been lost over the past century. They did not see the Germans or their allies as

ideological peers, but rather as a means to an end. The Three Pashas all agreed that Europe had

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been exerting its influence in the empire for too long, and they saw the war as not only a chance

to redress that issue, but as an opportunity to finally solve the “Armenian Question”.

In the years leading up to the war, anti-Armenian rhetoric had dramatically increased.

Talaat Pasha in particular frequently spoke of his disdain for the Armenian Reform Agreement,

which had been intended to protect Armenians and other dhimmi from discriminatory practices

and violence. He was hardly alone in his sentiments. A series of anonymous letters, signed only

“Islam Young Turks,” were delivered to the press and contained ominous warnings for the

dhimmi. “The Turkish sword to date has cut down millions of gavurs, nor has it lost its intention

to cut down millions more hereafter. Know this: that the Turks have committed themselves, and

have vowed to subdue and to clean up the Armenian gavurs who have become tubercular

microbes for us.”36 This type of threat was becoming commonplace, and by the start of the war,

which for the Ottoman Empire was in November 1914, the government had formally dissolved

the ARA, less than a year after it had been implemented.

The onset of war in Europe provided the cover that the Young Turks were waiting for,

and by the spring of 1915, the answer to the Armenian Question was underway. Thanks to the

ARA and other reforms, Armenians could now hold positions in the military, but most of them

had been relegated to labor details. These units were massacred en masse at the end of 1915,

eliminating a major number of the “able bodied men” that could have stood up to the genocide.

In the cities and towns of the empire, the Turks rounded up and summarily executed the men,

while they forcibly deported women, children, and less able-bodied, justifying their actions with

the Temporary Law of Deportation of May 27, 1915. The deportations were mostly done on

36 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 173.

20

foot, and many of the casualties were quite literally walked to death. Others the Turks drowned

in rivers and lakes along the marching routes, or simply left to die along the road or even in the

desert. Towns such as Aleppo “were both killing stations and refugee spots, where Armenians

who had survived long death marches from the north lived in concentration camps, in makeshift

tents, or on the desert ground, hoping to stay alive.”37 Others still the Turks forced into caves

and suffocated using brush fires.

There was little that the Armenians could do to stop the killings, as the CUP had

implemented policies to limit the backlash of their actions. Perhaps the most important of these

policies was the declaration that Armenians surrender their arms to their local officials. Many

had already disarmed, so when the officials came to collect and found nothing, they assumed that

they were hiding the weapons, and arrested or killed the “offenders.” The government created

organized killing squads, made up of convicts, and first tested them on April 8, 1915 in a “trial

run” in the town of Zeitun. A week later, the Armenians of Van, an historic hearth city for

Armenia, resisted the efforts of the local governor to conscript them, and a siege took place. To

prevent organized resistance, 250 intellectuals and leaders were arrested in Constantinople and

executed. According to Peter Balakian, scholars estimate that in 1915 alone, the Ottoman

Empire killed between eight hundred thousand and one million Armenians.38 The following

year, another two hundred thousand were killed. The end of the war did not see the end of the

killing however. Marash in 1920 and Smyrna in 1922 saw further massacres take place. In total,

the death toll is estimated at approximately one and a half million Armenians.

37 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 176. 38 Balakian, Burning Tigris, 179.

21

The Great Debate: Religion or Politics?

At various points throughout the years of both the Hamiidian Massacres and the

Armenian Genocide that officials and perpetrators gave both political and religious justifications.

In official reports and orders, religion is never mentioned, instead referring to insurgents, rebels,

or malcontents, despite evidence from extra-governmental sources that indicate that the victims

of these atrocities never displayed such tendencies outside of self-defense efforts once violence

had already been initiated. This issue is further compounded by the lack of remaining official

communiques between Ottoman officials during the time. It is evident that the CUP made

extreme efforts to cover their tracks, but some documentation does still exists. Taner Akcam

devotes an entire chapter of his book to the documentation and analysis of the few documents

that could be obtained39. The Armenian Genocide Museum – Institute has endeavored to do the

same. Despite the efforts of these scholars, very little remains. It is also evident that given the

involvement of softas and hojas, religion was absolutely a factor in defining who the intended

victims of these actions would be: the dhimmi. Previous efforts throughout the 19th century also

exclusively targeted Christians, regardless of their ethnic background. Similarly, state-sponsored

propaganda and the anonymous letters specifically pointed to the gavur as the source of the

empire’s problems, and the target of their solution to those problems. These seemingly

contradictory motivations appear to demonstrate a variety of reasons for these attacks, with the

government having one motive and many citizen participants having another. The research,

however, does not bear this out.

39 Taner Akcam, The Young Turks’ Crime Against Humanity: The Armenian Genocide and Ethnic Cleansing in the Ottoman Empire (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2012), 203 - 226

22

One might argue that the Three Pashas were a solely political entity, citing their

opposition to the implementation of Shari’a Law as evidence. This assertion could be countered

by noting the declaration of jihad at the start of the war by the religious leader of the empire. So,

what then is the truth? The truth seems to be, that for the Three Pashas and their Muslim

subjects, political life and religious life were one and the same. They honored their God by

honoring their empire.

It is the tendency and desire of scholars to clearly define and explain that which they are

examining, arguably because without these things, they are less authentic or valid. In the real

world, however, things are rarely so easily black and white. The truth of the matter seems to be a

muddled one. Like the Jews of Nazi Germany decades later, the Armenians were a hardworking

and generally affluent community, often drawing the ire and jealousy of their Muslim neighbors.

Add to this the fact that they were Christians living, and prospering, in a mostly Muslim empire,

and the seeds for hatred began to sprout. Furthermore, the decline of the empire over the past

century had left the Muslim population searching for a scapegoat, and who makes a better

scapegoat than those who are different from the majority? Combine these factors with the fear of

further loss of territory to Europe and Russia, and the political instability of the empire and you

end up with a richly fertilized garden, needing only the opportunity to be harvested. That

opportunity would present itself in the first World War. To a homicide investigator, these factors

form the trifecta of means, motive, and opportunity. The primary difference between a homicide

and a genocide, however, is not merely one of numbers. A “perfect” murder is carried out by

one or several people, and targets one or more victims, but it would usually transpire over a

relatively short period of time. A genocide, on the other hand, requires a vast number of

individuals working under the leadership of others to coordinate their campaign of terror against

23

their victims, and almost always takes place over not only a lengthy period of time, but over a

vast area as well.

To this day, the Republic of Turkey will not acknowledge these events officially, nor will

the government of the United States. The reasoning is generally that if the United States did

officially acknowledge these events, they would lose Turkey as an ally. This would present

multiple problems since Turkey is a member of NATO and the U.S. presence within Turkey

allows NATO access to Iraq and Syria directly, both battlefields in the war against terror,

specifically ISIS. Unofficially, many governments around the world do acknowledge these

events, but due to the Young Turks thoroughness in destroying their records, very little remains

in terms of official evidence of the government sponsorship of the Armenian Genocide. Despite

the fact that it would serve as a blueprint for the Nazis and their campaign against the Jews, the

Armenian Genocide is largely forgotten by the world as a whole. This is why to many scholars it

is called the Forgotten Genocide, but to its survivors, it is called The Great Calamity.

24

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