Another example of Trump's inhumanity: the refusal to allow the Armenian genocide resolution

We should have learned by now that there is little in the way of humanity and simple human decency in Donald Trump and his familiars. Doctors on the border have been denied access to children detained in Trump’s concentration camps in order provide flu vaccinations, after three children died of the flu this year. No doubt the “guidance” to deny these vaccinations was given by Stephen Miller and Ken Cuccinelli. But the Trump administration’s efforts to block a bi-partisan resolution condemning the Armenian genocide is another level of low. On the “request” of Trump, both Sen. Lyndsey Graham and Sen. David Perdue blocked the resolution in the Senate that had been passed in the House. Resolutions condemning human rights abuses in Turkey have also been similarly blocked. Ostensibly, this was done  not to “embarrass” or “anger” Turkish president Recep Erdogan, and “interfere” with “sensitive” negotiations meant to bring Erdogan in line with NATO thinking and strategy, which has been an ongoing problem. 

But this continuing denial and failure to hold Turkey to account for past misdeeds needs to be truthfully confronted. First some background. Armenians as a historical entity appeared in Greek literature around the 7^th century BC. At its largest territorial extent, this people occupied a land area about the size of modern Turkey. Save for  brief periods when it was an autonomous client state of competing powers in the region, for much of its history it was a “province” or vassal state controlled by the Persians, Macedonians, Romans, Byzantines, Arabs and various Turk groups. Armenians were converted to Christianity in the 3^rd century AD, and largely remained so during its occupation by Muslim forces. During the Byzantine period a few of its emperors were believed to be of Armenian heritage, most notably Heraclius.

However, the Armenians were deemed a “perverse and unruly” people difficult to control first by the Byzantines and Persians, and then by the Arabs and Turks. Efforts were made to scatter the population, as had occurred with the Jews. Under the rule of Byzantine Emperor Basil II, the Armenian state largely ceased to exist. After the Battle of Manzikert in which the Byzantine army was virtually destroyed by the Seljuq Turks in 1071, Turkish/Muslim rule dominated Armenian history, with the much of the population relocating to other parts of the Caucasus region. However, with onset of the Ottoman conquest, they like most Christian elements within that empire, were largely allowed to exist without disruption so long as they did not cause “trouble.” 

But that changed with the rise of the Turkish revolutionary group known as the “Young Turks” in the late 19^th century. Although they advocated for the modernization of the empire under a constitution, its nationalist tendencies were the cause for alarm by non-Muslim ethnicities like the Armenians in the east and the Greeks in the west. Massacres of Armenians had occurred before the “official” genocide, mainly under the cover of the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-78. Although Britain and France put pressure on the Turks to stop continuing oppression of Christian minorities, and despite “reforms” being instituted, oppression by local Muslims who treated Christians as second-class citizens who were not (among other things) permitted to give evidence against Muslims in the courts continued. 

But with the rise of Turkish nationalists, the situation became far worse for the Christian minority, and for the Armenians in particular, since the Greek minority did have a “homeland” to return to. The “best” estimate of the pre-World War I population of Armenians in Anatolia (the Asian territory of modern-day Turkey) was about 1.8 million, about 10 percent of the population of Anatolia. Turkish nationalists who saw an opportunity to drive out Christian populations claimed that Armenians were a dangerous “threat” and secretly “allied” with the enemies of the Ottoman Empire. Beginning in 1914 Armenians were driven out of their homelands and force-marched into non-Turkish parts of the Ottoman Empire. The “best” estimate is that 1/3^rd—or 600,000—of Armenians living in Turkey either died on these marches or were deliberately massacred. One can liken this to the “Trail of Tears” forced march of Cherokee Indians, save that for the Armenians in was much more brutal and deadly. Even Armenians who voluntarily converted to Islam were not spared. 

A German general who witnessed the events noted the "total extermination of the Armenians…The aim of Turkish policy is, as I have reiterated, the taking of possession of Armenian districts and the extermination of the Armenians. Talaat's government wants to destroy all Armenians, not just in Turkey, but also outside Turkey. On the basis of all the reports and news coming to me here in Tiflis there hardly can be any doubt that the Turks systematically are aiming at the extermination of the few hundred thousand Armenians whom they left alive until now.”

Although the victorious allies forced the Ottoman government to hold courts-martial of those responsible for the war crime of genocide, and a few were convicted, the only actual punishment meted out were by Armenian vigilantes. The Turkish government that arose in Ankara. that would eventually force the end of the sultanate, denied claims of genocide, and all those detained on war crimes charges were eventually freed without charge. 

The Turks have from the beginning denied that genocide occurred, although it has been “admitted” that “some” Armenians died during “relocation” efforts. The reasons for this denial range from the Turkish fear that admitting to the forced removal and killing of Armenians would open them up to demands of compensation by the victims, to simply not wanting to “upset” the Turks. Some have claimed that atrocities occurred on “both sides,” or that while there were massacres of Armenians, they were not part of an “official” policy. The Armenians did not have a military or police force to engage in force against the Turks, but some “scholars”—both Turkish and American—insist that the Armenians put up an “armed resistance.” Most genocide deniers also cite a far lower death toll than is usually given by historians. It also should be pointed out that Turkish “relations” with its Kurdish minority should be regarded in the same light as this attitude toward the Armenians.

The vast majority of historians and scholars outside of Turkey and the Muslim world have no doubts that a deliberate genocide of the Armenians occurred. That the U.S. continues to be one of the few countries which has not “officially” recognized that genocide of Armenians. Israel also does not officially recognize the genocide, not because it doesn’t like the “competition”—the Armenian genocide predated that of the Holocaust—but because since it is one of the few Muslim countries it has diplomatic relations with, it prefers not to antagonize the Turkish government. But the UK and France, among other European countries like Switzerland for which it is a crime to deny the genocide, have “officially” recognized the genocide without any noticeable effect on their relationship with Turkey.

Why the U.S. is “worried” about “antagonizing” a country that has become increasingly autocratic and anti-democratic, and openly accepts military assistance from Russia simply makes no sense. The truth is the truth. If Turkey can’t face it, like Germany has its own past, then that is their problem they must face.