What were the Armenians like before the genocide? Armenian genocide in Turkey: a brief historical overview

§ 1. Beginning of the First World War. Progress of military operations on the Caucasian front

On August 1, 1914, the First World War began. The war was fought between coalitions: the Entente (England, France, Russia) and the Triple Alliance (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Turkey) for the redistribution of spheres of influence in the world. Most states of the world took part in the war, voluntarily or forcedly, which is why the war got its name.

During the war, Ottoman Turkey sought to implement the “Pan-Turkism” program - to annex territories inhabited by Turkic peoples, including Transcaucasia, the southern regions of Russia and Central Asia to Altai. In turn, Russia sought to annex the territory of Western Armenia, seize the Bosporus and Dardanelles straits and access the Mediterranean Sea. Fighting between the two coalitions took place on many fronts in Europe, Asia and Africa.

On the Caucasian front, the Turks concentrated an army of 300 thousand, led by Minister of War Enver. In October 1914, Turkish troops launched an offensive and managed to capture some border territories, and also invaded the western regions of Iran. In the winter months, during the battles near Sarykamysh, Russian troops defeated superior Turkish forces and drove them out of Iran. During 1915, military operations continued with varying success. At the beginning of 1916, Russian troops launched a large-scale offensive and, having defeated the enemy, captured Bayazet, Mush, Alashkert, the large city of Erzurum and an important port on the Black Sea coast of Trapizon. During 1917, there were no active military operations on the Caucasian Front. The demoralized Turkish troops did not attempt to launch a new offensive, and the February and October revolutions of 1917 in Russia and changes in government did not give the Russian command the opportunity to develop an offensive. On December 5, 1917, a truce was concluded between the Russian and Turkish commands.

§ 2. Armenian volunteer movement. Armenian battalions

The Armenian people took an active part in the First World War on the side of the Entente countries. In Russia, about 200 thousand Armenians were drafted into the army. More than 50,000 Armenians fought in the armies of other countries. Since the aggressive plans of tsarism coincided with the desire of the Armenian people to liberate the territories of Western Armenia from the Turkish yoke, Armenian political parties conducted active propaganda for the organization of volunteer detachments with a total number of about 10 thousand people.

The first detachment was commanded by the outstanding leader of the liberation movement, national hero Andranik Ozanyan, who later received the rank of general of the Russian army. The commanders of other detachments were Dro, Hamazasp, Keri, Vardan, Arshak Dzhanpoladyan, Hovsep Argutyan and others. The commander of the VI detachment subsequently became Gayk Bzhshkyan - Guy, a later famous commander of the Red Army. Armenians - volunteers from various regions of Russia and even from other countries - signed up for the detachments. Armenian troops showed courage and participated in all major battles for the liberation of Western Armenia.

The tsarist government initially encouraged the volunteer movement of the Armenians in every possible way, until the defeat of the Turkish armies became obvious. Fearing that the Armenian detachments could serve as the basis for a national army, the command of the Caucasian Front in the summer of 1916 reorganized the volunteer detachments into the 5th rifle battalion of the Russian army.

§ 3. Armenian genocide of 1915 in the Ottoman Empire

In 1915-1918 The Young Turk government of Turkey planned and carried out the genocide of the Armenian population in the Ottoman Empire. As a result of the forced eviction of Armenians from their historical homeland and massacres, 1.5 million people died.

Back in 1911 in Thessaloniki, at a secret meeting of the Young Turk party, it was decided to Turkify all subjects of the Muslim faith, and destroy all Christians. With the outbreak of World War I, the Young Turk government decided to take advantage of the favorable international situation and carry out its long-planned plans.

The genocide was carried out according to a specific plan. Firstly, men liable for military service were drafted into the army in order to deprive the Armenian population of the possibility of resistance. They were used as work units and were gradually destroyed. Secondly, the Armenian intelligentsia, which could organize and lead the resistance of the Armenian population, was destroyed. In March-April 1915, more than 600 people were arrested: parliament members Onik Vramyan and Grigor Zokhrap, writers Varuzhan, Siamanto, Ruben Sevak, composer and musicologist Komitas. On the way to their place of exile, they were subjected to insults and humiliation. Many of them died along the way, and the survivors were subsequently brutally murdered. On April 24, 1915, the Young Turk authorities executed 20 Armenian political prisoners. An eyewitness to these atrocities, the famous composer Komitas lost his mind.

After this, the Young Turk authorities began to evict and exterminate already defenseless children, old people and women. All property of the Armenians was plundered. On the way to the place of exile, the Armenians were subjected to new atrocities: the weak were killed, women were raped or kidnapped for harems, children died from hunger and thirst. Of the total number of exiled Armenians, barely a tenth reached the place of exile - the Der-el-Zor desert in Mesopotamia. Of the 2.5 million Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire, 1.5 million were destroyed, and the rest scattered throughout the world.

Part of the Armenian population was able to escape thanks to the help of Russian troops and, abandoning everything, fled from their homes to the borders of the Russian Empire. Some Armenian refugees found salvation in Arab countries, Iran and other countries. Many of them, after the defeat of the Turkish troops, returned to their homeland, but were subjected to new atrocities and destruction. About 200 thousand Armenians were forcibly Turkified. Many thousands of Armenian orphans were rescued by American charitable and missionary organizations operating in the Middle East.

After the defeat in the war and the flight of the Young Turk leaders, the new government of Ottoman Turkey in 1920 conducted an investigation into the crimes of the previous government. For planning and carrying out the Armenian genocide, the military tribunal in Constantinople convicted and sentenced to death in absentia Taleat (Prime Minister), Enver (Minister of War), Cemal (Minister of Internal Affairs) and Behaeddin Shakir (Secretary of the Central Committee of the Young Turks Party). Their sentence was carried out by Armenian avengers.

The Young Turk leaders fled Turkey after their defeat in the war and found refuge in Germany and other countries. But they failed to escape vengeance.

Soghomon Tehlirian shot Taleat on March 15, 1921 in Berlin. The German court, having examined the case, acquitted Tehlirian.

Petros Ter-Petrosyan and Artashes Gevorkyan killed Dzhemal in Tiflis on July 25, 1922.

Arshavir Shikaryan and Aram Yerkanyan shot Behaeddin Shakir on April 17, 1922 in Berlin.

Enver was killed in August 1922 in Central Asia.

§ 4. Heroic self-defense of the Armenian population

During the genocide of 1915, the Armenian population of some regions, through heroic self-defense, was able to escape or die with honor - with arms in hand.

For more than a month, the residents of the city of Van and nearby villages heroically defended themselves against regular Turkish troops. Self-defense was led by Armenak Yekaryan, Aram Manukyan, Panos Terlemazyan and others. All Armenian political parties acted in concert. They were saved from final death by the Russian army's offensive on Van in May 1915. Due to the forced retreat of Russian troops, 200 thousand residents of the Van vilayet were also forced to leave their homeland along with Russian troops in order to escape new massacres.

The highlanders of Sasun defended themselves against regular Turkish troops for almost a year. The siege ring gradually tightened, and most of the population was slaughtered. The entry of the Russian army into Mush in February 1916 saved the people of Sasun from final destruction. Of the 50 thousand population of Sasun, about a tenth was saved, and they were forced to leave their homeland and move within the Russian Empire.

The Armenian population of the town of Shapin-Garaisar, having received an order to relocate, took up arms and fortified themselves in a nearby dilapidated fortress. For 27 days, the Armenians repelled attacks by regular Turkish forces. When food and ammunition were already running out, it was decided to try to break out of the encirclement. About a thousand people were saved. Those who remained were brutally killed.

The defenders of Musa-Lera showed an example of heroic self-defense. Having received an order to evict, the 5 thousand Armenian population of seven villages in the Suetia region (on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea, near Antioch) decided to defend themselves and fortified themselves on Mount Musa. Self-defense was led by Tigran Andreasyan and others. For a month and a half there were unequal battles with Turkish troops armed with artillery. The French cruiser Guichen noticed an Armenian call for help, and on September 10, 1915, the remaining 4,058 Armenians were transported to Egypt on French and English ships. The story of this heroic self-defense is described in the novel “40 Days of Musa Dagh” by the Austrian writer Franz Werfel.

The last source of heroism was the self-defense of the population of the Armenian quarter of the city of Edesia, which lasted from September 29 to November 15, 1915. All the men died with weapons in their hands, and the surviving 15 thousand women and children were exiled by the Young Turk authorities to the deserts of Mesopotamia.

Foreigners who witnessed the genocide of 1915-1916 condemned this crime and left descriptions of the atrocities carried out by the Young Turk authorities against the Armenian population. They also refuted the false accusations of the Turkish authorities about the alleged uprising of the Armenians. Johann Lepsius, Anatole France, Henry Morgenthau, Maxim Gorky, Valery Bryusov and many others raised their voices against the first genocide in the history of the 20th century and the atrocities taking place. Nowadays, the parliaments of many countries have already recognized and condemned the genocide of the Armenian people committed by the Young Turks.

§ 5. Consequences of genocide

During the Genocide of 1915, the Armenian population in their historical homeland was barbarously exterminated. Responsibility for the Genocide of the Armenian population lies with the leaders of the Young Turks party. Turkish Prime Minister Taleat subsequently cynically declared that the “Armenian Question” no longer existed, since there were no more Armenians, and that he had done more in three months to resolve the “Armenian Question” than Sultan Abdul Hamid had done in 30 years of his reign. .

Kurdish tribes also actively participated in the extermination of the Armenian population, trying to seize Armenian territories and plunder the property of the Armenians. The German government and command are also responsible for the Armenian genocide. Many German officers commanded Turkish units that took part in the genocide. The Entente powers are also to blame for what happened. They did nothing to stop the mass extermination of the Armenian population by the Young Turk authorities.

During the genocide, more than 2 thousand Armenian villages, the same number of churches and monasteries, and Armenian neighborhoods in more than 60 cities were destroyed. The Young Turk government appropriated the valuables and deposits plundered from the Armenian population.

After the Genocide of 1915, there was practically no Armenian population left in Western Armenia.

§ 6. Culture of Armenia at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries

Before the Genocide of 1915, Armenian culture experienced significant growth. This was associated with the rise of the liberation movement, the awakening of national self-awareness, and the development of capitalist relations both in Armenia itself and in those countries where a significant number of the Armenian population lived compactly. The division of Armenia into two parts - Western and Eastern - was reflected in the development of two independent directions in Armenian culture: Western Armenian and Eastern Armenian. The major centers of Armenian culture were Moscow, St. Petersburg, Tiflis, Baku, Constantinople, Izmir, Venice, Paris and other cities, where a significant part of the Armenian intelligentsia was concentrated.

Armenian educational institutions made a huge contribution to the development of Armenian culture. In Eastern Armenia, in the urban centers of Transcaucasia and the North Caucasus and in some cities of Russia (Rostov-on-Don, Astrakhan) at the beginning of the 20th century, there were about 300 Armenian schools, male and female gymnasiums. In some rural areas there were primary schools where they taught reading, writing and arithmetic, as well as the Russian language.

About 400 Armenian schools of various levels operated in the cities of Western Armenia and large cities of the Ottoman Empire. Armenian schools did not receive any state subsidies either in the Russian Empire, much less in Ottoman Turkey. These schools existed thanks to the material support of the Armenian Apostolic Church, various public organizations and individual philanthropists. The most famous among Armenian educational institutions were the Nersisyan school in Tiflis, the Gevorkian theological seminary in Etchmiadzin, the Murad-Raphaelian school in Venice and the Lazarus Institute in Moscow.

The development of education greatly contributed to the further development of Armenian periodicals. At the beginning of the 20th century, about 300 Armenian newspapers and magazines of various political trends were published. Some of them were published by Armenian national parties, such as: “Droshak”, “Hnchak”, “Proletariat”, etc. In addition, newspapers and magazines of socio-political and cultural orientation were published.

The main centers of Armenian periodicals at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries were Constantinople and Tiflis. The most popular newspapers published in Tiflis were the newspaper “Mshak” (ed. G. Artsruni), the magazine “Murch” (ed. Av. Arashanyants), in Constantinople - the newspaper “Megu” (ed. Harutyun Svachyan), the newspaper “Masis” (ed. Karapet Utujyan). Stepanos Nazaryants published the magazine “Hysisapail” (Northern Lights) in Moscow.

At the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, Armenian literature experienced rapid flowering. A galaxy of talented poets and novelists appeared in both Eastern and Western Armenia. The main motives of their creativity were patriotism and the dream of seeing their homeland united and free. It is no coincidence that many of the Armenian writers in their work turned to the heroic pages of the rich Armenian history, as an example for inspiration in the struggle for the unification and independence of the country. Thanks to their creativity, two independent literary languages ​​took shape: Eastern Armenian and Western Armenian. Poets Rafael Patkanyan, Hovhannes Hovhannisyan, Vahan Teryan, prose poets Avetik Isahakyan, Ghazaros Aghayan, Perch Proshyan, playwright Gabriel Sundukyan, novelists Nardos, Muratsan and others wrote in Eastern Armenian. Poets Petros Duryan, Misak Metsarents, Siamanto, Daniel Varudan, poet, prose writer and playwright Levon Shant, short story writer Grigor Zokhrap, great satirist Hakob Paronyan and others wrote their works in Western Armenian.

An indelible mark on Armenian literature of this period was left by the prose poet Hovhannes Tumanyan and the novelist Raffi.

In his work, O. Tumanyan reworked many folk legends and traditions, glorified national traditions, life and customs of the people. His most famous works are the poems “Anush”, “Maro”, the legends “Akhtmar”, “The Fall of Tmkaberd” and others.

Raffi is known as the author of the historical novels “Samvel”, “Jalaladdin”, “Hent” and others. His novel “Kaytser” (Sparks) enjoyed great success among his contemporaries, where the call was clearly heard for the Armenian people to stand up in the fight for the liberation of their homeland, not really hoping for help from powers.

The social sciences have made significant progress. Professor of the Lazarev Institute Mkrtich Emin published ancient Armenian sources in Russian translation. These same sources in French translation were published in Paris at the expense of the famous Armenian philanthropist, Prime Minister of Egypt Nubar Pasha. A member of the Mkhitarist congregation, Father Ghevond Alishan, wrote major works on the history of Armenia, gave a detailed list and description of the surviving historical monuments, many of which were subsequently destroyed. Grigor Khalatyan was the first to publish a complete history of Armenia in Russian. Garegin Srvandztyan, traveling through the regions of Western and Eastern Armenia, collected enormous treasures of Armenian folklore. He has the honor of discovering the recording and the first edition of the text of the Armenian medieval epic “Sasuntsi David”. The famous scientist Manuk Abeghyan conducted research in the field of folklore and ancient Armenian literature. The famous philologist and linguist Hrachya Acharyan studied the vocabulary of the Armenian language and made comparisons and comparisons of the Armenian language with other Indo-European languages.

The famous historian Nikolai Adonts in 1909, wrote and published in Russian a study on the history of medieval Armenia and Armenian-Byzantine relations. His major work, “Armenia in the Age of Justinian,” published in 1909, has not lost its significance to this day. The famous historian and philologist Leo (Arakel Babakhanyan) wrote works on various issues of Armenian history and literature, and also collected and published documents related to the “Armenian Question”.

Armenian musical art developed. The creativity of folk gusans was raised to new heights by gusan Jivani, gusan Sheram and others. Armenian composers who received a classical education appeared on the stage. Tigran Chukhajyan wrote the first Armenian opera “Arshak the Second”. Composer Armen Tigranyan wrote the opera “Anush” on the theme of the poem of the same name by Hovhannes Tumanyan. The famous composer, musicologist Komitas initiated the scientific study of folk musical folklore, recorded the music and words of 3 thousand folk songs. Komitas gave concerts and lectures in many European countries, introducing Europeans to the original Armenian folk musical art.

The end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries were also marked by the further development of Armenian painting. The famous painter was the famous marine painter Hovhannes Aivazovsky (1817-1900). He lived and worked in Feodosia (in Crimea), and most of his works are devoted to marine themes. His most famous paintings are “The Ninth Wave”, “Noah Descends from Mount Ararat”, “Lake Sevan”, “Massacre of Armenians in Trapizon in 1895” and etc.

Outstanding painters were Gevorg Bashinjagyan, Panos Terlemezyan, Vardges Surenyants.

Vardges Surenyants, in addition to easel painting, was also engaged in mural painting; he painted many Armenian churches in different cities of Russia. His most famous paintings are “Shamiram and Ara the Beautiful” and “Salome”. A copy of his painting “The Armenian Madonna” today adorns the new cathedral in Yerevan. Forward

Genocide(from Greek genos - clan, tribe and Latin caedo - I kill), an international crime expressed in actions committed with the aim of destroying, in whole or in part, any national, ethnic, racial or religious group.

Actions qualified by the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide of 1948 as acts of Genocide have been committed repeatedly in human history since ancient times, especially during wars of extermination and devastating invasions and campaigns of conquerors, internal ethnic and religious clashes, during the period of partition peace and the formation of colonial empires of European powers, in the process of a fierce struggle for the redistribution of the divided world, which led to two world wars and in the colonial wars after the Second World War of 1939 - 1945.

However, the term "genocide" was first introduced into use in the early 30s. XX century by a Polish lawyer, a Jew by origin, Rafael Lemkin, and after the Second World War received international legal status as a concept defining the gravest crime against humanity. By Genocide, R Lemkin meant the massacre of Armenians in Turkey during the First World War (1914 - 1918), and then the extermination of Jews in Nazi Germany in the period preceding the Second World War, and in the Nazi-occupied countries of Europe during the war.

The first genocide of the 20th century is considered to be the extermination of more than 1.5 million Armenians during 1915 - 1923. in Western Armenia and other parts of the Ottoman Empire, organized and systematically carried out by the Young Turk rulers.

The Armenian Genocide should also include the massacres of the Armenian population in Eastern Armenia and the Transcaucasus as a whole, committed by the Turks who invaded Transcaucasia in 1918, and by the Kemalists during the aggression against the Armenian Republic in September - December 1920, as well as the pogroms of Armenians organized by the Musavatists in Baku and Shushi in 1918 and 1920 respectively. Taking into account those who died as a result of periodic pogroms of Armenians carried out by the Turkish authorities, starting from the end of the 19th century, the number of victims of the Armenian Genocide exceeds 2 million.

The Armenian Genocide 1915 - 1916 - mass extermination and deportation of the Armenian population of Western Armenia, Cilicia and other provinces of the Ottoman Empire, carried out by the ruling circles of Turkey during the First World War (1914 - 1918). The policy of genocide against the Armenians was determined by a number of factors.

The leading importance among them was the ideology of Pan-Islamism and Pan-Turkism, which from the middle of the 19th century. professed by the ruling circles of the Ottoman Empire. The militant ideology of pan-Islamism was characterized by intolerance towards non-Muslims, preached outright chauvinism, and called for the Turkification of all non-Turkish peoples. Entering the war, the Young Turk government of the Ottoman Empire made far-reaching plans for the creation of “Great Turan”. These plans meant the annexation of Transcaucasia, the North Caucasus, Crimea, the Volga region, and Central Asia to the empire.

On the way to this goal, the aggressors had to put an end to, first of all, the Armenian people, who opposed the aggressive plans of the Pan-Turkists. The Young Turks began to develop plans for the destruction of the Armenian population even before the start of the World War. The decisions of the Union and Progress party congress, held in October 1911 in Thessaloniki, contained a demand for the Turkification of the non-Turkish peoples of the empire.

At the beginning of 1914, a special order was sent to local authorities regarding the measures that were to be taken against the Armenians. The fact that the order was sent out before the start of the war irrefutably indicates that the extermination of the Armenians was a planned action, not at all determined by a specific military situation. The leadership of the Unity and Progress party has repeatedly discussed the issue of mass deportation and massacre of the Armenian population.

In October 1914, at a meeting chaired by the Minister of Internal Affairs Talaat, a special body was formed - the Executive Committee of Three, which was tasked with organizing the extermination of the Armenian population; it included the leaders of the Young Turks Nazim, Behaetdin Shakir and Shukri. When plotting a monstrous crime, the leaders of the Young Turks took into account that the war provided an opportunity to carry it out. Nazim directly stated that such an opportunity may no longer exist, “the intervention of the great powers and the protest of the newspapers will not have any consequences, since they will be faced with a fait accompli, and thereby the issue will be resolved... Our actions must be directed to exterminate the Armenians so that not a single one of them remains alive."

By undertaking the destruction of the Armenian population, the ruling circles of Turkey intended to achieve several goals:

• the elimination of the Armenian Question, which would put an end to the intervention of European powers;
• the Turks would get rid of economic competition, all the property of the Armenian people would pass into their hands;
• the elimination of the Armenian people will help pave the way for the conquest of the Caucasus, for the achievement of the great ideal of Turanism.

The executive committee of the three received broad powers, weapons, and money. The authorities organized special detachments “Teshkilati and Makhsuse”, consisting mainly of criminals released from prisons and other criminal elements, who were supposed to take part in the mass extermination of Armenians.

From the very first days of the war, rabid anti-Armenian propaganda unfolded in Turkey. The Turkish people were told that Armenians did not want to serve in the Turkish army, that they were ready to cooperate with the enemy. Fabrications were spread about the mass desertion of Armenians from the Turkish army, about uprisings of Armenians that threatened the rear of the Turkish troops, etc. Anti-Armenian propaganda especially intensified after the first serious defeats of the Turkish troops on the Caucasian front. In February 1915, Minister of War Enver gave the order to exterminate the Armenians serving in the Turkish army (at the beginning of the war, about 60 thousand Armenians aged 18-45 years were drafted into the Turkish army, i.e. the most combat-ready part of the male population). This order was carried out with unprecedented cruelty.

On the night of April 24, 1915, representatives of the Constantinople police department burst into the homes of the most prominent Armenians in the capital and arrested them. Over the next few days, eight hundred people - writers, poets, journalists, politicians, doctors, lawyers, lawyers, scientists, teachers, priests, educators, artists - were sent to the central prison.

Two months later, on June 15, 1915, 20 Armenian intellectuals, members of the Hunchak party, were executed in one of the squares of the capital, who were charged with trumped-up charges of organizing terror against the authorities and seeking to create an autonomous Armenia.

The same thing happened in all vilayets (regions): within a few days, thousands of people were arrested, including all famous cultural figures, politicians, and intellectuals. The deportation to the desert regions of the Empire was planned in advance. And this was a deliberate deception: as soon as people moved away from their homes, they were mercilessly killed by those who were supposed to accompany them and ensure their safety. The Armenians who worked in government bodies were fired one after another; all military doctors were thrown into prison.
The great powers were completely drawn into the global confrontation, and they put their geopolitical interests above the fate of two million Armenians...

From May - June 1915, mass deportation and massacre of the Armenian population of Western Armenia (vilayets of Van, Erzurum, Bitlis, Kharberd, Sebastia, Diyarbekir), Cilicia, Western Anatolia and other areas began. The ongoing deportation of the Armenian population in fact pursued the goal of its destruction. The US Ambassador to Turkey, G. Morgenthau, noted: “The true purpose of the deportations was robbery and destruction; this is truly a new method of massacre. When the Turkish authorities ordered these expulsions, they were actually passing a death sentence on an entire nation.”

The real goals of the deportation were also known to Germany, Turkey's ally. In June 1915, the German Ambassador to Turkey Wangenheim reported to his government that if at first the expulsion of the Armenian population was limited to provinces close to the Caucasian front, now the Turkish authorities extended these actions to those parts of the country that were not under threat of enemy invasion. These actions, the ambassador concluded, the ways in which the expulsion is carried out indicate that the Turkish government has as its goal the destruction of the Armenian nation in the Turkish state. The same assessment of the deportation was contained in messages from German consuls from the vilayets of Turkey. In July 1915, the German vice-consul in Samsun reported that the deportation carried out in the vilayets of Anatolia was aimed at either destroying or converting the entire Armenian people to Islam. The German consul in Trebizond at the same time reported on the deportation of Armenians in this vilayet and noted that the Young Turks intended to put an end to the Armenian Question in this way.

The Armenians who were removed from their places of permanent residence were brought into caravans that headed deep into the empire, to Mesopotamia and Syria, where special camps were created for them. Armenians were destroyed both in their places of residence and on the way to exile; their caravans were attacked by Turkish rabble, Kurdish bandits eager for prey. As a result, a small part of the deported Armenians reached their destinations. But even those who reached the deserts of Mesopotamia were not safe; There are known cases when deported Armenians were taken out of the camps and slaughtered by the thousands in the desert. The lack of basic sanitary conditions, hunger, and epidemics caused the death of hundreds of thousands of people.

The actions of the Turkish pogromists were characterized by unprecedented cruelty. The leaders of the Young Turks demanded this. Thus, the Minister of Internal Affairs Talaat, in a secret telegram sent to the governor of Aleppo, demanded an end to the existence of Armenians, not to pay any attention to age, gender, or remorse. This requirement was strictly fulfilled. Eyewitnesses of the events, Armenians who survived the horrors of deportation and genocide, left numerous descriptions of the incredible suffering that befell the Armenian population. A correspondent for the English newspaper The Times reported in September 1915: “From Sasun and Trebizond, from Ordu and Eintab, from Marash and Erzurum, the same reports of atrocities are coming in: of men mercilessly shot, crucified, mutilated or taken to labor battalions, about children kidnapped and forcibly converted to the Mohammedan faith, about women raped and sold into slavery deep behind the lines, shot on the spot or sent along with their children to the desert west of Mosul, where there is neither food nor water... Many of these unfortunate victims did not reach their destination..., and their corpses precisely indicated the path they followed."

In October 1916, the newspaper "Caucasian Word" published correspondence about the massacre of Armenians in the village of Baskan (Vardo Valley); the author cited an eyewitness account: “We saw how the unfortunates were first stripped of everything valuable; then they were stripped, and some were killed on the spot, while others were taken away from the road, into remote corners, and then finished off. We saw a group of three women , who embraced each other in mortal fear. And it was impossible to separate them, to separate them. All three were killed... The screams and wails were unimaginable, our hair stood on end, our blood froze in our veins..." Most of the Armenian population was also subjected to barbaric extermination Cilicia.

The massacre of Armenians continued in subsequent years. Thousands of Armenians were exterminated, driven to the southern regions of the Ottoman Empire and kept in the camps of Rasul Aina, Deir Zora, and others. The Young Turks sought to carry out the genocide of Armenians in Eastern Armenia, where, in addition to the local population, large numbers of refugees from Western Armenia accumulated. Having committed aggression against Transcaucasia in 1918, Turkish troops carried out pogroms and massacres of Armenians in many areas of Eastern Armenia and Azerbaijan.

Having occupied Baku in September 1918, Turkish invaders, together with Azerbaijani nationalists, organized a terrible massacre of the local Armenian population, killing 30 thousand people.

As a result of the Armenian genocide, carried out by the Young Turks in 1915 - 1916, more than 1.5 million people died, about 600 thousand Armenians became refugees; they scattered throughout many countries of the world, replenishing existing ones and forming new Armenian communities. An Armenian diaspora (“Spyurk” - Armenian) was formed.

As a result of the genocide, Western Armenia lost its original population. The leaders of the Young Turks did not hide their satisfaction at the successful implementation of the planned atrocity: German diplomats in Turkey reported to their government that already in August 1915, the Minister of Internal Affairs Talaat cynically declared that “actions against the Armenians have been largely carried out and the Armenian Question no longer exists.”

The relative ease with which the Turkish pogromists managed to carry out the genocide of the Armenians of the Ottoman Empire is partly explained by the unpreparedness of the Armenian population, as well as the Armenian political parties, for the impending threat of extermination. The actions of the pogromists were greatly facilitated by the mobilization of the most combat-ready part of the Armenian population - men - into the Turkish army, as well as the liquidation of the Armenian intelligentsia of Constantinople. A certain role was also played by the fact that in some public and clerical circles of Western Armenians they believed that disobedience to the Turkish authorities, who gave orders for deportation, could only lead to an increase in the number of victims.

The Armenian genocide carried out in Turkey caused enormous damage to the spiritual and material culture of the Armenian people. In 1915 - 1916 and subsequent years, thousands of Armenian manuscripts stored in Armenian monasteries were destroyed, hundreds of historical and architectural monuments were destroyed, and the shrines of the people were desecrated. The destruction of historical and architectural monuments in Turkey and the appropriation of many cultural values ​​of the Armenian people continue to this day. The tragedy experienced by the Armenian people affected all aspects of the life and social behavior of the Armenian people and firmly settled in their historical memory.

Progressive public opinion around the world condemned the heinous crime of the Turkish pogromists who tried to destroy the Armenian people. Social and political figures, scientists, cultural figures from many countries branded the genocide, qualifying it as a grave crime against humanity, and took part in providing humanitarian assistance to the Armenian people, in particular to refugees who have found refuge in many countries of the world.

After Turkey's defeat in the First World War, the leaders of the Young Turks were accused of dragging Turkey into a disastrous war and put on trial. Among the charges brought against war criminals was the charge of organizing and carrying out the massacre of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire. However, the verdict against a number of Young Turk leaders was passed in absentia, because after Turkey's defeat they managed to flee the country. The death sentence against some of them (Talaat, Behaetdin Shakir, Jemal Pasha, Said Halim and others) was subsequently carried out by the Armenian people's avengers.

After the Second World War, genocide was qualified as the gravest crime against humanity. The legal documents on genocide were based on the basic principles developed by the international military tribunal in Nuremberg, which tried the main war criminals of Nazi Germany. Subsequently, the UN adopted a number of decisions regarding genocide, the main of which are the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (1948) and the Convention on the Inapplicability of the Statute of Limitations to War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity, adopted in 1968.

Every year on April 24, the world celebrates the Day of Remembrance of the Victims of the Armenian Genocide in memory of the victims of the first extermination of people on ethnic grounds in the 20th century, which was carried out in the Ottoman Empire.

On April 24, 1915, in the capital of the Ottoman Empire, Istanbul, arrests of representatives of the Armenian intelligentsia took place, from which the mass extermination of Armenians began.

At the beginning of the 4th century AD, Armenia became the first country in the world in which Christianity was established as an official religion. However, the centuries-old struggle of the Armenian people with the conquerors ended with the loss of their own statehood. For many centuries, the lands where Armenians historically lived ended up not just in the hands of conquerors, but in the hands of conquerors professing a different faith.

Complex interethnic and inter-religious relations in the Ottoman Empire worsened significantly towards the end of the 19th century. A series of Russian-Turkish wars, most of them unsuccessful for the Ottoman Empire, led to the appearance on its territory of a huge number of Muslim refugees from the lost territories - the so-called “Muhajirs”.

The Muhajirs were extremely hostile towards Armenian Christians. In turn, the Armenians of the Ottoman Empire by the end of the 19th century, tired of their powerless situation, increasingly demanded equal rights with the rest of the inhabitants of the empire.

These contradictions were superimposed by the general decline of the Ottoman Empire, which manifested itself in all spheres of life.

The Armenians are to blame for everything

The first wave of massacres of Armenians on the territory of the Ottoman Empire took place in 1894-1896. The open resistance of the Armenians to the attempts of the Kurdish leaders to impose tribute on them resulted in massacres not only of those who participated in the protests, but also of those who remained on the sidelines. It is generally accepted that the killings of 1894–1896 were not directly sanctioned by the authorities of the Ottoman Empire. Nevertheless, according to various estimates, from 50 to 300 thousand Armenians became their victims.

Erzurum massacre, 1895. Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org / Public Domain

Periodic local outbreaks of reprisals against Armenians occurred after the overthrow of Sultan Abdul Hamid II of Turkey in 1907 and the coming to power of the Young Turks.

With the entry of the Ottoman Empire into the First World War, slogans about the need for “unity” of all representatives of the Turkish race to confront the “infidels” began to sound increasingly louder in the country. In November 1914, jihad was declared, which fueled anti-Christian chauvinism among the Muslim population.

Added to all this was the fact that one of the opponents of the Ottoman Empire in the war was Russia, on whose territory a large number of Armenians lived. The authorities of the Ottoman Empire began to consider their own citizens of Armenian nationality as potential traitors capable of helping the enemy. Such sentiments grew stronger as more and more failures occurred on the eastern front.

After the defeat inflicted by Russian troops on the Turkish army in January 1915 near Sarykamysh, one of the leaders of the Young Turks, Ismail Enver, aka Enver Pasha, declared in Istanbul that the defeat was the result of Armenian treason and that the time had come to deport Armenians from the eastern regions who were threatened Russian occupation.

Already in February 1915, emergency measures began to be used against the Ottoman Armenians. 100,000 soldiers of Armenian nationality were disarmed, and the right of Armenian civilians to bear arms, introduced in 1908, was abolished.

Destruction technology

The Young Turk government planned to carry out mass deportation of the Armenian population to the desert, where people were doomed to certain death.

Deportation of Armenians via Baghdad railway. Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org

On April 24, 1915, the plan began in Istanbul, where about 800 representatives of the Armenian intelligentsia were arrested and killed within a few days.

On May 30, 1915, the Majlis of the Ottoman Empire approved the “Deportation Law,” which became the basis for the massacre of Armenians.

The tactics of deportation consisted of the initial separation of adult men from the total number of Armenians in a particular locality, who were taken out of the city to desert places and destroyed in order to avoid resistance. Young Armenian girls were handed over as concubines to Muslims or were simply subjected to mass sexual violence. Old people, women and children were driven away in columns under the escort of gendarmes. Columns of Armenians, often deprived of food and drink, were driven into desert areas of the country. Those who fell exhausted were killed on the spot.

Despite the fact that the reason for the deportation was declared to be the disloyalty of the Armenians on the eastern front, repression against them began to be carried out throughout the country. Almost immediately, the deportations turned into mass murders of Armenians in their places of residence.

A huge role in the massacres of Armenians was played by the paramilitary forces of “chettes” - criminals specially released by the authorities of the Ottoman Empire to participate in massacres.

In the city of Khynys alone, the majority of whose population were Armenians, about 19,000 people were killed in May 1915. The massacre in the city of Bitlis in July 1915 killed 15,000 Armenians. The most brutal methods of execution were practiced - people were cut into pieces, nailed to crosses, driven onto barges and drowned, and burned alive.

Those who reached the camps around the Der Zor desert alive were killed there. Over the course of several months in 1915, about 150,000 Armenians were killed there.

Gone Forever

A telegram from US Ambassador Henry Morgenthau to the State Department (July 16, 1915) describes the extermination of the Armenians as a “campaign of racial extermination.” Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org / Henry Morgenthau Sr

Foreign diplomats received evidence of the large-scale extermination of Armenians almost from the very beginning of the genocide. In the joint Declaration of May 24, 1915, the Entente countries (Great Britain, France and Russia) recognized the mass murder of Armenians as a crime against humanity for the first time in history.

However, the powers drawn into a major war were unable to stop the mass destruction of people.

Although the peak of the genocide occurred in 1915, in fact, reprisals against the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire continued until the end of the First World War.

The total number of victims of the Armenian genocide has not been definitively established to this day. The most frequently reported data is that between 1 and 1.5 million Armenians were exterminated in the Ottoman Empire between 1915 and 1918. Those who were able to survive the massacre left their native lands in droves.

According to various estimates, by 1915, between 2 and 4 million Armenians lived in the Ottoman Empire. Between 40 and 70 thousand Armenians live in modern Turkey.

Most of the Armenian churches and historical monuments associated with the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire were destroyed or turned into mosques, as well as utility buildings. Only at the end of the 20th century, under pressure from the world community, the restoration of some historical monuments began in Turkey, in particular the Church of the Holy Cross on Lake Van.

Map of the main areas of extermination of the Armenian population. Concentration camps

Russo-Turkish War 1877–78 Treaty of San Stefano. Berlin Congress and the emergence of the Armenian Question.

The reason for the Russian-Turkish war of 1877–1878. served as an uprising against the Ottoman yoke in Bosnia and Herzegovina (1875–1876) and the April Uprising in Bulgaria (1876), drowned in blood by the Turks. By the end of 1877, after stubborn fighting on the Balkan front, Russian troops liberated Bulgaria, and at the beginning of 1878 they were already on the approaches to Constantinople. On the Caucasian front, Bayazet, Ardahan, and the fortress city of Kars were taken.

Turkey soon capitulated, and a peace treaty with Russia was signed in the town of San Stefano on February 19 (March 3, new style). In the 16th article of the treaty, for the first time, the problem of the security of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire was officially considered, and the question of carrying out administrative reforms in Western Armenia was raised.

Fearing the rise of Russian influence, Britain and Austria-Hungary did everything possible to disrupt the implementation of the Treaty of San Stefano. To revise the treaty, in the summer of 1878, at the request of these powers, the Berlin Congress was convened, during which Russia was forced to make significant concessions, including on the Armenian question. Russian troops were withdrawn from Western (Turkish) Armenia, thereby depriving the Armenians of the only real guarantee of their security. Although Article 61 of the Berlin Treaty still spoke about reforms in Western Armenia, there were no longer any guarantees of their implementation. Because of this, the already difficult situation of Armenians in Turkey subsequently sharply worsened.

Armenian pogroms 1894–1896

Soon after the completion of the Berlin Congress, it became clear that Sultan Abdul Hamid II did not intend to carry out any reforms in Western Armenia. Moreover, Muslims from the Balkans and the Caucasus and Kurds moved en masse to areas populated predominantly by Armenians and other Christian peoples. From year to year, exactions from the Armenian population increased. Often, having collected taxes, Turkish officials returned to the same village a few days later and, threatening arrests and torture, again extorted the already paid tax. Armenian peasants were obliged to host Muslim nomads for the winter, to host government officials with all their accompanying persons for several days a year, and to carry out free road work. On the other hand, representatives of the Turkish authorities on the ground did little to protect Armenians from attacks by Kurds and Circassians, and often they themselves were behind the raids on Armenian villages.

At the beginning of 1894, the issue of implementing Article 61 of the Berlin Congress was again raised, the reason for which was the uprising of the Armenians of Sasun, which began in the same year. The uprising was caused by attempts by the Turkish authorities to end the semi-autonomous status of Sassoun, as well as Armenian-Kurdish clashes provoked by the authorities. When the uprising was suppressed by Turkish troops and Kurdish detachments, more than 10,000 Armenians were massacred.

On May 11, 1895, the ambassadors of the great powers demanded that Sultan Abdul Hamid II carry out reforms (the so-called “May Reforms”) in order to protect the Armenians from attacks and robberies. The Sultan, as always, was in no hurry to fulfill the ambassadors' demands.

The peak of the Armenian pogroms occurred after the demonstration on September 18, 1895, held in the area of ​​​​the Turkish capital Bab Ali (the residence of the Sultan was located there). During the demonstration, demands were made to implement the “May reforms.” The soldiers were ordered to disperse the demonstrators. More than 2,000 Armenians died in the pogrom that followed the crackdown. The massacre of the Armenians of Constantinople begun by the Turks resulted in a total massacre of Armenians throughout Asia Minor.

The following summer, a group of Armenian Haiduks made a desperate attempt to draw European attention to the intolerable plight of the Armenian population by seizing the Imperial Ottoman Bank, Turkey's central bank. The first dragoman of the Russian embassy, ​​V. Maksimov, took part in resolving the incident. He assured that the great powers would put the necessary pressure on the Sublime Porte to carry out reforms, and gave his word that the participants in the action would be given the opportunity to freely leave the country on one of the European ships. His terms were accepted, but the seizure of the bank not only did not solve the problem of Armenian reforms, but, on the contrary, aggravated the situation. Before the participants in the takeover had time to leave the country, a pogrom of Armenians sanctioned by the authorities began in Constantinople. As a result of the three-day massacre, various estimates range from 5,000 to 8,700 people.

During the period 1894–96. In the Ottoman Empire, about 300,000 Christians were killed: mainly Armenians, but also Assyrians and Greeks.

Establishment of the Young Turk regime

The Sultan's policies had a detrimental effect on the position of the Ottoman Empire as a whole. The Turkish bourgeoisie was also dissatisfied with the rule of Abdul Hamid II. After the events of the 1890s, Turkey's political prestige weakened so much that in Europe they started talking about the imminent collapse of the empire. In order to establish a constitutional regime in the country, a secret organization was created by a group of young Turkish officers and government officials, which later became the basis of the Ittihad ve Terakki party (Unity and Progress, also known as the Ittihadist or Young Turk Party). At the beginning of the 20th century, many organizations took part in the fight against the Sultan’s regime - both Turkish, Armenian, Greek, Arab, Albanian, Macedonian, Bulgarian. Moreover, all attempts to suppress the anti-Sultan movement with brute force only led to the strengthening of this movement.

In 1904, the Turkish authorities again tried to conquer Sasun, however, encountering stubborn resistance, they were forced to retreat.

Anti-Sultan sentiments intensified. The influence of the Young Turks was especially strong in military units stationed in the European regions of the Ottoman Empire. At the end of June 1908, Young Turk officers rebelled. The attempt to suppress it did not lead to anything, since the troops sent to suppress the rebellion went over to the side of the rebels. Very soon the rebellion grew into a general uprising: Greek, Macedonian, Albanian, and Bulgarian rebels joined the Young Turks. Within a month, the Sultan was forced to make significant concessions, restore the constitution, not only grant amnesty to the leaders of the uprising, but also follow their instructions in many matters. Celebrations on the occasion of the restoration of the constitution took place throughout the country, and all the peoples of the Ottoman Empire took part in them. The Armenians joyfully greeted the Young Turks, believing that all troubles and unbearable oppression had come to an end. The slogans of the Ittihadists about universal equality and brotherhood of the peoples of the empire found the most positive response among the Armenian population.

The euphoria of the Armenians did not last long. The rebellion raised by the Sultan's supporters on March 31 (April 13), 1909 in Constantinople coincided with a new wave of anti-Armenian pogroms in Cilicia. The first pogrom began in Adana, then the pogroms spread to other cities in the Adana and Aleppo vilayets. The troops of the Young Turks from Rumelia sent to maintain order not only did not protect the Armenians, but together with the pogromists took part in robberies and murders. The result of the massacre in Cilicia was 30,000 dead. Many researchers are of the opinion that the organizers of the massacre were the Young Turks, or at least the Young Turk authorities of the Adana vilayet.

In 1909 - 10 Pogroms of national minorities swept across Turkey: Greeks, Assyrians, Bulgarians, Albanians and others.

World War I and the Armenian genocide

Modern Turkish and pro-Turkish authors, trying to justify the policy of the Young Turks, justify the destruction of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire by the fact that the Armenians sympathized with the Russians and were preparing an uprising in the Turkish rear. The facts indicate that the destruction was being prepared long before the war, and the war only provided the Young Turks with an opportunity to carry out their plans without hindrance. After the Adana events of 1909, despite the attempts of the Dashnaktsutyun party to continue cooperation with the Young Turks, relations between the Young Turk regime and the Armenians constantly deteriorated. Trying to push the Armenians out of the political arena, the Young Turks secretly developed violent anti-Armenian activities throughout the country.

Back in February 1914 (four months before the assassination of Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo!) the Ittihadists called for a boycott of Armenian businesses. Moreover, one of the Young Turk leaders, Doctor Nazim, went on a trip to Turkey in order to personally monitor the implementation of the boycott.

The day after Germany declared war on Russia, the Turks and Germans signed a secret treaty, effectively transferring Turkish troops under German command. At first, Turkey declared neutrality, but this was just a ploy in order to have time to mobilize and better prepare for the upcoming war. On August 4, mobilization was announced, and already on August 18, the first reports began to arrive from Central Anatolia about the looting of Armenian property carried out under the slogan of “raising funds for the army.” At the same time, in different parts of the country, authorities disarmed Armenians, even taking away kitchen knives. In October, robbery and requisitions were in full swing, arrests of Armenian political figures began, and the first reports of murders began to arrive.

On October 29, 1914, the Ottoman Empire entered the First World War on the side of Germany: Turkish warships under the command of German officers launched a surprise attack on Odessa. In response, on November 2, Russia declared war on Turkey. In turn, jihad (holy war) was declared in Turkey against England, France and Russia.

The situation of the Armenian population in the Ottoman Empire worsened every day: the Turkish government accused the Armenians of attempting an uprising (of course, without presenting any evidence). While the Turkish Red Crescent Society built hospitals for the Turkish army using voluntary donations from Armenians, demonstrative executions of individual Armenian military personnel were carried out in military units. Most of the Armenians drafted into the army were sent to special labor battalions and subsequently destroyed.

At the beginning of December 1914, the Turks launched an offensive on the Caucasian front, however, having suffered a crushing defeat (losses amounted to 70,000 people out of 90,000), they were forced to retreat. The retreating Turkish troops brought down all the anger of defeat on the Christian population of the front-line areas, slaughtering Armenians, Assyrians, and Greeks along the way. At the same time, arrests of prominent Armenians and attacks on Armenian villages continued throughout the country.

By the spring of 1915, the genocidal machine of the Young Turks was working at full capacity. The disarmament of the Armenians was in full swing, in the Alashkert Valley, detachments of Turkish and Kurdish Chetniks massacred Armenian villages, not far from Smyrna (now Izmir) Greeks conscripted into the army were killed, and the deportation of the Armenian population of Zeytun began. In early April, the massacre continued in the Armenian and Assyrian villages of the Van vilayet. In mid-April, refugees from surrounding villages began arriving in the city of Van, reporting horrors occurring there. The Armenian delegation invited to negotiate with the administration of the vilayet was destroyed by the Turks. Having learned about this, the Armenians of Van decided to defend themselves and refused the demand of the Turkish governor-general to immediately surrender their weapons. In response, Turkish troops and Kurdish detachments besieged the city, but all attempts to break the resistance of the Armenians ended in nothing. In May, advanced detachments of Russian troops and Armenian volunteers drove back the Turks and finally lifted the siege of Van.

Meanwhile, mass arrests of prominent Armenians began in Constantinople: intellectuals, entrepreneurs, politicians, religious leaders, teachers and journalists. On the night of April 24 alone, 250 people were arrested in the capital; in total, more than 800 people were arrested within a week. Most were later killed in prisons and on the way to exile. At the same time, the arrests and destruction of Armenian leaders throughout the country continued.

At the beginning of summer, mass deportation of the Armenian population to the deserts of Mesopotamia began. In almost all cases, the authorities acted according to the same pattern: at the very beginning, men were separated from women and children and dealt with at the first opportunity. Women and children were sent further: on the way, many died from hunger and disease. The columns were constantly attacked by Kurds, girls were kidnapped or simply bought from guards, those who tried to resist were killed without hesitation. Only a small part of the deportees reached their destination, but they too faced death from hunger, thirst, and disease.

Officials who refused to carry out orders to exterminate the Armenians (there were some, for example, the Governor-General of Aleppo Jalal Bey) were fired, and more zealous party members were appointed in their places.

At first, the property of the Armenians was simply stolen by local authorities, gendarmes and Muslim neighbors, but soon the Young Turks introduced strict accounting of the loot. Some of the property was distributed to the perpetrators of the massacre, some was sold at auctions, and the proceeds were sent to the leaders of Ittihad in Constantinople. As a result, a whole layer of the Turkish national elite was formed, enriched by the expropriation of the property of Armenians and later becoming an important part of the Kemalist movement. The operation to exterminate the Armenians was personally led by Talaat Pasha, the Minister of Internal Affairs of the Ottoman Empire.

Autumn, 1915. Columns of emaciated and ragged women and children walk along the country's roads. Roadside ditches are full of corpses, and the bodies of the dead are floating in the rivers. Columns of deportees flock to Aleppo, from where the few survivors are sent to die in the deserts of Syria.

Despite all the attempts of the Turks to hide the scale and ultimate goal of the action, foreign consuls and missionaries continuously sent messages about the atrocities taking place in Turkey. This forced the Young Turks to act more cautiously. In August 1915, on the advice of the Germans, Turkish authorities prohibited the killing of Armenians in places where American consuls could see it. In November of the same year, Jemal Pasha tried to put on trial the director and professors of the German school in Aleppo, thanks to whom the world became aware of the deportations and massacres of Armenians in Cilicia. In January 1916, a circular was sent out prohibiting photographing the bodies of the dead...

At the beginning of 1916, Russian troops, having broken through the Turkish front, advanced deep into Western Armenia. In the entire city of Erzurum (which at that time was called in the Russian press “the capital of Turkish Armenia”), the Russians found only a few Armenian women kept in harems. Of the entire Armenian population of the city of Trebizond, only a small group of orphans and women remained, sheltered by Greek families.

Spring, 1916 Due to the difficult situation on all fronts, the Young Turks decide to speed up the process of destruction. It is no longer enough that thousands of Armenians die every day in the deserts from hunger and disease: now the massacre continues there too. At the same time, the Turkish authorities over and over again suppress any attempts by neutral countries to provide humanitarian assistance to the Armenians dying in the deserts.

In June, the authorities dismissed the governor of Der-Zor, Ali Suad, an Arab by nationality, for refusing to exterminate deported Armenians. Salih Zeki, known for his ruthlessness, was appointed in his place. With the arrival of Zeki, the process of extermination of the deportees accelerated even more.

By the fall of 1916, the world already knew about the massacre of Armenians. Perhaps they did not yet fully understand the scale, perhaps they were somewhat distrustful of all reports about the atrocities of the Turks, but they understood that something hitherto unseen had happened in the Ottoman Empire. At the request of the Turkish Minister of War Enver Pasha, the German ambassador Count Wolf-Metternich was recalled from Constantinople: the Young Turks believed that he was protesting too actively against the massacre of the Armenians. In the USA, President Woodrow Wilson declared October 8th and 9th “Days of Relief for Armenia”: on these days, the entire country collected donations to help Armenian refugees.

At the end of 1916, it seemed that Türkiye was losing the war. On the Caucasian front, the Turkish army suffered heavy losses; in the south, the Turks were retreating under the pressure of the allied armies. However, the Young Turks still continued to “solve” the Armenian question, and with such fanatical frenzy, as if there was nothing more important for the Ottoman Empire at that time than the speedy completion of the “project” begun two years ago.

During 17, the situation on the Caucasian front was not in favor of the Russians. The February Revolution in Russia, failures on the Eastern Front, and the active work of Bolshevik emissaries to disintegrate the army were doing their job. After the October coup, the Russian military command was forced to sign a truce with the Turks. Taking advantage of the subsequent collapse of the front and the disorderly withdrawal of Russian troops, in February 1918, Turkish troops took Erzurum, Kars and reached Batum. The refugees who began to return from the Caucasus again came under attack: the advancing Turks mercilessly exterminated all the Armenians and Assyrians who came in their way. The only obstacle that somehow restrained the advance of the Turks were the Armenian volunteer detachments covering the retreat of thousands of refugees. After the Turks captured Alexandropol (now Gyumri), the Turkish army was divided: part continued the offensive in the direction of Erivan, the other part began to move towards Karakilis.

Last ten days of May, 1918 In fact, the very existence of the Armenian people is in question. The success of the Turkish invasion of Eastern Armenia will mean the destruction of the last national home of the Armenians.
Throughout Armenia, bells are ringing incessantly, calling the people to arms. Party feuds and internal contradictions have been forgotten; stubborn battles have been going on for ten days in Sardarapat, Bash-Aparan and Karakilisa. The career officers of the tsarist army and haiduks, peasants and intelligentsia, united in rage and despair, deal blow after blow to the enemy, throwing off centuries of shame and defeat from their shoulders.

On May 28, the Armenian National Council announced the creation of an independent Armenian republic, and on June 4, the Turkish delegation at negotiations in Batumi recognized the independence of Armenia within those territorial limits that remained at that time under the control of Armenian forces.

Having suffered defeat in Armenia, the Turks, however, did not intend to weaken their positions in Transcaucasia. Together with Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan (with their capital in Elizavetpol) declared independence. On the same day, Nuri Pasha, Enver's half-brother, began to form the so-called in Elizavetpol (Azerbaijan). The “Army of Islam”, the core of which was the Ottoman 5th Infantry Division, and which also included detachments of Caucasian Tatars (Azerbaijanis) and Dagestanis. The Turks did not particularly hide their intention to annex Azerbaijan to the Ottoman Empire, which first required taking Baku, which was under Soviet rule. After almost three months of heavy fighting, the Turkish army stood on the outskirts of the city. The assault on Baku resulted in a massacre of the Armenian population, in which, according to the most conservative estimates, about 10,000 people died.

Despite the advance of the Turks in Transcaucasia, the overall situation of the Ottoman Empire was desperate. British troops continued to push back the Turks in Palestine and Syria, while the Turkish allies, the Germans, retreated in France. The capitulation of Bulgaria on September 30, 1918 actually meant the defeat of Turkey: deprived of ties with Germany and Austria-Hungary, the Turks also had only to lay down their arms. A month after the fall of Bulgaria, the Turkish government signed the Mudros Truce with the Entente countries, according to which, among other things, the Turkish side pledged to return the deported Armenians and withdraw troops from Transcaucasia and Cilicia.

After the signing of the treaty, the new Turkish government, under pressure from the international community, began trials of the organizers of the genocide. In 1919–20 Extraordinary military courts were formed in the country to investigate the crimes of the Young Turks. It should be noted that by that time the entire Young Turk elite was on the run: Talaat, Enver, Dzhemal and others, taking the party cash, left Turkey. They were sentenced to death in absentia, but only a few lower-ranking criminals were punished.

Later, by decision of the leadership of the Dashnaktsutyun party, Talaat Pasha, Jemal Pasha, Said Halim and some other Young Turk leaders who fled from justice were tracked down and destroyed by the Armenian avengers. Enver was killed in Central Asia in a skirmish with a detachment of Red Army soldiers under the command of the Armenian Melkumov (a former member of the Hunchak party). Dr. Nazim and Javid Bey (Minister of Finance of the Young Turk Government) were executed in Turkey on charges of participating in a conspiracy against Mustafa Kemal, the founder of the Turkish Republic.

Kemalist movement. Armenian-Turkish war. Massacre in Cilicia. Treaty of Lausanne.

In the summer of 1919, a congress of Turkish nationalists took place, opposing the terms of the Mudros Truce. This movement, organized by Mustafa Kemal, did not recognize the right to self-determination for national minorities and actually adhered to the same policy on the national question as the Young Turks. Skillfully taking advantage of the contradictions between France and England, arousing the nationalism of the Kurds and the religious feelings of Muslims, Kemal managed to gather and arm an army and began the struggle to restore control over the territories of the Ottoman Empire lost to the Young Turks.

After the Truce of Mudros, Armenians who survived the pogroms and deportations began to return to Cilicia, attracted by promises from the allies (especially France) to assist in the creation of Armenian autonomy. However, the emergence of the Armenian state entity ran counter to the plans of the Kemalists. For the French, who were primarily interested in restoring the position of French capital in the Turkish economy, the fate of the Cilician Armenians was only a convenient lever of pressure on the Turks during negotiations and, in fact, was of little concern to French diplomats. Thanks to the connivance of France, in January 1920, Kemalist troops began an operation to exterminate the Armenians of Cilicia. After heavy and bloody defensive battles that lasted in some areas for more than a year, the few surviving Armenians were forced to emigrate, mainly to French-mandated Syria.

On August 10, the Treaty of Sèvres was signed between the Sultan's government of Turkey and the victorious allies in the war, according to which Armenia was to receive a significant part of the Van, Erzurum and Bitlis vilayets, as well as part of the Trebizond vilayet along with the port of the same name. This agreement remained on paper because the Turkish side never ratified it, and the Kemalists, having received financial and military assistance from the Bolsheviks and secretly agreed with them on the division of the Armenian state, began military operations against Armenia in September 1920. The war ended with the defeat of the Republic of Armenia and the surrender of the Kars region and Surmalinsky district to the Turks.

The support of the Bolsheviks, as well as France and Italy, allowed the Kemalists in January 1921 to begin successful operations against the Greek troops, who by that time had occupied (by agreement with the Entente) Eastern Thrace and the western regions of Asia Minor. In September 1922, Turkish troops entered Smyrna (now Izmir). The capture of the city was accompanied by a massacre of the peaceful Greek and Armenian population of the city; The Armenian, Greek and European quarters of the city were completely burned by the Turks. The seven-day massacre killed approximately 100,000 people.

In 1922–23, a conference on the Middle East question was held in Lausanne (Switzerland), in which Great Britain, France, Italy, Greece, Turkey and a number of other countries participated. The conference ended with the signing of a series of treaties, among which was a peace treaty between the Turkish Republic and the Allied Powers, defining the borders of modern Turkey. In the final version of the treaty, the Armenian issue was not mentioned at all.

Conclusion

The above facts leave no doubt that in the Ottoman Empire, from at least 1877 to 1923 (and not only during the First World War, and especially not only in 1915) * with three In different and hostile Turkish regimes, the genocidal policy towards the Armenians was implemented consistently and mercilessly. Ultimately, this led to the complete elimination of the Armenian presence in most of the historical homeland of the Armenian ethnic group. And even today, when Turkey is not at all threatened by the “Armenian danger,” the Turkish authorities are still consistently destroying traces of the presence of Armenians on the territory of Western Armenia. Churches are turned into mosques or completely destroyed, khachkars are reduced to rubble, even the Latin names of animals generally accepted in the scientific world, in which the word “Armenia” is mentioned, are changed.

At the same time, the consequences of the genocide are still palpable for the Armenian ethnic group, both in geopolitical and psychological terms: tangible, but not sufficiently realized. This lack of awareness is caused not least by the fact that, despite the presence of many serious scientific works on the Armenian question, there is no concise, clear and consistent presentation of the events of those years accessible to the average reader. Even in Armenia, very few people are familiar with the history of the genocide in detail, mainly historians specializing in this area. In some Armenian media you can often find such a fundamentally erroneous statement as “the Armenian genocide occurred in 1915.”

It should be noted that coverage of the history of the Armenian genocide has always been and remains extremely politicized. The works of Soviet authors kept silent about the anti-Armenian activities of the Bolsheviks; the works of American and European authors respectively hush up the unseemly acts of American, British, French and German politicians and diplomats. The works of many Armenian authors are not free from party and countryman biases. Turkish historians, for the most part, are making every effort to deny the very fact of the Armenian genocide, to denigrate its victims and justify the organizers.

Today, almost a hundred years after the mass extermination of Armenians by the Ottoman Empire, the question of international condemnation of the Armenian genocide still remains open. However, recently there have been some changes: resolutions condemning the Armenian genocide were adopted by a number of states, including Russia, France, Sweden, and Switzerland. Some Armenian organizations around the world are actively working in this direction.

On the other hand, the Armenian issue is still used by a number of states as an effective means of exerting political pressure on Turkey. The interests of the Armenian side are simply ignored. In the current situation, recognition of mistakes made in the past and repentance are primarily beneficial to Turkey itself, because thereby it will not only improve relations with Armenia and the Armenian diaspora, but will also deprive third countries of one of the oldest levers of pressure on themselves.

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* Historian Armen Ayvazyan traces the tendency to pursue a policy of genocide towards the Armenians in the Ottoman Empire in an earlier period. See Armen Aivazian, The Armenian Rebellion of the 1720s and the Threat of Genocidal Reprisal. Center for Policy Analysis, American University of Armenia. Yerevan, 1997.

The Armenian genocide was the physical destruction of the Christian ethnic Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire that occurred between the spring of 1915 and the fall of 1916. About 1.5 million Armenians lived in the Ottoman Empire. At least 664 thousand people died during the genocide. There are suggestions that the death toll could reach 1.2 million people. Armenians call these events "Metz Egern"("Great Crime") or "Aghet"("Catastrophe").

The mass extermination of Armenians gave impetus to the origin of the term "genocide" and its codification in international law. Lawyer Raphael Lemkin, the coiner of the term “genocide” and the thought leader of the United Nations (UN) program to combat genocide, has repeatedly stated that his youthful impressions of newspaper articles about the crimes of the Ottoman Empire against Armenians formed the basis of his beliefs in the need for legal protection national groups. Thanks in part to Lemkin's tireless efforts, the United Nations approved the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in 1948.

Most of the killings of 1915-1916 were carried out by Ottoman authorities with the support of auxiliary troops and civilians. The government, controlled by the Union and Progress political party (also called the Young Turks), aimed to strengthen Muslim Turkish rule in Eastern Anatolia by eliminating the large Armenian population in the region.

Beginning in 1915–16, Ottoman authorities carried out large-scale mass executions; Armenians also died during mass deportations due to hunger, dehydration, lack of shelter and disease. In addition, tens of thousands of Armenian children were forcibly taken from their families and converted to Islam.

HISTORICAL CONTEXT

Armenian Christians were one of the many significant ethnic groups of the Ottoman Empire. In the late 1880s, some Armenians created political organizations that sought greater autonomy, which increased the Ottoman authorities' doubts about the loyalty of large sections of the Armenian population living in the country.

On October 17, 1895, Armenian revolutionaries seized the National Bank in Constantinople, threatening to blow it up along with more than 100 hostages in the bank building if the authorities refused to grant regional autonomy to the Armenian community. Although the incident ended peacefully thanks to French intervention, the Ottoman authorities carried out a series of pogroms.

In total, at least 80 thousand Armenians were killed in 1894-1896.

THE YOUNG TURKISH REVOLUTION

In July 1908, a faction that called itself the Young Turks seized power in the Ottoman capital of Constantinople. The Young Turks were predominantly officers and officials of Balkan origin who came to power in 1906 in a secret society known as Unity and Progress and transformed it into a political movement.

The Young Turks sought to introduce a liberal constitutional regime, not related to religion, which would put all nationalities on equal terms. The Young Turks believed that non-Muslims would integrate into the Turkish nation if they were confident that such policies would lead to modernization and prosperity.

At first it seemed that the new government would be able to eliminate some of the causes of social discontent in the Armenian community. But in the spring of 1909, Armenian demonstrations demanding autonomy turned violent. In the city of Adana and its environs, 20 thousand Armenians were killed by Ottoman army soldiers, irregular troops and civilians; Up to 2 thousand Muslims died at the hands of the Armenians.

Between 1909 and 1913, activists in the Union and Progress movement became increasingly inclined toward a strongly nationalistic vision of the future of the Ottoman Empire. They rejected the idea of ​​a multi-ethnic “Ottoman” state and sought to create a culturally and ethnically homogeneous Turkish society. The large Armenian population of Eastern Anatolia was a demographic obstacle to achieving this goal. After several years of political upheaval, on November 23, 1913, as a result of a coup d'etat, the leaders of the Union and Progress Party received dictatorial power.

WORLD WAR I

Mass atrocities and genocide often occur during times of war. The extermination of the Armenians was closely interconnected with the events of the First World War in the Middle East and the Russian territory of the Caucasus. The Ottoman Empire officially entered the war in November 1914 on the side of the Central Powers (Germany and Austria-Hungary), which fought against the Entente countries (Great Britain, France, Russia and Serbia).

On April 24, 1915, fearing the landing of Allied troops on the strategically important Gallipoli Peninsula, the Ottoman authorities arrested 240 Armenian leaders in Constantinople and deported them to the east. Today, Armenians consider this operation the beginning of genocide. The Ottoman authorities claimed that the Armenian revolutionaries had established contact with the enemy and were going to facilitate the landing of French and British troops. When the Entente countries, as well as the United States, which at that time still remained neutral, demanded an explanation from the Ottoman Empire in connection with the deportation of the Armenians, it called its actions precautionary measures.

Beginning in May 1915, the government expanded the scale of deportations, sending the Armenian civilian population, regardless of the distance of their residence from the war zones, to camps located in the desert southern provinces of the empire [in the north and east of modern Syria, northern Saudi Arabia and Iraq] . Many escorted groups were sent south from the six provinces of Eastern Anatolia with a high proportion of Armenian population - from Trabzon, Erzurum, Bitlis, Van, Diyarbakir, Mamuret-ul-Aziz, as well as from the province of Marash. Subsequently, Armenians were expelled from almost all regions of the empire.

Since the Ottoman Empire was an ally of Germany during the war, many German officers, diplomats and aid workers witnessed atrocities committed against the Armenian population. Their reaction varied: from horror and filing official protests to isolated cases of tacit support for the actions of the Ottoman authorities. The generation of Germans who lived through the First World War had memories of these terrible events in the 1930s and 1940s, which influenced their perception of the Nazi persecution of Jews.

MASS KILLINGS AND DEPORTATIONS

Obeying orders from the central government in Constantinople, regional authorities, with the complicity of the local civilian population, carried out mass executions and deportations. Military and security officials, as well as their supporters, killed the majority of Armenian men of working age, as well as thousands of women and children.

During escorted crossings through the desert, surviving elderly people, women and children were subjected to unauthorized attacks by local authorities, bands of nomads, criminal gangs and civilians. These attacks included robberies (for example, stripping victims naked, stripping them of their clothing, and subjecting them to body cavity searches for valuables), rape, abductions of young women and girls, extortion, torture, and murder.

Hundreds of thousands of Armenians died without reaching the designated camp. Many of them were killed or kidnapped, others committed suicide, and a huge number of Armenians died from hunger, dehydration, lack of shelter or disease along the way. While some residents of the country sought to help the expelled Armenians, many more ordinary citizens killed or tortured those being escorted.

CENTRALIZED ORDERS

Although the term "genocide" appeared only in 1944, most scholars agree that the mass murder of Armenians meets the definition of genocide. The government, controlled by the Union and Progress Party, took advantage of the national martial law to implement a long-term demographic policy aimed at increasing the share of the Turkish Muslim population in Anatolia by reducing the size of the Christian population (mainly Armenians, but also Christian Assyrians). Ottoman, Armenian, American, British, French, German and Austrian documents from the time indicate that the leadership of the Union and Progress Party deliberately exterminated the Armenian population of Anatolia.

The Union and Progress Party issued orders from Constantinople and ensured their execution with the help of its agents in the Special Organization and local administrative bodies. In addition, the central government required careful monitoring and collection of data on the number of Armenians deported, the type and number of housing units they left behind, and the number of deported citizens admitted to the camps.

The initiative for certain actions came from the senior members of the leadership of the Unity and Progress party, and they also coordinated the actions. The central figures of this operation were Talaat Pasha (Minister of the Interior), Ismail Enver Pasha (Minister of War), Behaeddin Shakir (Head of the Special Organization) and Mehmet Nazim (Head of the Population Planning Service).

According to government regulations, in certain regions the share of the Armenian population should not exceed 10% (in some regions - no more than 2%), Armenians could live in settlements that included no more than 50 families, as far away as from the Baghdad railway, and from each other. To fulfill these demands, local authorities carried out deportations of the population over and over again. The Armenians crossed the desert back and forth without the necessary clothing, food and water, suffering from the scorching sun during the day and freezing from the cold at night. The deported Armenians were regularly attacked by nomads and their own guards. As a result, under the influence of natural factors and targeted extermination, the number of deported Armenians decreased significantly and began to meet the established standards.

MOTIVES

The Ottoman regime pursued the goals of strengthening the country's military position and financing the "Turkification" of Anatolia by confiscating the property of killed or deported Armenians. The possibility of property redistribution also encouraged large numbers of ordinary people to engage in attacks on their neighbors. Many residents of the Ottoman Empire considered Armenians to be wealthy people, but in fact, a significant part of the Armenian population lived poorly.

In some cases, the Ottoman authorities agreed to grant Armenians the right to reside in their former territories, subject to their acceptance of Islam. While thousands of Armenian children died due to the fault of the authorities of the Ottoman Empire, they often tried to convert children to Islam and assimilate them into Muslim, primarily Turkish, society. Generally, the Ottoman authorities avoided carrying out mass deportations from Istanbul and Izmir in order to hide their crimes from the eyes of foreigners and to benefit economically from the activities of the Armenians living in these cities in order to modernize the empire.