Tall Armenian Tale

 

The Other Side of the Falsified Genocide

 

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 When this site began, Turkish sources were steered clear of as much as possible; the Turks are the accused party in these genocide allegations, and the allegations are widely accepted. We all know from prison movies that every man in the joint says he's innocent. And everyone knows the criminal can't be believed. (The difference in this analogy, of course, is that the men from the joint were tried and convicted. The Turks are only accused, nothing has been proven, but because of prejudice, all the world needs is the accusation to convict the Turks.)

However, as there is a page on this site examining Armenian Oral History, there should also be a place to put up what Turkish witnesses had to say. (There have already been a couple of incidental examples, links of which are at page bottom.)

The problem with "oral history" in all forms is that even if the witness makes an honest attempt to relate events, the experienced trauma could color one's views. Even when there was no passage of time, the views of witnesses could be colored, as evidenced poignantly here.

Because the Armenians' genocide is such a politicized raison d'etre, a lot of "Armenian oral history" is suspect to begin with. Why were these being recorded? Mainly, for propaganda purposes. In cases where genocide advocates sought aged Armenians to tell their tales, it is not unreasonable to assume a degree of manipulation was involved. Too many Armenians are also raised with a hatred for Turks, and as Hovhannes Katchaznouni noted, Armenians as a whole are not good in accepting responsibility, even when they are at fault. The monstrous Turks make a handy fall guy, no matter what.

By contrast, the Turks who suffered at the hands of Armenians did not go out to advertise their sufferings. Culturally, this is the Turkish way:

 

  
One might be pardoned if, on reading of the various atrocities visited upon the Balkan Turks, it seems as if the atrocities were invented, or at least much inflated, by those who allegedly suffered. One answer to this is the type of confirmatory evidence provided by the European consuls, reporters, and other observers. I believe, though, that the evidence drawn from Muslim refugees was generally reliable in itself. Those who in 1876-78 had long dealt with Turks avowed that Turks were very unlikely to overstate their suffering. Quite the opposite was true — Turks were unlikely to mention their defeats, or to underplay them, and the massacres of the Balkan Turks were a horrible defeat. British Consul Blunt at Edirne spoke of the difficulty of getting Turks to speak of their sufferings, because of the ‘habitual reluctance of the Turks to speak of indignities to which any among them have been subjected. (It is this very policy, I may add, which induced them to conceal from public knowledge, rather than denounce the mutilations constantly practiced by the Montenegrins on their Turkish victims.)’ " (F.O. 195-1137, no. 90, Blunt to Layard, Adrianople, 6 August 1877.)

Justin McCarthy, "Death and Exile," 1995, Footnote, p. 97

The only reason why these people were sought was to combat Armenian propaganda. Is it possible they also could have been coached, or as Armenian propagandists would be quick to charge, that the Turkish government paid them off to lie? Anything is possible. This is why "Oral History" is not one to prominently turn to, in the seeking of truth.

But when one considers the psychology involved with both people (Armenians: Sell the genocide to the world in any way possible, with the perpetuation of hatred; Turks: Bad things happen. Best to put the bad things behind, for the sake of a future with brotherhood and love. Armenians: Yell and shout, make a religion of victimhood; Turks: Suffer silently), the reader can determine which side is better coming from the position of truth.

One other matter to bear in mind is that witnesses who saw Armenian suffering and dead, like Armin Wegner and Leslie Davis, usually saw bodies in one piece. Atrocity tales from the Armenian perspective are almost always provided second hand, through missionaries and other sympathetic Christian parties, who accepted Armenian accounts first hand. (A genocide book claims there was only one American newspaperman who travelled to the Ottoman interior in 1915, George Schreiner, serving as the rare and genuine eyewitness, and he concluded there was no "genocide.") Those "neutral" witnesses who support the Turkish accounts come from the ranks of Armenian sympathizers: Americans (like Robert Dunn, Niles and Sutherland), French, and especially Russians. The common thread in what these latter groups tell is that the Armenians usually did not stop just with massacring, but performed the most hideous and sadistic deviltries.

  An Ottoman Soldier


 The Russian soldiers have occupied Kars, Erzurum, Erzincan and they were marching towards Sivas. There were Armenian battalions among the Russian army. Even though the Russian commanders tried very hard to stop them, wherever they set foot these Armenian soldiers tortured the Muslim Turks and
burned them alive.
. . .
Sevket Sureyya Aydemir volunteered to join the Ottoman Army's
university educated soldiers class during World War I. He was assigned to fight in the Eastern front, namely the Caucasus Branch. In 1917 while he was sitting in the trenches waiting for the fight to begin, their opponents leave the Russian trenches and walk towards them with bread and cheese in their hands.
They are unarmed. They say "We want to become friends with you, not fight". They leave their trenches and leave for their villages. The Bolshevik revolution has taken place in Russia. Some Armenians also leave with the Russian soldiers, because they could not hold foot on Anatolian soil. Once the path is cleared, the Turkish soldiers rush to the evacuated
places.

Sevket Sureyya Aydemir reaches to a village of Erzincan. His
observations were like this; "The Dashnak Committee members had the upper hand among the Armenian Army. The only ambition of this committee members was to eradicate and revenge. Their demented ambition had no end.

Along the road to Erzurum, across from the Cinis Village there was a village named Evreni. The Armenians did not feel satisfied with killing all inhabitants of this village — children, elderly, and women they also cut up their body parts — arms, legs, and heads, and hang them on hooks and nails for exhibition like a butchers' shop. This was not enough either.

They also killed all animals — cows, fowl, even dogs and tore them limb to limb. All were scattered on the streets. The Turkish army continues with its forward march. When they arrive in  Erzurum Sevket Sureyya writes in his memoirs the things that he saw like this; "The bloodbath reached its zenith in Erzurum. I think half the population was killed. Only in the station called Georgian Gate (Gurcu Kapisi Istasyonu) there were 3,000 bodies stored. They were sorted according to size, very neatly laid down to make efficient use of all space, like you would with your fire-wood. It appears that the people who did this took pleasure from handling these corpses. Any space between large bodies was carefully filled up by insertion of a child's or old person's small body to avoid the pile from falling aside. I imagine the Turkish-Armenian reckoning chapter should better be erased from the history books.

(Sevket Sureyya Aydemir, The Man Who Searches for Water: pp 120-121. Remzi kitabevi, Ninth printing, 2003).

Thanks to Fatma S. for providing and translating the above; the original Turkish may be [Read Here].

Reader Accounts

 Plenty of readers have written with their own "oral history" as to how much the Armenians hurt their families. Here's one:

I am 39 years old and living in Istanbul. My mother born in Rize (blacksea city) in 1936. My grand mother and my grandpa
also from born in same city in begining of 20th century , years of 1900 & 1905 . They told us lots of bad things about the past...
During the russsian war, armenian gangs always was attacking to their towns and neighboorhood villages.They were killing
families, villagers, and muslim population.

THE WORST STORY IS:
My mother'shas two Aunt , Sisters of my Grandpa , they were twins, and was 15-16 years old. Armenian gangs had wrapped them to a tree and raped them. then cut their nipples and make "prayer beads"(tespih) from the cutted woman nipples.. It was a tradition that time.. In eastern Turkey, Hundreds of thousand innocent people killed or raped by armenian gangs and russian troops during and before first world war. Because all Muslim Men , Turks and few Christian Ottomans (their brothers since 1000years) was fighting in all around the Anatolia against enemies, such as in Gallipoli, etc..

my father killed by Iranian troops in 1986, during Iran - Iraq war , shall i hate from Iranians? Answer is "No"

Actually i have lots of good armenian friends in my town that i born. Now, we had mosque and armenian churches next to next, living in a peace since many many years in this nice lovely country.

be sure that emperialist powers such as Usa , UK , France , and others tried to make brothers enemy , they succeeded partly.. but not entirely..

Tarkan K., March 8, 2007

Mass Graves


 Mass graves were unearthed in the following villages in Turkey: Oba Village of Igdir (March 1986); Alaca Village of Erzurum (three graves in May and July 1986); Cavusoglu hay-stack of Van Ercis (July 6, 1988); Yesil Yayla of Erzurum Dumlu (October 1988); Zeve of Van (April 4, 1990); Subatan of Kars (June 20, 1991); Timar Village of Erzurum Pasinler (July 7 1993); Hakmehmet of Igdir (October 6, 1999). Shreds of fabrics, fez, head coverings, rings, buttons, bullets, wallets, and Islamic relics, cigarette holders remained intact.
More Reading

 

Further Turkish Oral History:

A Massacre at Van

The 1915 Armenian Revolt in Van: Eyewitness Testimony

Ahmet Refik Book Excerpts

Ottoman Archives:

Documentation of Massacres upon Turks by Armenians

Armenian, Russian and other testimony:

Slayer Armenians Reveal Their Turk-Killing Ways  

 

 
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THE PURPOSE OF TALL ARMENIAN TALE (TAT)
...Is to expose the mythological “Armenian genocide,” from the years 1915-16. A wartime tragedy involving the losses of so many has been turned into a politicized story of “exclusive victimhood,” and because of the prevailing prejudice against Turks, along with Turkish indifference, those in the world, particularly in the West, have been quick to accept these terribly defamatory claims involving the worst crime against humanity. Few stop to investigate below the surface that those regarded as the innocent victims, the Armenians, while seeking to establish an independent state, have been the ones to commit systematic ethnic cleansing against those who did not fit into their racial/religious ideal: Muslims, Jews, and even fellow Armenians who had converted to Islam. Criminals as Dro, Antranik, Keri, Armen Garo and Soghoman Tehlirian (the assassin of Talat Pasha, one of the three Young Turk leaders, along with Enver and Jemal) contributed toward the deaths (via massacres, atrocities, and forced deportation) of countless innocents, numbering over half a million. What determines genocide is not the number of casualties or the cruelty of the persecutions, but the intent to destroy a group, the members of which are guilty of nothing beyond being members of that group. The Armenians suffered their fate of resettlement not for their ethnicity, having co-existed and prospered in the Ottoman Empire for centuries, but because they rebelled against their dying Ottoman nation during WWI (World War I); a rebellion that even their leaders of the period, such as Boghos Nubar and Hovhannes Katchaznouni, have admitted. Yet the hypocritical world rarely bothers to look beneath the surface, not only because of anti-Turkish prejudice, but because of Armenian wealth and intimidation tactics. As a result, these libelous lies, sometimes belonging in the category of “genocide studies,” have become part of the school curricula of many regions. Armenian scholars such as Vahakn Dadrian, Peter Balakian, Richard Hovannisian, Dennis Papazian and Levon Marashlian have been known to dishonestly present only one side of their story, as long as their genocide becomes affirmed. They have enlisted the help of "genocide scholars," such as Roger Smith, Robert Melson, Samantha Power, and Israel Charny… and particularly  those of Turkish extraction, such as Taner Akcam and Fatma Muge Gocek, who justify their alliance with those who actively work to harm the interests of their native country, with the claim that such efforts will help make Turkey more" democratic." On the other side of this coin are genuine scholars who consider all the relevant data, as true scholars have a duty to do, such as Justin McCarthy, Bernard Lewis, Heath Lowry, Erich Feigl and Guenter Lewy. The unscrupulous genocide industry, not having the facts on its side, makes a practice of attacking the messenger instead of the message, vilifying these professors as “deniers” and "agents of the Turkish government." The truth means so little to the pro-genocide believers, some even resort to the forgeries of the Naim-Andonian telegrams or sources  based on false evidence, as Franz Werfel’s The Forty Days of Musa Dagh. Naturally, there is no end to the hearsay "evidence" of the prejudiced pro-Christian people from the period, including missionaries and Near East Relief representatives, Arnold Toynbee, Lord Bryce, Lloyd George, Woodrow Wilson, Theodore Roosevelt, and so many others. When the rare Westerner opted to look at the issues objectively, such as Admirals Mark Bristol and Colby Chester, they were quick to be branded as “Turcophiles” by the propagandists. The sad thing is, even those who don’t consider themselves as bigots are quick to accept the deceptive claims of Armenian propaganda, because deep down people feel the Turks are natural killers and during times when Turks were victims, they do not rate as equal and deserving human beings. This is the main reason why the myth of this genocide has become the common wisdom.