Tall Armenian Tale: The Other Side of the Falsified Genocide

HOME

SECTIONS

Quotes

COMMENT

The following was from a site, ermenisorunu.gen.tr, which was down the last time checked. Thankfully, this information had been preserved by TAT.

The list below is really from 1914 on; there is one entry from 1906, in the "undetermined" table that follows.

An analysis follows.

THE LIST OF MASSACRES BY ARMENIANS OF TURKS IN ANATOLIA AND CAUCASIA, 1906-1922

Volume and Doc. No
Date Place Deaths

1/2
1914-2-21 Kars, Ardahan 30.000

1/3
1916-5-8 Pasinler 2.000

1/3
1916-5-8 Tercan 563

1/3
1916-5-8 Van, Tatvan 1.600

1/3
1915-5-9 Bitlis 40.000

1/3
1916-5-8 Bitlis 10.000

1/3
1915-5-9 Bitlis 123

1/4
1915 Van 44

1/4
1916-5-22 Van 1.000

1/4
1916-5-22 Köprüköy / Van 200

1/4
1916-5-22 Van 15.000

1/4
1916-5-22 Van 8

1/4
1916-5-22 Van 8.000

1/4
1916-5-22 Van 80.000

1/4
1916-5-22 Van 15.000

1/5
1916-5-23 Of 5

1/6
1916-5-23 Trabzon 2086

1/6
1916-5-23 Van 300

1/6
1916-5-11 Van 44.233

1/6
1916-5-11 Malazgirt 20.000

1/7
1916-6-11 Bitlis 12

1/8
1916-4-1 Van, Resadiye 15

1/9
1916-6 Van Abbasaða 14

1/9
1916-6 Edremid, Vastan 15.000

1/10
1915-4 Bitlis 29

1/10
1915-4 Muradiye 10.000

1/11
1915-5 Van 20.000

1/11
1915-2 Haskay 200

1/11
1915-2 Dutak 3

1/12
1915-4 Van 120

1/12
1915 Van 150

1/11
1915-5 Bitlis 16.000

1/11
1916-5 Mush 500

1/12
1916-5-25 Bayezid 14.000

1/13
l 915 Mush 800

1/13
l 915-8 Müküs 126

1/13
l 915-6-7 Müküs Seyhan 121

1/13
l 915-7 Mush Akçan 19

1/13
329 Mush 10

1/14
l 915 Bitlis Hizan 113

1/15
l 915 Van 5200

1/16
1916-8-14 Bitlis 311
(34 wounded)

1/19
1916-6-6 Shatak Serir 45

1/19
1916-6-6 Shatak 1150

1/23
1916-1-15 Terme 9

2/2
1919-1-25 Kars 9

2/3
1919-1-21 Kilis 2

2/4
1919-2-26 Adana, Pozanti 4
(1 wounded)

2/5
1919-5-18 Osmaniye 1

2/7
1919-6-13 Pasinler 3

2/10
1919-6-3 Igdir 8

2/11
1919-7-7 Kars, Göle 9

2/12
1919-7-9 Kagizman 6

2/13
1919-7-9 Kurudere 8

2/16
1919-7-8 Mescidli 4

2/16
1919-7-8 Gülyantepe 10

2/22
1919-7-11 Mescidli 20

2/26
1919-7-19 Bulakli 2

2/31
1919-7-24 Kars, Kagizman 9

2/36
1919-7 Sarikamish 803

2/37
1919-7 Sarikamish 695

2/38
1919/8 Muhtelif Köyler 2502

3/1
1919-7-5 Kagizman 4

3/1
1919 Tiknis, Agadeve 5

3/1
1919-7-19 Pasinler 2
(2 wounded)

3/1
1919 Nahçivari 4000

3/6
1919-7 Kurudere 8

3/6
1919-7-4 Akçakale 180

3/6
1919 Sarikamish 91
(2 wounded)

3/7
1919-8-15 Erzurum 153

3/7
1919-8-15 Erzurum 426

3/14
1919-9 Allahüekber 3

3/16
1919-9-14 Sarikamish 2
(1 wounded)

3/18
1919-11-11 Marash 2
(2 wounded)

3/19
1919-11 Adana 4

3/19
1919-11-16 Ulukishla 7

3/22
1919-12-7 Adana 4
(5 wounded)

3/26
1920-1-22 Antep 1
(2 wounded)

3/27
1919-9 Ünye 12

3/28
1920-2-28 Pozanti 40

3/29
1920-2-10 Çildir 100

3/32
1920-3-9 Zaruþat 400

3/33
1920-2-2 Shuregel 1350

3/35
1338-3 Marash 4
(4 wounded)

3/36
1920-3-22 Shuregel, Zarushat 2000

3/37
1920-3-9 Zarushat 120

3/37
1920-3-16 Kagizman 7201
(15 wounded)

3/39
1920-4-6 Gümrü 500

3/40
1920-4-28 Kars 2

3/41
1920-5-5 Kars 1774

3/46
1920-5-22 Kars 10

3/47
1920-7-2 Kars, Erzurum 408

3/47
1920-7-2 Zengibasar 1500

3/49
1920-7-27 Erzurum 69

3/50
1920-2-1 Zaruþat 2150

3/50
1920-5 Kars, Erzurum 27

3/50
1920-8 Oltu 650

3/50
1920-8 Kars, Erzurum 18

3/51
1920-10-15 Bayburt 1387

3/52
1920-10-20 Göle 100

3/53
1920-10-17 Pasinler 9287

3/54
1920-10-18 Tortum 3700

3/55
1920-10-19 Erzurum 8439

4/2
1920-10-26 Kars vicinity 10693

4/3
1920-10-?8 Ashkale 889

4/4
1919-1-6 Zarushat 86

4/5
1920-12-1 Kosor 69

4/6
1920-12-3 Göle 508

4/7
1920-12-4 Kosor 122

4/9
1920-12-4 Kars, Zeytun
28

4/10
1920-12-4 Sarikamish
1975

4/12
1920-12-6 Göle
194

4/14
1920-12-7 Kars, Digor
14620

4/16
1920-12-14 Sarikamish 5337

4/17
1920 Göle 600

4/17
1920 Kars 3945

4/18
1920
Haramivartan 138

4/19
1920
Nahçivan 64408

4/20
1920-11-29
Zarushat 1026

4/21
1921-2
Zenibasar 18
(3 wounded)

4/23
1920
Nahçivan 5307
(163 wounded)

4/24
1920-2
Kars vicinity 561

4/26
1920-12
Erivan 192

4/27
1921
Karakilise 6000

4/29
1921-11-21
Pasinler 53

4/29
1921-11-21
Erzurum 1215

4/30
1918
Hinis 870

4/31
1918
Tercan 580

4/32
1921 Nahçivan 12

4/33
1921 Bayburt 580

4/34
1921 Arpaçay 148

Sources: GOVERNMENT ARCHIVES

THE LIST OF UNDETERMINED NUMBER OF INCIDENTS

Volume and Doc. No
Date Place Deaths

1/2
1906-2-11 Revan The people of 25 villages

1/3
1915-5-9 Bitlis The people of 1 village

1/3
1915-5-9 Bitlis No. of people not known

1/4
1916-5-22 Van No. of people not known

1/6
1916-5-23 Van No. of people not known

1/6
1915-5-11 Trabzon No. of people not known

1/7
1916-6-11 Bitlis No. of people not known

1/7
1916-6-11 Van No. of people not known

1/7
1916-6-11 Baskala No. of people not known

1/10
1915-6-11 Van 180 Families

1/11
1915-6 Bitlis 100 Families

1/11
1915-5 Van No. of people not known

1/11
1915-6-10 Maçka No. of people not known

1/13
1914-12-17 Eleskird No. of people not known

1/13
1916-5-23 Hinis No. of people not known

1/13
1915-12 Mush No. of people not known

1/13
1915-1 Mush The people of 2 villages

1/13
1915 Elaziz No. of people not known

1/13
1915-8 Gevaþ No. of people not known

1/13
1915-2 Shatak 9 villages

1/14
1915 Hizan No. of people not known

1/18
1916-6-3 Diyarbakir 55

1/20
1916-5 Tercan 30 villages

2/2
1919-1-25 Ardahan No. of people not known

2/15
1919-7-8 Gülantab 2 villages

2/20
1919-7-16 Büyük Vedi No. of people not known

2/32
1919-7-25 Gümrü No. of people not known

2/35
1919-7-12 Kars 1 Families

3/1
1919-7 Artvin Several

3/1
1919-7 Bayezid A series of people

3/4
1919-8 Nahçivan The people of 3 villages

3/6
1919 Sarikamish In large no.

3/6
1919 Sarikamish 1 village

3/6
1919 Sarikamish No. of people not known

3/6
1919-8-15 Erzurum 30 Families

3/8
1919-7-12 Kars 2 Families

3/9
1919-8-12 Kars No. of people not known

3/9
1919-8-12 Kars All Males

3/9
1919-8-12 Kars All people

3/9
1922-8-18 Kars All Males

3/12
1919-8-31 Sarikamish All people

3/12
1919-8-31 Kagizman No. of people not known

3/13
1919-8-18 Kagizman No. of people not known

3/14
1919-9 Karaurgan No. of people not known

3/16
1919-9-14 Sarikamish No. of people not known

3/31
1920-3-3 Kozan In large no.

3/33
1920 Suragel No. of people not known

3/37
1920-3-9 Zaruþad No. of people not known

3/37
1920-3-16 Kagizman No. of people not known

3/47
1920-5-24 Kars vicinity No. of people not known

3/49
1920-7-27 Oltu-Göle All males

3/50
1920-5-24 Kars vicinity All people

4/8
1920-12-3 Kars No. of people not known

4/23
1919 Kars vicinity a few Tents

4/23
1919-3 Kars vicinity 85 Families

4/23
1919-3 Sarikamish The people of 1 village

4/23
1919-2 Igdir Hundreds

4/23
1920 Kars vicinity No. of people not known

4/26
1920-11 Erivan-Kars No. of people not known

4/30
1918 Tekman No. of people not known

SOURCES
1. Osmanli Belgelerinde Ermeniler (1915 — 1920) / Armenians in the Ottoman Documents (1915 — 1920), Basbakanlik Devlet Arsivleri Genel Müdürlügü Yayinlari, Prime Ministry State Archives General Management Publications, 1995.
2. Hüseyin Nazim Pasa, Ermeni Olaylari Tarihi / History Of Armenian Events, Basbakanlik Devlet Arsivleri Genel Müdürlügü Yayinlari, Prime Ministry State Archives General Management Publications, 1994.
3. Arsiv Belgelerine Göre Kafkaslar’ da ve Anadolu’ da Ermeni Mezalimi / Armenian Oppressions in Caucasia and Anatolia In Accordance With Archive Documents, (Turkish and English), Basbakanlik Devlet Arsivleri Genel Müdürlügü Yayinlari, Prime Ministry State Archives General Management Publications, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998.
4. Armenians in Ottoman Documents (1915 — 1920), The Turkish Republic Prime Ministry General Directorate Of The State Archives Publication, 1995.
5. Kars Ili ve Cevresinde Ermeni Mezalimi / Armenian Oppressions In The Kars Province And Its Environs, Dr. Fahrettin Kirzioglu, 1970, Kars Turizm Dernegi / Kars Tourism Society.
6. Arsiv Vesikalariyla Tarihte Ermeni Mezalimi ve Ermeniler / Armenian Oppressions and Armenians in History In Accordance With Archive Documents, Mehmet Hocaoglu, 1976; Osmanli ve Sovyet Belgelerinde Ermeni Mezalimi / Armenian Oppressions In The Ottoman And The Russian Documents, Halil Kemal Türközü, 1983; Ermeni ve Rus Mezalimi / Armenian and Russian Oppressions, Erdal Ilter, 1999.

The Validity of the Numbers Above: An Analysis

We well know when it comes to the corroboration of their mortality figures, the numbers suddenly don't matter to deceptive pro-Armenians. They will come up with any number that is expedient. At the Peace Conference, they claimed 600,000-800,000 Armenians were killed. Basing upon his bloated pre-war population figure of 2.1 million, the Patriarch claimed 840,000 were killed at war's end. Meanwhile, organizations connected to the Near East Relief (responsible for the 1919 film, RAVISHED ARMENIA) went as high as "four millions"; Armenian propagandist hysteria reached heights of 2 million, but seems to have settled down to 1.5 million of late, although some try to be more "honest" by toning their figure of the "annihilated" down to "more than a million." As we know through the consensus of "neutral" (that is, Turk-unfriendly "Western") estimates, there were only some 1.5 million Ottoman-Armenians before the war began, and hard-liners concede one million survived. (Which happens to be 260,000 less than what the Patriarch had concluded.) A mortality of 1.5 million or even "more than a million" would not be mathematically possible.

Turnabout is fair play, however, and we should now take a look at the honesty of the Turkish claims.

The ones who try to discredit this list attempt to get away with the notion that the Turks and Muslims murdered by Armenians were incidental at best. We can understand, since Armenians obtain their life's blood from deriving sympathy, their "martyrology" has become an unofficial science vying with biology or chemistry, and there can be no room for other victims besides the poor, innocent, unarmed, Christian Armenians. The people who travel this route have no idea of how morally bereft they are, and if they are aware, they simply don't care; the end justifies the means, in traditional Dashnak style. We know from genuine eyewitnesses, (unlike bigoted Western consuls and missionaries, who mainly repeated what Armenians told them; they never saw actual massacres being committed) those who would have had every reason to protect the Armenians, their Russian, English and French allies, that the Armenians had gone on a mad spree of ethnic cleansing of epic proportions.

There are some impressive Ottoman-prepared lists, as one can get a taste on TAT's "518,000" page, with links to other examples, where the Turkish archives have documented the victims down to the names and their villages. These are from internal government documents, when the police or other officials bore a responsibility to make a record of the victims of Armenian criminals. Granted, not all of it may be accurate, but no one can say they were prepared with the intention of fooling future historians. Westerners did not care about Muslim victims then, no more than they do these days, and so these records were prepared strictly for the use of the Turks.

Yet not all of the claims on this list were prepared meticulously. I'm always in tune to the "counter-claims" of Armenian propaganda, on the off-chance the claims could be based on actual fact, for a change.

Let's read an "Armenian criticism" that was found on one of the omnipresent Armenian forums:

First, let's see what the supposed massacre of Turks by Armenians during the 'revolt' in Van is all about. This attempt of the Armenians to defend themselves against the Turkish attack in Van was promptly misrepresented in a communiqué which was sent by Enver Pasha and the Turkish Government to Berlin, and thence spread all over the world, as an attack by bands of Armenian insurrectionists who, in the rear of the Turkish army had fallen prey upon the Mohammedan population. Out of 180,000 Moslems in the Vilayet of Van only 30,000 had succeeded in escaping! In a later report issued by the Turkish embassy in Berlin on October 1, 1915, the story was further embellished: ''No fewer than 180,000 Moslems had been killed. It was not surprising that the Moslems had taken vengeance for this.'' Some 18 Turks, answering to the number of Armenians they had killed in Van, had turned into180,000! This astonishing impudent lie has a kind of foundation. According to statistics there should be180,000 Moslems, including 30,000 Turks and 150,000 Kurds, in the Vilayet of Van. The Turks fled westwards when the Russian army advanced, while the 150,000 Kurds remained where they were, and were molested neither by the Russians nor the Armenians. (Armenia and the Near East, Dr. Fridtjof Nansen, 1928, p.302)

Now did you get that? It sounds like the author is trying to say only 18 of 180,000 were killed. It doesn't make much sense, because the part about the 18 Turks sounds like the 18 were actually killers, "answering to the number of Armenians they had killed in Van." So even in the rare instance when an Armenian discusses Turkish victims of Armenians, they must be made to look like killers of Armenians.

(So offensively written, isn't it? Note "revolt" is put in quotation marks, even though this person is aware of what really went on. Sure, with Russia crashing through the east, and France and England bursting through the west, the bankrupt Turks were going to pick this desperate moment, squandering men and resources they did not have to "attack" Van. How do we expose the above writer for the shameless liar that he is, when he writes of the "attempt of the Armenians to defend themselves against the Turkish attack"? We turn to no other source than the leader of the Van revolt, later appointed Van's mayor by the Russians as a reward, Aram Manukian; he said: "For a month we started our rebellion, we were fighting in the expectation that the Russians would come." Haiasdan, 6 July 1915, no. 25.)

The population of Van Province was half a million; the city was around 100,000, of which (in April 1915) 33,789 comprised 42.3 percent of the population, closest to an Armenian majority of any city in the empire. A study of Patriarchate statistics, drawn from the Armenian archives and published in 1992 by Kevorkian and Paboudjian, attest to a total of 110, 897 Armenians in all of Van Province. Allowing for the usual Armenian exaggeration, let's round that off to an even 100,000. Subtracting from the total pre-war Van population of some 500,000, we see there were 400,000 non-Armenians, almost all of whom were Muslim. What "statistics" is our knuckleheaded Armenian friend referring to, when he cites a total of 180,000 Muslims, less than half the reality?

(Perhaps he has allowed himself to be "caught dead" with reliance on a Turkish source: Ottoman 1914 statistics for the city of Van, where the district of Adilcevas [now part of Bitlis] was added: 67,792 Armenians, 179,389 Muslims; Suslu, Ermeniler ve 1915 Tehcir Olayi, 1990, p. 22. You'll note, however, he specified 180,000 for the "Vilayet" [Province] of Van, not just the city.)

What can be said for the above? It is horrifying, the level this Armenian author will go to ("the supposed massacre of Turks by Armenians"), in order to cast doubt on the fact that Armenians were simply out of control, killing any Muslim (and anyone who did not fit their prototype, including Jews, some Greeks, and even fellow Armenians who had converted to Islam) usually in the most inhumanly creative manner. When Armenians invented their "Terrible Turk" stories, they did not have to think very hard, experienced as they were in the gruesome art of murder and mutilation.

The fact is, there was a revolt in Van and elsewhere, as allied and even Armenian testimony confirms. The ones engaged in self-defense were the outnumbered Turks, as most of the men were away at the desperate multiple wartime fronts... and they were trying to fend off the traitorous Armenians, who had fired the first shot, as usual. (One eyewitness's description: "There were only very few gendarmes in Van, and they were used to ensure public security. The governor distributed arms to those among the people who were capable of holding weapons. They comprised the reserve forces. But to what purpose? The weapons were basic, there was no ammunition, and no trained soldiers." See "p. 100.")

Fridtjof Nansen (1861-1930)

And get a load of this outrageous statement: "The Turks fled ... while the 150,000 Kurds remained where they were, and were molested neither by the Russians nor the Armenians." Presumably, the source of this horrid statement is Dr. Fridtjof Nansen, an Armenophile par excellence, who acted as President of the Armenian commission appointed by the International Labour Office, and as early as 1906 signed part of a petition to fellow bigot President Roosevelt, hoping to 'save from total annihilation' (as Arsheg Mahdesian put it in a 1919 article in "The New Armenia") “the Armenian people whose origin is the same as ours, and who have played an important part in the development of civilization since ancient times.” Similar to many "human rights" activists of today, the Norweigan barely regarded the Turks as equal human beings, and this is the kind of hopelessly biased source we are asked to put our faith in. Naturally, the Armenian who wrote this, sounding more knowledgeable than the average Armenian, knows exactly what the story is, but because his end justifies the means, he must be "patriotic" by classifying Muslim victims of Armenians as an "astonishing impudent lie." The toll of Turks/Muslims (certainly including Kurds when the shorthand of "Turks" is sometimes used; when we speak of "Americans," we don't simply mean the Indians, either) in eastern Anatolia was around one million in all, and half were killed through the bloodthirsty efforts of Armenians and their Russian allies. Prof. Guenter Lewy recorded in "The Armenian Massacres in Ottoman Turkey: A Disputed Genocide" that only 3,000 Turks remained in Van.

The rest of what the Armenian wrote (not shown here) was similarly misleading; for example, the 1968 book, "The Kurds" by Hassan Arfa, described by Kamuran Gurun ("The Armenian File") as "anti-Turkish," is now twisted into being "really an anti-Kurdish, anti-Armenian book," because the author was an "Azeri Turk." The author was actually an Azeri-Iranian, and because of his sensitivity "between ethnic identity and citizenship," as Martin van Bruinessen put it in an article ("The Kurdish Question: Whose Question, Whose Answers?"), Arfa "wrote sympathetically on the Kurds." Was the book anti-Turkish? It certainly doesn't sound pro-Turkish with lines such as, "The Turks say: ‘you are Turks not Kurds; there are no Kurds in Turkey.’ (….) They do not allow that there is any Kurdish question in Turkey." And why should the book be regarded as "anti-Armenian"? Because our Armenian author hated Arfa's having reported that Armenians were responsible for the destruction of 600,000 Ottoman-Kurds (as Gurun put it; the Armenian reported a higher figure of 600,000-700,000.)

In a desperate attempt to discredit this claim, the Armenian points to "a real Kurdish sources in the 20s: The Register of the Director of Emigration in Constantinople discloses the ghastly fact that from1915 the Young Turks deported 700,000 Kurds from Kurdistan to Western Anatolia...Not even half of these unfortunates reached their destination." Our boy has no idea (aside from now donating his "Western Armenia" to "Kurdistan") that he is supporting the fact that it was not just the Armenians who were relocated, which weakens the claims for his genocide (that is, resettlement of populations according to war conditions is a matter of course for many nations); Ottoman Muslims were also moved away, in this case away from the path of the advancing and dangerous enemy known to rid conquered lands of Turks/Muslims. (Ara Sarafian confirmed Gurun's mistaken figure of some 702,900 relocated as applicable toward Ottoman Muslims, not Armenians, but this is not what the Armenian is referring to. His "real" source is "The Case of Kurdistan Against Turkey," 1928, Sureya Bedr Khan, p. 33. The 700,000 claim is actually on p. 6 of this hateful propaganda's online version, but there is nothing about "The Register of the Director of Emigration in Constantinople"; the figures are simply thrown in the ring, although the low end of his estimate of the Armenian mortality comprised of "nearly one-half million" Armenians is on track — even though he characterizes all as "murdered." [Sample: "Even the Turkish chauvinist now realizes that the life of the parasite can last no longer than that of his victims," and where the Turk is referred to as a "Mongoloid" vs. the pure, Armenian-like "Aryan" Kurd. Since the enemy of my enemy is my friend, the Kurdish author was sweet on the Armenians, as we can see in footnote 22 of pg. 32; we can also read the not very Armenian-helpful line, "In the World War, three hundred thousand Armenians fought in the ranks of the Allied and Associated armies or as independent units.")

If half of these relocated Muslims died, that also serves as proof against the Armenian author's genocide, because everyone in the Ottoman Empire was dying of the same reasons; famine, disease, exposure. Yet to this Armenian, the fact that people died of such non-violent causes must serve as proof that they were murdered by the Turks, and here is the shameless way he has wrapped up his moronic thesis: "Those 600,000 to 700,000, were in fact the Kurdish victims of the Turkish forces and nothing to do with the Armenians."

Since the ethics of such extremist Armenians are rarely in evidence, it becomes an exercise of frustration and futility to counter each offered falsehood, because that would take a lifetime. So let us concentrate on the one claim here that made sense! Here is what he wrote:

Let's see now the list, in which it is calculated over 500 000 Turks were killed by Armenians. Let’s take Van, since those two references above refer to it. These are some of the documents for Van. Belge no. 3, Tarih. 1916-5-22, number of Victims (Van): 8 Belge no. 3, Tarih. 1916-5-22, number of Victims (Van): 8,000 Belge no. 3, Tarih. 1916-5-22, number of Victims (Van): 80.000 The three are coming from the same said ''document''. One document, the same identification, the same date, the same location. One can wonder, how Armenians for the same date, the same location, in the same document could have killed, 8, 8,000 AND 80,000. In fact, there has been another version, where there has been a ''1'' added before the 80,000 to be presented to the Germans as the one that Nansen is referring to. James Morgan Read, in his work' 'Atrocity Propaganda 1914-1919,'' write about the same thing...

I don't know about that other version where "1" was added before the 80,000, so let's concentrate on what we do know. The above is the archive's official figures. And the Armenian is making rare sense here. How could there be 8, and then 8,000 and then 80,000 for the same city, the same date, the same document number? There is obviously something very wacky going on there.

Luckily, I've been behind this site for a while now, and have made a few contacts. One of the few Turkish historians I have gotten to know (after preparing an analysis of a Taner Akcam job) is Professor Kemal Cicek, and he was kind enough to look into this matter. Prof. Cicek is a real pro. His specialty is foreign documents, so this area is not his normal turf. He looked at what was there without analysis, simply to provide whatever details were offered.

Here we go:

8 is the number of gendarmes killed in the Gendarme Station of the village of Peli, town of Gevaş, Van on "Kanun 1330" (December/January 1914/15.).

8,000 is the number killed in Van, and this number comes from the testimony of Nigar, the wife of Osman, the "Miracoglu Süvari Çavusu." In her testimony she says that she and many others had been dispatched to the American Missionary station. After staying in this place for some time they were given a loaf of bread per person and having eaten these breads people began to lose their hair, blood came out of their mouths, and died after their bodies became swollen. She also lost 4 of her 5 children in this manner. She further stated that the number of people gathered by the Russians around the American Missionary station was not less than 8000. They were not allowed to go out or stay in the garden and spent two months at this location. During this period people died of the bread and not more than 150 persons were left. Then these people were taken to the house of Haci Ziya Bey, where they were subjected to every kind of inhuman treatment. Women were raped, even some boys were raped by Armenians, and most died. The few survivors were saved by the approaching Turkish soldiers.... etc. This statement is corroborated in almost the same manner by Zeliha Hanim, the wife of Kadikoğlu Hüseyin of the village of Norşin, Van. No dates were provided in these documents but the testimonies begin with words such as "on the night of the evacuation of Van...."

The third entry's 80,000 number comes from the testimony of Ali, the son of Reshid of the quarter of Topçioğlu, Van. Here he says in brief that they left Van and arrived at Hoşap. They were planning to reach Siirt province. However on their way they met a crowd of people gathered from all towns and villages in the area. He estimated the number as 80,000. The Turkish version of this testimony (there is also an English version) says that Russian soldiers were in on the mistreatment of these people, along with Armenians. The people were surrounded before the arrival of the forces of Halil Bey, and taken. First they collected the babies and children from their mothers and threw them into the river. They began massacring people with bayonets, swords and daggers. Only 2000 survived. These people were transferred to Hoşap again, where the inhuman treatment continued for two months. One night the Russian troops suddenly pulled out and the people heard not long after that the Turkish army had entered Van. They then left Hoşap for Van to join with the soldiers.

So what do we make of this material?

At least we can see actual sources exist to back up the discrepancy of the 8-8,000-8,000 Van figures. (The "1916-5-22" date, as one can see above, has also been used for three or four other "Van" entries, reflecting not the dates of the deaths, but most likely the dates for when this information was recorded.) Once again, a reminder to not accept "surface" explanations of pro-Armenians. As the TV program, THE X-FILES, kept reminding us, "the truth is out there." But one has to make the effort and go out there to get the truth.

On face value, the quality is very poor. Most of these documents do not provide exact dates, and the officials who questioned or interviewed the people did not bother to ask what date they were talking about, and were hardly thorough. That does not mean the people were being untruthful; no doubt they went through a horrific experience. But these entries are anything but scientific; what some might call "a la Turca." (The 80,000 estimate of "Ali" for example... that is not what we would call reliable.)

Each of these entries from the "518,000" list needs to be examined to see exactly how many are similarly slipshod. There are some that appear to be very respectable, providing individual names and villages of victims (as mentioned above), which is remarkable. But if too many of the other entries are like the testimony of "Ali," then the integrity of this list becomes seriously threatened.

Given the unreliability of these entries, does that mean the baby should be thrown out with the bathwater? Heck, no; there are too many horrifying accounts from non-Turkish eyewitnesses, the Armenians' own Russian and French allies. These are corroborated by American missions, such as Niles and Sutherland in 1919, and even some of the Harbord Commission report. It's obvious hundreds of thousands of Turks, Muslims and others died at the hands of the Armenians and sometimes their Russian allies. This unholy treatment was repeated by the Armenians for the Azeris/Muslims in Armenia during 1919-20 or so, and a killer's M.O. does not change. This latter episode could be classified as a real genocide, as the majority of the Muslims of Armenia were wiped out.

It's unfortunate Westerners were not around at the time of these events, or the few bigots who were around did not regard these Muslim victims as worthy human beings. So we can't get too much Western substantiation; here are a few examples. We've already covered one from above, about 600,000 Muslim victims in "The Kurds." The best is from British Colonel Wooley, who estimated 300,000-400,000 Ottoman Muslims (he specified "Kurds"), in two districts alone. (Van and Bitlis; in other words, the losses from all the many other districts were not included). These estimates tell us the 518,000 figure must not be off the mark, and may in fact be an undercount; particularly when one considers the incidents not accounted for, as the reader may note from the above list's "Part II" or "UNDETERMINED" section. But until these entries are examined by genuine scholars with a lot more care than has obviously gone into them, no exact figure can be provided for the number of Turkish/Muslim victims of the Armenians.