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"My
affairs are too important to be trifled with."
One of the ways in which the self-important Henry Morgenthau
strong-armed Talat Pasha, yet another episode where the Ottoman leader
acquiesced to the superior American. From "Ambassador Morgenthau's
Story."
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Ambassador Henry
Morgenthau, Sr. |
From an Armenian web
site is the following insight into the life of Ambassador Morgenthau...
written by ANI's Dr. Rouben
Paul Adalian:
Henry
Morgenthau (1856-1946) was United States ambassador to the Ottoman Empire
during the Armenian Genocide. A naturalized American from a German Jewish
family, Morgenthau was a successful lawyer active in Democratic Party
politics. With the election of President Woodrow Wilson, he was appointed
United States Ambassador to the Sublime Porte in 1913. In Constantinople he
established personal contact with the Young Turk leaders of the Ottoman
Empire, especially the Minister of the Interior, Talaat, with whom he
unsuccessfully intervened to alleviate the plight of the Armenian population
when beginning in April, 1915, news of the deportations and massacres began to
reach the Embassy. The US consulates in the interior of the Ottoman Empire
relayed a stream of alarming reports detailing the extent of the measures
taken against the Armenians. Despite the difficulties of communication during
the war, Oscar H. Heizer in Trebizond, Leslie A. Davis in Mamuret-el-Aziz, or
Harput (Kharpert in Armenian), and especially Jesse B. Jackson in Aleppo
regularly posted the Embassy with their own eyewitness accounts of the
treatment of the Armenians. On June 5, 1915, Jackson shared his views about the persecutions with the
Ambassador and concluded that they constituted "a carefully planned
scheme to thoroughly extinguish the Armenian race." Morgenthau forwarded
all the reports to Washington, D.C. The accumulating evidence also led
Morgenthau to cable the Department of State on July 16, 1915, with his own
dispatch that "a campaign of race extermination is in progress."
Drained by his failure to avert this disaster, Morgenthau returned to the
United States in 1916 and for the remainder of the war years he dedicated
himself to raising funds for the surviving Armenians. In 1918 he published Ambassador
Morgenthau's Story, a memoir of his years in Turkey, in which he stressed
the German influence and role in the Ottoman Empire. He titled the chapter on
the Armenians, "The Murder of a Nation." He described the
deportations and the atrocities as a "cold-blooded, calculating state
policy." He avowed at the time: "I am confident that the whole
history of the human race contains no such horrible episode as this."
Morgenthau was the father of Henry Morgenthau Jr., Secretary of the Treasury
during the administration of US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
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Here
is an example of the Ambassador's Thinking |
The Independent
February 28, 1920
Shall Armenia Perish?
By Henry Morgenthau
Former Ambassador to Turkey, and National
Vice-Chairman of Near East Relief
Two hundred and fifty thousand Christian Armenian women enslaved in Turkish harems call to
the people of America for liberation! One hundred thousand women already rescued by Near
East Relief agents from harems will perish unless support from America is continued! Two
hundred and fifty thousand children, orphaned by the unspeakable Turks, are calling in the
only English they know, "Bread, Uncle Sam." One million two hundred thousand
destitute, homeless, clotheless adults look to the giant in the West for the succor that
will keep them from annihilation. What shall our answer be?
If they were good enough to fight and die for us when we needed their help so sorely, are
they not good enough to be given some crumbs from our plenty?
Since the beginning of the war, the Turkish Armenians have been largely refugees. A
simple, agricultural people, they have been exiled from their farms and deprived of all
opportunity to support themselves. Now, more than a year after the armistice, they are
still living the life of nomads, able to continue alive only by virtue of American
philanthropy. If ever unmerited suffering called for succor the plight of the Armenians
should be heeded now. A few months more and it may be relief will come too late for those
myriads whom only we can save.
Let the American slogan now become-Serve Armenians for a little while longer with life's
necessities that they may be preserved for the day of national freedom and rebirth, which
no people more truly and greatly deserves.
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Henry's
main squeeze, at right
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The belief, held by some persons, that Turkey has repented and can do
not further harm, is without foundation. The group that led Turkey into the war on the
side of Germany is now in the saddle. The Turk has not been disarmed and these leaders are
now aiding the Tartars. Kurds and Bolshevists are urging them on to kill and rob the
surviving Armenians at every opportunity. The deportations and massacres during the war
were not spontaneous uprisings of unorganized mobs, but were the working out of a
well-plotted plan of wholesale extermination in which regular Turkish officers and troops
took part as if in a campaign against an enemy in the field.
More than 2,000,000 persons were deported. The system was about the same everywhere. The
Armenians, men, women and children, would be assembled in the marketplace. Then the
able-bodied men would be marched off and killed by being shot or clubbed in cold blood at
some spot which did not necessitate the trouble of burial.
Next the women would be sorted out. Agents of the Turk officers picked the youngest and
fairest for their masters' harems. Next the civil officials had their pick, and then the
remainder either were sold for one medjidi-a silver coin valued at about 80 cents-or were
driven forth to be seized by the lower class Turks and Kurds.
As a last step, those who remained, mothers, grandmothers, children, were driven forth on
their death pilgrimages across the desert of Aleppo, with no food, no water, no shelter,
to be robbed and beaten at every halt, to see children slain in scores before their eyes,
and babies dashed to death against rocks or spitted on the bayonets of the soldier
guards.
If America is going to condone these offenses, if she is going to permit to continue
conditions that threaten and permit their repetition, she is party to the crime. These
peoples must be freed from the agony and danger of such horrors. They must not only be
saved for the present but either thru governmental action or protection under the League
of Nations they must be given assurance that they will be free in peace and that no harm
can come to them.
HAREMS??
|
"Two hundred and fifty thousand Christian Armenian women
enslaved in Turkish harems," indeed! So ordinary Turks had harems... hmmmm.
Contrary to Western belief, the only harem I'm aware of — the Sultan's harem —
wasn't even the kind of place where the Sultan could "pick and choose" his
sexual partners. (The harem, by the way,
was a Byzantine tradition.)
Ambassador Morgenthau was
playing up to Americans' ignorance of the mysterious ways of the Orient. Not the
only time he expressed a willingness to demonstrate a total disregard for the truth.
On the surface, the ambassador
seemed to be your plain, everyday Turk-hater common to the period, with descriptions
such as "The unspeakable Turks." (Morgenthau believed the Turks were an
inferior race, possessing "inferior blood.") He certainly was not above
repeating (or creating) sensational stories, such as, "...babies dashed to death against rocks or spitted on
the bayonets of the soldier guards."
Nor did he care about citing actual statistics, claiming a deportation of a cool two million
Armenians, more than existed in the entire
Ottoman Empire. And check out his pat conclusion: "...not spontaneous uprisings of unorganized mobs, but ... the
working out of a well-plotted plan of wholesale extermination." No wonder Armenians still love to quote this
man. (Californian Professor Marashlian calls Morgenthau's testimony " unimpeachable." Footnotes for Dr. Lowry's
examination of the book give examples of how Fellow Californian Professor
Hovannisian cites Morgenthau practically every chance he gets.)
What kind of a man was the
ambassador, anyhow?
"Henry Morgenthau, who
is frequently quoted by Armenian Americans, visited the Ottoman Empire with
political, not humanitarian aims. His correspondence with President Wilson reveals
his intent was to uncover or manufacture news which would goad the U.S. into joining
the war. Given that motive, Henry Morgenthau sought to vilify the Ottoman Empire, an
enemy of the Triple Entente." (From An Unjust Trial.)
Prof. Heath W. Lowry, in his
article entitled "American Observers in Anatolia CA. 1920: The Bristol
Papers" states as follows:
"Morgenthau was a confirmed 'Turcophobe' whose hatred for the Turks was matched
only by his unabashed support for the Christian minorities under Ottoman
rule...Armenian spokesmen consistently refer to H. Morgenthau's statements as proof,
in their pursuit to convince the politicians that a so-called genocide occurred. In
his tenure, Mr Morgenthau has never left Istanbul ..."
Morgenthau himself admits that
he never visited eastern Anatolia and he let his Armenian aide shape up his
diplomatic propaganda against the Ottoman Empire:
"I have really found it impossible to sit down and
dictate a letter
quietly. So I have instructed Andonian to take my diary and copy it with some
elaborations of his own. Of course this relieves me of all responsibility for any
error."
Lowry, 1990; Franklin Delano Roosevelt Presidential Library, New
York, Letters; Box 7 May 11, 1915; Box 1 2 September 1, 1915; Box 8 July 13,
1915)
|
Hagop S.
Andonian |
RELIEVES ME OF ALL
RESPONSIBILITY FOR ANY ERROR? That's convenient. It reveals a lot about the man's
character, too. The Ambassador also wrote:
"You probably know that with the approval of the President (Wilson),
I have undertaken to write a book. Mr. Andonian is assisting me in the preparation
of that work and owing to his intimate knowledge of the east (Anatolia) and his
unusual experience, his services to me are really indispensable."
Lowry, 1990; Library of Congress, The Papers of Henry Morgenthau,
Reel No 8.
That does not help in building
credibilty to the historical value of his book, "Ambassador Morgenthau's
Story." Moreover, as influential as his Armenian assistants (his primary aide,
translator and confidant in Istanbul and Anatolia was an Armenian, Arshag
Schmavonian, his secretary, sometime translator and soon-to-become sometime movie
companion [upon traveling to the States] was also an Armenian, Hagop Andonian...
possibly related to the forger, Aram Andonian, since "Andonian" may not
have been that common a name) could well have had pull with false reports, and even
to the extent of shaping up his memoirs; the ambassador also employed a ghost writer
(Burton J. Hendrick) to actually write his book... deviating by the truckload from
his letters and diaries.
Professor Heath Lowry exposes
these deviations in his report, The
Story Behind Ambassador Morgenthau's Story.
George A. Schreiner in his
"The Craft Sinister: A Diplomatico-Political History of the Great War and its
Causes, (G. Albert Gayer, New York, 1920)" writes about Ambassador
Morgenthau¹s misleadings of the American government. ("It is to be hoped that the future historian will
not give too much heed to the drivel one finds in the books of
diplomatist-authors.") The
distinguished foreign correspondent (having served in Turkey from February through
the end of 1915) wrote Morgenthau a
biting December 11,1918 letter, criticizing him for the fallacies in his unethically written book
(Ambassador Morgenthau's Story).
It seems to me Morgenthau let
his ego run away with him, enjoying the notion that his fellow Americans looked upon
the ambassador as the savior of a Christian people. The intensity with which he
communicated his thoughts (as with the article above) provides a strong clue... he
must have liked the fact that he came across as a hero. There are a good number of
passages in his ghost-written book where his heroic deeds and attitude is presented
(or as Schreiner mocked, his "omniscience
and omnipotence"), even though some
of his letters and diaries paint an altogether different picture.
For example, there is a point
where he forces himself on the Turkish leaders whenever he wants:
"I shall not be denied an interview," I replied. "I shall
come up to the cabinet room at four o'clock. If you refuse to receive me then, I
shall insist on going into the council room and discussing the matter with the whole
Cabinet. I shall be interested to learn whether the Turkish Cabinet will refuse to
receive the American Ambassador."
Immediately after which, Enver
Pasha is heard to gasp over the phone. As always, Morgenthau gets what he wishes.
The Turkish leaders snap to his
every high and mighty command throughout the book. For example, he brags about
seeing Talat "nearly every day." Yet, in the first six months of 1914, his
diaries and letters indicate a Talat tete-a-tete of no more than twenty times.
Some of the incidents he has
his ghostwriter tell us, if true, must have done wonders for his bloated ego. For
example, at one point he once again manipulates the Turks to acquiesce to his wishes
by managing to get only a handful of Ottoman Britons and French shipped off. When he
comes back to tell the nervously awaiting flock the good news, they are so stunned
in disbelief that the women fall on their hands to kiss his hands, and the men
embrace him (in the case of the latter, much to his "violent
protestations"... Morgenthau wanted to make clear he was a manly man). That
kind of hero-worship must have gotten pretty addictive.
However, the greatest example,
to my mind, of Ambassador Morgenthau's mission to present himself as a heroic savior
is...
...His decision to
appear in 1919's RAVISHED ARMENIA
as HIMSELF! What an egomaniac..!
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Passages
where Morgenthau itches to show the Turks as beautiful human beings |
And then with great cleverness he would play upon the only emotion
which really actuates the Turk. The descendants of Osman hardly resemble any people I
have ever known. They do not hate, they do not love; they have no lasting animosities or
affections. They only fear. And naturally they attribute to others the motives which
regulate their own conduct. "How stupid you are," Wangenheim would tell Talaat
and Enver....
So the Turks are cowards. Check.
The state of war had now made me, as American Ambassador, the
protector of all British, French, Serbian, and Belgian subjects. I realized from the
beginning that my task would be a difficult one. On one hand were the Germans, urging
their well-known ideas of repression and brutality, while on the other were the Turks, with
their traditional hatred of Christians and their natural instinct to maltreat those who
are helplessly placed in their power.
The Turks are brutes. Check.
The Turks, like most primitive peoples, wear their emotions on the
surface, and with them the transition from exultation to despair is a rapid one...
The Turks are primitive. Check.
Essentially the Turk is a bully and a coward; he is brave as a lion
when things are going his way, but cringing, abject, and nerveless when reverses are
overwhelming him.
The Turks are bullies. Check. And cowards...
hey. We already covered cowards. However, let's make a note of how nerveless Turks are
against overwhelming odds. As in Plevna, for
example. And as with not settling to have the right of self determination taken away from
them, when the Allies came up with the Sevres Treaty. Few chapters in history represented overwhelming odds
as those that governed the birth of the Turkish Republic.
We must realize that the basic fact underlying the Turkish mentality is its utter contempt
for all other races. A fairly insane pride is the element that largely explains this
strange human species...
Pretty ironic this haughty fellow is one to look
down on pride. Building several empires over the course of a millennium has a tendency to
produce pride, it's a funny thing. And as far as utter contempt for other races, those
other races were allowed to rise to high positions in Ottoman life centuries before blacks
got the right to drink from general water fountains in the United States.
At this point, I fear Ambassador Morgenthau just
might have lost his faith in human nature. Where, oh where, will he come up with an
example to offset this Turkish blight upon humanity? Hold on! Here it comes...
What is definitely known about the Armenians, however, is that for
ages they have constituted the most civilized and most industrious race in the eastern
section of the Ottoman Empire. From their mountains they have spread over the Sultan's
dominions, and form a considerable element in the population of all the large cities.
Everywhere they are known for their industry, their intelligence, and their decent and
orderly lives. They are so superior to the Turks intellectually and morally that much of
the business and industry had passed into their hands.
Armenian.... Good. Turk.... Bad. Got it...
The most beautiful and healthy Armenian girls could be taken,
converted forcibly to Mohammedanism, and made the wives or concubines of devout followers
of the Prophet. Their children would then automatically become Moslems and so strengthen
the empire, as the Janissaries had strengthened it formerly. These Armenian girls
represent a high type of womanhood and the Young Turks, in their crude, intuitive way,
recognized that the mingling of their blood with the Turkish population would exert a
eugenic influence upon the whole.
Armenians.... Salvation for the Turkish Race. Got
it.
Say, didn't those Janissaries weaken the empire? I
thought that was why they were gotten rid of, finally.....
...It was a complete revelation of Turkish mentality; the fact that,
above all considerations of race and religion, there are such things as humanity and
civilization, never for a moment enters their mind. They can understand a Christian
fighting for a Christian and a Jew fighting for a Jew, but such abstractions as justice
and decency form no part of their conception of things.
Well, I think we have churned enough stomachs and
now have an excellent idea of where the good Ambassador was coming from. We also now can
see why the Armenians and Greeks totally revere this man, and why Armenian professors are
desperate to still cling to his weighty words as the gospel truth.
More on Morgenthau (from
guestbook commentator, Nick, a Briton)
|
(Bold highlighting by Holdwater)
Re: Please read this message
From: NICK
Date: 11/22/1999
Comments
Interesting. But you don't think that somewhere in these reports was the element of
war time propaganda? Morgenthau is extremely unreliable and his book is not only an
example of war time propaganda but also of the pathology of 19th century racism. I
refer you to chapter XXII of Ambassador Morgenthau's Story, "The Turk Reverts
to Ancestral Type". It is full of nonsensical stories of abducted women forced
into harems or auctioned at markets, forced adoption of children and so on. He says
the same things about the Germans and Austrians incidentally — deportations of
Belgians, wholesale violation of Belgian women, the abduction by Austrians of Serb
children and the settlement in parts of Europe vacated by deportees by good German
stock! All stories proved false after the war. He even states that the Turks, good
with cudgels and knives, are too dull and unimaginative to come up with the concept
of deportation — it was a German idea!
His book oozes with racial slurs and
prejudice----"The most beautiful and healthy Armenian girls could be taken,
converted forcibly to Mohammedanism, and made wives or concubines of devout
followers of the Prophet. Their children would then automatically become Moslems and
so strengthen the empire as the janissaries had strengthened it formally. These
Armenian girls represent a high type of womanhood and the Young Turks, in their
crude intuitive way, recognized that the mingling of their blood with the Turkish
population would exert a eugenic influence on the whole." This is ludicrous,
ridiculous and this nasty book is still in print, it is cited in Congress and
used in "education packs" for high school and college students.
Sentiments like these expressed about any
other ethnic group would be considered abhorrent — yet aimed at the Turks it seems
to be acceptable. It is mystery to me how any sensible person could, in this day and
age, read this rubbish without squirming in his seat with embarrassment.
It is ironic that Morgenthau, as a Jew, should
make these kinds of racial comments and eugenic observations given what was to
follow. This book is a piece of propaganda and it is interesting that Morgenthau is
the source of many articles and stories — he is a principle supplier of
information to Bryce whose role during the war was as a producer of propaganda. Even
Bryce's material, emanating as it does from a professional, is interesting if you
read between the lines; in a letter from an American missionary woman in Van it says
that she had "thrust" upon her the care of 1000 Turkish refugees from
villages that Russo-Armenian volunteers were "cleaning out"!
Now there is an interesting phrase with more
than a little contemporary resonance. The term "ethnic clearing" was used
by Serbs to describe the cleaning of Vukovar of Croat Catholics. The interesting
thing is that this comment is dropped in in a matter of fact way — it must have
been commonplace and it illustrates her prejudices and priorities — "While
Armenian refugees had been mutually helpful and self sacrificing, these Moslems
showed themselves absolutely selfish, callous and indifferent to each other's
suffering. Where Armenians had been cheery and hopeful, and had clung to life with
wonderful vitality, the Moslems, with no faith in God and no hope of a future life,
bereft now of hope in this life, died like flies of prevailing dysentry from lack of
stamina and the will to live."
This is a sample from what is common throughout
these reports. Muslims are brutal, barbaric, selfish and died like "flies"
because they lacked faith in God. Christians are cheerful in adversity, meek,
selfless and sustained by their Christian faith. It should be obvious to a simpleton
that these reports are one sided, biased, carefully selected and presented to cater
to the baser prejudices and prurient fantasies that western people had about the
east, in the interest of promoting the war effort.
These "stories" are accepted today
without any reservation because they serve an ideology. For example, the Christians
of Trebizond — 10,000 of them — are put into sailing boats and (methods varying
according to which source you read) taken out to sea, and thrown overboard! All 10,000 of them and all in an afternoon!
Has anyone actually thought about the logistics of this? Isn't this just a little
complicated? Am I the only one who thinks that Bryce is egging the pudding just a
bit?
On
Oct 6th 1915 Bryce tells the House of Lords that 800,000 Armenians had been murdered
in six months! What remarkable access he had to information from the interior of an
enemy country! And yet we have all these survivors. We are told that 1.5-2 million
Armenians died (time frame flexible) — and yet the top estimate of the Armenian
population of Ottoman Anatolia at the turn of the century is just under 1.5 million.
If you look at population statistics for this period you will see that between 1914
and 1922, in Anatolia, about 300,000 Greeks died, about 600,000 Armenians and about
2.75 million Muslims died. If the argument were to be made that in the course of
this war Armenians suffered a catastrophe that was genocidal in its impact then
nobody would be arguing. But that is not what is being said. Bryce states that
Armenians are being destroyed as a policy of state — that there are orders to this
effect. Well, where are these orders?
The fact remains that there is not a single
Ottoman government document in existence that discusses, plans or commands the
execution of these "orders". The definition of genocide has to be made
very elastic to make the accusation credible in this case and there is reliance on
propaganda of dubious provenance and eighty years old and liberal use of repugnant
racial stereotypes in lieu of facts. The only fact that is certain is that this war
was genocidal in its impact for all the people of Anatolia. No other theatre of war
experience casualties of this magnitude not just amongst soldiers but civilians as
well. It is complicated by the fact that the distinction between regular and
irregular troops and civilians did not exist.
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The Lawyer was a Liar |
"One day Talaat
made what was perhaps the most astonishing request I had ever heard. The 'New
York Life Insurance Company' and the 'Equitable Life of New York' had for
years done considerable business among the Armenians. The extent to which
these people insured their lives was merely another indication of their
thrifty habits.
'I wish,' Talaat now said, 'That you would get the American Life Insurance
Companies to send us a complete list of Armenian policy holders. They are
practically all dead now and have left no heirs to collect the money. It of
course all escheats to the state. The Government is beneficiary now. Will you
do so?
This was almost too much, and I lost my temper. 'You will get no such list
from me,' I said, and I got up and left him.
The above is a passage often
pointed to in Armenian friendly sources to show the inhumanity of Talat Pasha;
it is from Henry Morgenthau's book, and only one of the many fabrications
exposed by the meticulous research conducted by Dr. Heath Lowry in "The
Story Behind Ambassador Morgenthau's Story."
Today, lawyers enjoy the reputation
of being perhaps the sleaziest of professions in the United States, and the
field's practitioners are often perceived as people with no moral scruples
whatsoever. This was not always the case; there was a time when those who were
experts in the Law were seen as among the most honorable of citizens. There
were enough examples of lawyers performing in immoral ways that turned public
opinion drastically against them, and we can now see Henry Morgenthau must
have done his utmost to assist this tide that went against those of his chosen
profession.
(By the way, it also didn't hurt
for the unethical Mr. Morgenthau to drop the name of an insurance firm
[Equitable] he happened to be on the
Board of Directors of... a free plug never hurts, especially in what was
sure to be a sensationally popular book.)
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Oh,
Henry! |
|
Children
loved Henry Morgenthau |
Was Morgenthau as rabid a Turk-hater as he comes
across? When I read such words coming from missionaries or from religiously-inclined U.S.
Consuls such as George Horton, I can
believe their Turk-hatred truly emanates from their hearts. However, Morgenthau appears to
be of a different breed. As a lawyer and real estate developer, and as a city person
who probably wasn't too wrapped up in religion, I don't see how he could be this venomous.
Morgenthau's purpose was to vilify Turks and Germans
to induce the Americans to enter the war. Thus, there was a strong possibility he wasn't
totally out there as his wild words indicate (although he certainly must have had enough
prejudice within him to have gone as overboard as he did)... since he got along well with
the Turks, according to his letters/diaries, and any of this oozing contempt seemed rare
in those more reliable documents (some letters of which secretary Andonian wrote, so they
are not completely reliable, either.)
This leads me to believe he mostly said such things
in order to achieve an end. If such is the case, what must we think of him?
It's one thing when a racist makes offensive
statements... not that it wouldn't be terrible, but while one's lip curls in disgust
somehow one could understand such people; they can't help themselves, having been mentally deranged. This is why it's hard to hate
Armenians in their web sites.
However, if someone slanders to the ugly and vicious
extent that Ambassador Morgenthau allowed himself to do... regardless of how noble he
believed his cause was (similarly, his propagandist co-conspirators on the other side of
the ocean, Lord Bryce and Arnold Toynbee, engaged in outright lies for their Queen, and
the holy man Lepsius, doing his bit for Christ)... that makes a person a particularly low
form of humanity, in my book. it's harder to forgive someone who is calculatingly
deceitful, and so easily inclined to murder the reputation of an entire people, because
such a person has a choice. Unlike a mentally deranged racist, such a person can help
himself. I believe this lawyer, Henry Morgenthau, was in full command of his faculties.
It's no wonder that George Schreiner was so
absolutely disgusted with Morgenthau's lack of ethics in the December 11,1918 letter he wrote... where he declared, "You saw little of the cruelty you
fasten upon the Turks."
"Apart from that he (Enver Pasha) was in no
respect what you picture him. Of course, if we are to take it for granted that we of the
West are saints, then the Turk is any good. You will agree with me, no doubt, that the
Turks count among the few gentlemen still in existence."
He then correctly declares something all Armenians
and their supporters should bear in mind:
"Ultimately truth will prevail."
Like the movie MIDNIGHT EXPRESS where there was no indication of "good" in
the Turkish people, and the film was incredibly successful in turning minds against the
Turks, Morgenthau's extremely popular book added in a significant way the anti-Turkish
hysteria already well in place. The book effectively contributed (perhaps almost as much
as that other hoax-book, The Forty Days of Musa
Dagh) to negative perceptions against Turkey that Greeks and Armenians are well aware
of how to exploit. This is why they can keep conning Westerners today, as they know they
have their well-established, solid foundation of hate and ignorance to work from. This is
why a Peter Balakian (among others) can con
famous authors like Norman Mailer, Kurt Vonnegut, John Updike and Arthur Miller, who
already have their deep-rooted prejudices and automatically accept the anti-Turkish drivel
they are told; and they don't think twice about joining the bandwagon to smear a professor
like Heath Lowry because they can't believe any
professor in his right mind can deviate from the version of events they prefer to believe,
without being a tool of the Turks. Meanwhile, truly partial historians like Richard Hovannisian teach at
universities funded by wealthy Armenian organizations, and these author-hypocrites have no
problem with that.
Dr. Lowry winds up his excellently-researched The Story
Behind Ambassador Morgenthau's Story by
telling us:
One can not help but wonder how many of the young
Armenians who turned to the terrorist assassinations of Turkish officials (and bystanders)
in tl1e 1970's and early 1980's, were influenced by reading Ambassador Morgenthau's Story?
Ambassador Morgenthau committed a great wrong, the
repercussions of which can still be felt today. I'd like to bring up two other points from
his book.
|
Constantinople
Cop: Bedri Bey |
Bedri Bey, the police prefect, is
in awe of the American and always snaps to attention when Morgenthau is around. (He is one
of those primitive people, after all... and Morgenthau is just so superior.) As a Turk, of
course, Bedri Bey salivates to cause damage to defenseless people, but the moral,
upstanding Morgenthau is there to foil his plans. The two engage in a kind of power play,
where Bedri Bey usually winds up as the loser.
At one point, the Ambassador manipulates the mentally
sluggish Turk by threatening:
"You are very foolish to try to play such
tricks on us," I said. "Don't you know that I am going to write a book? If you
go on behaving this way, I shall put you in as the villain."
Bedri Bey, afraid, magically comes to his senses.
Turks are cowards, after all.
Unrelated to Bedri Bey, Morgenthau says, elsewhere in
his ghostwritten book:
I still attempted to persuade Talaat that the
treatment of the Armenians was destroying Turkey in the eyes of the world, and that his
country would never be able to recover from this infamy.
Now here is the great irony. It hasn't come true yet,
but one day, it inevitably will. It inevitably will, because as George Schreiner said,
"Ultimately truth will prevail."
Ambassador Morgenthau's record of his life will one
day blow up in his posthumous face, and his reputation will forever be besmirched... just
as he has been destroying the reputation of the Turks these many years with his dishonesty
and lies... and he is the one who will never be able to recover from his infamy.
Far from Bedri Bey's being the villain of his book,
Ambassador Morgenthau will one day emerge as the villain of his book.
This is only a matter of time.
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