CITY OF VAN FREE OF TURKS AT LAST

THEIR SIX-HUNDRED YEAR REIGN IN ARMENIAN TOWN AT END FOR PRESENT AT LEAST.

STORY OF THE REVOLT

Question Now Whether Van is to be considered Independent or Annexed by Russia

Correspondence of the Associated Press
Van, Turkish Armenia, June 18. —The 600 -year reign of the Turk has been brought to an end, for the present at least, in both the town and the vilayet of Van. It is no longer strictly correct to date this correspondence as coming from Turkish Armenia, at the same time it is a question whether Van may yet be considered an independent State or whether it will be annexed to Russia. A foundation of Armenian autonomy [1] has been laid, however, by the naming of one of the Armenian leaders, Aram, who was a former supervisor of schools, as civil Governor and the establishment of a provisional administration. [2]

The vilayet of Van has an area of about 15,000 square miles with a population of several hundred thousand. The story of the revolt, by which Turkey has lost control of the ancient region, has not hitherto been told with much fullness. In the midst of a racial war, with its innumerable massacres and scattered disorders, it was impossible to gather a comprehensive view of the situation, and even now the story of the [burghers'] fight for freedom must be discounted by the possibility of the Turks” return — although that is regarded as remote.

 
Trouble first arose between the sturdy Armenian mountaineers of Shadach and their Kurdish neighbors. Jevdett Bey then said that if the Armenians of Van stirred he would make an end of the race throughout the Empire.[6] T here was shortly war between Armenian and Kurdish villagers in all parts of Turkish Armenia, mutual pillage and massacre, though the Armenians then suffered incomperatively more than the Kurds. The Armenian leaders counseled patience and submission and Jevdett Bey persuaded Ishkan and three other revolutionists to undertake a peace mission to Shadakh. On the way they were treacherously murdered, by order of Jevdett Bey, as the Armenians assert.[7]

On April 16, Jevdett summoned Vremyan, another Armenian leader, for a conference and bundled him off to Constantinople. Aram barely escaped seizure. The Armenians, now aware of Jevdett’s hostile intentions, declared their inability to supply 3,000 recruits, but offered 100 and gradual payment of exemption charges for the remainder.

All the American missionaries worked ceaselessly and effectively. Miss Carolise Sillman organized and took charge of a hospital annexed for cases of measles. Miss Gertrude Rogers and Miss Elizabeth Ussher helped Miss Bond, superintendent of the hospital, where there were always 1500 patients for a fifty-patient capacity. Mr Yarrow discharged a multitude of administrative duties assisted by Mrs. Yarrow and Mrs. J.C. Raynolds, the veteran of the station, having lived there forty-four years without slackening energy or enthusiasm. Besides these there were, as sharers of the dangers and [spoils?] of the siege the eight children of the Usshers and Yarrows and Miss Knapp, a visitor from the Bitlis Misson.

In spite of day and night bombardment from the imposing Fortress Rock, an isolated [?rising?] sheer from the flat plain immediately adjoining the old town, the handful of Armenians remaining there cut off from their fellows by the intervening Turkish gardens, shortly captured some of the fortified government buildings in their midst. Thirteen thousand cannon balls or shells were thrown from the fortress into the old town, but mainly fell harmlessly into mud walls, only three lives lost from the cannonade there.

 
There followed a wild night of frenzied rejoicing and incendiarism. The old town and the Turkish garden city went up in smoke. Half of Van, one of the prettiest cities of Asia, became a ruin. To make matters worse, Aram, appointed temporary Governor, allowed the cutting of shade trees in the Turkish quarter, partly for spite and partly to raise revenues.

The splendidly equipped Turkish hospital was plundered of its invaluable medicines before the missionaries, whose medical supplies were nearly exhausted, reached it. They extinguished three incendiary fires started in the hospital.

The Armenians claimed to have had ample provocation for reprisals, the Kurds having committed nameless atrocities and the Turks having executed160 Armenian prisoners, of whom 80 were sick or wounded, before they retired, shooting, besides all the Armenian conscripts in their ranks. The Turks left their own sick and wounded in terrible straits. Seventeen were rescued alive by the Armenians. The survivors declared they had had neither food nor water for four days. Scores were dead in their beds, largely of neglect.[13]

The explanation of the Turkish retreat came on May 18 in the person of Vartan and 3.000 Armenian volunteers, followed by a Russian detachment.

 
^1. The Armenians had always enjoyed an autonomy, albeit an "internal" one, as Richard Hovannisian instructs us.

^2. A mid-1915 French newspaper reported: "At the beginning of this war, Aram took up arms and became the head of the insurgents of Van." Aram Manoukian was not engaged in "self-defense," but fired the first shot; he was a great traitor to his Ottoman nation. Ambassador Henry Morgenthau believed Aram's forces numbered the higher end of 10,000-25,000, while the Armenian-sympathizing Rafael de Nogales, who faced off against the Van Armenians, vouched for 30,000-35,000, versus 12,000 Turks.

^3. Naturally this account must make villains of the Turks and their "severe measures," but note the utter absurdity. When a nation is at war and particularly in desperate need of manpower to stave off invading superpowers bent on the nation's extinction, it is not as though the citizens of that nation would have the right to consider conscription as a "choice." From the war's outset, Ottoman-Armenians had joined their nation's enemies; their treacherous intention was clear, and that was to fight against their nation. Jevdet Bey was acting in self-defense. On April 24, the Armenians' celebrated "Date of Doom," it was Jevdet Bey who was considering a "deportation"... of Turks and Muslims whose lives the murderous Armenians were imperiling.

^4. Armenian soldiers in the Ottoman army were treated no differently than Turkish soldiers, who were no less unfed. The reason why the Armenian soldiers were disarmed is that too many were acting treacherously and could not be trusted. The last thing the government wished was not to be able to make use of desperately-needed soldiers that were already trained and equipped.

^5. Note how the lies of Armenian propaganda become unraveled even in a partisan article such as this. Despite efforts to make Jevdet into a monster (Peter Balakian tells us his hobby was to nail horseshoes onto Armenian feet), of course Jevdet was friendly and would have "consulted the Armenian leaders frequently and they trusted his professed sincerity"; it was only after the Armenians' treachery became too blatant to ignore did Jevdet perform his duty and try to defend his people and territory.

^6. How could Jevdet have made "an end of the [Armenian] race throughout the Empire" if his authority extended only to Van? If this threat was not made publicly, it's curious where the Armenian who provided this alleged statement might have heard it from.

^7. The stupidities abound. Practically all able-bodied Muslim men in the area were away trying to defend the empire from mortal enemy Russia, poised at the gates, particularly after the army in the east was decimated in Sarikamish, no thanks to treacherous Armenians. The traitorous Armenian men, either having deserted or having avoided conscription were behind in huge numbers, massacring the Muslims. Yet here we are told the Armenians, those eternal victims, still suffered "incomparatively" more. And just as we're trying to recover from that fearsome lack of logic, we're told Jevdet arranged for four Armenians to talk sense into their fellow revolutionists, to try and get their dangerous behavior under control. Then, for no reason whatsoever, he arranges for their murder. It seems even the reporter realized the stink, and made sure to remind his readers these stories derived from the assertions of Armenians."

^8. If Jevdet was "obdurate" in trying to put down a rebellion during dangerous wartime, then Jevdet was doing nothing less than his job... much as the article tries to make it seem as though he were a brute. And do we need further confirmation as to how much these missionaries were in total cahoots with their beloved Armenians? The reason why they found the protection of a Turkish guard objectionable was because they did not want the authorities to be near the subversive activities the Armenians were up to, with the cooperation of the missionaries.

^9. The "hostilities" had actually begun earlier than April 20th. They were merely heating up by this point, playing a good part in the government's decision to arrest the ringleaders of the rebellion in Istanbul four days later, marking the beginning of the "genocide."

^10. 1,500 youths is nothing less than a small army. If we are to take that word literally, we'd need to assume many were "kids"; a dangerous component of the Armenian community, necesitating their inclusion in the "deportation."

^11. Now doesn't that take the cake. The two-faced Armenians switch gears from "friend" to enemy as soon as they smell blood, and when Jevdet responds to this threat as he was duty-bound to do, suddenly his previous friendliness must be described as a "mask."

^12. The accent here is on the word, "story." Such stories of hearsay from inventive Armenians were, as a rule, accepted as fact.

^13. We're meant to get the idea that the Turks were so cruel, they neglected their own. Recruiting genocide-speak, was such neglect a result of "intent"? Or is it possible manpower and resources were severely limited? Whatever the reason, the "genocide"-busting conclusion is this: If the Turks couldn't take care of their own, why should Armenians have received special treatment?

^14. Note the double standard, compared with Footnote 13 above. Suddenly, the neglect of Muslims under missionary care is presented as a "couldn't be helped" case. It's interesting to contemplate who might have received preferential treatment with the limited provisions on hand... Armenians, or Muslim Kurds? Since that one is a no-brainer, here is another point to ponder: precisely how limited was this revenge by Armenians? Since the mass killings had barely begun, of course that is another no-brainer. Finally, since the Armenians fired the first shot, how could their murders of Muslims be justified as a revenge mode?

^15. Armenian battle stories must always be presented with limited losses for the Armenians and overwhelming losses for the Turks.

^16. Business as usual for the Dashnaks and other revolutionary leaders, criminally exploiting their own. These were the gangsters the Armenian community put their trust in, only to see the terrorists destroy the Armenians' cushy, prosperous lives. Since Armenians are not "man" enough to take responsibility for their decisions, when they lost their gamble and were faced with ruin, they immorally had to make a "genocide" out of these events.

^17. Yes, those missionaries were certainly known for their "neutrality," all right. And how interesting that the Armenians preferred Russian dominance over independence. They must have been very happy when they would get their wish some six years later, enslaved over the next sixty years, with that warm and cuddly, fair Russian treatment.