Here We Go!

 


"Part I" of this study encompassed basically the first three pages of Power's first chapter. If we devote the same degree of attention for the rest of Power's book, we'll soon be sinking in quicksand, because practically every word she has written comes straight from the annals of Armenian propaganda. So we'll make an effort to shoot for the highlights. (Or lowlights.)

The photo of Armenian children above is featured on p. 4 of Power's book, and Power has written: "Only four of the children survived the Turkish slaughter." Could it have been John Mirak, credited with the photo, who simply made such a claim? Whomever made this claim that would be so exceptionally difficult to verify, is it not awfully irresponsible of our "genocide scholar" to simply accept some agenda-ridden propagandist's "word"? It's highly unethical and disgraceful to make a charge of "slaughter" if there is no proof. Furthermore, is it not just as awful for reviewers and "historians" who have lauded this book to not have their alarm bells go off when they read a caption such as this ? The first question that should have entered the mind of any responsible party would have been, "How do you know?" And yet, they were all accepting of the dubious sources Power has presented... so their unprofessional lack of questioning is hardly surprising.

Power:

Britain and France were at war with the Ottoman Empire and publicized the atrocities. The British Foreign Office dug up photographs of the massacre victims and the Armenian refugees in flight. An aggressive, London-based, pro-Armenian lobby helped spur the British press to cover the savagery.9

Footnote 9: "The Friends of Armenia, the Anglo-Armenian Association, and the British Armenia Committee secured meetings with senior British policymakers. Just beginning his scholarly career, British historian Arnold Toynbee joined the British Armenia Committee's propaganda subcommittee and published a pamphlet in 1915 that accused the Ottomans of planning 'nothing less than the extermination of the whole Christian population within the Ottoman frontiers.' Arnold Toynbee, Armenian Atrocities: The Murder of a Nation (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1915), p. 27." (Holdwater: Power also cites the murderously propagandistic "The Treatment of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire, 1915-16"; the propaganda subcommittee Power refers to above was only in operation in 1920; see Nassibian, p. 49. Power was referring to Wellington House, the propaganda division of his country, erroneously crediting this private pro-Armenian group instead.)

"Britain and France were at war with the Ottoman Empire," which means Britain and France had every reason to show the Ottomans to be wicked beasts, given that Britain and France, along with Russia, were planning to gobble up the Ottoman Empire. This means the last people we want to listen to in order to get at the truth would be "Britain and France." Arnold Toynbee's "scholarly career" took a great unscholarly detour when he agreed to serve as Wellington House war propagandist, which emphasized demonization of the enemy. Toynbee was not proud of this chapter of his career, denouncing the work as "war propaganda." (Pg. 50 of 1922's “The Western Question in Greece and Turkey.”)

Arnold Toynbee, as editor of The Bryce Report, the Blue Book of the British (F.O. 371/3404/162647, p. 2), in a memorandum dated 26 September 1919, wrote the following, when the British propaganda services were alarmed about newspaper accounts mentioning the treachery of the Armenians: "To lessen the credit of Armenians is to weaken the anti-Turkish action. It was difficult to eradicate the conviction that the Turk is a noble being always in trouble. This situation will revive this conviction and will harm the prestige not only of Armenians, but of Zionists and Arabs as well. The treatment of Armenians by the Turks is the biggest asset of his Majesty’s Government, to solve the Turkish problem in a radical manner, and to have it accepted by the public."

Now where in the world could Britain have "dug up photographs of the massacre victims," since the British were no longer present on Ottoman soil? We keep seeing the same unverified photos of dead people in Armenian genocide web sites, some so underhanded they actually have used verified photos of massacred Turks, in the hands of Armenians. (But what do we expect from our "human rights" champion who writes that only four children from the above photo were "slaughtered," when she has no way of proving it?) Pictures of "Armenian refugees in flight" would be more believable, but are shots of people in wartime panic or suffering supposed to serve as proof that there was a systematic plan to eliminate them?

By pointing to enemies of Turkish people to "prove" her claims, what Samantha Power the Irishwoman is doing is no different than if someone else with an ax to grind against the Irish would do to show how "bad" the Irish are. There are plenty of examples of English sources throughout history who spoke disparagingly of the Irish, particularly during times of conflict. Let's say an agenda-ridden party refers solely to examples of Irish-committed atrocities after 1916, in Ireland's guerilla struggle, and documented by the English. Would it be ethical of anyone to compile a list of such biased sources to demonstrate that the Irish are simply no good? Samantha Power would hate that, but look at what she is doing. The sources she uses to prove her case are nothing less than a travesty.

But some had trouble believing the tales. British foreign secretary Sir Edward Grey, for one, cautioned that Britain lacked "direct knowledge" of massacres. He urged that "the massacres were not all on one side" and warned that denunciation would likely be futile.

Footnote 10: Sir Edward Grey to Sir Francis Bertie, British ambassador to France, May 11, 1915, cited in Gary Jonathan Bass, Stay the Hand of Vengeance: The Politics of War Crimes Tribunals (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000), pp. 115, 348-349.

So here we have a British man of integrity, brave enough to allow honor to supersede his duty to his country's wartime propaganda, similar to C. F. Dixon-Johnson. But his opinion was shared by only a mere handful; the British Press would insure that almost all the people in Great Britain would accept the savagery of the Terrible Turk as a fact. (Note Grey's message was dated before the relocation, or "genocide," began.) The irony here, of course, is that Grey's information that the Armenians had conducted massacres are presented as a point of ridicule by the agenda-ridden Samantha Power. (Understandable, as she has made not one reference to crimes of Armenians.)

After informing us of the May 24 Entente declaration, Power tells us the Allies were too busy trying to win the war (p. 5), to do much about helping the Armenians... who happened to be revolting against their country at the behest of the Allies. "At the same time the Turks were waging their campaign against the Armenian minority, the German army was using poison gas against the Allies in Belgium. In May 1915 the German army had torpedoed the Lusitania passenger liner, killing 1,200 (including 190 Americans)."12

Footnote 12. Jay Winter, "Under Cover of War: Genocide in the Context of Total War," paper presented at the National Holocaust Museum, Washington, D.C., September 28, 2000. Her "May 24" source was The New York Times, and Power elaborated: "Most Europeans identified with the Armenians' suffering because they were fellow Christians. But when the Russians suggested condemning 'crimes against Christianity,' it seemed too parochial, and the phrase 'crimes against humanity and civilization' was chosen instead." Perhaps Russia chose to specify "Christianity" as a means to let Russia off the hook for Russia's crimes against "Judaism" that the hypocritical Allies chose to ignore. One of the reasons to demonize Turks stemmed from the Allies' wish to take the heat off Russia, heat that threatened to steer the USA away from joining the Allies. No mention in Power's book, by the way, of Russia's WWI crimes.

Jay Winter is a full-fledged member of the profitable genocide industry who presided over the propagandistic PBS show, "The Great War." (Even though in that show's book version, Winter contradicted himself, writing the relocation program was "not genocide.") Regardless of how Winter depicted the actions of WWI Germany, it is unconscionable of Power the anti-scholar to present only the view that helps with her agenda. Here, she seems determined, for some odd reason, to show the "Hun" was a beast in its own right. (Perhaps this is her way of getting back at Germany, as she began the "Recognition" part of her chapter with Germany's covering up "Talaat's campaign." Power was wrong on this count, as well.)

Could Power have imagined she was in the hairy arms of "The Hun"?

Indeed, there were times Germany behaved miserably during the war, as all nations have a tendency to do during war, but it appears Power is still fully in line with the British propaganda of the period. Germany was using gas, but so were the Allies. (The British reportedly used chemical weapons against the Turks, in the Gallipoli invasion.) Some accounts have it that Germany torpedoed ships with warning at the outset, and changed policy only after the Allies torpedoed without warning. As for the Lusitania, Germany issued a traveller's warning in America that "vessels flying the flag of Great Britain or any of her allies are liable to destruction." One torpedo was fired, but there were two explosions, probably the result of a secret cargo of heavy munitions on the ship. The rules of warfare required that civilian ships were not to carry ammunition. (Britain claimed the second explosion was caused by coal dust igniting.)

"Escaped From  Lusitania" — J. Ayala,  Cuban consul general  of Liverpool, was one  of the fortunate  passengers on the  Lusitania, for he  escaped with his life in  the curious outfit of  clothing in which he is  here photographed."  (The Pinedale  Roundup, Wyoming,  1915)

(The Daily Kennebec Journal, on May 28, 1915, offered what must have been the prevailing thought on the warning loophole: "Rattlesnake Gives Warning. [Bath Times] The rattlesnake gives warning too, but he is not regarded as a highly desirable citizen. That is the way the New York World sums up in 15 words all there is to be said about the sinking of the Lusitania.")

.Howard Zinn ("A People's History of the United States," 1980): "It was unrealistic to expect that the Germans should treat the United States as neutral in the war when the U.S. had been shipping great amounts of war materials to Germany's enemies...The United States claimed the Lusitania carried an innocent cargo, and therefore the torpedoing was a monstrous German atrocity. Actually, the Lusitania was heavily armed: it carried 1,248 cases of 3-inch shells, 4,927 boxes of cartridges (1,000 rounds in each box), and 2,000 more cases of small-arms ammunition. Her manifests were falsified to hide this fact, and the British and American governments lied about the cargo."

At least Power did not insist the Germans had bayoneted Belgian babies. (Although she will actually try to legitimize anti-German propaganda later in her book.) Such claims were so awfully invented by British war propagandists, the British apologized to Germany in 1936 for the fabrications in their Blue Books. Since Turks are low men on the totem pole, no similar apology to the Turks was issued for similar lies. In this day and age, propagandists like Samantha Power are still citing British Blue Book references, as Power has done with Toynbee's The Treatment of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire.

Power next tells us that Wilson had not joined the Entente's May 24 declaration to maintain the neutrality of the USA (does Power have evidence that the USA was even asked to join this declaration?), yet Amb. Henry Morgenthau would emerge as a sort of America's conscience:

In January and February 1915, Morgenthau had begun receiving graphic but fragmentary intelligence from his ten American consuls posted throughout the Ottoman Empire. At first he did not recognize that the atrocities against the Armenians were of a different nature than the wartime violence. He was taken in by Talaat's assurances that uncontrolled elements had simply embarked upon "mob violence" that would soon be contained.13

Footnote 13: The 2000 reprint of "Ambassador Morgenthau's Story," mysteriously requiring the services of "Editor" Peter Balakian.

If Talat Pasha explained the violence against Armenians was coming from uncontrolled elements, Talat Pasha was being 100% truthful. If the idea was extermination, after all, the majority of Armenians could not have survived. Power agrees a million survived. The original pre-war population hovered around 1.5 million, and the bulk of those who lost their lives died of famine and disease, the same causes claiming the lives of "thousands" of Turks daily, as Morgenthau had written in his "Story" book. Morgenthau is also on record, as quoted by Vahan Cardashian in an early 1916 letter to Lord Bryce, for agreeing that the "genocide had all but run its course," as even Vahakn Dadrian had put it. [The Armenian Review, Winter 1957, p. 107.] If the idea was "Race Murder," why stop in early 1916, when the majority was still alive and kicking? Morgenthau was also aware central command was weak. When a federal government is not fully in control, the odds for "uncontrolled elements" increase. The odds of a "Final Solution" plan carried out by the central government similarly decrease. Talat Pasha, in fact, sent a "cease and desist" "deportation" directive in August 1915, but needed to keep re-issuing similar orders until 1916... since locals had different ideas, illustrating the weakness of central command. (Guenter Lewy, "The Ottoman Massacres in Ottoman Turkey: A Disputed Genocide.")

Morgenthau had various reasons for wanting the USA to hop aboard the war train. His English-speaking Armenian secretaries had his ear, and Morgenthau developed a racist distaste for matters Turkish. Knocking out the Turks would also quicken the path to a Jewish homeland. (The Zionist Rabbi Stephen Wise was a close friend.) The fabrications Morgenthau presented in his "Story" book were at odds with his personal communications. For example, the "intelligence" he received made him fully aware that Armenians were, in fact, rebelling in great numbers. He didn't report the full story, because Morgenthau had an agenda. Morgenthau was not an honest man.

...[B]y July 1915 the ambassador had come around. He had received too many visits from desperate Armenia and trusted missionary sources to remain skeptical. They had sat in his office with tears streaming down their faces, regaling him with terrifying tales. When he compared this testimony to the strikingly similar horrors relayed in the rerouted consular cables, Morgenthau came to an astonishing conclusion. What he called "race murder" was under way.

BINGO! There you have it, ladies and gentlemen, the sources for not only Morgenthau but for his gang of consuls. (Among whom, apparently only Leslie Davis took the trouble to have a personal look-see.) Who in their right minds would trust missionaries, whose Godly duty, as evidenced in their prayers, was to vilify the Turks? And it wasn't as though the missionaries served as "eyewitnesses" for massacres. Mostly, they observed suffering people. The missionaries were generally swayed because they listened to teary-eyed Armenians. Too many Armenians , then and now, observe the Dashnak "end justifies the means" principle. Missionaries and Armenians have agendas, and do not serve as valid sources.

Westerners, particularly bigoted Christian westerners, and especially Americans, having grown to be the most hostile thanks to relentless propaganda, were easy prey to "terrifying tales," told by people with "tears streaming down their faces." This is the kind of "evidence" that has condemned an entire nation of "Race Murder": the hearsay of terrifying tales.

The unethical Henry Morgenthau

Power made certain to reproduce Morgenthau's horribly prejudiced "July 10 cable" that he based on the hearsay of Armenians and missionaries with tears streaming down their faces. It is the professional duty of ambassadors to provide factual, honest, and unbiased reporting about the countries where they serve. Morgenthau, however, had his own agenda and prejudices. An Armenian representative had told Morgenthau half a million resettled Armenians were doing relatively well, but that kind of tidbit would only surface in his private entries. As Prof. Lowry summed up, "All comments in Ambassador Morgenthau's Story notwithstanding, as late as September 1915, Morgenthau had not firmly concluded that the Armenians were the subject of an attempted 'extermination' by the Young Turk leadership."

Local witnesses urged him to invoke the moral power of the United States. Otherwise, he was told, "the whole Armenian nation would disappear."15 The ambassador did what he could, continuing to send blistering cables back to Washington and raising the matter at virtually every meeting he held with Talaat. He found his exchanges with the interior minister infuriating.

Again and again, Silly Samantha Power demonstrates what an anti-scholar she is. Heath Lowry's excellent research, "The Story Behind Ambassador Morgenthau's Story," was available (see last link above) by the time Power prepared her propaganda book. Lowry scoured Morgenthau's own diary and letters, and Morgenthau's privately written words served to sink many of his "Story" claims. In actuality, Morgenthau enjoyed a relatively good relationship with Talat and Enver. When Morgenthau said good-bye, in fact, Talat was kind enough to state how sorry he was to see him go, adding, "We feel almost as though you were one of us." (Morgenthau changed the line to a meaner tone, upon the advice of his ex-boss, Secretary of State Robert Lansing.)

Now why would Power present the idea that there was tension between Morgenthau and Talaat, when the ambassador's letters and diaries stated otherwise? Either she did not read the Lowry report, or more likely ignored what she had read, because the truth did not fit in with her propagandistic agenda. She demonstrates anti-scholarship also by referring to "Ambassador Morgenthau's Story" (e.g., her footnote 15, above; of 49 total "Race Murder" footnotes, a whopping one-seventh refers to the Story book) as though it were real history. (George Schreiner, perhaps the only American correspondent who travelled into the Ottoman interior in 1915 (see below) and concluded "no genocide," was incensed at Morgenthau's dishonesty, and wrote in his preface to “The Craft Sinister,” "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.” (That lets Power off the hook somewhat, as she certainly is no "historian.")

Talaat believed in collective guilt. It was legitimate to punish all Armenians even if only a few refused to disarm or harbored seditious thoughts. "We have been reproached for making no distinction between the innocent Armenians and the guilty," Talaat told a German reporter. "But that was utterly impossible, in view of the fact that those who were innocent today might be guilty tomorrow."17

The fact is, the Armenian community as a whole was disloyal, thanks to fanatical Dashnaks and Hunchaks' successful poisoning of relations. The loyal Armenians were often made fatal examples of, and by this time Armenians were "belligerents de facto, since they indignantly refused to side with Turkey," as Boghos Nubar put it in his 1919 letter to the Times of London. Leon Surmelian outlined how there was nary a loyal Ottoman-Armenian to be found; captured Russian POWs would even be applauded at times in the streets! The situation wasn't like Japanese-Americans or French Alsatians "deported" in WWII; these groups were completely innocent. By contrast, the terrorist committee men could expect local Armenian villages to feed and otherwise take care of them. The situation was most dire for the Ottoman Empire, attacked by superpowers on multiple fronts. Tolerating thousands of armed Armenian traitors from behind-the-lines would not have been an option for any nation; the traitors needed to be moved out. (It fact, self-defense is the duty of a nation. No less a historian than the Armenian, Borian, reminded us in 1929: "It is obvious that when a mass of ten thousand people revolt against the state behind the military front, the idea of state entails the state rule and statesmen to take responsible precautions to necessary defense.”)

Although Power is pointing to Talat's statement (Power's source for footnote 17: Ambassador Morgenthau's Story) as words an obvious criminal would make, the grim circumstances demanded no other recourse. Enver used similar reasoning in Power's favorite historical source. Check out the sensibility.)

Power makes propaganda with her statement that "all" Armenians were punished, but she is blowing her usual hot air: