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Van Johnson
reluctantly takes command of the "Japs" |
The Hollywood war film, starring Van Johnson, documenting the heroic
efforts of a volunteer Japanese regiment during World War II (the 442nd; the 1951 film: GO
FOR BROKE) begins with the following declaration from Franklin D. Roosevelt, the U.S.
President who signed the order (Executive Order 9066) to lock up the Japanese Americans
from the West Coast:
"No loyal citizen of the United States should be denied the democratic right to
exercise the responsibilities of his citizenship, regardless of his ancestry. The
principle on which this country was founded and by which it has always been governed is
that Americanism is a matter of the mind and heart; Americanism is not, and never was, a
matter of race or ancestry."
(Roosevelt made this declaration to justify the re-opening of the military to
Japanese-Americans.)
Those words are thought-provoking. When one is a citizen of a multi-cultural society,
heart and mind takes precedence over race and ancestry. Otherwise, if it's "every
race for themselves," soon there would be no country.
Does this always work? Of course not. Not in America, nor in other nations that have
established ethnic enclaves. Usually, those other nations, like Germany and France, were
homogeneous to begin with, so their cases are a bit different. But they are now becoming
"melting pots" as well, which is what the United States is based on. (And what
the Ottoman Empire was based on, as well.) Certainly little nation-states divided by
culture, religion, language and social customs may be found in the United States as well
as other countries. But there is not a country on earth that would not expect allegiance
beyond all else. There is nothing wrong with having ethnic pride and honoring the cultural
traditions of the "old country"; provided, in the case of the USA, that one is
an American first and foremost.
Basically, this is the main difference. Japanese-Americans during World War II were mostly
loyal. Ottoman-Armenians during World War I were mostly not. Not just in terms of putting
their "Armenianism" before their "Ottomanism," which could be endured
during times of peace. But in terms of fighting against their country, while super-powers
were set on extinguishing their country off the face of the earth.
Much of what's below comes from jainternment.org; Let's examine the relocation
orders in both historical examples, and their consequences.
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|
A quick overview of the Japanese case, as provided by excerpts of a President Bill
Clinton speech in mid-2000, paying tribute to Asian-American medal of honor
recipients (here is the whole shebang).
In early 1945, a young Japanese American of the 442nd Regimental
Combat Team lay dead on a hill in southern France — the casualty of fierce
fighting with the Germans. A chaplain went up to pray over him, to bless him, to
bring him back down. As the Chaplain later said, "I found a letter in his
pocket. The soldier had just learned that some vandals in California had burned down
his father's home and barn in the name of patriotism. And yet, this young man had
volunteered for every patrol he could go on."
In a few moments I will ask the military aides to read individual citations,
detailing the extraordinary bravery of 22 Asian American soldiers — some still
with us, some to be represented by family members. We recognize them today with our
nation's highest military honor, the Medal of Honor. They risked their lives, above
and beyond the call of duty. And in so doing, they did more than defend America; in
the face of painful prejudice, they helped to define America at its best.
(...)
Immediately following Pearl Harbor, Japanese Americans in the United States military
were forced to surrender their weapons. National Guardsmen were dismissed;
volunteers were rejected; draft-age youth were classified as — quote —
"enemy aliens." Executive Order 9066 authorized military commanders to
force more than 100,000 Japanese Americans from their homes and farms and businesses
onto trains and buses and into camps, where they were placed behind barbed wire in
tar-paper barracks, in places like Manzanar, Heart Mountain, Topaz. I am sad to say
that one of the most compelling marks of my youth is that one of those was in my
home state.
One resident of the camps remembers his 85-year-old grandmother standing in line for
food, with her tin cup and plate. Another remembers only watch towers, guards, guilt
and fear. Another has spent years telling her children, "No, Grandfather was
not a spy."
The astonishing fact is that young men of Japanese descent, both in Hawaii and on
the mainland, were still willing, even eager, to take up arms to defend America.
In 1942, a committee of the Army recommended against forming a combat unit of
Japanese Americans, citing — and I quote — "the universal distrust in which
they are held." Yet, Americans of Japanese ancestry, joined by others of good
faith, pressed the issue, and a few months later President Roosevelt authorized a
combat team of Japanese American volunteers.
In approving the unit FDR said, "Americanism is a matter of the mind and heart.
American is not, and never was, a matter of race or ancestry." That statement
from President Roosevelt, so different from the executive order of just a year
before, showed a nation pulled between its highest ideals and its darkest fears. We
were not only fighting for freedom and equality abroad, we were also in a struggle
here at home over whether America would be defined narrowly, on the basis of race,
or broadly, on the basis of shared values and ideals.
When young Japanese American men volunteered enthusiastically, some Americans were
puzzled. But those who volunteered knew why. Their own country had dared to question
their patriotism and they would not rest until they had proved their loyalty.
As sons set off to war, so many mothers and fathers told them, live if you can; die
if you must; but fight always with honor, and never, ever bring shame on your family
or your country.
Rarely has a nation been so well-served by a people it has so ill-treated. For their
numbers and length of service, the Japanese Americans of the 442nd Regimental Combat
Team, including the 100th Infantry Battalion, became the most decorated unit in
American military history. By the end of the war, America's military leaders in
Europe all wanted these men under their command. Their motto was "Go or
Broke." They risked it all to win it all.
They created a custom of reverse AWOL — wounded soldiers left their hospital beds
against doctor's order to return to battle. They were veterans of seven brutal
campaigns. They fought in Italy to overwhelm entrenched German positions that
blocked the path north. They fought in France and liberated towns that still
remember them with memorials. They took 800 casualties in just five days of
continuous combat in southern France, to rescue the lost battalion of Texas which
had been surrounded by German troops.
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| Let's
Get Some Differences Out of the Way |
Before we get to the similarities let's make clear that we're
comparing two different entities. ("OE" is the Ottoman Empire.)
USA = The world's greatest democracy
OE = A dictatorial empire, once very theocratic
USA = The world's richest nation
OE = The "Sick Man" was bankrupt
USA = The central government was strong and fully in charge
OE = The central government was weak,
orders often ignored
USA = Relatively safe from enemy attack in WWII.
OE = Geographically, a nightmare to defend, attacked on all sides by superpowers, with the
intent to snuff out the life of the Turkish nation, via secret treaties. In short, a life or death struggle. (End
result = Death.)
A note on the first set. How could a democracy compare to a dictatorship? Yet the gap was
not impossibly wide. Thanks to the "Millet"
system, the Ottoman Empire came closest to Plato's Republic, as Arnold Toynbee
opined. While Armenian propaganda stresses how persecuted the Armenians were (and, yes,
there was a "giavour" mentality; as with any ruling nation, the rulers felt
themselves superior), the fact is, the Armenians were still around after half a millennium
and were, in a sense, the masters of Ottoman society. As Consul Leslie Davis pointed
out in "The Slaughterhouse Province," "Most of the business of
the region was in their hands. 95% of the deposits in the banks belonged to them."
(He was referring to Harput, but the Armenians were similarly prosperous throughout the
entire nation. Moreover, they were allowed to participate in practically every walk of
Ottoman society.)
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Daniel
Inouye: war hero
(Photo:
HomeOfHeroes.com) |
Meanwhile, in the world's greatest democracy, if you didn't belong
to a certain class or race, your chances for advancement were limited. (That is, "as
with any ruling nation, the rulers [The WASPs, in the USA's case] felt themselves
superior.") Before 1915, Catholics didn't have much hope of getting into government.
(By contrast, Ottoman-Armenians were allowed entry into the highest ranks of government. It was probably
not until 1959 when the first Japanese American was allowed in government in a substantial
way, after Hawaii became the 50th state and Daniel Inouye, a veteran of the 442nd
Regiment, became the first senator.)
Andrew Wheatcroft put it well:
Although the Ottoman reformers promised that arbitrary power would be abolished, and
that all criminals would have the right of appeal ... arbitrary power continued to lie at
the heart of the Ottoman system. Those who were well inclined to the Ottomans, such as
Robert Curzon, suggested that injustices stemmed from inferior officers of the government
who were oppressors without the knowledge or acquiescence of their superiors. He also
pointed out that arbitrary power was not exclusive to the Ottoman empire, that the USA was
‘a land of liberty, where every free and independent citizen had the right to beat his
own nigger’. In many cases it was maladministration, not bad faith, that produced
injustice.
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Three Quick Facts
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1) While other American citizens representing the
Axis Powers were left alone (since Germans comprised the majority of white folk,
one supposes it had to be that way), "thousands"
of Americans of German, Italian, and other European descent were also forced to
relocate to the established camps. Many more were classified as "enemy
aliens" and subject to increased restrictions, as sort of happened (in a less
aggressive manner) to Arab-Americans, after 9/11.
2) While the total number of Japanese relocated varies from 100,000 to 120,000,
there were also 23,000 Canadians of Japanese descent who were sent to camps in
British Columbia. Unlike the USA, where families were generally kept together,
Canada sent male evacuees to work in road camps or on sugar beet projects.
3) After the Japanese Empire invaded Alaska in early June 1942, the American
military evacuated (June 12) Aleuts from Aleutians and Pribilofs. A demolition
crew from the USS Gillis burned the Aleuts’ homes on Atka, with all their
personal possessions still in them. As alaskamaritime.fws.gov
further informs us, days later "Pribilof Aleuts are evacuated from their
islands with several hours notice and start their journey to internment in
abandoned salmon canneries and mines in Southeast Alaska until May 1944. A total
of 881 Aleuts were removed from their homes in the Aleutian and Pribilof
islands."
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| Living
Conditions |
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Behind
the barbed wire |
We know the living conditions of the Armenians were horrible.
Naturally, it depended on where the Armenians were sent to. Some were sent into
makeshift camps. (Were these enclosed by barbed wire? To my knowledge, no.) Others
integrated into villages. (The idea of relocation was that Armenians would be sent
into areas in the manner that the Armenians would not exceed 10% of the local
population, in order to cut down on the chances for their rebellions.) So it's not
like the Armenians were "locked up." (All I know thus far, mainly from
missionary reports, is that their living conditions were believably awful. But I
have yet to see evidence that any of the Armenians were in an enclosed prison
setting. I'm sure there were guards to make sure they would stay put.) Some managed
to earn livings. Some had
trickled back during the war years, as missionary Mary Graffam reported, indicating
guns were not always pointed at the Armenians' heads, and often Armenians were
unguarded. (This is in vast contrast to the lot of the Japanese-Americans,
who were all "locked up" in prisons.) The killers of the Armenians
were mostly famine and disease. The bulk of the 2.5 million Turks also lost their
lives in such a fashion; as Morgenthau wrote, thousands of Turks were dying daily
from such factors.
The terrible conditions had to do with a shortage of resources and Turkish
ineptness. No doubt there were times revengeful local officials also had it in for
the Armenians, regarding them as traitors.
How did the USA, the richest country in the world, fare? jainternment.org
tells us:
Many families lived in horse stalls under unsanitary conditions, often by open
sewers. Others occupied hastily constructed barracks. Toilet and bathing facilities
were communal and devoid of privacy.
Barbed wire fences and armed guard towers with guns facing toward the inmates
surrounded these compounds. They were, in fact, prisons.
Inmates stood in line for everything, including meals, latrines, supplies and
services. Meals were nutritionally inadequate, medical care, minimal.
According to a 1943 report published by the War Relocation Authority (the
administering agency), Japanese Americans were housed in "tarpaper-covered
barracks of simple frame construction without plumbing or cooking facilities of any
kind." Coal was hard to come by, and internees slept under as many blankets
as they were allotted. Food was rationed out at an expense of 48 cents per internee,
and served by fellow internees in a mess hall of 250-300 people.
We are also constantly told the Armenians were sent to the desert to die, going for
the sympathy vote. (While the fact is, Armenians were sent mainly to regions known
historically as "The Fertile Crescent.") What of the Japanese-Americans?
These camps were located in isolated inland areas in vast, sandy deserts or swamp
lands. Inmates, who had come from relatively mild climates of the West, experienced
frequent dust storms, bitter cold winters, and sizzling summers for the first time.
Both Japanese-Americans and Ottoman-Armenians experienced a nightmare. At least
there were no lawless bands preying on the Japanese-Americans, so the
Ottoman-Armenians had it much worse. Yet for those of us who believe, as accounted
for in many internal Ottoman reports which were never meant to be public relations
exercises, that the Ottoman government's heart was in the right place... that they
tried to take care of the Armenians as best as they could, which is worse? Armenians
suffering from lack of food and medical care because there wasn't enough to go
around in the whole desperate Ottoman nation, or Japanese-Americans not getting
sufficient food or medicine, even though the United States government was in the
position of taking much better care of their own?
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| Now
for Some Similarities |
An American publication, The Weekly Tribune, had the following to report in its
February 20, 1942 issue (entitled, "President Roosevelt Signs Executive Order
9066"):
Yesterday, February 19,1942 President Roosevelt signed the Executive Order 9066. This
order gave the army the ability to designate what are called “military areas”. Areas
that certain people can be excluded from. The intent of signing this order will give the
U.S. the ability to force the Japanese out of certain areas, giving us a way for mass
removal of any people with Japanese ancestry. President Roosevelt and the Justice
Department believe that the mass removal of Japanese of any descent is a step in the right
direction. A little over two months ago Japan signed an alliance with Germany and Italy,
which heightened the already high tensions between the U.S. and Japan. On December 7,1942
Pearl Harbor, Hawaii was bombed by the Japanese. The following day the U.S. declared war
on Japan, and Germany and Italy — being alliances with Japan — declared war on the
U.S. WWII had officially begun. Although the FBI has promised the United States government
that the Japanese pose no threat, many people still believe that the Japanese may have had
spies of some sort. Which would have given them an insight of how and when to bomb Pearl
Harbor. There are many mixed opinions about the recent events. Some people believe that
what is being done to the Japanese is an act of racial prejudice and are taking sides with
the Japanese, while others believe that it is perfectly justified.
Mass removal of the Japanese Americans will begin as soon as possible. Japanese families
will be loaded up, taken to segregation camps, registered, and given numbered tags that
will be used to identify them and their belongings. They will be able to bring only what
they can carry, which will include household and personal items for their daily living.
Until they are evacuated from their homes, they have one week to prepare and have strict
guidelines that they must follow, including curfews and travel permits to leave their
homes.
We learn that in both cases:
1) The populations from the "danger zones" (or as the article above put it,
"military areas") were affected. The Japanese-Americans from New York City were
unaffected, for example, as were the Ottoman-Armenians of Istanbul.
2) Both were allowed only to bring with them what they could carry. Both were forced to
sell assets at fire sale prices. Armenian homes, according to Ottoman decrees that were
not always followed, were meant to be safeguarded until the Armenians were allowed to
return (and contrary to what Armenian propaganda tells us, many did return, especially
after the Ottoman decree of late Dec. 31, 1918; there were 644,900 Armenians in what was
left of the Ottoman Empire by 1921, according to the Armenian Patriarch. With the Allies
in charge, once Armenians returned, you can bet their homes occupied by others, such as
Muslim refugees, were vacated).
It appears the Japanese-Americans had it far worse; in contrast to the Ottoman government
that promised to look after the properties of their Armenians, the U.S. government did not
give the same option to their Japanese.
As another site informs us, the commanding general of the Western Defense Command,
Lieutenant General John L. De Witt, , issued (on February 14, 1942) a final recommendation
to the secretary of war arguing that it was a military necessity to evacuate
"Japanese and other subversive persons from the Pacific Coast." In his report,
he cited that "The Japanese race is an enemy race," and that "112,000
potential enemies of Japanese extraction" had to go from the Pacific Coast
(California, Oregon, and Washington). He also added, in a crazy case of lopsided logic:
"There are indications that the very fact that no sabotage has taken place to date is
a disturbing and confirming indication that such action will be taken." (War
Department 1942, 34)
The above was merely an interesting prelude to the point we were trying to get at; the
article further informs us:
On February 25 General De Witt ordered the eviction of the two thousand Japanese living
on Terminal Island, in Los Angeles, giving them twenty-four hours to sell their homes and
businesses.
If this was the rule, then it appears Japanese-Americans, unlike Ottoman-Armenians, were
not allowed to hold on to their properties.
With this example, then, the Ottomans were even more humane than the Americans.
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|
Notice on
Bainbridge Island to Japanese-Americans |
3) The article cites another De Witt order on March 24, regarding an
island in Washington (Bainbridge), where the Japanese community also got only 24 hours
notice. By early 1942, other Japanese were given "a matter of days."
The average notice given to Ottoman-Armenians was about a week. Taner Akcam stresses the
norm was 24 hours, and no doubt examples of that may be found (the rules changed,
depending on the whims of the local officials), but all the pro-Armenian sources
encountered so far state otherwise.
Looks like the Ottomans once again, although not by much, edged out on the humanity
over the Americans.
4) Length of Time:
In 1944, two and a half years after signing Executive Order 9066, President Franklin D.
Roosevelt rescinded the order. The last internment camp was closed by the end of 1945.
The Ottoman relocation began at the end of May. Talat Pasha called a halt to the
relocations in August 1915. It was ignored by locals, forcing Talat to keep repeating the
order into 1916, the year Vahakn Dadrian tells us, "the genocide (that is, the
relocation) had "run its course."
The Ottoman authorities first considered rescinding the order in 1917, allowing the
Armenians to return, but that did not officially take place until the end of 1918,
bringing the total time length to three and a half years
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Loyalty
|
Here we don't have an equal comparison. For centuries, Armenians of the Ottoman
Empire were known as 'the Loyal Millet." Certainly there were Armenians who
loved their country, the country that had allowed them to prosper so well... when
"enlightened" European countries treated the Moslems residing in their
territories as little more (and sometimes less) than slaves.
Yet, while racism was nothing new for Japanese-Americans, the resettlement policy
came out of nowhere. Japanese-Americans did not have a history of disloyalty to
their country. In contrast, with the establishment of Armenian terror organizations
in the mid-to-late 19 century, the bulk of the Armenian community had done an
about-face, in terms of their loyalty. Some didn't want any part of it, but when
Dashnaks in particular made fatal examples of those who did not comply (the old,
"if you're not with us, you're against us" trick), even loyal
Ottoman-Armenians learned that they had to choose sides.
So let's keep this difference in mind, as we proceed further. In other words, if
there was a 40-year-old building policy of sedition among the Japanese, the
Japanese-Americans who were so quick to volunteer to fight for their country may not
have been the reality.
Regardless, let's take a look at how many Japanese-Americans behaved, in spite of
their humiliating conditions. We already had a good idea of what happened from
President Clinton's speech excerpts presented above, but let's examine in closer
detail.
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As we've seen from Clinton's speech:
Immediately following Pearl Harbor, Japanese Americans in the United States military
were forced to surrender their weapons. National Guardsmen were dismissed; volunteers were
rejected; draft-age youth were classified as — quote — "enemy aliens."
The difference: The Japanese were largely not given the chance to enlist, as soon as Pearl
Harbor forced Americans to enter the war. Ottoman-Armenians, like all other Ottomans, were
conscripted during the preparatory stage of war in 1914, and served, some quite
faithfully, at the beginning stages.
The Armenians were disarmed only after there were many indications of their disloyalty,
including their refusal to be conscripted (many hopped across the border to join the
Russians as, for example, Talat Pasha assassin Soghoman Tehlirian, from Erzurum), along with betrayal of Armenians in the
Ottoman ranks (firing blanks at the enemy, or firing on their fellow Ottomans), among
those who did not desert in droves. Professor Justin McCarthy estimates there may have
been as many as 50,000 Armenian troops who did not serve during the 1914-15 campaign,
which could have made the difference at Sarikamish.
(Here are other Ottoman-Armenian troop figures,
betraying their nation.)
Soon after the many reports of Armenian rebellion throughout the empire, the Armenian
troops were disarmed and sent to labor battalions. Were there Armenians who still wished
to fight for their Ottoman nation? Certainly; but Armenian leaders had poisoned the
atmosphere, and there was no outlet left for armed combat. With excellent reason, Ottoman
leaders could no longer trust that those Armenians would not turn their rifles upon fellow
Ottoman soldiers.
But would those Armenians, if given the chance, have fought with as much gusto as the
Japanese-Americans did? The example of the latter was extraordinary.
The U.S. government at first (Jan. 1944) gave the option for the young men in the
internment camps to enlist, as a way out. Quite a few, understandably, refused.
Eventually, however, many volunteered. It seemed they were so offended by being deemed
"enemies" when they had given no signs of disloyalty, they were on a mission to
prove what loyal Americans they could be.
As our main web reference goes on to tell us (the Nisei were American-born
Japanese, as opposed to the Issei, the older generation):
A number of Nisei left the barbed wire confines to volunteer for the Army. A sizeable
number volunteered out of desire to prove their loyalty and in response to the urgings of
the Army and the Japanese American Citizens League (JACL).
Several thousand volunteers served in the all-Nisei 442nd Regimental Combat Team (RCT).
Together with the 100th Infantry Battalion, composed of many Japanese Americans from
Hawaii, they fought brilliantly overseas in Europe and suffered tremendous casualties.
For its size and length of service, the 100th Infantry Battalion / 442nd Regimental Combat
Team became the most highly decorated unit in U.S. history.
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Reparations
|
In 1988, the USA and Canada paid around $20,000 in reparations to each of the
survivors of the internees.
As we know, the Armenians are also looking for reparations, even though practically
everyone from the 1915 period is dead. Unless Armenians have no faith in
Armenians keeping their word, "reparations" is an irrelevant issue,
because:
As Dashnak Critic Arthur Derounian wrote, referring to the Gumru/Alexandropol Treaty: "Highly
significant Is Article 8, wherein Dashnags agreed 'to forego their rights to ask
for damages... as a result of the general war,' thus closing the doors FOREVER to
reparations for the enormous destruction of Armenian life and property."
Regardless, from a moral standpoint, do the descendants of the Armenians deserve
reparations? In fairness, we must also ask whether the over half-million Ottomans
whom the Armenians killed and looted also deserve reparations from the Republic of Armenia
(which came into being while portions of eastern Anatolia were still being held by
Armenians, after most Russians had left), but since "human rights"
advocates are too racist to deem these other victims as human equals, once again the
world focuses only upon the "Christian" Armenians.
|
| Conclusions |
What the USA did was clearly wrong and will forever serve as a stain upon U.S.
history.
Critics from the period, such as Eugene V. Rostow, professor and later dean of the
Yale Law School, contended that the evacuation program was a drastic blow to civil
liberties and that it was in direct contradiction to the constitutional principle
that punishment should be inflicted only for individual behavior, not for membership
in a particular demographic group. That's from another site, which also informs us:
In a memorandum written in February 1942 that became known as the Ringle Report,
Ringle estimated that the highest number of Japanese Americans "who would act
as saboteurs or agents" of Japan was less than three percent of the total, or
about 3500 in the United States; the most dangerous of these, he said, were already
in custodial detention or were well known to the Naval Intelligence service or the
FBI. In his summary Ringle concluded that the "Japanese Problem" had been
distorted largely because of the physical characteristics of the people and should
be handled based on the individual, regardless of citizenship, and not on race.
The Japanese were not disloyal.
It was easier to target the Japanese because of their identifiable racial
characteristics.
President Harry Truman spelled it out, when he honored the 100/442nd Regimental
Combat Team, on July 15, 1946:
"You fought not only the enemy, but you fought prejudice – and you won.
Keep up that fight, and we will continue to win – to make this great Republic
stand for just what the Constitution says it stands for – the welfare of all the
people, all the time."
The Ottoman Empire, as so many other nations, was without the protection of that
most valuable document, the U.S. Constitution. But that still would not have excused
them from resettling their Armenians, if they had done so for the same reasons as
the Americans.
Armenian propagandists tell us the reason why Armenians were singled out was because
it was "Turkey for the Turks" time, and the Armenians happened to be
non-Turks. Like the Japanese, the poor, innocent, unarmed Armenians were victimized
for racial reasons. (This is important for "genocide" identifiers, because
victims of a genocide need to be from a particular group, and they need to be
innocent, attacked for no other reason than for belonging to that group, as
demonstrated by the Nazi-Jew example.)
Everything else about real history tells us otherwise. If there were reasons of
racial animosity, not many Armenians would have been left after centuries of
co-existence. No other non-Turkish groups, such as the Jews, went through what the
Armenians had gone through.
The only reason why what happened to the Armenians took place may be summarized by
the words of the Armenian leader, Boghos Nubar:
"...[E]ver since the beginning
of the war the Armenians fought by the side of the Allies on all fronts... the
Armenians have been belligerents de facto, since they indignantly refused to side
with Turkey."
The Armenians committed treason in their nation's darkest hour. During times of
desperation, with enemies at the gates, it was impossible to separate the wheat from
the chaff. The bulk of the Armenians from the "military zones" had no
choice but to suffer as a whole.
This page demonstrates that the Americans, despite their great Constitution, did the
exact same thing with their Japanese. (Except, fortunately, they were in a position
to prevent massacres from lawless bands and local officials who behaved criminally).
In some cases, the Americans treated their Japanese in an even less humane manner.
Let's repeat part of Roosevelt's words from the top of the page: "Americanism
is not, and never was, a matter of race or ancestry."
The same was true of "Ottomanism." There was such an absence of racial
hatred on the part of the forward-thinking Turks, that if anyone was ridiculed and
looked upon with contempt, it was the "Turks" of the empire. If the
Armenians had not become so racist, treacherous and opportunistic, and kept in mind the
brotherhood of all Ottomans, they would have never experienced this tragic episode
in their history.
What's more, the Americans can offer all the apologies and reparations they want.
But if ever "war hysteria" reigns, as happened in a less extreme way after
9/11, all bets will be off. It is the duty
of a nation to preserve itself. If the United States was in the same predicament as the Ottoman Empire, on
its knees and bankrupt and with limited manpower and resources, attacked on all
sides by enemies bent on the extinction of the USA... and if a sizeable community
— say, the near-million Armenians of California — were compelled to rise up
against America, hitting the army from the back and massacring fellow Americans to
make way for an ethnically pure "New Armenia," then you don't have to
hesitate. You can be sure the consequences against the Armenians would be at least
as severe as what they experienced during Ottoman times. I'd bet the consequences
would be even more severe.
This would be the right of any nation.
Only the Turks are criticized, because there is great prejudice against Turkish
people in the world, no thanks to certain ethnic groups who are in power positions
to keep perpetuating the age-old "Terrible Turk" bigotry. It is a given
that the Turks must suffer from this double standard; the "Mongol Turks" have more in common today
with WWII era Japanese-Americans, looked upon so contemptuously by their racist
contemporaries, than Ottoman-Armenians ever had.
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