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Non-Turkish estimates range from 800,000 to 1.5 million Armenians killed. Most of these deaths were low-tech but high efficiency. The army rounded up hundreds or thousands of civilians, drove them into wilderness areas, and waited until they starved to death.

GENOCIDE? NONSENSE!

It is still the official position of the Turkish government that this was not genocide; it was a relocation for military reasons. You see, there was a revolt being planned by Armenians and Russians in the border region of Van. This was the explanation provided in 1915 by the Turkish Consol General in New York, in a statement published in the October 15, 1915 issue of the New York Times. An autonomous republic was set up in Van, which was run by someone named Aram. (We read it here first.)

Then, somehow, things just got out of hand. The government was powerless. You know: just like all other governments during wartime with respect to the activities of officials in defense of the nation. Helpless. What’s a government to do? Therefore, in recent days, a minor official for the Turkish government has apologized.

"We apologize to the Armenians for us and our ancestors not having been able to prevent the Genocide." These are the words of Jashar Arif, representative of the International Exchange Confederation, who is a Turk. He has arrived in Armenia together with several other Turks to take part in the events of the 90th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide.

The Turkish government still maintains that the rulers had expected the Armenians to join with Russians to fight Turkey. As recently as April 24, the Philadelphia Enquirer reported that Yasar Yakis, the head of the Turkish Parliament’s European Union Affairs Committee, explained the reasons for the relocations. "The Armenians were relocated because they cooperated with the enemy, the Russians, and they . . . killed Ottoman soldiers from behind the lines."

Armenians were systematically killed all over the Empire, not just on the Russian border. Relocation to a camp usually means providing food, shelter, and basic amenities. It doesn’t mean letting people starve in the wilderness.

The written text of the government’s order is controversial. It was a state secret. One version was smuggled out of Turkey in 1916. It is posted online. As with all such secret orders, it should not be accepted automatically. But it serves as a starting point for full-scale research: open archives openly arrived at.

Our fellow countrymen, the Armenians, who form one of the racial elements of the Ottoman Empire, having taken up, as a result of foreign instigation for many years past, with a lot of false ideas of a nature to disturb the public order; and because of the fact that they brought about bloody happenings and have attempted to destroy the peace and security of the Ottoman state, and the safety and interests of their fellow countrymen, as well as of themselves; and, moreover, as they have now dared to join themselves to the enemy of their existence [i.e., Russia] and to the enemies now at war with our state – our Government is compelled to adopt extraordinary measures and sacrifices, both for the preservation of the order and security of the country and for the welfare and the continuation of the existence of the Armenian community. Therefore, as a measure to be applied until the conclusion of the war, the Armenians have to be sent away to places which have been prepared in the interior villages; and a literal obedience to the following orders, in a categorical manner, is accordingly enjoined on all Ottomans:

First. – All Armenians, with the exception of the sick, are obliged to leave within five days from the date of this proclamation, by villages or quarters, and under the escort of the gendarmerie.

Second. – Though they are free to carry with them on their journey the articles of their movable property which they desire, they are forbidden to sell their lands and their extra effects, or to leave the latter here and there with other people, because their exile is only temporary and their landed property, and the effects they will be unable to take with them, will be taken care of under the supervision of the Government, and stored in closed and protected buildings. Anyone who sells or attempts to take care of his movable effects or landed property in a manner contrary to this order, shall be sent before the Court Martial. They are free to sell to the Government only the articles which may answer the needs of the Army.

Third. – Contains a promise of safe conduct.

Fourth. – A threat against anyone attempting to molest them on the way.

Fifth. – Since the Armenians are obliged to submit to this decision of the Government, if some of them attempt to use arms against the soldiers or gendarmes, arms shall be employed against them and they shall be taken, dead or alive. In like manner those who, in opposition to the Government’s decision, refrain from leaving or seek to hide themselves – if they are sheltered or given food and assistance, the persons who thus shelter or aid them shall be sent before the Court Martial for execution.

What happened subsequently was fully consistent with this order.

The Turkish government said in 1989 that the archives regarding the non-existent genocide were now open. But, as it turned out, they were not open to Armenians studying the non-existent genocide.

What the archives prove, according to the Turkish government, is that the Turks were the victims of mass murder by Armenians. Yes, it’s hard to believe. But that’s what the archives show. We can take the Turkish government’s word for this. On April 25, a report appeared on the website of the International Relations and Security Network which is partially funded by the Swiss defense agency. Here, we read:

Armenians say at least 1 million of their ethnic kin died between 1915–17 as a result of a deliberate policy of extermination. They say the policy was initiated by the Committee of Union and Progress (Ittihad ve Terakki Cemiyeti), or CUP, which then ruled over the empire. Ankara claims the death toll is grossly inflated and that 300,000 Armenians died during these years. It also says the deaths were the result of negligence, interethnic strife, or wartime operations. It says the CUP leaders – also known as the Young Turks – had no intention of wiping out the empire’s largest remaining Christian community. While admitting to the massive deportations of 1915 – which followed the massacre of 200,000 Greeks – Turkey’s official historiography says the transfers were aimed at preventing Armenians from collaborating with Russia. Tsarist Russia was then at war with the Ottoman Empire and its German ally. Turkey’s official historiography also asserts that more than 500,000 Turks died at the hands of Armenians between 1910–1922.

On April 25, 2005 – hot off the TurkishPress.com site – we learn of that ruthless counter-genocide.

Turkish Republican People’s Party (CHP) deputy leader Onur Oymen said on Monday, "if you must express grief about Armenian casualties, you also have to talk about more than half a million Turks who were killed in the same incidents."

In a written statement, Oymen said that the decision of the U.S. president Bush not to use the term "genocide" represents the reality.