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Congress aims to build bridge by burning another |
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Tuesday, 23 October 2007 |
The decision to vote on the resolution that describes the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Armenians as genocide has polarized the United States Congress.
To the naked eye the decision may appear easy, but you have to empathize with both sides of the argument before you jump to conclusions.
On the surface, any human being with half of a heart wouldn’t hesitate to declare the gruesome slayings of an ungodly amount of people as genocide.
Only paralleled by the Holocaust, the Armenian killings by the Ottoman
Empire in World War I are quite possibly one of the most disturbing and
grotesque happenings in human history.
The Armenian National Committee of America estimates that over 1.5
million Armenians perished by the hands of the Young Turks of the
Ottoman Empire.
It seems like a no-brainer. It may be a little late, but hey, any condemnation of genocide is quite warranted, right?
Well, it’s a little more complicated than that.
See, it’s been close to 100 years since the genocide took place.
The Ottoman Empire crumbled after World War I and became modern-day Turkey.
To this day, Turkey refuses to acknowledge the acts as genocide, which is utterly ridiculous and embarrassing to that nation.
However, in these tumultuous times of war in the Middle East, Turkey
happens to be one of our only allies in the region. We have bases and
troops in Turkey that are key in stabilizing the Kurds in Northern
Iraq.
Now, I know what you’re thinking.
Who gives a damn if we offend Turkey? We shouldn’t be there in the first place!
Well you may very well be right about those notions, but if condemning
a century-old act by a nation that doesn’t exist anymore will only lead
to more American troops getting killed for naught, then we might want
to rethink our timing.
I admire Nancy Pelosi for trying to acknowledge one of the most fatal
blunders and inexcusable acts of aggression in the world’s history.
But if doing so will put more troops in harm’s way if Turkey does not
cooperate with U.S. troops, then it might be worth it to wait for a
time that wouldn’t be so detrimental to our troops.
And while you’re at it, why doesn’t Congress speak out on other treacheries committed in history?
Let’s go way back in time and denounce some lingering faults that have never been addressed.
What about that little thing the United States participated in called
slavery? Maybe there isn’t a lobby as powerful as the Armenian one
that can persuade Congress to call for reparations.
What about Japanese internment camps or banana republics or sweatshops that we still fund unabashedly?
My point is that there are many things that the U.S. Congress can look back upon and denounce, so why this one now?
If Congress is concerned with bringing home the troops safely, then do it.
However, the fact that the Turkish President Abdullah Gul denounced the
American vote as “unacceptable” and referred to the resolution as
“petty games of domestic politics” makes it very difficult to side with
a country that labels the genocide as a “civil strife” and refuses to
acknowledge their grandfathers’ wrongdoings.
But the Turkish president does bring up an interesting point.
Is this really a political move?
The Armenian lobby has been trying to get this resolution passed for
decades, and now, when we are in an oversees struggle with a NATO ally,
is the time when we decide to come around and speak out about the
atrocities?
I shudder to think that Congress is playing political chess with the
lives of our soldiers in order to dissolve the war in Iraq.
I hope the Armenian people are satisfied with the U.S. denunciation and I hope Turkey admits to what their ancestors did.
I also hope Congress continues to point out other mishaps in history,
including our own, and that their hasty decision to condemn the Ottoman
Empire doesn’t lead to more American casualties in the region.
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NO. 1:
Henry Morgenthau's memoirs (something so often used by those who back the genocide theory) itself claims that;
"The Armenians in Istanbul, Izmir and Aleppo were not harmed."
For ANY NEUTRAL OBSERVER who wanted to see "what the fuss was all about", this should raise a red flag:
These were the three biggest cities in the Empire, Istanbul being the capital. So the Ottomans were committing genocide, but somehow didn't touch the Armenians (most probably the most prosperous among them) who lived right under their nose? WTF? That would be like the Nazis not touching any Jews who lived in Berlin, Warsaw and Frankfurt!!!
WHY?
As a Turk, I find it extremely weird that Ottomans wouldn't touch any Armenians right under their nose if they were comitting genocide between 1915-17.
Everyone knows that many Armenians died. But it was war and many ethnic groups were killing each other in a moment of history where "might was right".
It is tragic, but there has never been a SOUNDPROOF case for genocide.
In fact, the Armenian population in the very capital, Istanbul, was unchanged between 1914 and 1918.
But until that day, NO WAY JOSE. I will always believe that it was a tragedy and will feel sorry for all the Armenians, Muslims, Turks, Kurds, Azeris, Greeks etc who died during the war - but no genocide.