why blame me?

[Joseph]

But remember SoSarkissian, its not a genocide if there were any survivors, right?

[SoSarkissian]

it is Genocide because of the Ottoman order by Enver, Jamal, Talaat ... killing 1.5 out of 3 million armenians is genocide to me ... the aim was genocide but mission was not 100% accomplished. For God's sake their sultan's nickname was RED! ... the RED sultan ... sultan Hamid... I'm sure we all know where he got that nick from.

[Joseph]

it is Genocide because of the Ottoman order by Enver, Jamal, Talaat ... killing 1.5 out of 3 million armenians is genocide to me ... the aim was genocide but mission was not 100% accomplished. For God's sake their sultan's nickname was RED! ... the RED sultan ... sultan Hamid... I'm sure we all know where he got that nick from.

You know I was being sarcastic above, right? Usually the next response we get from deniers is that "it can't be genocide because some Armenians survived"

[1.5 million]

to call something as genocide there must be an intention like "we are going to kill all these armenian people who lives in the borders of this country".i really made so many researchs about this point and i couldn't find any documents that proves this.so i don't want to call these actions as "genocide".but one day if someone finds documents about it,it doesn't matter for me to accept it like "genocide".and i think it will be so for my people.

asia - I can understand you and other Turks having reluctance to accept that indeed what the Turkish nation - under the criminal leadership of the CUP party - did indeed plan and consumate a genocde against the Armenian people - but in fact this is uneiquivically the case. You claim to have conducted some sort of research into this issue on your own leading you to believe that no proof exists or that there is no basis to claim that this is indeed a genocide - and in this I again say that you are incorrect - the probelm is not that this proof is not available or that it is yet to be discovered - but the problem is that you aparently have not done sufficient research. As Joseph stated there is no single document - no German Public Law or decree or order from Hitler or any type of document, specific notes or recordings where in fact the Annhilation of the Jews is documented - yet - I assume that you - as most laymen and scholars alike - accept the fact the Jews were indeed subject to genocide - correct? So on what information/documentation/evidence etc is our knowledge based on? What is it that causes us to accept - without question - that in fact the Germans deliberatly acted to exterminate Jews under their control - that their deaths were not just a byproduct of resettlement (as the Germans did issue mutiple decrees indicating that Jews from the West were to be resettled in the East and in fact they did such) or that their deaths were just a byproduct of the harsh wartime conditions (as many Germans died as well due to such causes, and it should be noted that a great number of Jews died of hunger/starvation and were afflicted with diseases that caused their death and many were just worked to death at forced labor - etc) or that this was just war - and Jews like others were to be found in the armies of Germany's adversarys, additionally they rioted and revolted in many cities such as Warsaw and Krakow and toward the end of the war and just after Jewish "gangs" consisting of freed camp internees and partisan units hunted down and commited atrocities against many Germans - including presumably innocent ones...etc etc - Oh and of course the figure of 6 million Jews killed/dead is heavily disputed as is the existance/use of "gas chambers" for killing (Nazi apologists can correctly point to many legitimate orders for Zyclon B for use in pest control & delicing and none that explicitly cite purpose was for killing anyone)...so how is it - with such seeming contrmanding "evidence" and with no actual proof in terms of written orders or such - how is it that we accept the Holocaust and the Germen intention and effort to destroy the European Jews as fact? Well? I imagine that all of these circumstances sound familiar too you. Yes? Well it should be no surprise that deniers of the Holocaust and deniers of the Armenian Genocide use many of the EXACT same specious arguments. So how do we know the Holocaust (and the Armenian Genocide) to be true - to be deliberatly planned and carried out campaigns to exterminate a single ethno-religious minority population in Germany and the Ottoman Empire respectively? Don't tell me that you are doubting the Holocaust now...that would be sad - that would be proof of your conditioning. I'm hoping for better. I'm hoping for honesty for a start. OK - your time is up - here is how we know (actually there are two primary means...OK perhaps three...) - the first is eyewitnesses. And in fact - the case of the Armenian Genocide was far more witnessed (then the Jewish Holocaust) - and by orders of magnitude - by a wde range of (thousands of) unconnected and geographically dispersed individuals (survivors, perpetrators, winesses from evey possible nationality and group present - etc) - whose combined accounts corroborate each other's information (fully) as well as paint a clear picture of events that occured over a period of months and years and throughout the Empire (which document BTW an Ottoman State sponsored/enacted campaign to kill Armenians - in no uncertain terms - and the actors and methodology and chain of command - etc are all most clear). Of course in the case of the Holocaust we have more in the way of pictures of camps and video and such which present a compelling picture (literally) - but for the most part eyewitness accounts are primarily that of survivors (and after the fact) with some accounts as well of a few other eyewitnesses and purpetrator confession and testimony. Which brings us to the next category of proof - documentary evidence. While neither genoicde seems to have a single specific order to kill or annhilate all Jews and Armenians respectively - both have a series of orders and decrees and related dosumentation (correspondences and orders - such as telegragh cables, appointments to certain positions of certain individuals with known views) and so on and so forth. In both cases the (party led) aparatus and the special units involved (SS/Special Organization etc) are known and their activites well documented. Additionally, based on this documentation and based upon eyewitmness corroboration we can clearly see that little or no provisions were made for the care and feeding of Armenians en route and that their ultimate destination were to be sent to desert camps where the only purpose was death - etc. These facts are well documented by scholars who nearly universally conclude that the evidence of the lack of any attempt on the Ottoman Government to actually resettle or care for the Armenians - as well as the confessions of CUP members and eyewitness accounts of repeated mass slughters leave little doubt as to the plan and program of the CUP - annhialation of Armenians. This is as well documented as that of the Holocaust. Which brings me to the third - sort of - proof - that of trials or legal judgements. In this case you will likewise find that the Post War Ottoman Military tribunals - based on clearly documented evidence and testimony - proove beyond a doubt the genocidal intent and actions of the CUP functionaries and of the Ottoman Government itself. In fact the rules of evidence and proceedure at these trials did not differ significantly to that of the Post WWII Nuremburg Trials. Now I don't want you to start doubting the veracity of the Holocaust - but I would be remiss if I failed to point out that at no point in the Nuremburg trials were charges brought up or was there any conviction of any specific acts of genocide or even specifically of massacre and/or killing of Jews by the Nazis charged and convicted. The indictments were for "war crimes" (that primarily consisted of mistreatment of Polish and Russian prisoners) and a generic "crimes against humanity" - which included such things as "murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation, and other inhumane acts against "civilian populations" - thus no Nazi was ever convicted at Nuremburg specifically for any crime that could absolutly be said to be genocide or the Holocaust proper (with the key word here being specifically). So in this light - the convictions of the Ottoman post war tribunals could be said to be more specific in many cases as to the crimes of directly killing/massacring Armenians - and the pattern of evidence and conviction - particularly in regard to the corroborating evidence of masses of eyewitness testimony and other documention - provide more then enough evidence to clearly and unequivicly determine the actions by the CUP/Ottoman Turks angainst the Armenians of Anatolia during this period of time as genocide.

And in the word of (German) genocide researcher Hilmar Kaiser - "The Armenian genocide is the Ottoman government's answer to the Armenian Question...I use the word `genocide' because it adequately describes the phenomenon. It's the only term we have that describes it. If one day we have a better word, fine. The English, German, and Turkish languages have only one word to describe. That this has a negative consequence on the Turkish government is something I can't change; I can't change history. I'm not prepared to haggle over it. If a Turkish scholar says it too politicized and he or she doesn't want to use the word, then let him/her take a different subject. If you want to be part of this debate, apply proper terminology and if you don't want to do it, you aren't a scholar." Dr. Hilmar Kaiser, in interview with Khatchig Mouradian (24 September 2005) published in Aztag Daily Newspaper

So I hope that this settles it in your mind. I will be more then happy to reference scholarly articles and texts that document this evidence and provide other statements from researchers (including Turkish ones) if you remain unconvinced. Let me just say that the information is there. You may not have easy access to it (but a search of the archives of this web forum might be a place to start) - but the information exists and it is more then sufficient - so with that thought I leave you with the words of Holocaust and genocide researcher Yves Ternon: "The Armenian Genocide is proven in all its components — among them intent. The converging evidence is well in excess of that generally judged abundant in establishing other historical truths. The genocide was a horrendous crime. The evidence is there — province by province, city by city, village by village, hamlet by hanlet, with its countless variations according to time and place yet all the same in the vast process of extermination — genocide. A deliberate plan, carefully organized and brutally executed. The deniers and rationalizers offend the dignity of the historian and of all humanity.
Yves Ternon, author of several volumes concerning human rights and genocide in Freedom and Responsibility of the Historian — the "Lewis Affair" (1999)

So asia - I'm anxiously awaiting your thoughts/comments...

[1.5 million]

Murat Yaslioglu

Murat - I (and other Armenians) would never blame YOU for the Armenian Genocide...only for denying it. Now that seems an easy thing for you to fix if you desire our friendship or at least not to have any animosity eh?

[SoSarkissian]

You know I was being sarcastic above, right? Usually the next response we get from deniers is that "it can't be genocide because some Armenians survived"

Of course I knew, I was simply pointing it out again for all readers

[asia]

You know I was being sarcastic above, right? Usually the next response we get from deniers is that "it can't be genocide because some Armenians survived"

it really is not my point.a person is a person,i don't care the numbers.if there were just three deaths,i would also think and react as i do now.and if i thougt as you say,i would not be here to speak with you because i wouldn't have any doubts...

[asia]

1.5 million,thanks for informing me.
Yes i can't deny that may be you are right and i will never succeed to find a document about it.But it doesn't mean that i give up searching it.In brief,i'll continue to search the pure reality.
But i still think that this term refers to a well defined crime and the definition is (a world wide definition which has been given after in an international convention made after the Second World War: the "Convention of Prevention and Repression of Crime of Genocide", approved by the General Assembly of the United Nations in its resolution of December 9, 1948 and which went into effect on January 11, 1951, convention Turkey has signed and ratified this agreement.And this definition of the crime of genocide consists three elements particular:
1-There has to be a national, ethnic, racial or religious group (right),
2-Then, this group has to be subjected to certain acts such as the "murder of the members of the group, and forced transfer of the children of one group into another group and subjecting the members of a group to conditions which -will eventually bring about their physical destruction" (right),
3-there has to be "an intention of destroying", in part or as a whole the said group.(???)

This definition helps us (just me may be) to differentiate genocide from the other forms of homicide.
Homicide becomes genocide when the latent or apparent intention of physical destruction is directed at members of any national, ethnic, racial or religious groups simply because they are the members of that group.As Sartre said in speaking of genocide on the occasion of the Russell Tribunal on the Vietnam War, that one must study the facts objectively in order to prove if this intention exists, even in an implicit manner.

[Joseph]

1.5 million,thanks for informing me.
Yes i can't deny that may be you are right and i will never succeed to find a document about it.But it doesn't mean that i give up searching it.In brief,i'll continue to search the pure reality.
But i still think that this term refers to a well defined crime and the definition is (a world wide definition which has been given after in an international convention made after the Second World War: the "Convention of Prevention and Repression of Crime of Genocide", approved by the General Assembly of the United Nations in its resolution of December 9, 1948 and which went into effect on January 11, 1951, convention Turkey has signed and ratified this agreement.And this definition of the crime of genocide consists three elements particular:
1-There has to be a national, ethnic, racial or religious group (right),
2-Then, this group has to be subjected to certain acts such as the "murder of the members of the group, and forced transfer of the children of one group into another group and subjecting the members of a group to conditions which -will eventually bring about their physical destruction" (right),
3-there has to be "an intention of destroying", in part or as a whole the said group.(???)

This definition helps us (just me may be) to differentiate genocide from the other forms of homicide.
Homicide becomes genocide when the latent or apparent intention of physical destruction is directed at members of any national, ethnic, racial or religious groups simply because they are the members of that group.As Sartre said in speaking of genocide on the occasion of the Russell Tribunal on the Vietnam War, that one must study the facts objectively in order to prove if this intention exists, even in an implicit manner.

The third point you quoted "there has to be "an intention of destroying", in part or as a whole the said group.(???)"

And how is this very broad point determined? And how can you argue that the Armenian community in the Ottoman Empire was not "in part" destroyed intentionally as stated in point 2?

What is written above does not make a reference to official documents, photographs, video etc and if that was a criteria, then the only genocide to ever considered a genocide would be the Holocaust (but then I guess Hitler could not be implicated since there are no documents to tie him to the actual killings/concentrations camps, etc)

As I hope you know, the term "genocide" was coined by Raphael Lemkin (1900-1959), a Polish-Jewish legal scholar, in 1943, from the roots ????? genos (Greek for family, tribe or race) and -cide (Latin - occidere - to massacre) in the context of the Jewish Holocaust. Lemkin's original genocide definition was narrow, based mainly on the Holocaust and Armenian genocide, as it addressed only crimes against "national groups" rather than "groups" in general. At the same time, it was broad in that it included not only physical genocide but also acts aimed at destroying the culture and livelihood of the group. According to the Swiss professor Julia Fribourg, the term "genocide" includes displacement of national groups from their homelands with an aim of destroying their cultural and habitational grounds.

From what I gather, as well as the majority of historians who study the issue, prior to the Holocaust, the Armenian Genocide was the most defined crime that characterized the word genocide and would thus become an example of a genocide. The stubbornly disagree but that is only because they do not want to be associated with such a crime. Who would? But no matter how they try to whitewash the past, it happened and denying it only further prolongs their evil intentions.

In 1933, Lemkin made a presentation to the Legal Council of the League of Nations conference on international criminal law in Madrid, for which he prepared an essay on the Crime of Barbarity as a crime against international law. The concept of the crime, which later evolved into the idea of genocide, was based mostly on the experience of Assyrians massacred in Iraq on 11 August 1933. The event in Iraq reminded him of earlier similar events of the Armenian Genocide during World War I. He presented his first proposal to outlaw such 'acts of barbarism' to the Legal Council of the League of Nations in Madrid the same year. However, the proposal failed and his work incurred the disapproval of the Polish government, which was at the time pursuing a policy of conciliation with Nazi Germany.

Additionally, according to the 2003 ICTJ ruling, commissioned by Turks and Armenians titled “Legal Analysis on the Applicability of the United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide to Events which Occurred During the Early Twentieth Century” concluded that, “At least some of the [Ottoman] perpetrators knew that the consequences of their actions would be the destruction, in whole or in part, of the Armenians of eastern Anatolia, as such, or acted purposefully towards this goal and, therefore, possessed the requisite genocidal intent. The Events can thus be said to include all the elements of the crime of genocide as defined in the Convention.”

To sum up my understanding of the Genocide.

To Turks do not want to be associated with the ugly word "genocide". It connotes murder. So, even when they are guilty of committing one they will deny it out of a sense of nationalism and stubborn pride. They will try to play a game of semantics to deny genocide. They are stuck on a word and will deny it no matter what.

[Joseph]

So Asia, are you denying there was an Armenian Genocide?