Part 5
Unfortunately the Turk never deigns to explain his own case, and thus the pro-Armenians always manage to hold the field, appalling the public by incessant reiteration and exaggeration as to the number of victims, and apparently valuing to its full extent the wisdom of the old Eastern proverb: Give a lie twenty-four hours’ start, and it will take a hundred years to overtake it. Later on, when the true figures become available, only a very few inquisitive people realize the falsity of the earlier stories. Thus Lord Bryce, speaking in the House of Lords on October 6th, 1915, said that the information he had received went to show that 800,000[8] was a possible number of the Armenians destroyed since May last. By adding to this figure the 250,000 refugees in Russia for whom funds are requested, and 13,000 refugees in Egypt, we arrive at a grand total of 1,063,000 Armenians, while, according to Sir Charles Wilson, the total Armenian population of the nine Provinces most thickly populated by them is only 925,000, which he describes as an outside estimate. The total number of Arabs killed by the Italian newspapers in the Tripolitan war exceeded three times the population of the country. It would seem that the advocates of the Armenians are imitating the Italian Press.
An example of the most extraordinary reports anent the so-called massacres, furnished to and circulated through the English newspapers by Lord Bryce, is that of Mersina:
The number of Armenians sent _from_ this city now totals about 25,000, and this _in addition_ to the many thousands coming from the north that pass through.
Yet the total population of Mersina as given in the official returns for 1908 was 20,966 persons, of whom 11,246 were Moslems, 2,441 Jews, and the remaining 7,279 Christians of various sects, Greek, Armenian, Latin and Nestorian. How 25,000 Armenians could have been sent from Mersina out of a total Christian population of 7,279 (at least one half of whom were Greeks), is difficult to understand.
The _Times_ report of Lord Bryce’s statement in the House of Lords quotes him as saying, that at Trebizond
the facts as to the slaughter were vouched for by the Italian Consul, who was there at the time. The Turkish authorities hunted out all the Christians, gathered them together and drove them down the streets to the sea. They were all put on sailing boats and carried out some distance into the Black Sea, and there thrown overboard and drowned; the whole Armenian population of from 8,000 to 10,000 was destroyed in that way in one afternoon.[9] After that any other story becomes credible.
Indeed any other story would be more credible. Consider (apart from the time that would be required for the collection and embarkation of the victims) the number of sailing boats necessary to carry 8,000 or 10,000 people “some distance” out to sea, even if the boats were able to make more than one journey! And still this was the preposterous story vouched for, according to Lord Bryce, by the Italian Consul, Signor Corrini, who was there at the time. Yet the account of the same event, as given in the Rome _Messagero_, is entirely different, the Consul being made to say that the banishment of Armenians under escort, and wholesale shootings in the streets, continued for a whole month, while there is nothing about the Armenians having been shipped out to sea and drowned _en masse_ in one afternoon.
It is interesting to compare the original accounts relating to the number of Bulgarians killed in the popular risings of 1876 and of Armenians killed in the Sassun disturbances of 1896, with the subsequent official estimates.
ORIGINAL ESTIMATES.
Bulgarians 60,000 Armenians 8,000 ------ 68,000
SUBSEQUENT OFFICIAL ESTIMATES.
Bulgarians and Turkish soldiers 3,500 Armenians 900 ------ 4,400
We thus see that the total number of victims amounted to only about 6.4 per cent. of the figures originally circulated. Such exaggeration, deliberately made with the object of appealing to the imagination of sentimental people, is astounding in its mendacity. When we can apply the test of investigation to Lord Bryce’s estimate of 800,000 killed in the present alleged “massacres” we shall in all probability find these figures similarly excessive.
All the stories of Turkish misdeeds have proved on investigation to be gross exaggerations beyond the belief of any thoughtful person. Anyone gifted with imagination and a sufficiently prurient mind could write up the stories now being so assiduously circulated to the Press by Armenian agencies acting, undoubtedly, under instructions from a central Bureau.[10]
“The Bulgarian atrocities,” to which reference has already been made, afford a very good example of how easily a prejudiced sentimentalist can be deceived. The late Canon McColl, at Mr. Gladstone’s request, went out to the Balkans to collect evidence. On one occasion his guide (presumably a Levantine, over-anxious to please his employer and to earn some extra backsheesh) pointed out on the horizon a large number of erections, which he asserted were “hundreds of impaled Christians.” The report of this was sent home to England, where it made a great sensation as apparently irrefutable first-hand evidence, on good authority. But in the sequel conclusive proof came forth that no Christians had been either massacred or crucified anywhere near that district, and furthermore that the supposed figures were nothing but the common haycocks of the country, which are built up around a pole, and which—after the hay has been eaten by the cattle until only a few bunches are left—might bear rather the appearance suggested by the guide. Canon McColl acknowledged his mistake, but of course the mischief had been done.
Leaving aside these stories of “massacres” and extermination of the Armenians, which we believe to be, in the main, a tissue of exaggerations and invention, let us now turn to the question of “Armenian Independence” and examine whether their claim to any such independence is founded on the inherent right which all united races however small, possess to choose their own form of government.
The answer must be an emphatic negation, for the reason that the Armenians are neither the most numerous nor the most homogeneous section of the population of the country in which they live.
Sir Charles Wilson, an unbiassed authority, estimates the total Armenian population of the nine provinces of Kurdistan as being 925,000 at the most, or only 15 per cent. of the total population of 6,130,000, which is made up of 4,460,000 Moslems, 645,000 Greeks and other Christians, plus 100,000 Jews and Gypsies. And General Zelenyi, in a census made for the Caucasus Geographical Society in 1896, estimates that even in the five provinces which they most largely inhabit, the Armenians form only 26 per cent. of the entire population.
In order to make this minority less apparent, the pro-Armenians take the figures of only 6 provinces—choosing of course those most thickly populated with their friends—and add to them the Greeks, other Christians and Jews; but even then the Moslems are in large majority.
The following are the figures for 1908 of the population of the nine vilayets specified below, as ascertained by an official census taken by the Ottoman Government:—
Non-Moslems, Christians and Jews, Gypsies and Yezidis (Devil Total Moslems. Worshippers). Population.
1. Adana 185,000 215,000 400,000 2. Aleppo 644,597 261,977 906,574 3. Bitlis 295,000 75,000 370,000 4. Diarbekir 301,509 112,016 413,525 5. Erzerum 501,101 146,009 647,110 6. Marmmet el Aziz 378,723 101,263 479,986 7. Sivas 848,474 273,450 1,121,924 8. Trebizond 1,001,260 70,211 1,071,471 9. Van 325,000 105,000 430,000 --------- --------- --------- 4,480,664 1,359,926 5,840,590 --------- --------- ---------
Even if for the sake of argument we were to grant (although such is far from being the case), that the Christian and Jewish population does form a majority over the Moslem one, it proves no case for the pro-Armenians, because all the Moslems are solidly united in opposition to any alteration of the status quo, while the Christians have no common idea or policy.
Thus a large majority of the Roman Catholics and Protestants, including even the Armenian Roman Catholics and Protestants, as well as the orthodox Greeks, favour the status quo, as do also the Jews and Gypsies.
The Gregorians are hopelessly divided: some want a national existence when even their friends, like Mr. Buxton, agree that “the population is too divided to permit success,” while others desire annexation by Russia, and on the other hand Boghos Nubar Pasha, the leader of the largest section, declares that they desire to remain with their fellow Moslems an integral part of the Ottoman Empire.
VIII.
The stories that have been so assiduously circulated about wholesale “massacres” of Armenians have a distinct object in view, viz: to influence the future policy of the British Government and to prepare the public mind for the desired settlement—the incorporation of Armenia in the Russian Empire.
The advocates of this arrangement naturally uphold the correlative policy of Great Britain annexing Mesopotamia. Superficially considered the idea looks attractive, however opposed it may be to the proclaimed objects with which we embarked on this war. It would appear, however, that the supporters of the scheme have not properly considered the profound underlying dangers of their project. The very fact of the great importance attached to the Anglo-Russian Alliance should inspire one with the gravest doubts as to the wisdom of the suggestion. Two great Powers with frontiers meeting along such a tract of country may at any moment not see eye to eye on every question. There is no continuity in international politics; they change from day to day according to the needs of a situation which can never be permanently fixed. It is the duty of statesmen to look further than the immediate present, and England will never forgive it, if in the settlement at the conclusion of the war they permit mistakes, which would almost inevitably lead to friction between two prospective neighbours and present friends.
In this connection it may be useful to recall the prophetic words of Sir Henry Layard, one of our ablest and most far-sighted diplomatists:
It would probably signify little to the rest of Europe whether Russia retained Armenia or not. But England has to consider the effect of the annexation to Russia of this important Province upon the British Possessions in India. Russia would then command the whole of Asia Minor and the great valley of the Euphrates and Tigris which would inevitably fall into her hands in course of time.... The moral effect of the conquest of Armenia and the annexation of Ghilan and Mazanderan by Russia upon our Mohammedan subjects, and upon the populations of Central Asia cannot be overlooked by a statesman who attaches any value to the retention of India as part of the British Empire.
Mr. Grattan Geary, than whom no writer has studied more closely the question at issue, speaks thus of the enormous advantage which the Power in possession of highland Kurdistan would have over the one that ruled lowland Mesopotamia:
Diarbekir is the key to the valleys of both the Tigris and the Euphrates—once there, they can decide whether they will move down the former to Bagdad, or down the latter to a point where they can command both rivers and reach the gulf ... the forests at the head of both rivers supply the means of constructing with small cost light boats or rafts, for floating reinforcements and military stores to any point where a General might choose to establish an entrenched camp, so that it would be almost impossible to shake his hold of the country, once he had entered and taken possession.... For it must be borne in mind that the swift currents of those rivers will enable an army to move without fatigue or difficulty from North to South, while a force moving northwards must toil along a roadless country where rapid marching is out of the question.... Once an army gets into the Mesopotamia plains, there is no fortified place there that could withstand it for an hour, and the current of the rivers would save even the trouble of locomotion. There would be nothing absolutely novel in this line of invasion. The Emperor Trajan and a couple of centuries later the Emperor Julian, descended the Euphrates with large fleets put together in the Armenian mountains.
It is interesting to note that in Mr. Grattan Geary’s opinion a powerful nation holding Kurdistan could equally from Diarbekir overrun Syria and seriously menace Egypt.
It may therefore not be out of place to consider how the Armenian question stood immediately before the outbreak of the European war.
The policy of the British Government, bound by the Cyprus Convention to maintain the integrity of the Sultan’s dominions in Asia, had been to strengthen the position of Turkey by loyally endeavouring to ameliorate the unrest which the revolutionary societies had stirred up amongst the Armenians. It is well known that all schemes of reform proposed by Great Britain or by Turkey herself, had been without exception cold-shouldered or openly opposed by Russia, firstly because they would, if successful, destroy any excuse for intervention and subsequent annexation; secondly because they contained some form or other of self-government, which Russia feared would not only encourage the national feeling of the Ottoman Armenians (who would look to England as their protector rather than to Russia), but would also encourage a similar national sentiment amongst the Armenians in the Caucasus.
With the advent of the Anglo-Russian Entente, our policy was revised. There are many Englishmen who believed, and still firmly believe, that wise and prescient statesmanship should have succeeded in reconciling, or at least allaying, the hereditary animosity which existed between our new friend and our old, traditional ally, and that in any case it would have been more worthy and more dignified, besides being to the advantage of this country, had we openly declared that under no circumstances would we sacrifice sacred obligations and old friendships to a policy of expediency. Public opinion, awakened by recent occurrences in the Near East, at last realizes how mistaken was the attitude of our Government towards Turkey. Official Russia, we believe, would have appreciated and accepted our point of view. Progressive Russia most certainly would have done so.
Unfortunately the British Government apparently thought otherwise. In 1912, the Porte without any outside pressure and being genuinely anxious to improve the condition of her Asiatic provinces, demanded (under the terms of the Cyprus Convention) that they should be supplied with British administrators, but these were refused.
The Russian Government then took up the question of reforms, and Turkey appealed to Germany to protect her from the very unpalatable scheme put forward by Russia. Germany gained a nominal victory, but success really rested with Russia. As a compromise a thoroughly unpracticable scheme was adopted, by which two Inspector Generals were appointed, one of whom was a Dutchman and the other a Norwegian. Neither had any knowledge of the Near East: one spoke no language other than his own, and the other in addition spoke only a few words of French. Then came the European War, and neither of these gentlemen ever reached Kurdistan. The scheme was foredoomed to failure, as was, indeed, expected. In this connection the Russian “Orange Book” is full of interest. We find there that during the negotiations, on July 8th, 1913, M. Sazanoff sent the Porte a vigorous despatch, in which he laid stress on the fact that the integrity of the Ottoman Empire largely depended upon the degree of pacification of the Armenian provinces. He further declared that:
The Imperial Government cannot admit a chronic state of anarchy, which by reason of the proximity of the Turkish frontier, cannot fail to have a most pernicious effect on the neighbouring provinces of the Caucasus.
Further light is thrown on the situation as it was then, by an article published at that time in the “Nineteenth Century” by Mr. Noel Buxton, who had been travelling in Kurdistan. Mr. Buxton is all the more convincing because the object of the article apparently was to prove, that the only salvation of the district was annexation by Russia. Mr. Noel Buxton wrote:
The present aim of Russia’s policy is also, perhaps, to prevent the Kurdish chiefs in the Turkish territory _from making terms with the Turks or on the other hand with the Christians_, and so to keep up the _excuse for possible intervention_.
Mr. Buxton then proceeds to justify this policy of creating disorder. It was the policy his friends the Bulgars had pursued with such success in Macedonia with the Komitadjis[11] (as was to be expected, we now find Mr. Buxton taking a prominent role in damning the Turks for the recent alleged massacres). Mr. Walter Guinness, M.P., in his description of a tour made in Kurdistan about the same time as Mr. Buxton, corroborates the evidence of that gentleman. He mentions numerous indications of an active Russian propaganda not only amongst the Armenians, but among the Kurds as well. He adds:
_Many of these (the Kurds) are armed with Russian rifles, and in the mountains I found, in an out of the way village, a Russian dressed as a Kurd, and living the life of the Kurds._
Russia was arming both the Kurds and the Orthodox Armenians. The object was two-fold: the Kurds would resist the measures taken by the local officials to enforce the decree against the carrying of rifles, which had been promulgated by the Turkish Government in order to enforce law and order, and the Armenians, excited by agents-provocateur and revolutionaries, would be encouraged to revolt. In either event there would be disturbances, which would enable Russia to point to the failure of European control as justification for her armed intervention followed by annexation, on the ground that this was the only possible solution. The observant student of current history will no doubt perceive in this desired end an interesting and instructive parallel to the handing over to Austria of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and her final cynical annexation of those provinces; whether the parallel would stop here, if the object is gained, may be told by some future historian.
IX.
Some people, perhaps, will say that whether these stories of massacres be true or false, it is inopportune to defend the reputation of a nation with whom we are at war. If this argument were true, it would apply with equal force as a criticism of the officers and men who have written home from Gallipoli, giving spontaneously such wholehearted and generous testimony to the bravery and chivalry of the Turks. Truth can never be inopportune so long as our conscience is clear, which it would not be if we allowed false stories to remain uncontradicted simply because the untrue assertions might be detrimental to an enemy. But at this advanced stage of the war such stories are scarcely likely to have any effect on the neutral nations, who are, indeed, more likely to be influenced in our favour if we show ourselves fair-minded and willing to investigate the truth. Their object is simply to bias public opinion in this country still further against an already misjudged and badly maligned enemy.
Some good-natured people have indeed gone so far as to say, that “the fact of the Armenians rising in rebellion and butchering the Moslems of Van and only waiting an opportunity to do so in other places, was no justification for the severity of the Turkish Government, or for the reprisals of the local Turks and the cruelties of the Kurds.” But even admitting, all exaggeration apart, the severity of the Turkish Government’s action in ordering the removal of the Armenian population and the methods adopted by local officials to stamp out disaffection, it must not be forgotten how critical the situation was for Turkey: that for her it was a matter of life and death. There is not the slightest doubt that, unless the incipient revolution had been immediately crushed and further danger removed, the Turkish army on the Caucasus would have been hopelessly cut off and the Moslem population exterminated at the hands of the revolutionaries. The British Government has never hesitated under much less critical conditions to suppress rebellion within its borders with an iron hand and by measures which, surveyed after the time of stress and danger was past, have appeared both harsh and cruel in the extreme.
It is possible that a certain number of innocent Armenians may have been killed by the mob who, infuriated and panic-stricken by the reports they had received of the butchery of their co-religionists at Van, and the slaughter of the soldiers at Zeitun, believed that should the Armenians get the upper hand they would suffer in the same manner; but for the fate of these poor victims, or for the excesses committed by the Kurds, it would hardly be just to hold either the Turkish Government or the local Turkish officials responsible. These had done everything possible to disarm the tribes so as to make them amenable to law and order, but despite their endeavours the Kurds were being continually armed by outside agencies. One of the principal causes of the Albanian revolution was the attempt to disarm the mountaineers, and after that experience it is greatly to the credit of the Turkish Government that they still persisted in trying to deprive the Kurds of their rifles.
We have no hesitation in repeating that these stories of wholesale massacre have been circulated with the distinct object of influencing, detrimentally to Turkey, the future policy of the British Government when the time of settlement shall arrive. No apology, therefore, is needed for honestly endeavouring to show how a nation with whom we were closely allied for many years and which possesses the same faith as millions of our fellow-subjects, has been condemned for perpetrating horrible excesses against humanity on “evidence” which, when not absolutely false, is grossly and shamefully exaggerated.