RECOGNISING GENOCIDE: PART TWO
Neos Kosmos – The Hellenic Perspective, Australia
June 2 2014
Obstacles for recognition of genocide in Modern Turkey
To date, other than the extremely brave Turkish scholars such as
Taner Akcam, Selim Deringil and some journalists who lament the demise
of a multicultural Turkey, there have been few efforts by Greece to
actively engage Turkey in a rational discussion on the Genocide.
However, popular opinion in Turkey is gradually shifting, especially
with regard to the genocide against the Armenians. Recently, the
grandson of Jemal Pasha, one of the three army officers who instigated
the genocide, suggesting that “Turkey, as a state, should apologize to
the Armenians.” Such public calls for recognition are becoming larger
in number, with prominent businessman Ishak Alaton commenting that:
“Apology is a sign of maturity and it is time for Turkey to grow up…
There is little time left until 2015 when Turkey will face a huge
campaign by the Armenian lobby, which claims it will be the 100th
year of Armenian genocide.” There appears to be at least a tacit
acknowledgment by sections of the Turkish media, that, despite their
own interpretation of events, the Armenians have managed to convince
the world of the righteousness of their cause.
Hurriyet journalist Mehmet Ali Birand, for example, observed the
following in an article strangely entitled: “Now the Armenians
are making us walk the Deportation March”: “Armenians are almost
approaching the end in their genocide claims. They have made the world
accept their claims by working continuously like industrious ants
for 100 years. While they were explaining their pain and what they
had to live through, we did not even discuss among ourselves what had
happened. We buried our heads in the sand and have reached these days.
We could not reply in a persuasive manner. We lost the case.”
While some sympathy exists for the Armenians among the Turkish
intelligentsia, and while some Turkish journalists stress the need to
tactically address the Armenian Genocide in order to enhance the global
image of Turkey, this does not seem to extend to a consideration of
the genocide against Greeks in Pontus and the rest of Asia Minor. Last
year, when the Diatribe wrote about this Genocide, an incendiary
letter was received from a Turkish nationalist, making accusations of
racism and incitement of racial hatred. This is something echoed by
many Turks I have spoken to over the years: that the victim’s (our)
discourse about the genocide, (which usually involves exhibiting
statistics of the death toll and reading contemporary newspaper
articles that describe crimes of murder and torture in harrowing
detail), is that it is a natural consequence of the actions of a race
which is by its very nature, inhumane and barbaric. According to this
view, the Armenians, Assyrians and Greeks are using the Genocide to
vilify the entire Turkish nation and deny its humanity.
I profoundly disagree with this point of view, which does not take into
account (a) the inherited trauma of the brutality of genocide and (b)
frustration at the continued Turkish denial of this crime. I believe
that the enormity of the crime, as contained in newspaper accounts of
the time is so horrific as to need no further embellishment. However,
I concede that the disturbing gleefulness with which some Greek
ultra-nationalists and for want of a better word “genocide-peddlers”
take it upon themselves to present historical incidents of Turkish
brutality against Christians, the gorier the better, sometimes does
seem to be more than just reporting of facts and rather, calculated
to a) enhance their own self importance and b) incite feelings of
disgust and anger at the entire Turkish race, despite their vocal
protestations to the contrary.
Both in Greece and in Australia, the Genocide discourse is thus
being played out, mostly for domestic consumption, with a schematic
and highly narrow presentation of facts to the already converted,
that focuses mainly on the mechanics of the slaughter. There is
no consideration of the broader social, historical and political
framework which enabled the Genocide to take place and certainly no
dialogue with, or consideration of the discourse from the Turkish
point of view, which is necessary, if we are to reach some type of
recognition by them of the Genocide and an apology to the victims.
Further, if our only contribution to the discussion is the internalised
list of crimes, it is axiomatic that when faced with a perceived
onslaught of racial denigration, that the immediate Turkish knee-jerk
reaction is to dismiss all accusations put by us and wallow in rage,
just as post-war Germans turned their heads away from the screen
when forced by the Allies to watch footage of the Nazi extermination
camps. At that stage, the time for listening or dialogue is past and
any attempts to engage with Turks in order for them to appreciate
the enormity of the crime of Genocide committed by their ancestors,
are rendered futile.
Another major problem with unseasoned Genocide campaigners’ approaches,
it their pseudo-legalism, where, in their quest to forensically ‘prove’
the genocide, they try to selectively fit the events of the genocide
into the various legal definitions of genocide that exist, some of
which have changed or are no longer as broad as they should be, or are
too broad. For example, the UN definition is now extremely broad but
does not cover all instances of cultural genocide or violence against
women. As a result, the whole debate becomes a nit-picking exercise
between would be-lawyers, obfuscating the main point – which is that
a State took it upon itself to incite its subjects to commit horrible
crimes against subject minorities, with a view to exterminating them,
from within its borders and even worse, that the State in question,
the Ottoman Empire and its successor, deny that it ever happened,
despite a multitude of eyewitness and independent evidence verifying
it. In this case, legally ‘proving’ what the world already knows
is a useless exercise, especially since nation states can ‘opt out’
of being bound by international court decisions.
In his book With Intent to Destroy: Reflections on Genocide, Colin
Tatz argues that Turkey denies the genocide so as not to jeopardize
“its ninety-five-year-old dream of becoming the beacon of democracy
in the Near East”. In the light of recent developments in the region,
this argument seems unconvincing. On the other hand in their book
Negotiating the Sacred: Blasphemy and Sacrilege in a Multicultural
Society, Elizabeth Burns Coleman and Kevin White present a list of
reasons explaining Turkey’s inability to admit the genocides committed
by the Young Turks, being: a) a suppression of guilt and shame that
a warrior nation, a ‘beacon of democracy’ as it saw itself in 1908
(and since), slaughtered several ethnic populations. Democracies, it
is said, don’t commit genocide; ergo, Turkey couldn’t and didn’t do so.
b) A cultural and social ethos of honour, a compelling and compulsive
need to remove any blots on the national escutcheon. c) A chronic
fear that admission will lead to massive claims for reparation and
restitution. d) To overcome fears of social fragmentation in a society
that is still very much a state in transition. e) A ‘logical’ belief
that because the genocide was committed with impunity, so denial
will also meet with neither opposition nor obloquy and f) An inner
knowledge that the juggernaut denial industry has a momentum of its
own and can’t be stopped even if they wanted it to stop.
Notwithstanding the above dealing with the genocide on a bilateral
basis, the largest problem the Greek people face has to do with the
nationalist hysteria referred to earlier and the fact that our history
with Turkey is different to that of Armenians or the Assyrians. In
striving to explain how we are the innocent victims of genocide, we
shy away from exploring how it was that the Turks could be incited
to commit genocide in the first place – a topic of vital importance
if our intention is to ensure that genocide never takes place again,
rather than achieve an ascendancy over the Turks.
We also airbrush out our own history in the region. In particular
we ignore the role played by Turkish refugees from the Balkans, who,
dispossessed and resentful, were easily manipulated into taking out
their frustrations against the Greeks of Asia Minor. We also forget
that the Greek army, assisted by native Greeks in Anatolia, during
the Asia Minor campaign, also took part in massacres, though on an
extremely smaller scale and in markedly different circumstances.
We are silent on these, though need to examine them and put them in
perspective, for the Turkish response to our claims is always that
we also committed massacres and or genocide, so that if they did
perpetrate the genocide, we are no better than they and thus, all
things are equal. Once we have examined our own role, and understand
the motivation behind it, we can then condemn all acts of racial
violence and brutality wherever these are committed, including our
own, separating these and not linking them to the Genocide committed
by the Ottoman Empire against the Christian of Asia Minor.
Next week, we will examine the massacres the Greek army committed in
Asia Minor and consider how these impact upon Turkish views of the
Greek Genocide.
* Dean Kalimniou is a Melbourne solicitor and freelance journalist.
Part 1 can be read at
From: Baghdasarian
http://neoskosmos.com/news/en/recognising-genocide-part-one
http://neoskosmos.com/news/en/recognising-genocide-part-two