The Economist
October 20, 2007
U.S. Edition
Unearthing the past, endangering the future – Turkey and America
Turkey votes to invade northern Iraq; Congress considers the Armenian
genocide. The two are dangerously connected
STANDING before a blurred photograph of a ditch full of emaciated
corpses, an elderly woman begins to cry. "The Turks are butchers,"
hisses another. These women are among thousands of diaspora Armenians
who travel from all corners of the globe to pay tribute to their dead
at the genocide memorial in Yerevan. "Our objective is not to attack
this or that country," explains a grim-faced guide. "It is to ensure
recognition of the first genocide of the 20th century, that of 1.5m
Armenians by the Turks."
For decades, Armenians round the world have lobbied for explicit
official recognition of their point of view. Over the years, Armenian
groups in America (where perhaps 400,000 people have Armenian
ancestry) have persuaded 40 out of 50 states to recognise the
genocide. They seemed poised to snatch their biggest trophy yet when
the Foreign Affairs Committee of America’s Democrat-controlled House
of Representatives passed a bill on October 10th stating that "the
Armenian genocide was conceived and carried out by the Ottoman empire
from 1915 to 1923." But this was overshadowed, on October 17th, by
another, related, vote: the Turkish parliament’s decision to allow
the government to clobber guerrillas of the homegrown Kurdistan
Workers’ Party (PKK) in their haven in northern Iraq.
For, even as Congress has been considering a war that is almost a
century old, America’s present war in Iraq has made Turkey newly
vulnerable to Kurdish attacks. The de facto autonomy enjoyed by Iraqi
Kurds has encouraged the PKK. Many PKK guerrillas are now attacking
the Turks from bases in Iraq. As many as 20 Turkish soldiers have
died in clashes with the PKK in the past two weeks alone. The Turks
have held back from retaliation, largely because they hoped that
America would deal with the PKK itself. Its failure to do so, mainly
because it fears upsetting its Iraqi Kurdish allies, is the biggest
cause of rampant anti-American feeling in Turkey, which has been
strengthening for some time (see chart on next page). So although
President George Bush warned Turkey, just before its parliamentary
vote, that it was not in its interests to send troops into Iraq, the
Turks ignored him. "The genocide resolution poured more oil on to the
flames at the worst possible time," observes Taha Ozhan of the SETA
think-tank in Ankara.
The raw facts of the Armenian tragedy are not disputed. In 1915 many
hundreds of thousands of Armenian civilians were deported to the
deserts of Syria and Iraq. They were more than likely to die on the
journey from starvation, exhaustion and attacks by robbers or
irregular fighters. Their deportation, in the view of most Western
historians, fits the United Nations’ 1948 definition of genocide: an
action intended "to destroy in whole, or in part, a national, ethnic,
racial or religious group". That conclusion is based in part on the
testimony of Christian missionaries and Western diplomats, who
observed at close hand the atrocities inflicted on the Armenians and
concluded that this was not just brutal deportation, but a policy of
extermination.
Turkey admits that several hundred thousand Armenians did die, but
says this was not because of any centrally organised campaign to wipe
them out. The deaths, it says, were a result of the chaos convulsing
the Ottoman empire in its final days – a collapse accelerated by the
treachery of its Armenian subjects, who had sided with invading
Russian and French forces. In short, the tragedy was war, not
genocide. This is the version taught to Turkish schoolchildren, who
are also told that many more Turks were killed by Armenians than vice
versa. Turks remember, too, that in the 1970s some 47 of their
countrymen, many of them diplomats, were killed by Armenian
militants.
Genocide is a tricky subject in Washington. Six weeks after the
Rwandan genocide began in 1994, when 500,000 people had already been
murdered for belonging to the wrong tribe, the American government
still hesitated to call it what it was. The trouble with calling
genocide "genocide" while the blood is still spilling is that, under
the terms of a UN convention, one is obliged to do something to stop
it.
The Armenian killings incur no such awkwardness. Obviously, Congress
cannot do much about a massacre that happened nearly a century ago.
But that does not mean that its words carry no cost. Being branded as
the precursors of Hitler "is a very injurious move to the psyche of
the Turkish people," said Turkey’s ambassador to Washington, before
he was withdrawn for "consultations". And plenty of Americans who
dismiss the Turkish account as whitewash nonetheless think that their
lawmakers are fools for saying so aloud.
Turkey is a key ally in a region where America has too few.
Three-quarters of the air cargo heading into Iraq passes through
Incirlik air base there. American planes fly freely through Turkish
air space en route to Iraq and Afghanistan, and the American navy
uses Turkish ports. Turkey provides Iraq with electricity and allows
trucks laden with fuel to cross its border into Iraq. But if American
politicians persist in dishing out what Turks perceive as a grave
insult, it will make it harder for the Turkish government to continue
co-operating so closely with America.
That is why Mr Bush urged Congress to ditch the bill. Eight former
secretaries of state, from both parties, urged the same. The current
secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, called Turkey’s foreign
minister, prime minister and president to mollify them. She also
dispatched two able lieutenants to Turkey. She tried to reassure
Ankara that "the American people don’t feel that the current Turkish
government is the Ottoman empire". Jane Harman, a Democrat who had
originally co-sponsored the House resolution, has now withdrawn her
support, noting that the House had already passed similar resolutions
in 1975 and 1984, and that doing so again would "isolate and
embarrass a courageous and moderate Islamic government in perhaps the
most volatile region in the world." Without, she might have added,
saving a single Armenian.
Foreign-policy experts, too, are aghast. Steven Cook of the Council
on Foreign Relations, a think-tank, laments the cavalier way Nancy
Pelosi, the speaker of the House, and her Democratic cohorts are
treating relations with a crucial ally. Anthony Cordesman of the
Centre for Strategic and International Studies frets that the bill
will create "yet another pointless source of anger" against America
in the Middle East. The White House has promised to do all it can to
prevent the full House from voting on the resolution – though Ms
Pelosi, whose Californian constituents include many rich Armenians,
has promised that the measure will reach the House floor by
mid-November.
Meanwhile, the Turkish government has racked up its lobbying in
Washington by several degrees. If the resolution passes the full
House, it has hinted, use of the Incirlik base may be denied.
"Unfortunately, some politicians in the United States have made an
attempt to sacrifice big issues for minor political games," said
Turkey’s newly elected president, Abdullah Gul. The hawkish army
chief, General Yasar Buyukanit, gave warning that if the House bill
went through, "our military relations with the US will never be the
same again."
By October 17th, both Republican and Democratic congressmen were
beginning to back away from the resolution. Around a dozen of them
withdrew their support, and its chances of passage looked much dimmer
than before. "This vote", said the head of the Democratic caucus,
"came face to face with the reality on the ground." But the damage,
it could be argued, had already been done.
Turkey is now seething with conspiracy theories about American and
assorted Western ne’er-do-wells wanting to weaken and divide the
country, as they did when the empire collapsed. Kurds and Armenians
are connected in villainy. At the recent funeral of a Turkish soldier
killed by the PKK, a state-appointed imam declared to mourners that
"the Armenian bastards" were "responsible" for his death.
All this has intensified the pressure on the mildly Islamist prime
minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, to wade into northern Iraq soon.
Threats of a Turkish invasion have helped to push world oil prices to
new highs. Meanwhile the PKK, in a statement, said its fighters would
defend the Kurds and their interests to "the last drop of blood".
Yet despite the chest-thumping, Turkish officials privately concede
that a large-scale cross-border operation is a rotten idea. Turkish
soldiers run the risk of getting bogged down, much as the Israelis
did in Lebanon. And as Mr Erdogan himself acknowledged last week, in
a recent interview with the CNN news channel, "We staged 24 such
operations in the past and can we say we achieved anything? Not
really." In reality, a Turkish incursion would probably win the PKK
fresh recruits while driving an even bigger wedge between Turkey and
America. It would also provide ammunition for countries, such as
France and Austria, which argue that Turkey should be given
"privileged partnership" of the European Union rather than full
membership.
And there lies another source of sourness. Disillusionment with the
EU is reflected in polls that show support for membership among Turks
is slipping from a high of 74% in 2002 to under 50% this year. Waning
EU influence may, in turn, leave Turkey feeling less constrained
about plotting mischief inside Iraq.
"If Turkey goes in [to Iraq] it will become isolated, authoritarian,
a very nasty place," says Soli Ozel, a political scientist at
Istanbul’s Bilgi University. Like many fellow liberals, he blames the
current mess as much on EU dithering as on Mr Erdogan and his ruling
Justice and Development (AK) Party. Riding on a wave of sweeping
reforms and economic recovery, the AK romped back to solo rule in the
July elections with a bigger share of the vote.
AK should have used this mandate to tackle Turkey’s most urgent
problems. It might have begun with Armenia, by considering America’s
plea to open its borders with it. These were sealed in 1993 after the
tiny landlocked state, once part of the Soviet Union, invaded a chunk
of ethnically Turkic Azerbaijan in a vicious conflict over the
enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh.
Over the past few months the Americans have been working on a
proposal calling for Turkey to establish formal ties with Armenia and
to end its blockade. In return, Armenia would recognise its existing
border with Turkey and publicly disavow any territorial claims,
including the claim to Mount Ararat, its national symbol. A deal of
that sort might have helped the Bush administration head off the
genocide resolution, and could possibly have squashed it for good.
A recent poll conducted by the International Republican Institute, a
pro-democracy pressure group, suggests that the people of
Armenia – unlike their brothers and sisters in the diaspora – may be
ready for change. Only 3% of respondents said that recognition of the
genocide was their first priority. A mere 4% listed it at all. For
many, finding a job is their chief worry.
Meanwhile, Turkey has looked the other way as thousands of illegal
Armenian migrants have sought work in Istanbul, the former Ottoman
capital. Mutual suspicions are beginning to fade as these newcomers
are recruited by Turks to care for babies and ageing parents.
Armenian tourists, too, braving accusations of treachery back home,
have been heading by the thousands to Turkey’s Mediterranean resorts.
"Until I met a real Turk, I rather feared them," confesses Tevan
Poghossian, an Armenian pundit, who runs projects to promote
Turkish-Armenian dialogue. "Now I go out drinking with them in
Yerevan."
The few Turks who travel the other way can discover that they have
more in common with their Armenian neighbours than they suppose. A
visit to the open-air vegetable market in Yerevan reveals that many
of the words for vegetables are the same (and so, too, are some of
the swear-words). As often as not, Turks who identify themselves are
greeted with a big smile and even with a discount. And a simple
apology for the events of 1915, without mention of the G-word, can
melt the ice.
In a gesture of goodwill, Turkey this year restored a much-prized
Armenian church in the eastern province of Van. Armenian officials
were among those invited to attend its opening – albeit as a museum – in
March. And a growing number of Turks, secure in the knowledge that
Ataturk, the revered founder of modern Turkey, had no hand in the
killings, are beginning to question the fate of the Ottoman
Armenians. A few intrepid souls such as Taner Akcam, a historian,
have even dared to call it a genocide.
Despite this burgeoning spirit of reconciliation, however, Turkey has
balked at establishing formal ties and insists that Armenia must make
the first move. Armenia retorts that it is up to Turkey to prove that
its overtures are not designed solely to kill the genocide
resolution; to prove its good faith, Turkey should act first. Mr
Erdogan’s lieutenants blame the impasse on Turkey’s meddlesome
generals, who insist that Armenia must make peace with Azerbaijan
before it can make peace with Turkey.
It is also the army that is blocking political accommodation with the
Kurds, they say. But since the AK was returned to power with 47% of
the popular vote, such excuses are looking thin. If the government
were sincere about democracy, it should have scrapped the notorious
Article 301 of the penal code that makes it a crime to "insult
Turkishness". Hundreds of Turkish academics and writers, including
Orhan Pamuk, a Nobel prize-winner, have been prosecuted under this
article. One of its targets, Hrant Dink, an Armenian newspaper
editor, was murdered in January by an ultra-nationalist teenager who
accused him of insulting Turkey. His lawyers accuse the government of
covering up the affair, despite evidence that at least one rogue
security official was involved in plotting Mr Dink’s death.
As long as Article 301 remains on the books, there is no substance in
Mr Erdogan’s call for historians, not politicians, to investigate
history. As Mr Ozel points out, "Anyone who disagrees with the
official line can end up behind bars." Article 301 also makes it
harder for Turkey’s own Armenians to oppose recognition of the
genocide by foreign governments, on the ground that it is better for
Turks to arrive at the truth themselves. Instead, nationalist rage is
stoked up on both sides.
Turning a deaf ear to such criticism, the government has wasted
precious political capital on writing a new constitution. The current
document, written by the generals after their last coup in 1980,
undoubtedly needs to be replaced. Yet by insisting on provisions that
would enable veiled women to attend university, the government has
been accused of promoting a covert Islamist agenda.
It did not help when, overriding American objections, Turkey signed a
gas-pipeline deal with Iran last July. Mr Erdogan’s bent for flirting
with rogue regimes in Iran and Syria, and for talking to Hamas in the
Palestinian territories, may not have influenced the voting on the
genocide resolution, but cannot have made congressmen warm to Turkey
either.
To make matters worse, Turkey has given warning that its strong
military ties with Israel may suffer if Israel fails to stop the
resolution being passed. It is threatening to sever air links between
Turkey and Yerevan and to expel Armenian migrant workers if the
Armenian government does not lobby on its behalf. Turkey refuses to
believe that neither Israel nor Armenia has the power to influence
Congress, a fact which shows "just how little Turkey understands the
way our country works", moans a frustrated American official. "It
also shows that Turkey lacks the stomach to take on the Americans, so
it is going after an easier target, Armenia, instead."
With luck, the resolution will be shelved and Turkey, its pride
salved, will rethink its policies. With luck too, it will recognise
that a full-blown invasion of northern Iraq would damage its
interests and further inflame Kurdish separatists. If Turkey wants to
fulfil its dreams of being a regional power and an inspiring example
of how Islam and democracy can co-exist, it must make peace with all
its citizens, including its Kurds. And it should find a way to face
up to its past. It could do worse than seek inspiration from Ataturk
who, as Mr Akcam noted in a recent book, once called the Armenian
tragedy "a shameful act".