The History of the Armenian Genocide

by Dadrian, Vahakn N.

• ISBN13: 9781571816665
• ISBN10: 1571816666
• Edition: 6th
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2004-02-01
• Publisher: Berghahn Books

Summary

The Armenian Genocide, though not given such prominent treatment as the Jewish Holocaust which it precedes, still haunts the Western world and has assumed a new significance in the light of "ethnic cleansing" in Bosnia. This study by the most distinguished scholar of the Armenian tragedy offers an authoritative analysis by presenting it as a case study of genocide and by seeing it as an historical process in which a domestic conflict escalated and was finally consumed by global war.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgement	xi
Abbreviations	xiii
Preface	xv
Introduction	xviii
Part I HUMANITARIAN INTERVENTION BY THE POWERS: A HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE
Islamic Sacred Law as a Matrix of Ottoman Legal Order and Nationality Conflicts	3	(4)
Humanitarian Intervention as a Response to Nationality Conflicts in the Balkans	7	(14)
Humanitarian Intervention and Ottoman Turkish Dominion
Serb Insurrection and Russian Intervention
The Greek War of Independence and European Intervention
The Crimean War: A New Impetus to Humanitarian Intervention
The 1856 Reform Act and Its Denunciation by Militant Islamists
Escalation of the Conflicts and Ottoman Palliatives. The Origins of the Eastern Question Foreshadowing the Armenian Question	21	(22)
Europe's Implausible Legal-Political Embrace of Theocratic Turkey
The Massacre of Christian Maronites and a New Protocol for the Protection of the Christians
The Balkan Insurrections. The Emergence Among Orthodox Slavs of a New Breed of Muslim Overlords
The Midhat Constitution
From the London Protocol to the Berlin Treaty
The Lethal Disjunctiveness of Public Law and Common Law in Ottoman Turkey
The Provocative Origin of the Armenian Question. A French Document
From Desperation to Desperate Acts: The Advent of Armenian Revolutionaries
Part II THE ORIGINS OF THE ARMENIAN QUESTION AND THE TURKO-ARMENIAN CONFLICT
The Ill-Fated Internationalization of a Domestic Nationality Conflict	43	(6)
The Cleavage Between Armenian and Turkish Revolutionaries Conjointly Seeking the Overthrow of Abdul Hamit
The Futility of Armenian Efforts for Administrative Remedies
The Interactive Dynamics of the Eastern and Armenian Questions	49	(12)
The Common Denominator Undergirding Both Questions
Armeno-Macedonian Cooperation
Greece, Crete and Zeitoun
Convergence in Origin But Divergence in Outcome
Part III THE DYSFUNCTIONS OF HUMANITARIAN INTERVENTION IN THE RISE AND TREATMENT OF THE ARMENIAN QUESTION
Manipulative Diplomacy Supplanting the Ideals of Humanitarian Intervention	61	(43)
The Armenian Question as a Pawn in British Party Politics. The Sway of a Moral Dilemma
The Austrian Policy of Acquiescence to the Massacres
The Role-Reversal of Russia: The Crux of the Armenian Disaster
France's Adhesion to Russia and the Tension Between Humanitarianism and Opportunism in French Foreign Policy
The Saga of a Dissident French Ambassador
The German Policy of Rejecting Both Humanitarianism and Intervention
The Impotence of Discordant Diplomacy: The Disconnective Vulnerabilities of the Armenians	104	(9)
Factors Handicapping the Armenian Quest for Relief
Abortive Treaty Engagements
The Factor of Hedging Through Diplomatic Semantics
Part IV THE INAUGURATION OF A PROTO-GENOCIDAL POLICY
The Era of the Abdul Hamit Massacres	113	(59)
The Sassoun Uprising
The Sterility of the European Response to the Sassoun Massacre
The Hunchakist Demonstration: The Sequela to the Sassoun Massacre
The Formative Elements of a Subculture of Massacre Against the Armenians
The 1895--96 Zeitoun Uprising
The Conflagration of Van
The Capture of Bank Ottoman
The Unleashing by the Authorities of the Predesigned Massacres
A Special Case of Collective Punishment Through Mass Murder
The Religious Dimensions of the Massacres
The Demography of the Empire-Wide Massacres and of Destruction: The Nature and Sweep of Armenian Losses
The Issue of Cultural and Subcultural Components of Massacre Revisited
Massacre as an Instrument of a Radical Policy
The Portentousness of the Abdul Hamit Era Massacres	172	(7)
Part V THE WARS AND MASSACRES OF THE NEW YOUNG TURK REGIME AND THE DEMISE OF HUMANITARIAN INTERVENTIONISM
The 1909 Twin Adana Massacres	179	(6)
The Hidden Agenda of the Young Turks Seizing Power
The Reenactment of Massacres as Rehearsal for the Genocide
The Eviction of the Turks from the Balkan Peninsula: A New Sense of Peril for Anatolia	185	(18)
Turkish Military Defeats in the 1912 Balkan War
The Dissolution of the Eastern Question into the Armenian Question
Part VI THE INITIATION AND CONSUMMATION OF THE GENOCIDE UNDER COVER OF THE FIRST WORLD WAR
The Legal-Political Context of the Initiation	203	(9)
The Alliance with Imperial Germany and the Opportunity Factor
External War as a Crucible for Targeting the ``Internal Foe''
International Law as a Crucible of Legal Liabilities	212	(7)
The Annulment of the Treaties
The Allies' Warning and the Introduction of the Principle of ``Crimes Against Humanity''
The Implementation of the Genocide	219	(16)
Mobilization and Deportation
Expropriation and Confiscation of Goods and Assets
The Genocidal Killings
The Disguises of the Law of Deportation and Ancillary Acts	235	(13)
Ultimate Responsibility for the Deportation
The Special Organization (Teskilati Mahsusa)
Efforts to Disguise Responsibility and Intent: A Challenge for Punishment
The Issue of German Complicity	248	(55)
The Revival of the Armenian Question and the New Turko-German Partnership
The Inroads of the German Military Mission to Turkey
The Bearings of the German Ideological Perspectives
The Complicity of the Military. The Order for the ``Deportations''
The Political Indicators of Complicity
An Ambassador and a Marine Attache: The Issue of Paramountcy in Complicity
Turkish Assertions on German Complicity
Incidents of Concealment and Disclosure
The Anti-Russian Ideology in the Turko-German Partnership and Its Anti-Armenian Repercussions
German Political Economists and the Armenian Genocide
The Views of German Experts of Criminal and International Law on German Complicity as a By-Product of Militarism
The Significance of Emperor William Il's Secret Activities
A Final Commentary on the Issue of German Complicity
Part VII The Quest for Justice in the Aftermath of Turkish Military Defeat
Allied Attempts at Retributive Justice	303	(14)
The Judicial Arm of the Paris Peace Conference
The Legal Gropings of the British
The Ultimate Suspension of Prosecution
A Commentary on the Abortiveness of Allied Justice
The Recourse to the Machinery of Turkish Justice	317	(30)
Pretrial Inquiries and Investigations
The Formation of the Court Martial
The Initiation of the Proceedings
The Key Indictment
The Jurisdictional Challenge by the Defense: The Constitutional Argument
The Key Verdict
Ancillary Verdicts and the End of the Proceedings
Political Impediments to the Domestic Trials
Part VIII THE PUSH BEYOND DOMESTIC GENOCIDE. THE TARGETING OF THE RUSSIAN ARMENIANS
The Ittihadist Thrust Against Russian Armenia	347	(9)
German Military Testimony
Other Accounts
Austrian Testimony
The Political Abetment of the Military
The Kemalist Thrust Against Russian Armenia	356	(21)
Ankara's Secret Order to ``Physically Annihilate Armenia''
The Reengagement of the Old Ittihadist Chieftains
The Proddings of the Top Ittihadist Leaders
The Cooperation of the Sultan's Government
Karabekir. The Foe of Armenia and the Patron of Azerbaijan
The Reactivation of the Leadership of the Wartime Special Organization
The Return of the Special Organization Field Officers
Part IX A REVIEW OF THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE IN A COMPARATIVE PERSPECTIVE
The Saliency of Some of the Determinants of the Armenian Genocide	377	(13)
A Note on the Dynamics of Impunity
Parallel Problems in the Post-War Prosecution of World War I German War Criminals	390	(4)
The Armenian Genocide in Relation to the Holocaust and the Nuremberg Trials	394	(26)
The Problem of the Vulnerability of the Jews and Armenians as Potential Targets of Victimization
Considerations on the Armenian Genocide Seen as a Precedent and a Precursor of the Holocaust
The Nuremberg Crucible
Conclusion	420	(4)
Epilogue	424	(2)
Bibliography	426	(29)
Subject Index	455	(3)
Names Index	458