Andranik Migranyan writes about Obama’s tough choice

Andranik Migranyan writes about Obama’s tough choice
Andranik Migranyan the director of Institute for Democracy and cooperation posted his articles on “The Huffington Post” writing about his observation over U.S. President’s April 24 address. Read the original story below:

On April 24 every year the U.S. President addresses the American people and the world to express solidarity with those who pay tribute to the 1915 genocide victims when 1.5 million Armenians were destroyed in the Ottoman Empire.
Every presidential candidate promises to the U.S. Armenian community that when he comes to office he will recognize the fact of the genocide but neither President Clinton, nor Bush, nor President Obama have fulfilled their election pledges yet. The last President to keep his word on this was President Reagan who explicitly recognized Armenian Genocide in 1981.
Last year, when on a trip to Ankara in April, President Obama, answering the question on Armenian-Turkish relations, did not use the word 'genocide' but said that his views on the issue had not changed since his election campaign. Then, he said "America deserves a leader who speaks truthfully about the Armenian Genocide," and more. To avoid using the word genocide in the U.S.
President's address on April 24, 2009 the U.S. administration had asked the President of Armenia to publicly announce on the eve of that date that some progress had been made in the negotiations with Turkey, and two protocols had been initialed that were aimed at normalizing the Armenian-Turkish relations.
The Armenian leadership agreed to do that despite the anticipation of serious criticism on the part of the Diaspora and especially the Armenian community in the United States who thought that this played into the hands of the Turks and helped Obama to save face and not to use the word 'genocide' in his speech on April 24, the reason being that he did not want to impede the normalization process in the relations between Armenia and Turkey. Instead, he used an Armenian language term for the genocide. After announcing the news regarding the protocols right before the genocide memorial date, the Armenian leadership received a statement from the U.S. Department of State to the effect that the parties should sign the protocols without any preconditions and within a reasonable time frame. By virtue of this action Washington, to a large extent, assumed the responsibility of being the guarantor of signing and ratification of these protocols. This was followed by the signing of the protocols in Zurich by the foreign ministers of Turkey and Armenia, with the active mediation of U.S. State Secretary Hillary Clinton.
The Turkish side, however, kept putting forward new conditions for the ratification, thus protracting the process and using the negotiations with Armenia to block the passing of the resolution by U.S. Congress denouncing the genocide of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire and recognition of the genocide by other states.
Such conduct on the part of the Turkish side left Armenia no choice under the circumstances but suspend further proceedings of the protocols placing the full responsibility for frustrating the talks on Turkey. Armenia formally did so today. It is now up to Turkey to settle things with the United States, France, European Union and Russia regarding the issue since the foreign ministers of France, the U.S. and Russia, as well as the representative of the EU took part in the protocol signing process in Zurich.
In order to maintain the negotiations process, the President of Armenia was invited to participate in the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington, DC on April 12-13, and within the framework of the Summit he had meetings with the Prime Minister of Turkey, President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton.
The Turkish side made the ratification of the protocols contingent on the progress in the relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan and on the upcoming parliamentary elections in Turkey, which is not due until 2011. Such conduct on the part of Turkey runs contrary to the very essence of the protocols and the statement of the U.S. Department of State on normalization of Armenian-Turkish relations without any preconditions and within a reasonable time frame.
Washington was not able to convince Ankara to comply with its obligations to ratify the protocols. It is just as unlikely to be able to keep Armenia in this negotiations process so as to have a chance for President Obama to save face this year again, in case on April 24 he does not use the word 'genocide' in his address.
The Armenian side could stay in the negotiations for a while longer even without the ratification of the protocols by the Turkish Parliament if the President of the United States used the word 'genocide' in his address on April 24. In that case neither the Diaspora nor the Armenian political circles in the opposition would be able to accuse the President of Armenia of his staying in the process, in fact, assisting the Turkish diplomacy and blocking the process of recognizing the genocide by the U.S. administration and Congress.
The Armenian side could stay in the negotiations process given the certainty that this year the Congress would pass a resolution on the genocide of Armenians which has already gone through the Foreign Affairs Committee of the House of Representatives. It might stay in this process if there is any progress in the position of the mediators on the Nagorny Karabakh settlement issue and clarification of the issue of its status. Without some positive results on a wide range of issues in the Armenian-Turkish and Armenian-Azeri relations, it will be difficult for the Armenian leadership to remain in this process without causing itself political damage.
In my view, as a result of the Armenian withdrawal from the process it is Turkey who will be the biggest loser, because yet again the Turkish side will show the world that it is not ready to recognize the genocide and apologize to the Armenian people; furthermore, it is not even ready to agree to a normalization of relations, thus presenting itself as a dangerous neighbor for Armenia and unreliable partner for all the countries that participated in the drafting and signing of the protocols.
Obviously, not only Obama but also the United States will sustain serious blows to their reputation since Washington acted as an unbiased mediator and, even more, gave the world reasons to believe that he had sufficient resources to convince Turkey to sign as well as ratify the protocols.
On April 24 the U.S. President is to deliver another address with regard to the 95th anniversary of the genocide of Armenians. He would do well if he came up with some language not to alienate the U.S. Armenian community and the Armenian people either from him personally or from his party on the eve of midterm elections to Congress, and here he should take into account certain capabilities of the Armenian lobby and the Armenian constituency.
Thus, the U.S. President is facing a difficult choice. If he recognized the genocide he would avoid challenges to his credibility, and gain the support of the Armenian-American community; he would also perform a moral duty as President Reagan did and which, incidentally, has already been done by such states as France, Germany, Russia and others. At the same time, that would create tensions in the relations with Turkey which is a NATO ally and a strategic partner. Indeed, Turkey is still viewed as such mechanically by many in Washington. However, only those totally divorced from politics cannot see that Turkey's recent policy on all major internal and external issues has been shifting. Turkey has been moving from a secular state toward an Islamic state. Moreover, it is pursuing the ambitions to re-instate its role as a leader of a neo-Ottoman world and as the leader of all Islamic states. Internally, the Army and the Joint Chiefs of Staff are rapidly losing their influence as the main guarantors of Turkey as a secular state. In the external policy, Erdogan has repeatedly subjected Israel to verbal accusations and made statements on protecting Iran from tougher U.S. sanctions in the UN Security Council. If this rapid slide of the Turkish policy continues in the future, then we may not find too unrealistic the strategic forecast of George Friedman, founder of STRATFOR, in his book "The Next 100 Years", on the inevitability of a full-scale war between the neo-Ottoman Turkey and the United States as early as the middle of this century.
In view of all these circumstances, the U.S. President will be presented with a tough choice that is really not too difficult.
Source: Panorama.am