Editorial
Turkey’s Willful Amnesia
By THE EDITORIAL BOARD
April 17, 2015
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Friday, April 24, Armenians the world over will commemorate the 100th
anniversary of the start of the mass killings of Armenians in Ottoman
Turkey, now widely recognized as the first genocide of the 20th century.
Widely, that is, outside Turkey, where the government and the majority
of Turks continue to furiously attack anyone who speaks of genocide.
When Pope Francis used the term at a memorial service for the Armenian victims on Sunday,
Turkey recalled its ambassador from the Vatican and a government
minister insidiously noted that the pope was Argentine, and “in
Argentina, the Armenian diaspora controls the media and business.” And
even before the European Parliament passed a resolution
on Wednesday urging Turkey to recognize the genocide and seek a
“genuine reconciliation” with the Armenians, President Recep Tayyip
Erdogan declared that whatever the Europeans say “will go in one ear and
out the other.”
The hard Turkish line is
especially unfortunate, because a year ago Mr. Erdogan seemed to be
moving toward a more conciliatory stance, offering condolences
to descendants of the Armenian victims and suggesting that a panel of
international historians be formed to examine the historical evidence.
No such panel was convened, and this week Mr. Erdogan was back to
painting Turkey as the aggrieved victim of international slander: “It is
out of the question for there to be a stain or a shadow called genocide
on Turkey.”
For Armenians, millions of whom form a
global diaspora outside the Republic of Armenia, demanding recognition
of the mass executions, death marches and concentration camps inflicted
on their ancestors in the disintegrating Ottoman Empire, in which as
many as 1.5 million died, has been a decades-long, global mission. While
Turkey has admitted that many Armenians died, the official narrative is
that this was a nasty episode in a nasty war, and not a premeditated
attempt to destroy a people — not, in other words, a genocide. To assert
otherwise is a crime in Turkey — “insulting Turkish identity” — and
intolerable from foreigners.
The
narrative, however, is simply not one Turkey can sustain against the
weight of scholarship that leaves no doubt of a regime-sponsored
campaign against Armenians during and after World War I. Mr. Erdogan was
on the right track last year when he called for an independent panel,
and it is difficult to understand why he has backed away now. The longer
Turks refuse to examine and acknowledge that history fully, the greater
the damage to Turkey’s international standing.
The
United States should not condone that posture of denial. During his
2008 presidential campaign, Barack Obama declared that “as president, I
will recognize the Armenian genocide.” But, like his predecessors, he
then became reluctant to upset an important NATO ally.
Maintaining
good relations with Turkey is important, but at the least the United
States should join Europe and Pope Francis in making clear to Mr.
Erdogan that the greatest danger to Turkey lies not in anyone’s use of
the word “genocide,” but in refusing to acknowledge what took place 100
years ago.
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