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GENOCIDE-DENIAL BILL ROCKS TURKISH-FRENCH RELATIONS
The National Interest Online
http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/genocide-denial-bill-rocks-turkish-french-relations-6343
Jan 11 2012
A while back, Turkish foreign minister Ahmet Davutoglu announced that
his country had embarked on a foreign policy based on "zero problems
with our neighbors."
But it would seem that Turkey's "zero-problems" policy has in recent
years been anything but-with Turkey most recently and loudly at
loggerheads with Israel (over Palestine), Cyprus (over the extent
of territorial waters and gas-drilling zones and rights), Syria
(over the Assad regime's bloody suppression of internal dissent),
Iraq (over anti-Kurdish cross-border incursions by the Turkish army)
and Greece (over Greece's planned border fence to keep out would-be
infiltrating Turkish emigrants bound for the EU).
Recently, it was the turn of Turkish-French relations, with Turkey
recalling its ambassador from Paris and suspending all bilateral
contacts and relations-political, economic and military-in the wake
of the passage by the French lower house of parliament, the National
Assembly, of a law prohibiting genocide denial, including the Armenian
genocide of World War I.
Armenian spokesmen at the time and many subsequent historians of the
period have alleged that the Ottoman Turks murdered between a million
and 1.5 million Armenians in the Middle East and the Caucasus in
a series of planned and systematic massacres. Though these actions
often were camouflaged as "deportations," the intent, according to
historians, was to exterminate the Armenian race, i.e., genocide.
Successive Turkish governments, including the incumbent Islamist
government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, have consistently denied the
allegation, arguing that Istanbul had merely put down internal
Armenian rebellions-an Armenian "stab in the back," as it were-as the
hard-pressed Ottomans were fighting the Russians, British and a variety
of Balkan Christian states during World War I. They have insisted
that the death toll amounted to no more than three hundred thousand
Armenians (alongside tens of thousands of Turks allegedly murdered by
Armenians). Occasionally Turkish spokesmen have conceded that there
had been some "excesses"-but by local Ottoman officials and units.
Most non-Turkish historians dealing with World War I have concluded
that the Turks, assisted by Kurds, Circassians, Tatars, Azeris and
Arabs, committed genocide. For example, Donald Bloxham, a respected
historian at Edinburgh University, recently wrote:
It may be said categorically that the killing did constitute a
genocide-every aspect of the United Nations' definition of the crime
is applicable. . . . [There was among the Turks] a general consensus
of destruction of the Armenian national community, a consensus which
developed and was augmented over time around broad principles of
discrimination and xenophobia, progressing from notions of removal
by dilution and\or assimilation to physical removal by deportation
and\or murder.
Increasingly Turkish historians, especially those working in democratic
countries outside Turkey, have reached the same conclusion.
The Turkish-born and educated Taner Akcam, who teaches at the
University of Minnesota, investigated the evolution of Turkish policy
toward the Armenians. In his major study A Shameful Act: The Armenian
Genocide and the Question of Turkish Responsibility, he called what
happened to the Armenians "the deliberate destruction of a people." It
was preceded by a plan by the Turkish ruling party, the Committee for
Union and Progress. One of the triumvirs who ruled the Ottoman Empire
during World War I, Talat Pasha, reportedly explained: "Necessary
preparations have been discussed and taken for the complete and
fundamental elimination of this concern [i.e., the Armenians] ... What
we are dealing with here . . . is the annihilation of the Armenians."
Turkish prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in his usual combative
style, parried the French move by charging France with committing
"genocide" against the Algerians during the 1940s and 1950s, and
he even hinted that French president Nicolas Sarkozy's father, Pal
Sarkozy, as a soldier in the French Foreign Legion, had taken part.
Pal Sarkozy responded that Erdogan's charge was "ludicrous" and that
he had never served in Algeria. The Turks added that the French move
was governed by Sarkozy's electoral considerations. France has an
estimated half a million citizens of Armenian origin and Sarkozy is
seeking reelection next year.
For the past few years, Turkey has been fighting a rearguard action
against international recognition of the Armenian genocide, often
brandishing diplomatic and political threats. But a growing number
of countries-including, recently, Argentina and Sweden-have done just
that, braving possible Turkish retaliation.
The Turkish suspension of relations with France is probably designed
to deter the French upper house, the Senate, from endorsing the
genocide-denial bill and perhaps to deter other countries from going
down the same path. The United States and Israel are among the states
that have so far avoided this path, although the legislatures of
forty-three U.S. states have "recognized" the Armenian genocide.
Benny Morris is a professor of history in the Middle East Studies
Department of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. He is the author
of 1948, A History of the First Arab-Israeli War (Yale University
Press, 2008).
The National Interest Online
http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/genocide-denial-bill-rocks-turkish-french-relations-6343
Jan 11 2012
A while back, Turkish foreign minister Ahmet Davutoglu announced that
his country had embarked on a foreign policy based on "zero problems
with our neighbors."
But it would seem that Turkey's "zero-problems" policy has in recent
years been anything but-with Turkey most recently and loudly at
loggerheads with Israel (over Palestine), Cyprus (over the extent
of territorial waters and gas-drilling zones and rights), Syria
(over the Assad regime's bloody suppression of internal dissent),
Iraq (over anti-Kurdish cross-border incursions by the Turkish army)
and Greece (over Greece's planned border fence to keep out would-be
infiltrating Turkish emigrants bound for the EU).
Recently, it was the turn of Turkish-French relations, with Turkey
recalling its ambassador from Paris and suspending all bilateral
contacts and relations-political, economic and military-in the wake
of the passage by the French lower house of parliament, the National
Assembly, of a law prohibiting genocide denial, including the Armenian
genocide of World War I.
Armenian spokesmen at the time and many subsequent historians of the
period have alleged that the Ottoman Turks murdered between a million
and 1.5 million Armenians in the Middle East and the Caucasus in
a series of planned and systematic massacres. Though these actions
often were camouflaged as "deportations," the intent, according to
historians, was to exterminate the Armenian race, i.e., genocide.
Successive Turkish governments, including the incumbent Islamist
government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, have consistently denied the
allegation, arguing that Istanbul had merely put down internal
Armenian rebellions-an Armenian "stab in the back," as it were-as the
hard-pressed Ottomans were fighting the Russians, British and a variety
of Balkan Christian states during World War I. They have insisted
that the death toll amounted to no more than three hundred thousand
Armenians (alongside tens of thousands of Turks allegedly murdered by
Armenians). Occasionally Turkish spokesmen have conceded that there
had been some "excesses"-but by local Ottoman officials and units.
Most non-Turkish historians dealing with World War I have concluded
that the Turks, assisted by Kurds, Circassians, Tatars, Azeris and
Arabs, committed genocide. For example, Donald Bloxham, a respected
historian at Edinburgh University, recently wrote:
It may be said categorically that the killing did constitute a
genocide-every aspect of the United Nations' definition of the crime
is applicable. . . . [There was among the Turks] a general consensus
of destruction of the Armenian national community, a consensus which
developed and was augmented over time around broad principles of
discrimination and xenophobia, progressing from notions of removal
by dilution and\or assimilation to physical removal by deportation
and\or murder.
Increasingly Turkish historians, especially those working in democratic
countries outside Turkey, have reached the same conclusion.
The Turkish-born and educated Taner Akcam, who teaches at the
University of Minnesota, investigated the evolution of Turkish policy
toward the Armenians. In his major study A Shameful Act: The Armenian
Genocide and the Question of Turkish Responsibility, he called what
happened to the Armenians "the deliberate destruction of a people." It
was preceded by a plan by the Turkish ruling party, the Committee for
Union and Progress. One of the triumvirs who ruled the Ottoman Empire
during World War I, Talat Pasha, reportedly explained: "Necessary
preparations have been discussed and taken for the complete and
fundamental elimination of this concern [i.e., the Armenians] ... What
we are dealing with here . . . is the annihilation of the Armenians."
Turkish prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in his usual combative
style, parried the French move by charging France with committing
"genocide" against the Algerians during the 1940s and 1950s, and
he even hinted that French president Nicolas Sarkozy's father, Pal
Sarkozy, as a soldier in the French Foreign Legion, had taken part.
Pal Sarkozy responded that Erdogan's charge was "ludicrous" and that
he had never served in Algeria. The Turks added that the French move
was governed by Sarkozy's electoral considerations. France has an
estimated half a million citizens of Armenian origin and Sarkozy is
seeking reelection next year.
For the past few years, Turkey has been fighting a rearguard action
against international recognition of the Armenian genocide, often
brandishing diplomatic and political threats. But a growing number
of countries-including, recently, Argentina and Sweden-have done just
that, braving possible Turkish retaliation.
The Turkish suspension of relations with France is probably designed
to deter the French upper house, the Senate, from endorsing the
genocide-denial bill and perhaps to deter other countries from going
down the same path. The United States and Israel are among the states
that have so far avoided this path, although the legislatures of
forty-three U.S. states have "recognized" the Armenian genocide.
Benny Morris is a professor of history in the Middle East Studies
Department of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. He is the author
of 1948, A History of the First Arab-Israeli War (Yale University
Press, 2008).