The Armenian Genocide Ideology

Book Reviews When Ideology Goes Wrong: Some Recent Books On Turkish-Greek-Armenian Wars, 1915-1923 A Review Article on Twice A Stranger, How Mass Expulsion Forged Modern Greece & Turkey, By Bruce Clark London: Granta Books, 2006, 274 pages, ISBN: 9781862077522. Paradise Lost, Smyrna 1922, The Destruction of Islam’s City of Tolerance, By Giles Milton London: Hodder & Stoughton Ltd., 2008, 426 pages, ISBN: 9781444731798. Smyrna September 1922, the American Mission to Rescue Victims of the 20th Century’s First Genocide, By Lou Ureneck New York: Ecco Paperback edition, 2016, 490 pages, ISBN: 9780062259899. There Was And There Was Not, By Meline Toumani New York: Metropolitan Books, Henry Holt & Co, 2014, 286 pages, ISBN: 9780805097627. The story of how Modern Turkey into victory, first over Armenians in the was created, a full century later, is east, and then over Greeks in western still emotional, especially when it is Turkey, is miraculous. For the Turks, linked with Greek-Turkish-Armenian relations. How the Turks, a defeated led by Mustafa Kemal (later Atatürk), nation in 1918, were able to turn defeat it is glorious. 101 PERCEPTIONS, Autumn-Winter 2016, Volume XXI, Number 3-4, pp. 101-122. Book Reviews Glory, however, came with tears and project, or an early case of ethnic blood. The bloodbath of the Ottoman cleansing? Or, perhaps it was necessary endgame 1914-1918, in which an as a long-range visionary exercise in estimated three million lives were lost, nation-building? How was it executed? was a colossal human tragedy. When What have been its consequences? the Sultanate and its ideology of The book by the Irish author Bruce Ottomanism died, the victorious Allies Clark provides answers to these had already decided on the partition of questions. Well-researched, highly the Empire. With partition came ethnic readable and very timely, the book is cleansing. Competing ideologies took a sad story, remarkably balanced and center-stage in the chaotic end of the impartial, based on extensive eye- Sultanate. Modern Greece, Armenia witness interviews on both sides of the and Turkey emerged out of this shared Aegean. It is well worth reading today, chaos. if only to understand the shared history The Greek-Turkish War, 1919-22, and the bitter legacy of Greek-Turkish was, first and foremost, an existential relations. Bitterness still exists, and war, driven by ideology. It all began as extreme ideology today haunts in places an aggression, fueled by an irredentist like Cyprus. Clark’s message (twice a Greek Megali Idea (Great Idea). In mid stranger) is accurate, and his capacity May 1919, the Greek army, a proxy for to enlighten, direct and indirect, are Allies, landed in Izmir in pursuit of a praiseworthy. In Clark’s book, history new Hellenic Byzantium, or Greater is approached with rare objectivity and Greece in Asia Minor. It collided head- fairness. on with Turkish national awakening. *** The Greek-Turkish War cost an Whose idea was the Population estimated one million lives over and Exchange in 1923? Clark leaves no above the WWI loss. Yet, that is only doubt: Venizelos was the self-confessed a statistic of war casualties. After the father of the idea (pp. 55-56). And in war, under a Population Exchange Dr. Fridtjof Nansen, the Norwegian Agreement in 1923, as part of the humanitarian in charge of the League Treaty of Lausanne, over 400.000 of Nations Refugee Commission, Turks were relocated from Greece to Venizelos had found an influential Turkey and 1.2 million Greeks went in collaborator to organize and carry out the reverse direction. this huge exodus. The two collaborated Why did this huge population exchange throughout, from conception to take place? Was it a humanitarian execution, and they must carry the chief 102 Book Reviews responsibility, in law, in morality as well the Muslim Turks out of western as in implementation of the policy. Thrace, had Ankara rejected his idea of population exchange. Fortunately In 1922, Venizelos was a broken man, for Venizelos, Nansen’s pleas found out of Greek politics temporarily. a receptive ear at the Congress of Earlier, he had been the hero of Lausanne, in particular with Riza Nur, ENOSIS in his home-island of Crete the deputy to İsmet İnönü, the chief of (union of the island with Greece), the Turkish delegation. Inonu was, at and in 1919 he was the architect of the time, engaged in very tough peace the Asia Minor invasion, in which, negotiations with the British Foreign together with the philhellenic British Minister Curzon and representatives of PM Lloyd George, Venizelos began his the Allies. In the end, a comprehensive biggest ideological project: The rebirth Population Exchange Agreement was of Greater Greece in Asia Minor, the reached, with just two exceptions: Second Byzantium. Greeks loved the Greeks in Istanbul and Turks in idea, both those in Greece and in Asia Western Thrace were allowed to stay. Minor. For the next year or two, a huge exodus Then, in the fall of 1922, Mustafa began: 200,000 Turks from Crete and Kemal’s Nationalists, and a grateful at least an equal number from other Turkish nation, were celebrating total parts of Greece were forcibly relocated. victory. The defeated Venizelos, in exile A total of 1.2 million Greeks from Asia in London, was still the most influential Minor joined the exodus in the reverse Greek politician. He worked feverishly, direction. selling his population exchange idea to Nansen. The Norwegian considered it Why the larger number for the latter? a humanitarian project. Venizelos, as Anatolian Greeks, by and large, had always, dreamt of the long-term: He taken part in the Greek invasion wanted to “Hellenize” Thrace (p. 50), and they shared blame in large-scale which had been acquired in the Balkan atrocities against local Turks. In the Wars. In 1919 Venizelos had negotiated summer and fall of 1922, the Greek a population exchange agreement armies burned Turkish towns and between Greece and Bulgaria. Now, in villages as they fell back in total disarray. 1922, Venizelos was a desperate man: Innocent civilian Turks were massacred With Greeks in Asia Minor on the run, by Greek soldiers in a wanton case of he needed houses, towns and villages revenge killings. These atrocities were to accommodate the flood of fleeing on such a scale that the Allies were Greeks, and he would have kicked forced to create a special commission. 103 Book Reviews The horror stories of Greek war crimes and enjoying the same citizenship are all documented. rights. By contrast, in Greece, the Greek refugees from Asia Minor Sadly, Anatolian Greeks played a big came with lots of Turkish customs in part in these war crimes. From the food, music, dress and many spoke moment of the Greek landing in Izmir nothing but Turkish. They faced open on 15 May 1919, the Greek army had hostility and discrimination. In some carried out a Scorched Earth Policy cases, like the Pontic Greek refugees, of killing indiscriminately the local newcomers tried to redeem themselves Turkish population, burning homes by fighting the Italians in the Second and mosques, and destroying property. World War. However, many Anatolian Anatolian Greeks joined the Scorched Greeks vented their alienation by going Earth Policy. For example, the Pontic Communist during the Greek Civil Greeks on the Black Sea, had joined in War in 1946-1949 (p. 231). Venizelos active fighting with the invaders. The must have turned in his grave! Orthodox Church and school teachers assumed special responsibility in ethnic Venizelos’ ideology, successful in Crete, cleansing against local Turks. Now in ended up destroying the Asia Minor 1922 these Greeks, fearing retaliation, Greeks, the innocent with the guilty had no choice but to run. In the end, were lumped together, creating the guilty or not, all Anatolian Greeks greatest human and moral tragedy of had become victims of the Megali Idea Modern Greece. One thing which all ideology. Even the peaceful Cappadocia refugees, Greek or Turk shared, was the Greeks were exchanged. loss of a homeland, the pain of which, according to evidence in Clark, never How did the refugees adjust to their disappears. new homeland? On the whole, Clark’s *** evidence shows that Turkish refugees did better adjusting in Turkey than Reading Clark’s interviews with the the Greek refugees in Greece. Europe few remaining survivors and their provided financial aid to Greece for aging family members, is, to say the refugee settlement. Turkey adopted least, touching. The book starts with a self-reliance. But the Kemalist nation- Turkish poem, İki Kere Yabancı (Twice building proper did not really start a Stranger), by Prof. Ayşe Lahur until 1928 when all Turkish citizens, Kırtunç, whose family came to Turkey including newcomers, were put into the from Crete. Her poem captures the same melting-pot, learning the Latin essence of the book. Everyone suffered alphabet, wearing European dress, twice: Those who survived the ordeal of 104 Book Reviews relocation did not find ideological bliss literally in flames in mid-September in their destination. They experienced 1922 when Smyrna went up in smokes. deprivation and discrimination. Their Out of the ashes emerged modern hurt still haunts many to this day. Izmir. Mustafa Kemal, calling the fire When ideology goes wrong, people “a regrettable incident,” moved on to pay the price. And the heaviest price forge a new nation, a new Republic. is psychological. There is no material The controversy over the Fire continues compensation for an ancestral to this day. Two recent books, one by homeland that only exists in memory. the British journalist Giles Milton, the other by the American genocide *** scholar, Lou Ureneck, are the latest But how much progress has been additions to the Post-Truth literature.

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