Cabinet of Armenia, 1920 MUNUC 32 TABLE OF CONTENTS ______________________________________________________ Letter from the Crisis Director…………………………………………………3 Letter from the Chair………………………………………….………………..4 The History of Armenia…………………………………………………………6 The Geography of Armenia…………………………………………………14 Current Situation………………………………………………………………17 Character Biographies……………………………………………………....27 Bibliography…………………………………………………………………...37 2 Cabinet of Armenia, 1920 | MUNUC 32 LETTER FROM THE CRISIS DIRECTOR ______________________________________________________ Dear Delegates, We’re very happy to welcome you to MUNUC XXXII! My name is Andre Altherr and I’ll be your Crisis Director for the Cabinet of Armenia: 1920 committee. I’m from New York City and am currently a Second Year at the University of Chicago majoring in History and Political Science. Despite once having a social life, I now spend my free-time on much tamer activities like reading 800-page books on Armenian history, reading 900-page books on Central European history, and relaxing with the best of Stephen King and 20th century sci-fi anthologies. When not reading, I enjoy hiking, watching Frasier, and trying to catch up on much needed sleep. I’ve helped run and participated in numerous Model UN conferences in both college and high school, and I believe that this activity has the potential to hone public speaking, develop your creativity and critical thinking, and ignite interest in new fields. Devin and I care very deeply about making this committee an inclusive space in which all of you feel safe, comfortable, and motivated to challenge yourself to grow as a delegate, statesperson, and human. We trust that you will conduct yourselves with maturity and tact when discussing sensitive subjects. No forms of bigotry will be permitted. The period of history in which this committee is set may be tragic at times, but it includes timely lessons that are more important today than ever. If you have questions about what conduct is and isn’t acceptable, feel free to email me at With all of that being said, Model UN should be an activity that is, first and foremost, fun! We hope that you will work collaboratively and honestly, and that you will leave this committee with new friends and new interests. All the best, Andre Altherr 3 Cabinet of Armenia, 1920 | MUNUC 32 LETTER FROM THE CHAIR ______________________________________________________ Howdy everybody! My name is Devin, and I am very excited to be your Chair! I’m from St. Louis, Missouri by way of Davis, California, but I am now a second-year at UChicago studying political anthropology, international relations, and screen-writing. Outside of classes, I work as a research assistant for an environmental anthropologist. I’ve spent my summers working for EducationUSA Mexico City, the Chris Koster for Missouri Governor campaign (RIP), a WashU ecologist, and a St.-Louis-based pizza law firm (ask me what “pizza law” is, I dare you). Beyond work and academics, I enjoy such totally-normal hobbies as growing hundreds of carnivorous plants and orchids, watching foreign films and movie musicals, and seeing just how inexpensively I can backpack other countries without getting myself killed. And hiking and rock- climbing, but those are more unironically normal. I genuinely love Model United Nations as an activity, and I am a believer in its ability to inspire substantive interests and effect communicative skills. I went to MUNUC as a delegate three times while in high school, and I can genuinely say it changed my life. Before I went my first time, I had never heard of the University of Chicago and thought I wanted to be a botanist. At MUNUC, though, I fell in love with international politics, and I now dream of working in embassies rather than greenhouses. It is also largely responsible for my interest in UChicago, and I couldn’t be happier that I’m here now. Going to MUNUC each year was one of the highlights of my high school years; I looked forward to next year’s MUNUC as soon as closing ceremony ended, and it was the prospect of going the coming year that kept me going through the summer jobs I worked to pay my way. I want to make MUNUC as meaningful for you as it was for me. 4 Cabinet of Armenia, 1920 | MUNUC 32 I had a wonderful experience working as an AC on the MUNUC XXXI Cabinet of Chile last year, and I can’t wait to chair this committee! This committee will deal with mature themes often avoided in high school conferences, but Andre and I trust that you will treat this topic with the respect, dignity, and empathy that it deserves. If you have any concerns or committee questions, feel free to shoot me an email at [email protected]. I can’t wait to meet all of y’all and look forward to a hoot of a conference! Cheers, Devin A. Haas 5 Cabinet of Armenia, 1920 | MUNUC 32 The History of Armenia Iranian Eastern Armenia: 1502-1828 While history of Armenia arguably begins with Urartu, the first Armenian kingdom, it existed almost 2,800 years before this committee begins. While ancient Armenia is fascinating, this background guide will focus on modern Armenian history, beginning in the 16th Century. Armenia and the rest of the Caucuses were the object of both Ottoman and Persian ambitions, leading to frequent wars and partitions during this period. Yerevan changed hands fourteen times between 1513 and 1737 alone.1 In the early 1600s, Shah Abbas, initially greeted by Armenians as a liberator from the Ottomans, began a scorched-earth campaign to destroy Armenian land and forcibly displace Armenians to complicate future Ottoman invasions. As part of this displacement, thousands of Armenians were ordered to march to Persia; only one-fifth survived these marches.2 However, following the 1639 Treaty of Zuhab, the Ottoman Empire would more or less maintain its claims to Western Armenia, while Persian dynasties would maintain claims to Eastern Armenia. These claims persisted until Russia gained control over the region at the end of this period, although there were still some lingering conflicts.3 While violence, political instability, and corruption led many Armenians to move westward from Western Armenia to Constantinople and to European countries, Persia created two Armenian provinces out of Eastern Armenia and allowed Armenians to develop commercial networks with the outside world, leading to the emergence of a new group of wealthy Armenian merchants and church elite.4 As the Persian Armenian economy expanded, many Armenians developed ties in the Russian economic sphere of influence as Christian Armenians split between two Muslim empires gravitated economically and culturally toward predominantly Christian Russia.5 After Armenian merchants presented Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich with a richly- decorated throne, he granted them the right to monopolize certain sectors of Persian commerce in Russia (like silk), built a Volga port to facilitate commerce, recruited Armenians for the Russian 1 Rachel Goshgarian, “Armenian Global Connections in the Early Modern Period,” in Armenia: Art, Religion, and Trade in the Middle Ages, edited by Helen C. Evans, (Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2018), 172. 2 Simon Payaslian, The History of Armenia (New York: Palgrave Macmillian, 2007), 106. 3 Payaslian, The History of Armenia, 106. 4 Ibid, 106-107. 5 Ibid, 107. 6 Cabinet of Armenia, 1920 | MUNUC 32 bureaucracy, and permitted the construction of Armenian churches within Russia.6 As the Armenian community prospered, religious and secular leaders alike sought to revive a sense of Armenian “nationhood” and sought to secure liberation from Muslim rule; the Armenian Church sent multiple delegations to Europe throughout this period to petition European emperors and popes for support, but to no avail.7 After the Safavid empire fell in 1722 and the Qajars emerged as the new governing power of Persia, prolonged political upheaval prompted many Armenians to move to Moscow and St. Petersburg, and their petitions for national liberation coincided with increasing Russian interests in the Caucuses.8 Russian Eastern Armenia: 1828-1917 As the 19th century dawned, Tsarist Russia became increasingly bullish about imperial expansion into the Caucuses. Following a series of annexations and wars with Persia in the 19th century’s first three decades, tsarist military conquest in the region concluded in 1828 with the Treaty of Turkmenchay, which brokered peace with Persia and gave Russia control of Eastern Armenia and parts of modern-day Azerbaijan and Turkey. While Armenians had been a minority in Eatern Armenia since Timur’s 14th century campaigns, Muslims emigrated to neighboring predominantly Muslim states following the 1828 Treaty, and Russia encouraged Armenians from Persia and the Ottoman Empire to settle in Russian Armenia. By 1832, there were an equal number of Armenians and Muslims in Armenia. While Armenians were initially hopeful that they would be granted some semblance of autonomy, the tsarist government instead moved to bring it under the control of a centralized Russian state. Tsar Nicholas I moved to reduce the political power of Armenian churches and asserted his authority over the process of choosing clergy. Official discrimination and the denial of equal educational opportunities also came with the new regime9. 6 Ibid, 108. 7 Ibid, 108. 8 Ibid, 109. 9 Richard G. Hovannisian. “Russian Armenia: A Century of Tsarist Rule.” Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas Neue Folge, 19(1) March 1971, pp. 31-48. 7 Cabinet of Armenia, 1920 | MUNUC 32 Russian rule also brought Armenia into the sphere of European thought and markets. Armenians in Russia had developed a reputation as entrepreneurs and merchants long ago, and capitalism and industrialization finally came home to roost in Russian Armenia. As industries for the production of cotton, copper, leather, and wine developed, so did an Armenian middle class. Armenian businessmen bought up land from the declining Georgian nobility and oil fields in Azerbaijan, adding economic tensions to ethnic and religious ones already existing between Armenians, Georgians, and Azeris10.