HOW THE FOOD GURU ANTHONY ARMENIA BOURDAIN OF CNN By Dr. Ferruh DEMİRMEN* TURNED INTO AN ARMENIAN PROPAGANDIST, AND PROSPECTS OF TURKEY-ARMENIA RELATIONS reface by the author: nian genocide.” Still worse, the pro- als and summarily executed them.” This opinion piece was gram contained serious falsehoods. Anyone left was then marched prepared right after https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B0st2H8cOXw. towards the Syrian desert, “delib- the “Anthony Bour- erately starving them along the way.” The diatribe continued into the dain feat. Serj Tankian Nagorno-Karabakh issue, without He described the events as “a con- in Armenia - Parts Unknown,” TV saying a word on the 1992 Khojaly certed and organized effort to eradicate program was aired in many parts of P Massacre and the unfulfilled UN Gen- an ethnic and national group,” then the world by CNN on May 20, 2018. eral Assembly resolution on the with- concluding: “So, this is genocide, But out of respect to Mr. Bourdain drawal of all Armenian forces from right”? and his family, the publication of the article was put on hold until the occupied Azerbaijani territory. Bowing his head in agreement, his now following his tragic death in On the 1915 events in Ottoman Armenian host weighed in: “Most France in June 2018. Anatolia, Mr. Bourdain, while estimates historically put the Arme- nian losses at around 1.5 million.” Mr. Bourdain, a celebrity chef and describing himself as “a casual storyteller, when he ventured into observer,” talked more like an The misinformation and distor- his Armenia program, probably had Armenian spokesperson, claim- tions regarding the genocide accu- all the good intentions to explore ing that the “Ottomans had justified sation were shocking, but given Armenian culture and cuisine and their actions by the widely held senti- the ingrained pro-Armenian, anti- tell his story to his followers. But in ment that the Christian Armenians Turkish/anti-Muslim bias in the the process he fell victim to Arme- would align themselves with a hos- Western media, not surprising. nian propoganda, and the result tile and Christian Russia threatening What was also striking was that was appalling. A program that was their borders” (notice the use of the Bourdain had been well coached supposed be about travel, culture word “sentiment” and emphasis on by his mentors, and he recited the and food turned into a politically “Christian”), and that the Ottomans usual “genocide” lines with confi- charged piece advocating “Arme- had “rounded up Armenian intellectu- dence and enthusiasm. 22 February, 2019 | THE DIPLOMATIC OBSERVER Photo 1: Purported Armenian victims at undisclosed location. In reality the victims are Muslims massacred near Kars. Faked photo be Ottoman soldiers holding guard One possibility is that the photo representations (photo-2). The message intended was shows executions in Haifa of spies again obvious: These were innocent caught working for British interests The few photographs interspersed Armenian leaders hanged merciless- in Palestine during World War-I. during the program added insult ly by the brutal Turks. Judging from the fur hats worn by to injury. At least one photo had the guards, however, it is more likely But this photo was also a forgery. unmistakable signs of Photoshop that the guards are Cossacks, with About three quarters of the photo on artistry. One of the photos showed executions somewhere in Russia. the right-hand side was copied from dead, mutilated bodies of children The photo arguably has nothing to page 507 of the book, Die Weltkriegss- and women (photo-1). The message do with “Armenian genocide.” pionage, dealing with World War-I for the audience was that these were espionage, authored by General von Still another picture (photo-3) Armenian victims killed by barbar- Lettow-Vorbeck. The German text showed corpses laid in front of ian Turks. did not identify the venue, the date a building, apparently a church or But in reality, the gruesome pictures and the circumstances of the execu- monastery, at an undisclosed loca- were those of Muslim victims killed tion, or the nationality of the victims. tion on an undisclosed date. It was by Tashnak Armenians on 25 April The section on the left side (where not clear what the photo had to do 1918 at a location called Subatan near Bourdain’s portrait is superim- with “Armenian genocide.” Several posed) was cunningly annexed from clergymen, Armenian or Russian, the city of Kars in eastern Turkey. another source through Photoshop were watching quizzically at the The photo is found in the Turkish (best viewed at high magnification). dead bodies. The picture probably Military Archives “ATASE” (Askeri Unlike in the rest of the photo, here depicts Armenians that perished Tarih ve Stratejik Etüd). we see guards apparently wearing from disease, malnutrition, etc. in Another photo included in the pro- helmets with crescent and star. The the First Republic of Armenia, 1918- gram shows several men hanged original photo from Die Weltkriegss- 1920. It is known from the work of from scaffolds with what appears to pionage has no such figures. Russian historian A.A. Lalaian of THE DIPLOMATIC OBSERVER | February, 2019 23 Photo 2: Armenian leaders purportedly hanged by Turks. Photo in part from German espionage book, Die Weltkriegsspionage. Armenian origin that 195,000 Arme- Committee of America) shamelessly cide” in the minds of the viewers. A nian citizens, or 22% of the total used the Subatan forgery represent- pyramid of skulls is surely enough to Armenian population, lost their lives ed in photo-1 on one of its posters as evoke horror, and the casual viewer due to deprivation and other causes a background when it urged Presi- will think that these are the skulls of during this fascist regime. dent Obama to recognize “Armenian innocent Armenians. Only a select Genocide.” few of the viewers will realize that (By comparison, loses in the First this macabre scene is in fact a 1871 Republic of Armenia, most of them We also know of numerous other painting (“Apotheosis of War”) by due to killings, for Azeri Turks were photo-forgeries, e.g., ghastly scenes Russian artist Vasily Vereshchagin, 200,000 (77%) and Kurds 24,500 of crucified women taken from a currently on display in the Tretyakov (98%), respectively. Chilling, eye- 1919 Hollywood film, “Ravished Gallery in Moscow. The artist died witness accounts of brutality against Armenia,” meant to depict Armenian in 1904. civilian Muslims by men under the women killed by barbarian Turks, leadership of Drastamat Kanayan or puppies at the foot of Atatürk This fakery was brazenly used in (“Dro”), an Armenian commander, in original photo changed, through “Armenian Genocide,” a supposed recounted by Robert Dunn in his Photoshop, into a dead child with his documentary film funded by Arme- book, World Alive, A Personal Story. guts hanging out. nian sources and aired on TV in Dunn was the intelligence officer the USA by Public Broadcasting Ser- Photo-1 is perhaps the “crown for- of Rear Admiral Bristol, the U.S. vice (PBS) on April 17, 2006. (PBS is gery” employed by the Diaspora con High Commissioner in Turkey dur- known to provide “educational ser- artists. While not included in the ing 1919-27). vices!”). It was also used by ANCA CNN program, a rival to the photo-1 in 2009 on a poster urging President Deceitful manipulation through pho- scene is the one shown in photo-4. Obama to recognize “Armenian gen- tography is nothing new in the prop- When the “genocide” story is told, ocide.” aganda arsenal of Armenian propa- Armenian con artists are known to gandists. For example, in December resort to this forgery in trying to The fakery in fact dates back to 1921 2009 ANCA (Armenian National evoke the horror of “Armenian geno- in connection with the murder trial 24 February, 2019 | THE DIPLOMATIC OBSERVER Photo 3: Scene of corpses unidentified as to date and location. Likely a church at Etchmiadzin near Yerevan, 1918-20. of Talat Pasha, the Ottoman Minister With a change of heart, Hofmann another picture showing half-naked of the Interior, in Berlin. The cover of subsequently had her book cover women assaulted by men. The cap- a book, Der Völkermord, published changed in 1985 with another horrid tion under the picture said: “Tortured in that year, showed the pyramid of image of unknown origin, but again and violated Armenians. Photographed skulls together with the portrait of with Talat Pasha’s portrait superim- on the street between Trabzon to Erzin- Talat Pasha. Another public appear- posed. Inside her book she entered can by a German officer.” ance of this fakery was in an inter- national festival in Toronto, Canada in the 1970s. Subsequently, Tessa Hofmann, the German academician, used the same fakery in a new book, also titled Der Völkermord, she edited in 1980 (photo-5). Inside the book the cover photo is credited as show- ing “Turkish barbarism.” While the book cover itself was red, the Rus- sian painting was cleverly shown in black and white, to give the impres- sion that it is a photograph of early 20th century. Hofmann’s skulldug- gery was exposed by Prof. Türkkaya Ataöv in 1985. The whole production was despic- able deception in “pursuit of scholar- Photo 4: Painting (“Apotheosis of War”) ship.” by Russian artist Vasily Vereshchagin in 1871. THE DIPLOMATIC OBSERVER | February, 2019 25 This image in fact was from a It was purely a defense measure. The 1918 the government sssued the “De- painting named “Les Horreur de la sick, the elderly, orphaned children, cree of Return” whereby the refugees Guerre” by French painter Paul-Emile government employees, and Catho- coud return and receive their land Boutigny (1853-1929).