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What was the Armenian Genocide? From The Choices Program 

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What was the Armenian Genocide? From The Choices Program 

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https://docs.google.com/document/d/1kX0ofgSyTmACNuCB7qfmY8otd_4PxRysCNjUi5CqSyk/edit

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This article was most recently revised and updated by

Armenian, Armenian Hay, plural Hayq or Hayk, member of a people with an ancient culture who originally lived in the region known as Armenia, which comprised what are now northeastern Turkey and the Republic of Armenia. Although some remain in Turkey, more than three million Armenians live in the republic; large numbers also live in Georgia as well as other areas of the Caucasus and the Middle East. A large number lived in Azerbaijan until the late 1980s, when most Armenians fled the country because of ethnic violence and the conflict over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region; other than a sizeable population in the Nagorno-Karabakh enclave, few Armenians remain in Azerbaijan. Many other Armenians migrated to Europe and North America.

The Armenians are the descendants of a branch of the Indo-Europeans. The ancient Greek historians Herodotus and Eudoxus of Rhodes related the Armenians to the Phrygians-who entered Asia Minor from Thrace-and to the peoples of the ancient kingdom upon whom the Phrygians imposed their rule and language. Known to the Persians as Armina and to the Greeks as Armenioi, the Armenian people call themselves Hayq (singular: Hay) and their country Hayastan, and they look back to a folk hero, Hayk.

Linguists classify Armenian as an independent branch of the Indo-European language family. The majority of Armenians belong to the Armenian Apostolic (Orthodox) Church. A small but not insignificant number belong to the Armenian branch of the Roman Catholic Church.

Until the early 20th century the Armenians were primarily an agricultural people. From 1930 to 1990, however, considerable industrial development took place in the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic, and by the late 20th century two-thirds of the population of the republic, which was about nine-tenths Armenian, had become urbanized. This urban trend has also predominated among Armenians who migrated to Europe and North America.

The ancient Armenian culture found expression in architecture, painting, and sculpture. The periods of greatest artistic activity tended to correspond to those of national independence or semi-independence, but, for the most part, this activity had reached its high point by the end of the 14th century. Armenian literature continued to develop after that period and witnessed a strong revival during the 19th century in the face of Turkish and Russian domination. Armenian writers did much to awaken the national consciousness of the Armenians, who became increasingly impatient with foreign rule. Growing nationalism on the part of Armenians provoked massacres by the Turks and confiscations by the Russians. The greatest single disaster was the Armenian Genocide, which occurred during World War I. In 1915 the Ottoman government, regarding the Armenians as a dangerous foreign element, decided to deport the entire Armenian population of eastern Anatolia to Syria and Mesopotamia. Most estimates of the total number of Armenians killed en route, either by troops and police or by starvation and disease, range from 600,000 to 1,500,000. The Turkish government rejects the characterization of these events as genocide, contending that although some atrocities took place, there was no policy of extermination.

The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica Adam Zeidan, Assistant Editor.

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Armenian (people) | Description, Culture, History, & Facts

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Armenian, member of a people with an ancient culture originally from the region known as Armenia. Sizeable populations are found outside Armenia as well. Cultural output reached its height in the 14th century, though a resurgence in literary output led to a national awakening in the 19th century.

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Each year on this day, we remember the lives of all those who died in the Ottoman-era Armenian genocide and recommit ourselves to preventing such an atrocity from ever again occurring. Beginning on April 24, 1915, with the arrest of Armenian intellectuals and community leaders in Constantinople by Ottoman authorities, one and a half million Armenians were deported, massacred, or marched to their deaths in a campaign of extermination. We honor the victims of the Meds Yeghern so that the horrors of what happened are never lost to history. And we remember so that we remain ever-vigilant against the corrosive influence of hate in all its forms.

Of those who survived, most were forced to find new homes and new lives around the world, including in the United States. With strength and resilience, the Armenian people survived and rebuilt their community. Over the decades Armenian immigrants have enriched the United States in countless ways, but they have never forgotten the tragic history that brought so many of their ancestors to our shores. We honor their story. We see that pain. We affirm the history. We do this not to cast blame but to ensure that what happened is never repeated.

Today, as we mourn what was lost, let us also turn our eyes to the future-toward the world that we wish to build for our children. A world unstained by the daily evils of bigotry and intolerance, where human rights are respected, and where all people are able to pursue their lives in dignity and security. Let us renew our shared resolve to prevent future atrocities from occurring anywhere in the world. And let us pursue healing and reconciliation for all the people of the world.

The American people honor all those Armenians who perished in the genocide that began 106 years ago today.

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Statement by President Joe Biden on Armenian Remembrance Day | The White House

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Each year on this day, we remember the lives of all those who died in the Ottoman-era Armenian genocide and recommit ourselves to preventing such an atrocity from ever again occurring. Beginning on April 24, 1915, with the arrest of Armenian intellectuals and community leaders in Constantinople by Ottoman authorities, one and a half million Armenians...

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This section features sample documents relating to the genocide from U.S. and British archives. The documents are available both as images and as text.

U.S. ARCHIVES

(United States of America, National Archives and Records Administration
Record Group 59, Records of the Department of State
Decimal File 867, Internal Affairs of Turkey
Decimal File 860J, Internal Affairs of Armenia)

BRITISH ARCHIVES

(United Kingdom, Public Record Office
Foreign Office Records
Class 371, Diplomatic Records)

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Sample Archival Documents on the Armenian Genocide

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This section features sample documents relating to the genocide from U.S. and British archives. The documents are available both as images and as text. U.S.

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STATISTICS SHOWING THE PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER
OF ARMENIANS IN THE TOWN OF BILEDJIK ALSO NUMBER OF HOUSES
HABITABLE.

--------------------

" " " " " " "
destroyed, all machinery and accessories looted.
All churches and schools belonging to the Armenians
Catholic & Protestant Armenians, damaged as well as all
water piping in the Armenian quarters destroyed.

STATISTICS SUPPLIED BY THE TURKISH AUTHORITIES OF BILEDJIK
SHOWING PRESENT POPULATION OF THE CAZA AS WELL AS
NUMBER OF ARMENIANS DEPORTED AND REPA-
TRIATED.

--------------------

STATISTICS SHOWING THE PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER OF ARMENIANS
IN THE NAHIE OF HENDEK - CAZA OF ADA BAZAR ALSO
NUMBER OF HOUSES HABITABLE.

--------------------

PRO reference:-FO 371/3660/512/paper/40460/folios 8-11

British Crown copyright: Public Record Office.
This document may be copied and downloaded for personal and research use only.
You must apply to the Public Record Office for permission for any other use.

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Statistics on the pre-war and post-war Armenian population in Biledjik, Bardizag, and Hendek

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STATISTICS SHOWING THE PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER OF ARMENIANS IN THE TOWN OF BILEDJIK ALSO NUMBER OF HOUSES HABITABLE. -------------------- " " " " " " " destroyed, all machinery and accessories looted. All churches and schools belonging to the Armenians Catholic & Protestant Armenians, damaged as well as all water piping in the Armenian quarters destroyed.

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**GRAPHIC CONTENT WARNING: CAUTION! VIEWING NOT REQUIRED**

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**GRAPHIC CONTENT WARNING: CAUTION! VIEWING NOT REQUIRED**

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Photos of Deportees

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Sometimes called the first genocide of the twentieth century, the Armenian genocide refers to the physical annihilation of Armenian Christian people living in the Ottoman Empire from spring 1915 through autumn 1916. There were approximately 1.5 million Armenians living in the multiethnic Ottoman Empire in 1915. At least 664,000 and possibly as many as 1.2 million died during the genocide, either in massacres and individual killings, or from systematic ill treatment, exposure, and starvation.
The Armenian Genocide
The origin of the term genocide and its codification in international law have their roots in the mass murder of Armenians in 1915-16. Lawyer Raphael Lemkin, the coiner of the word and later its champion at the United Nations, repeatedly stated that early exposure to newspaper stories about Ottoman crimes against Armenians was key to his beliefs about the need for legal protection of groups (a core element in the UN Genocide Convention of 1948).

Ottoman authorities, supported by auxiliary troops and at times by civilians, perpetrated most of the persecution and mass killing. The Ottoman government, controlled by the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP; also called the Young Turks), aimed to solidify Muslim Turkish dominance in the regions of central and eastern Anatolia by eliminating the sizeable Armenian presence there.

Mass atrocities and genocide are often perpetrated within the context of war. The destruction of the Armenians was closely linked to the events of World War I. Fearing that invading enemy troops would induce Armenians to join them, in spring 1915 the Ottoman government began the deportation of the Armenian population from its northeastern border regions. In the months that followed, the Ottomans expanded deportations from almost all provinces regardless of distance from combat zones.

The victims of the Armenian genocide include people killed in local massacres that began in spring 1915; others who died during deportations, under conditions of starvation, dehydration, exposure, and disease; and Armenians who died in or en route to the desert regions of the southern Empire [today: northern and eastern Syria, northern Saudi Arabia, and Iraq]. In addition, tens of thousands of Armenian children were forcibly removed from their families and converted to Islam.

US Ambassador to Constantinople Henry Morgenthau Sr. was deeply troubled by the atrocities committed against the Armenians and was among those who sought to rouse the world's conscience in response. The plight of the Armenians triggered an unprecedented public philanthropic response in the United States, involving President Woodrow Wilson, Hollywood celebrities, and many thousands of Americans at the grassroots level who volunteered both domestically and abroad and raised over $110 million (over $1 billion adjusted for inflation) to assist Armenian refugees and orphans.

The Armenian genocide cast a long shadow into the Holocaust era. Ambassador Morgenthau's son, Henry Morgenthau Jr., was secretary of the treasury in the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt. In part due to his memories of the Armenian genocide, Morgenthau Jr. was a key advocate for the establishment of the War Refugee Board which rescued as many as 200,000 Jews from Nazi Europe. Perhaps most hauntingly, a novel about Armenian self-defense (Franz Werfel's The Forty Days of Musa Dagh) was secretly passed from hand-to-hand among Jews imprisoned in ghettos during the Holocaust, who saw in it an inspirational analogy to their plight and a call to resistance.

Author(s): United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Washington, DC

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The Armenian Genocide (1915-16): Overview

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Sometimes called the first genocide of the 20th century, the Armenian genocide refers to the physical annihilation of Armenian Christians living in the Ottoman Empire from spring 1915 through autum...

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1915 AGHET - The Armenian Genocide (In English)

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Easily create beautiful interactive video lessons for your students you can integrate right into your LMS. Track students' progress with hassle-free analytics as you flip your classroom!

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From Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan

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From Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan

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No. 111.

April 28, 1915 [His Excellency, Mr. George Bakhmetoff, Ambassador of Russia]

Excellency:

In accordance with your oral request of April 27th, asking, on behalf of the Catholicos of the Armenian Church, that this Government should use its good offices with the Turkish Government to prevent the massacre of non-combatant Armenians in Turkish territory, the Department instructed the American Ambassador at Constantinople to bring the matter to the attention of the Turkish Government, urging upon it the use of effective means for the protection of the Armenians from violence at the hands of those of other religions.

The American Ambassador at Constantinople cabled the Department before receiving the Department's telegram, stating that over one hundred Armenians of the better class had been arrested, ostensibly to prevent revolutionary propaganda; and that the lives of these men are probably not in danger, although they are being deported to the interior.

After receiving this message the Department again cabled the Ambassador to urge the Turkish Government to protect the Armenians.

Accept, Excellency, the renewed assurances of my highest consideration.

W.J. Bryan

RG59, 867.4016/58

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Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan's response to the Catholicos' appeal to protect Armenians, April 28, 1915

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No. 111. April 28, 1915 [His Excellency, Mr. George Bakhmetoff, Ambassador of Russia] Excellency: In accordance with your oral request of April 27th, asking, on behalf of the Catholicos of the Armenian Church, that this Government should use its good offices with the Turkish Government to prevent the massacre of non-combatant Armenians in Turkish territory, the Department instructed the American Ambassador at Constantinople to bring the matter to the attention of the Turkish Government, urging upon it the use of effective means for the protection of the Armenians from violence at the hands of those of other religions.

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American Embassy,
Constantinople
July 20, 1915

The Honorable
The Secretary of State,
Washington.

Sir:-

Supplementing my despatch July 15, 1915, with reference to the Armenian Situation, I have the honor to enclose herewith copies, in duplicate, of a despatch on the same subject received from the American Consul at Trebizond.

I have the honor to be, Sir,
Your obedient servant,
(signed) [U.S. Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire, Henry] Morgenthau

Enclosure: copies in duplicate dated July 7th.1915.

AMERICAN CONSULATE
TREBIZOND.
July 7, 1915.

Honorable Henry Morgenthau,
American Ambassador
Constantinople.

Sir:-

Referring to my despatches to the Embassy of June 28th, 30th and July 3rd regarding the deportation of the Armenians from Trebizond to the Interior via Gumashhane and my despatch of July 3rd to the Department, copy of which was sent to the Embassy, regarding the suicide of Cavass Ohannes I now desire to report that the Armenian population of Trebizond Vilayet is estimated at 36,000 persons. The city of Trebizond and surrounding villages is estimated at 10,000 Armenians. Of this later number 5200 have already been sent away. The children, when the parents so desired, were left behind and placed in large houses in different parts of the city. There are approximately three thousand such children retained in these houses called by the Turks "Orphanages"

Girls up to 15 years of age inclusive, and boys to 10 years of age inclusive are accepted; those over these ages are compelled to go with their parents. A number of Armenian women and young ladies are retained in these houses to look after the infants and children. The institutions are guarded by gendarmes and each institution has a Turkish Mudir or Director.

Dr. and Mrs. Crawford received about 300 children into their school from parents who were being sent away. Some of these children were very small and there were a few babies. In some cases the parents left money or jewelry to cover the expenses of the children, or for safe keeping. Of course this was all contrary to the proclamation on which had been posted by the government.

The Governor General sent words to Dr. Crawford that he would be required to give up the children as the authorities were prepared to take care of them but nevertheless left the children a few days until arrangements could be made for them then sent and took them all away. The authorities also called upon him to turn over all money and articles of any kind deposited by Armenians in contravention of the proclamation.

Very disquieting reports concerning the treatment of these people who have been sent away are current and if one half turn out to be true it will be shocking.

I have the honor to be Sir,
Your obedient servant,
Signed:- Oscar S. Heizer.
American Consul.

RG59, 867.4016/103

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Report on the treatment of Armenian children in Trebizond, July 20, 1915

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American Embassy, Constantinople July 20, 1915 The Honorable The Secretary of State, Washington. Sir:- Supplementing my despatch July 15, 1915, with reference to the Armenian Situation, I have the honor to enclose herewith copies, in duplicate, of a despatch on the same subject received from the American Consul at Trebizond.

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The decision to carry out a genocide against the Armenian people was made by the political party in power in the Ottoman Empire. This was the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) (or Ittihad ve Terakki Jemiyeti), popularly known as the Young Turks. Three figures from the CUP controlled the government; Mehmet Talaat, Minister of the Interior in 1915 and Grand Vizier (Prime Minister) in 1917; Ismail Enver, Minister of War; Ahmed Jemal, Minister of the Marine and Military Governor of Syria. This Young Turk triumvirate relied on other members of the CUP appointed to high government posts and assigned to military commands to carry out the Armenian Genocide. In addition to the Ministry of War and the Ministry of the Interior, the Young Turks also relied on a newly-created secret outfit which they manned with convicts and irregular troops, called the Special Organization ( Teshkilati Mahsusa). Its primary function was the carrying out of the mass slaughter of the deported Armenians. In charge of the Special Organization was Behaeddin Shakir, a medical doctor. Moreover, ideologists such as Zia Gokalp propagandized through the media on behalf of the CUP by promoting Pan-Turanism, the creation of a new empire stretching from Anatolia into Central Asia whose population would be exclusively Turkic. These concepts justified and popularized the secret CUP plans to liquidate the Armenians of the Ottoman Empire. The Young Turk conspirators, other leading figures of the wartime Ottoman government, members of the CUP Central Committee, and many provincial administrators responsible for atrocities against the Armenians were indicted for their crimes at the end of the war. The main culprits evaded justice by fleeing the country. Even so, they were tried in absentia and found guilty of capital crimes. The massacres, expulsions, and further mistreatment of the Armenians between 1920 and 1923 were carried by the Turkish Nationalists, who represented a new political movement opposed to the Young Turks, but who shared a common ideology of ethnic exclusivity.

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Frequently Asked Questions about the Armenian Genocide

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The decision to carry out a genocide against the Armenian people was made by the political party in power in the Ottoman Empire. This was the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) (or Ittihad ve Terakki Jemiyeti), popularly known as the Young Turks.

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April 24, 1915

In anticipation of threatened Allied landings at the strategically important Gallipoli peninsula, Ottoman authorities arrest 240 Armenian leaders in Constantinople (today: Istanbul) on April 24, 1915, and deport them to Asia Minor. This roundup is commemorated today by Armenians as the beginning of the genocide.

The Ottomans claimed that Armenian revolutionaries had established contact with the enemy and were preparing to facilitate a Franco-British landing, from where the Entente forces would march on Constantinople. When challenged by the Entente Powers, the then neutral United States, and even by their own allies Germany and Austria-Hungary, Ottoman officials justified the deportations as a precautionary measure that was essential to the defense of the Empire. Mass atrocities and genocide are almost always perpetrated within the context of armed conflict. The destruction of the Armenians was closely linked to the events of World War I in the Near East and the Russian Caucasus.

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In anticipation of threatened Allied landings at the strategically important Gallipoli peninsula, Ottoman authorities arrest 240 Armenian leaders in Constantinople (today: Istanbul) on April 24, 1915, and deport them to Asia Minor. This roundup is commemorated today by Armenians as the beginning of the genocide.

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During and immediately after World War I, the atrocities committed against the Armenians of the Ottoman Empire were public knowledge. In their May 24, 1915 joint declaration, the Allied Powers, namely Great Britain, France, and Russia had accused the Young Turk regime of crimes against humanity and civilization. In 1919 the post-war Ottoman government prosecuted a number of Young Turk conspirators of the crimes of massacre and plunder. By signing the Treaty of Sèvres on August 10, 1920, Turkey obligated itself to the apprehension of those "responsible for the massacres." The international community did not question at the time the veracity of the reports on the extermination of the Armenians.

Developments intervening between the first quarter and the last quarter of the twentieth century, however, altered public perception and created the conditions for the denial of the Armenian Genocide. This regressive transformation in historical memory became the basis of the search by later generations of Armenians, descendants of the survivors, to seek international reaffirmation of the Armenian Genocide as a gesture of public acknowledgment of the terrible sufferings endured and of the crime committed against their forebears.

In 1923 the international community abandoned the Armenians when the European Powers agreed to the Treaty of Lausanne in which Turkey was absolved of further responsibility for the consequences of the policies of the expired Ottoman state. Turkey took license from this posture to embark upon a policy of denial, suppression of public discussion, and prevention of any official mention of the criminal treatment of the Armenians. The mood in Europe of escape from the horrors of WWI, isolationism in the US, and revolutionary utopianism in Russia, further stigmatized the Armenian survivors as witnesses of a catastrophe policy-makers and the public wanted to forget or bury. World War II, however, brought the problem of mass extermination into sharp relief as the revelation of the Holocaust revived the sense of international obligation toward victimized peoples. As this sense of duty to a moral order respectful of human life and of the dignity of the individual became embodied in a number of international covenants forged under the auspices of the United Nations, Armenians began to find renewed hope that their case would receive attention again. The 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide attached a label to mass slaughter and a new word entered the post-war political vocabulary: genocide. With it came the realization among Armenians that they had been victims of a crime which at the time still lacked a name.

To retrieve the memory of their forgotten genocide, Armenians worldwide in their diaspora domiciles initiated efforts for national and international recognition. These began with the introduction of commemorative resolutions in the United States Congress in 1975 and with efforts to enter the subject on the record at the UN, which occurred with the 1985 adoption of a report on genocide by the UN Commission on Human Rights. In 1987 broader recognition was achieved with the adoption of a resolution by the European Parliament, which stated that "the tragic events of 1915-1917...constitute genocide." In the following years, the legislatures of countries such as Belgium, Canada, Cyprus, France, Greece and Russia adopted resolutions affirming the historical record on the Armenian Genocide. Acknowledgment also came through declarations by heads of states and pronouncements by legislators. Among these have been the statements issued by presidents of the United States and many members of Congress on or about April 24 extending official condolences to the Armenian people on their day of mourning, although, bowing to Turkish government pressure, US presidents to date have avoided the word genocide. These efforts have contributed to greater media attention and the education of the broader public about the legacy of genocide in the twentieth century. The continued denial by the Republic of Turkey, however, has created conditions, which in the view of many Armenians, necessitates the continuation of the search for international reaffirmation until such time as acknowledgment is made universal and irreversible.

--Rouben Paul Adalian

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International Recognition of the Armenian Genocide

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During and immediately after World War I, the atrocities committed against the Armenians of the Ottoman Empire were public knowledge. In their May 24, 1915 joint declaration, the Allied Powers, namely Great Britain, France, and Russia had accused the Young Turk regime of crimes against humanity and civilization.

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On Oct. 29, 2019, the U.S. House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly to acknowledge the Armenian genocide that occurred at the hands of the Ottoman Turks during the First World War. Armenian-Americans have long-awaited this action, which was taken at a time of worsening U.S. and Turkey relations. The Prime Minister of Armenia, Nikol Pashinyan, lauded the motion on Twitter and called it "a bold step towards serving truth and historical justice." Here are 10 facts about the Armenian genocide to further contextualize this important decision.

10 Facts About the Armenian Genocide

1. The Armenian genocide refers to the systematic, premeditated massacre and forced deportation of more than one million Armenians by the Ottoman Empire. While the number of victims of the genocide is disputed, some estimates, such as one from the U.S. Congress, puts the number of Armenians killed by the Ottoman Empire at 1.5 million Armenians between 1915-1923. The genocide was an attempt by the Turks of the Ottoman Empire to eradicate the Armenian people.

2. Prior to the twentieth century, the Armenian people had resided in the Caucasus region for approximately 3,000 years. The Armenians are predominantly Christian and in the fourth century A.D., the kingdom of Armenia was the first country in the world to adopt Christianity as its official religion. In the 1400s, that empire was that of the Ottomans. Led by Muslim Turks, the Ottoman Empire was suspicious of the Armenians who they feared would be more loyal to Christian governments. Nevertheless, the Armenians thrived under the empire until its decline, beginning in the late 1800s. Ottoman discrimination towards the Armenians reached a new high as the empire grew weaker. By the 1890s, the regime was already committing mass atrocities, including the killing of hundreds of thousands of Armenians.

3. In 1908, the Young Turks, a nationalistic reformist group, overthrew the Sultan and formed a constitutional government. The Young Turks wanted to "Turkify" the empire and viewed the Christian non-Turks of Armenia as a threat to their regime. Indeed, when the Ottoman Empire entered the First World War on the side of Germany and Austria-Hungary, the Turks declared war on all Christians with the exception of their allies in the war. World War I was the immediate backdrop of the Armenian genocide. The Turks used it as justification for their persecution of the Armenians, whom the Turks called traitors. As the war dragged on and some Armenians sought to aid the Russian army against the Ottomans, the Turkish regime set out to remove Armenians from their Eastern front.

4. Historians consider the beginning of the genocide to be April 24, 1915. On this day, the Turks arrested and killed between 50 and more than 100 of Armenian intellectuals. After that, the Turkish government sent thousands of people on death marches and deprived them of basic needs, such as food and water. Often, Armenians were forced to walk naked until they died. The government had other gruesome ways to kill Armenians, including burning people alive.

5. Most of the killings occurred between 1915-1916, during which period the Ottoman Empire systematically slaughtered and terrorized Armenians by raping, starving, shooting, drowning and maiming them. Many Armenians died from disease or were subjected to mass deportations as well. Even after World War I, the Turkish nationalist government continued its persecution of Armenians and other ethnic minorities in Cilicia, Smyrna (Izmir) and the Armenian highlands. The nationalist regime confiscated property from Armenians in order "to finance the 'Turkification' of Anatolia" and to incentivize ordinary Ottoman citizens to take part in the ethnic cleansing campaign.

6. Ottoman forces sought to rid of the region of Armenian landmarks such as churches, homes and other cultural sites by destroying or confiscating the properties. According to the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, "tens of thousands of Armenian children were forcibly removed from their families and converted to Islam" because the Ottoman government wanted them to assimilate into Turkish society. In some cases, children could convert to Islam in exchange for staying alive. In addition to the Armenians, the Ottoman government targeted non-Turkic minorities, namely Yezidis, Assyrians and Greeks.

7. Turkey refuses to acknowledge the Armenian genocide, though the Turkish government acknowledges that some atrocities happened. However, the government argues that the killings of the Armenians were not systematic or premeditated and were an unavoidable consequence of the war. Recognition of the Armenian genocide is illegal in Turkey, as it is considered to be "insulting Turkishness."

8. Recognition of the genocide by the U.S. is controversial because of the United States' alliance with Turkey. For the first time in decades, the entire U.S. House of Representatives considered and decided to acknowledge the Armenian genocide. At the time of the ethnic cleansing and since then, the U.S. has condemned the Turks' genocidal activities on various occasions. U.S. Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire (1913-1916), Henry Morgenthau, declared the Ottoman's actions as a "campaign of race extermination" and organized protests by officials against the Ottomans. The U.S. government officially recognized the genocide in May 1951, April 1981, 1975 and in 1984.

9. The Armenian genocide still has consequences to this day. There are 7-10 million people in the Armenian diaspora, and 3 million people in Armenia, who are descendants of the genocide. The genocide is, for some, core to Armenia's identity. Yet others would like for Armenia to move and focus on problems in their own country. Turkey's refusal to recognize the genocide affects its politics today and its relations to Armenia. However, there are groups (including liberal intellectuals and Kurdish groups) in Turkey that have acknowledged and apologized for the genocide.

10. Denial of the genocide has far-reaching implications. Turkey's denial of the genocide has hindered peace between Turkey and Armenia. This denial undermines the commitment to preventing future genocides and atrocities. The institutionalized denial shields the perpetrators of the genocide from blame. The U.S. has refused to acknowledge the genocide as such, under the argument that doing so would threaten regional security and U.S. interests in the Middle East. Turkey's genocide denial has perpetuated the distrust and resentment Armenians have towards the Turks, as well as anxiety Armenians have that they are still under threat.

H. Res. 296: Affirming the United States Record on the Armenian Genocide

The House of Representatives recently passed a resolution acknowledging the genocide. This action is significant, as the previous U.S. attempts to recognize the genocide have resulted in renewed bilateral talks between Turkey and Armenia. Another positive effect of the United States' recognition of the genocide is that it is front-page news across Turkey. Thus, recognition of the Armenian genocide brings greater awareness to it, especially to Turks who never knew it occurred since the history of the mass killings was omitted from school books.

On April 8, 2019, Representative Adam Schiff [D-CA-28] introduced H.Res. 296 which had 141 cosponsors, including 120 Democrats and 21 Republicans. The House passed the resolution on Oct. 29, 2019, by a margin of 405 to 11. In the weeks leading up to the vote, Turkey outraged members of Congress by its ground offensive against the Syrian Kurds and U.S./Turkey relations have continued to sour since then.

On Dec. 12, 2019, the Senate unanimously voted to affirm the Armenian genocide, despite the Trump administration's objections.

The Armenian genocide was a horrific tragedy that led to the deaths of one and a half million people, yet many people still deny the reality of the genocide for political reasons. As these 10 facts about the Armenian genocide prove, the mass ethnic cleansing did happen, and its effects are felt to this day.

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10 Facts About the Armenian Genocide | The Borgen Project

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On Oct. 29, 2019, the U.S. House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly to acknowledge the Armenian genocide that occurred at the hands of the Ottoman Turks during the First World War. Here are 10 facts about the Armenian genocide to further contextualize this important decision.

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What was the Armenian “genocide” and why is it still such a sensitive issue?