Fatih Akin’s Film on 1915 to Premiere at Venice Film Festival

VENICE, Italy (A.W.)—Award winning director Fatih Akin’s latest film, “The Cut,” will premiere at the 71st Venice International Film Festival that will take place from Aug. 27 to Sept. 6. “The Cut” tells the story of an Armenian man, Nazareth Manoogian, who after surviving the Genocide learns that his twin daughters may be alive, and goes on a quest to find them. Nazareth’s journey takes him from his village Mardin to the deserts, to Cuba and finally North Dakota. Nazareth, who is a mute, is played by Tahar Rahim. Other cast members include Simon Abkarian, Arsinee Khanjian, Akin Gazi and George Georgiou. The script is written by Akin himself and Mardik Martin. The film is in English, and runs for 138 minutes, although the version that will premiere in Venice is dubbed over in German.

A snapshot from 'The Cut'
A snapshot from ‘The Cut’
A snapshot from 'The Cut'
A snapshot from ‘The Cut’

“Tahar doesn’t say a word throughout the film and he is a bit like Charlie Chaplin, but at the same time, he is a typical western character, like Sergio Leone,” Akin told Cineuropa.

“The Cut” is the third in the thematic trilogy of “Love, Death and the Devil” that Akin has worked on. “I think wickedness exists within us from the moment we are born. What I found fascinating was exploring the fact that wickedness is a process of transition from goodness and that the opposite phenomenon exists too. These are concepts that are very intimately tied to each other. The most beautiful of bodies, for example, can be carrying cancer on the inside, and one same person can be capable of the nicest of actions and the vilest of crimes. I have always thought that humans were in this in between place in the evolution process. We still have to find out whether we will stop living behind borders, separated by religion, nationality,” he told Cineuropa.

Akin had submitted “The Cut” to the Cannes Film Festival, but pulled it last minute, for “personal reasons.”

One of Europe’s prominent filmmakers, Akin was born in Hamburg, Germany, to Turkish parents. His critically-acclaimed films that have won numerous international awards include “Head On” (Golden Bear award at Berlin Film Festival, Best Film and Audience Award at European Film Awards in 2004) and “The Edge of Heaven” (Best screenplay at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival, and the LUX prize of European Parliament).

Below is the German trailer of “The Cut.”

 

62 Comments

  1. Unfortunately, the first Armenian Genocide movie that is actually was created by a Turk, ironically enough.

    • This is not the first Armenian genocide film. See “Mayrig” or Egoyan’s “Ararat”

    • Mayrig was good, but I wouldn’t consider “Egoyan’s Ararat” to be a “Genocide Film”, at least one worth mentioning – it was more an exercise of the twisted mind of an amateur filmmaker who thought he was being cute. That “film” will go down in our history as one of our more shameful and low points in artistic “creativity” or should I stress lack thereof.

  2. The film is a well made film, through the plight of one family the entire story of the Genocide is told. We recently had the honor of working on the Armenian dubbed version (meaning the Armenian characters in it) of the film under the supervision of Paris based actor/director Gerald Papasian. Can’t wait to have it hit the screens internationally!

  3. This is a pleasant surprise. But I’m not surprised that director Fetih Akin would make a film such as this. Germany has produced some progressive German-Turks. I’m looking forward to seeing this film.

    Also, how come I hadn’t heard of Mardik Martin before? He worked on the Raging Bull screenplay.

  4. Just watched the trailer and it looks fantastic! How great it is that there are Turks with such empathy and talent to make a film about the Armenian Genocide. Also it should be noted that the script for this film was co-written with Mardik Martin, an Armenian who is well known in Hollywood, having worked on such films as ‘Raging Bull’.

    Really though, regardless of who is making the film, thank God that at least we will have one film about the Armenian Genocide in 2015. There are other filmmakers who are trying – Eric Nazarian, Art Sevada, and I hope others. I myself have just released a documentary film, ‘Music to Madness – the Story of Komitas’ (see http://www.KomitasTheMovie.com for details) and I’m trying to raise funds for a narrative feature film, ‘Last Known Survivor’ (see https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/last-known-survivor for details).

    Lets hope that 2015 offers an abundance of films on the Armenian Genocide.

  5. You know what the saddest part about this whole film is the fact that the Armenian community of filmmakers cannot come together and make a simple modern film about the genocide. Countless documentaries area made about the genocide and hardly any of them by Armenians. Quite shameful.
    And now , a film about genocide made by a Turkish filmmaker. I’m not trying to hate here. I think it’s absolutely essential for films to be made. The point I am trying to make is that Armenian filmmakers DO NOT have the resources to shoot a film. We have no organizations or funding and I find that to be the most shameful above all else.

    • Armenians have sold their cause long time ago time ago, that is why they never did some constructive thing to spread the knowledge of the Armenian Genocide. Turks like this movie maker are thousand time better than chatting box Armenian useless so called leaders who prefer money in exchange of void words and inactiveness, that is why we are loosers.

  6. To GM: As an Armenian American filmmaker I appreciate your comments. Thank you!

    Scraping together my own money and that of close associates, myself and those associates managed to make a documentary film, ‘Music to Madness – the Story of Komitas’ (see http://www.KomitasTheMovie.com for details including a trailer) that was well received at select screenings across the US in April, including a Genocide and Holocaust conference. Getting the money to make that film was arduous to say the least.

    So now I can hardly believe that I’m going through the process again, this time to make a narrative feature film about the Armenian Genocide called ‘Last Known Survivor’ (see http://www.salientclear.com/LKS/ for details). The script is written, locations are being secured, and actors solicited. Unlike the documentary though, to complete this film myself and associates need to raise money. Doing that can, quite honestly, be a bit humiliating. I mean, who likes asking people for money? Still, I so believe in this project that I willing to put myself out there so to speak. Specifically myself and associates have just started an Indiegogo fundraising campaign at https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/last-known-survivor that provides a way for Armenians and others to contribute towards this film. Please do have a look at the campaign site and please spread the word about this film project. The contributions don’t have to be much if lots of people contribute. Together we Armenians can make an Armenian Genocide film happen for 2015.

  7. On the subject of films, how extremely shameful it is that not one single movie recognizing the Native American Indian Genocide has ever been made up to now in the United States. As a matter of fact, I still remember those “western cowboy” films I used to watch as a little kid on the TBS channel, which would glorify the killing of Native American Indians. Anyway, I have a speech by Dr. Martin Luther King, which I would like to share: “Our nation (United States) was born in genocide when it embraced the doctrine that the original American, the Indian, was an inferior race. Even before there were large numbers of Negroes on our shores, the scar of racial hatred had already disfigured colonial society. From the sixteenth century forward, blood flowed in battles over racial supremacy. We are perhaps the only nation which tried as a matter of national policy to wipe out its indigenous population. Moreover, we elevated that tragic experience into a noble crusade. Indeed, even today, we have not permitted ourselves to reject or to feel remorse from this Shameful episode. Our literature, our films, our drama, our folklore, all exalt it. Our children are still taught to respect the violence which reduced a red-skinned people of an earlier culture into a few fragmented groups herded into impoverished reservations.”
    That’s quite an emotional and touching speech by Dr. King. Even he, as opposed to so many people in America, happened to be aware that what took place against the original Americans on this land called the United States, constituted a genocide. However, there is one part that Dr. King wasn’t aware of. He wasn’t aware of the fact that the United States wasn’t the only nation which tried as a matter of national policy to wipe out its indigenous population. Besides the United States, there was also the Islamic nation of Turkey which as a matter of national policy during World War One, as well as four years after that, tried to wipe out its indigenous Christian population of Armenians, Greeks, and Assyrians, who had lived in Anatolia for thousands of years before the Turks arrived from central Asia in 1064.

    • Yerevanian, I think your comparison of the American genocide (a modern term not consistent with the consciousness of early colonialists or later settlers) of the native Indians (or, if you prefer, Americans – both words reflect a European construct of these people) with the Armenian genocide is not quite apt. It is true that both aggressions, and the resultant “genocides”, were imbued by a sense of religious and/or cultural superiority on the part of both Euro-Americans and Ottoman Turks, and a sense of racial superiority on the part of many white Americans. However, the impetus that led to genocide was totally different in both cases. For Americans it was a question of land conquest, and for the Turks it was a question of state security.
      After the Fall of Constantinople the Ottoman Empire saw itself as a continuation of the Roman Empire (the Byzantine Empire literally was such) ruling over diverse peoples. It was the standard-bearer for Islam, as the Byzantine had been for Christianity, but all religion s and cultures were protected and tolerated – though of course Islam was superior, and, in the beginning at least, Persian culture was probably considered superior. Until the conquest of Arab lands, it remained a predominantly Christian empire with a substantial Jewish minority. Constantinople was predominantly a Christian city up till the turn of the 20th century.
      By the 19th century the Ottoman Empire and Europe were both beset with the new consciousnesses of rising nationalisms of differing ethnic, cultural and religious peoples. For geo-political reasons Britain first championed the nationalism of Greece and later Bulgaria etc., Austria-Hungary helped foment Balkan nationalisms, while Russia championed Armenian nationalism. Late in the day the Ottoman intelligentsia, which included Armenian, Jewish and Greek-Ottomans, attempted to foster a sense of Ottoman nationality. It failed and morphed into the Turkish nationalism of the Young Turks (who initially still included leading Armenians and Jews). The massacres and expulsions of Armenians arose from a context in which the Ottoman Empire was besieged by a series of nationalist insurrections and wars, and then the onset of the WW1 in which the state (mistaken or not) perceived the Armenians and other Christian minorities of eastern Anatolia as a “fifth column” aiding Russian attacks
      Yes, genocide is genocide. A people suffer a terrible and unjust fate. But context does mean something. The later Ottomans (or Turks as they became) did not view Armenians as culturally or racially inferior, but rather as a (new) political threat to the security of the empire and the (new and reactionary) nationalistic desire for “Turkification”, and yes the state invoked Islam as a rallying cry to its Muslim populace and its troops (which contained ironically Armenians, Greeks, Jews – including David Ben-Gurion). As for the Americans, much of the population as well as the state saw the Indians as inferior in most ways, and an obstacle to the expansion of American territory.
      Also, if you allow me, two more points:
      First: “the Islamic nation of Turkey” did not exist. Turkey did not exist until 1923 when it was created as a secular state. The “policy” of genocide was an Ottoman one and done in the context outlined above. True, for reasons of blind, stupid nationalistic “pride” of some sort Turkey continues to deny the scale of the genocidal atrocities, though more and more reasonable Turks are acknowledging it.
      Second: The “Christian” population of Armenians, Greeks, and Assyrians are not exactly “indigenous” to Anatolia, any more than Christian peoples are indigenous to Europe or anywhere else. A rebellious Jewish sect, Christianity spread from Palestine throughout the Roman Empire, through conversion and adoption, until it became the state religion of the empire in the 4th century. As a people, Armenians may be indigenous to the area, in the sense they may have evolved from one or two Hittite tribes, though the Hittites came from somewhere else and supplanted an earlier Hattic people. As for the Greeks, they arrived in early migrations to the Anatolian coast from the Peloponnese and Aegean, and later Hellenistic trading colonies were established on the Black Sea. Alexander the Great opened up inner Anatolia to Greek migrants in 300s BC. As you say, Turkic tribes migrated into the area a thousand years ago. The term indigenous” is specious and fluid and, in the context of all the various peoples who have lived in Anatolia, somewhat useless. Anatolia has always been a multi-peopled area, perhaps never more so, in cultural and religious terms, then during the era of the Ottoman Empire. It was the tragedy of the rise of the modern idea of nationalism (just a more exalted form of tribalism) that led to the collapse of the Empire and the tragedy of the genocides there, and throughout much of the world.

    • Evan,

      I wasn’t comparing the Armenian Genocide to the Native American Indian Genocide. I know fully well that these two genocides were not similar to each other. However, the one single part that is similar is that the United States and Turkey both tried as a matter of national policy to wipe out their indigenous populations.

      In terms of the Native American Indian Genocide, the impetus was gaining land and expanding which eventually led to the U.S. government’s belief in “manifest destiny.” Therefore, a campaign of westward expansion would begin, and as a result, the United States would end up forcefully grabbing the entire remaining lands of the Native American Indian people. By the 1840’s, when the United States finally succeeded in pushing westward all the way to the Pacific Ocean, most of the Native American Indian tribes had already been wiped out. By the end of the 1890’s, there were no more than 250 thousand (full 100 percent) Native American Indians remaining in the entire United States, as opposed to 350 years earlier when there existed a thriving population of ten to twelve million (full 100 percent) Native American Indians, living on their very own land which would later become the United States.

      In terms of the Armenian Genocide, the impetus was actually more than just the Ottoman Turk leadership’s paranoid view of its state security. They also badly wanted to empty out the Western Armenian lands of its Armenian population in order to seize these lands along with the Armenian people’s wealth. In addition, the Ottoman Turk leaders, especially Enver Pasha, went even farther than that and became obsessed with the idea of pan-Turanism, an ideology based on Turkish expansion into the Caucasus and then into central Asia, with the goal of uniting all the peoples of Turkic origin.

      It’s rather interesting how in the middle of your previous comment, you attempt to suggest the possibility of Anatolia’s Armenians and other Christians aiding the Russians in their war with the Ottoman Turks. This is actually an excuse used by a number of Turk apologists in justification for committing the Armenian Genocide. So obviously, they would also use this same exact excuse to justify the Greek and Assyrian Genocides. What’s amusing is that the vast majority of the Ottoman Empire’s Armenians and other Christians were actually loyal to the Ottoman Turk government at the start of World War One. As a matter of fact, Armenians had fought hard for the Ottoman Empire in the prior Balkan War. Anyway, by the time the Russian soldiers arrived on the soil of eastern Anatolia (Western Armenia) in 1916, those lands had already been emptied of its Armenian population. There was nobody around to aid the Russian soldiers over in eastern Anatolia.

      Returning back to my earlier comment in which I was talking about the “Islamic nation of Turkey,” it’s true that the name, Turkey, was not existent until after 1923; however, Turkey is still the successor state of the pre-1923 Islamic Ottoman Turkish Empire. Secondly, Anatolia’s Armenians, Greeks, and Assyrians, were indeed indigenous to Anatolia. They inhabited Anatolia for thousands of years before the Turks arrived from central Asia in 1064. As a matter of fact, the Armenians by themselves, were in Anatolia for over 3800 years before the arrival of the Turks.

      You’re totally incorrect when you say that after the Fall of Constantinople, the Ottoman Empire protected and tolerated all religions and cultures. This, of course, is what they were saying all along; however, this is certainly not what they were practicing. After coming under the rule of the Muslim Ottoman Empire, the Armenians as well as the other Christians were subjected to a set of extremely oppressive social and political rules. They had no legal rights under the rule of the Ottoman Turkish Empire. The amount of theft and extortion, as well as rape of Armenian and Greek women that was permitted under the Ottoman Empire’s legal system, placed the Armenians and Greeks in extreme danger. Nothing that belonged to a Christian was safe under the Turkish rule of the Ottoman Empire. They were forced to pay all kinds of harsh taxes, and were persistently oppressed by a system of government which disallowed them to live freely, earn a living, and enjoy a feeling of security to life and property. As a result, the existence of an Armenian, Greek, or Assyrian in the Ottoman Turkish Empire, automatically subjected him or her to violent physical attacks and extreme discrimination.

  8. I cannot comment on all above posts.But GM´s really stands out,as worthy of consideration and perusal.We need to group all of our Film Directors( no scarcity of these) and make one that may be comparable to ,say ¨¨Schindler´s List¨. I have several times over brought FWD the need for one that can stand up to the latter.I have read the book ¨m a m i g o n ¨ by JACK HASHIAN, an ex-state Dept functionary…his book says it all. A Novel that if you pick up the book to read, I assure you you will not put it down until you have read it through in attempt-
    It starts in Western Armenia, the Saga of an Armenian staff officer or seargent-I don´t recall, in the Turkish army fighting alongside his Turkish buddy officer, is later…..
    Then the story shows/descrobes(rather like showing) the atrocities committed by the Turks and ends up in Boston.
    Do please read it then opine.Luckily the script of it has lately been written too…
    so if our Film industry Armenians( we have quite a few in the industry ,not just as directors)get together and study the possibility of making a film out of ¨¨m a m i g o n ¨it will certainly outdo the previous ones.
    Wish luck …

  9. Yerevanian,

    You write “Anyway, by the time the Russian soldiers arrived on the soil of eastern Anatolia (Western Armenia) in 1916, those lands had already been emptied of its Armenian population.”

    What do you think of the theory that the Russian soldiers deliberately delayed their invasion by one year, in order to let the genocide run its course, under the view that it would be easier to repopulate eastern Anatolia with Russians than to assimilate the indigenous Armenian population there? This was a theory mentioned by Robert Hewsen in his seminal work “An image from Armenia: A Historical Atlas”.

    • Alex,

      That’s certainly an interesting theory mentioned by Robert Hewsen; however, during the period of one year that the Russian troops occupied eastern Anatolia (Western Armenia), they did not attempt to repopulate those lands with Russian civilians. Furthermore, the Russians were not fully aware of the genocide being committed against Armenians until after successfully completing their invasion which enabled them to enter eastern Anatolia. As a matter of fact, upon their entrance, they became quite flabbergasted at the sight of so many slaughtered Armenian civilians.

  10. I’m extremely excited for this movie– Fatih Akin is a brilliant and honest director who deserves the success he’s found. He examines all societies with an equally critical eye and isn’t afraid to reflect what he sees. In many ways, the fact that this film was made by a Turkish filmmaker is a very important and a very good thing; it’s much easier for denialists to criticize and disregard an Armenian-made Armenian Genocide film. But the denial becomes more difficult when the narrative is being presented by a Turkish person. This is a very positive thing, and I’m sure the timing is no coincidence.

  11. The Lark Farm is another movie about genocide, directed by Paolo Taviani and Vittorio Taviani (Story by: Antonia Arslan). I am surprised no one has mentioned it.

  12. A social psychologist may say that man is a social animal, yet “xenophobia” is a residue in the brain that served cavemen, but is detrimental and destructive to modern man. Social scientists may look for the cause, and even a cure, if there is one, to xenophobia; while the pseudo scientists will look for bogus theories based on racism. The harsh reality is that there were children of educated and intelligent people who survived these deportation lines, and according to wikipedia, they were the inspiration for Franz Warfel’s “The 40 Days of Musa Dagh.” The “starving Armenian” children left in rags and lice, and with injuries. I think a movie based on this novel would be a good movie; a novel wikipedia compared to “War and Peace.” Existentialism and the meaning of life.

  13. Books and movies can awaken a moral conscience. “Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee” did mark a turning point for writing about American Indians; and it was written during the time of the Viet Nam war, which was very unpopular. It will be interesting to see how the Turkish people react to this movie; a govt. apology is overdue. A movie based on the “40 Days of Musa Dagh” would be interesting.

  14. FYI, “Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee” is about the govt. injustices against the American Indians, and the destruction of their culture and religion; wounded knee is where Custer’s last stand was fought, the last confrontation between the U.S. govt. and the American Indians.

    • The Wounded Knee Massacre, which occurred on December 29, 1890, was actually not the last confrontation between the U.S. government and Native American Indians. The following day on December 30, 1890, another confrontation (Drexel Mission Fight) occurred on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. As a matter of fact, a little over 82 years after Wounded Knee, between February 27-May,8, 1973, another confrontation occurred at the very same place between the U.S. government and Native American Indians.

  15. @ Evan

    I found your post on history of Anatolia interesting, but while it was a good shot at history of the region, I’m not in agreement with all of it…

    “For Americans it was a question of land conquest, and for the Turks it was a question of state security.”

    Here, a definite disagreement. During WWI, “state security” was an excuse to implement the Genocide, as the subsequent events of the Assyrian and Greek genocides would prove, it was a false pretext. Even the Turkish-Arab conflict adds to this point, all of a sudden Islam had no meaning when it came to turanism. After WWI, Turkish state security was not only irrelevant, but it was downright absent in the absence of a state itself. Thus, for the Turks during the war the reasons behind the genocides they committed were economic gain, as well as the ridiculous ideology of turanism, centered on the lands of the Armenians no less. And after WWI it was not only a land conquest, but even worse, looting, pillaging and murdering on a scale never before seen by any organization which later would come to be known as “The Republic of Turkey”.

    “After the Fall of Constantinople the Ottoman Empire saw itself as a continuation of the Roman Empire (the Byzantine Empire literally was such) ruling over diverse peoples… but all religion s and cultures were protected and tolerated”

    Perhaps, but the picture is not that rosy. Under today’s false history teaching in Turkey, and unfortunately outside of it as well, the Turks are under the false impression that “they” were the Ottoman empire, in fact that is far from reality. Ethnic ‘Turks’, actually more accurately “Ottoman Muslims of multiple ethnicities” held military power, and little else. Even in the military, the Ottoman Empire relied on converted Christian soldiers. These were the ones who in fact conquered Constantinople, the Janissaries.

    Without Asia Minor’s Armenians and Greeks, not only would the Turks never have conquered Constantinople, but their so-called ’empire’ would never have come to pass. This history may sound troubling to some, but the truth is, the Anatolian Christians as well as European ones partook in dismantling the Byzantine empire, the reasons being largely political or religious. Some Greeks were pro-Rome, but some anti-Rome. The Greeks wanted preservation of their church and the Armenians theirs, in other words resisting the unification and thus subservience to Rome. As the saying in Constantinople went, “better the Sultan’s turban than the Pope’s cap”. That is one of the reasons the Ottoman Empire became “multi-ethnic”. If it had been mono-ethnic, i.e. ‘Turkic’, the ’empire’ would be little more than colonies of warring tribes, and would last, maybe 50 or so years based on their cruel nature alone, but would eventually implode and become irrelevant without the up and coming European weapons technologies. The Ottoman Empire existed based on assimilating what it came across, not destroying it, because it couldn’t afford to, as in fact, Turkic culture brought nothing from Central Asia worth using, or even preserving.

    Of course Sharia law by definition treats non-Muslims as second and third class citizens, and this got out of hand in the 19th century, which is exactly why the Ottoman Empire did itself in. By this time, the parasite had already sucked all it could from Christian society, and the government no longer even had any control over its eastern provinces (Armenia) and relied on crude tribal local Muslims to “rule”, except it wasn’t any kind of rule, but an abuse of Sharia law, looting and theft of what little the Armenian villagers already had.

    “As a people, Armenians may be indigenous to the area, in the sense they may have evolved from one or two Hittite tribes, though the Hittites came from somewhere else and supplanted an earlier Hattic people… Anatolia has always been a multi-peopled area”

    That’s not complete. Ancient Anatolian groups were not ‘different’ peoples, they were all related to an extent, and from the Armenian perspective, all part of the Armenian ethno-genesis, i.e. Armenian tribes. From an outsider observation, the The Armenian race is the surviving race of the Anatolian peoples of antiquity after assimilating, for example Phrygians, Hittites, Urartians etc. When these groups “disappeared” who was left? Well, by 500BC there were two well defined people in Anatolia: Armenians and Greeks. The Persians were never Anatolian, they only made incursions for their conflicts with the Greeks. The Assyrians were not either, perhaps at its most eastern part, but their territories were largely in what is today Iraq, just south of Ancient Armenia. There may be evidence that Greek tribes made their way into Anatolia, but Armenians did not “come from someplace else” from the evidence. The evidence does suggest that Phrygians were related to Armenians, but they were not what defines the Armenian race, only a part of it.

    So in fact, Anatolia was not really “multi-ethnic” in antiquity, it only became that way only after the Seljuk, then Ottoman Empire and the infusion of multiple ethnicities of Muslims from all over.

    From your post what I do agree with however is that I am not sure if I would consider what happened to the American Indians constituted genocide in the sense that it was planned and intentional such as the Turkish government did to its Christian subjects. What happened to the American Indians was definitely tragic, remembering also that they were also victims to mother nature, as the new diseases the Europeans brought with them from Europe proved to be devastating for their immune systems. But as far as labeling it genocide, I have not really made up my mind fully yet.

    Also, I noticed typically, every time the US makes any positive moves to recognize the Armenian Genocide, many Turks start claiming that the US committed genocide against the natives in an effort to discredit the US. Well even ‘if’ it was genocide, Turkey would hit its version of genocide out of the ballpark compared to the US, both in its criminal intent and planning and vicious cruelty. There is no comparison.

  16. I think that the title of the book “Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee” was based on a poem “American Names” by a famous civil war poet, Steven Vincent Benet. I believe during the Viet Nam war, Americans became angry at the My Lai massacre in Viet Nam of innocent villagers; the author, who had an interest in American Indians, wrote this book reminding Americans of the massacre of Indians at Wounded Knee, and other stories about different tribes, and the book invoked empathy from the American public, which may have not been there before. There was a tv show on Custer’s last stand, pbs.org, that shows Custer in a very much different light than earlier movies portrayed him. I watched an earlier movie recently, on tv, made in the 1950’s, so I compared them. So, times change, and civil rights marches on.

  17. Some more information on the film. This page has the trailer in english. The music has a powerful feel to it.

    http://blogs.indiewire.com/theplaylist/venice-trailer-fatih-akins-the-cut-starring-tahar-rahim-plus-official-synopsis-and-first-images-20140724

    Another article revealing how the movie originally started from a project on Hrant Dink. He could not find an actor to play Hrant.

    http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/director-fatih-akin-suspends-dink-film-idea-after-actors-rejected-role.aspx?pageID=238&nID=69814&NewsCatID=381

  18. Within the last 10 days I released a 29 minute documentary video on YouTube titled Armenia, Ancient Nation Endangered which has received a lot of attention. I invite you to take a look at it.
    I am not a professional film maker. I wanted to do something to counter the tremendous amount of misinformation spread all over the world by Turkey and Azerbaijan and also to bring attention to the plight of Armenian’s living on Armenia’s borders with Azerbaijan.

  19. Hagop,

    You are wrong in suggesting that the Ottoman Turk government’s extremely paranoid view of their state security had not been one of the reasons in committing the Armenian Genocide. On the contrary, it was indeed an impetus and a rather big one too. To begin with, as a result of the Ottoman Turks’ defeat in the 1912-1913 Balkan War, they ended up losing a gigantic amount of territory (85 percent of their European territory). And, it was at that moment that the Ottoman Empire’s Armenians began to persuade the European powers to demand that the Ottoman Turks agree to some of the Armenian Reforms, launched back in 1878. After negotiations, the Armenian Reform Agreement of February, 1914, was created by the European powers, which among them, happened to be the Ottoman Turks’ most hated enemy, Russia. As a result, the Ottoman Turkish government feared that the renewal of these Armenian reforms could possibly turn into an eastern version of the humiliation it experienced in the Balkan War. The most significant aspect of the Armenian Reform Agreement, was the requirement that the Europeans be appointed as the general inspectors of the Ottoman Empire’s Armenian provinces in order to administer these reforms. As a result, the Ottoman Turkish government became deeply aggravated and began to construct a new plan dedicated to Turkification. The Ottoman Turk leadership began to advocate that the Turkish nation would only be revitalized if it eliminated its non-Muslim elements. In order for the Turkish nation to be strong again, the Ottoman Turk government believed it was mandatory to become a pure homogeneous nation, possessing a common culture and religion. In terms of war, World War One, created an atmosphere of total war for the Turks. It created an armed and mobilized Turk society, a heightened national security crisis, and a deepened xenophobia. These conditions would be used to render the “final solution” to the Armenians; and the Ottoman Turks would wage a campaign of annihilation against the Armenians by deeming them “the internal enemy.”

    Exactly where’s the logic in trying to suggest that the Anatolian Christians and Europeans took part in dismantling the Christian Byzantine Empire and assisted in installing the Muslim Ottoman Turkish Empire over in Constantinople? And then you proceed to say, “Better the Sultan’s turban than the Pope’s cap.” That actually sounds like something a typical Turk nationalist would say. Anyway, you should do some reading on the Crusades, which happened to be religious wars between European Christians and the Muslims of the Near East.

    Did you actually think that Anatolia became multi-ethnic after the establishment of the Ottoman Turkish Empire? On the contrary, Anatolia had already been multi-ethnic before the arrival of the Turks. Besides Armenians, Greeks, and Assyrians, there had also been other groups of people such as Akkadians, Hurrians, Kaskians, Hattians, Luwians, Scythians, and numerous other groups as well. There were also Kurds in Anatolia before the arrival of the Turks. Anyway, with the exception of the Armenians, Greeks, Assyrians, and Kurds, all of those other groups became extinct.

    In terms of the Native American Indian Genocide, it’s certainly not surprising that you don’t recognize it as a genocide. The Herero-Nama Genocide is also another genocide you don’t recognize. Anyway, returning back to the genocide of the Native American Indians, if it was not planned and intentional, then how did several hundred thousand Indians end up getting slaughtered in order for the United States to seize their lands? That’s totally the definition of a genocide.

    By the way, exactly which positive moves has the U.S. made in recognizing the Armenian Genocide? The truth of the matter is that the U.S. has made no positive moves whatsoever in that department. It’s always the same “dog and pony show,” year after year.

    Where did you get the impression that it’s the Turks who claim the U.S. committed genocide against the Native American Indians? Along with the Native American Indians, what about all of the African-Americans, Hispanic-Americans, and Asian-Americans who claim this? There even happen to be many Anglo-Americans who claim this. And to top it all off, the greatest civil rights activist in the history of the United States also claimed this.

  20. Part II.

    “There were also Kurds in Anatolia before the arrival of the Turks”.

    So? Are you so simple that you actually thought I, or anyone else was not aware that several nationalities have been living in Anatolia for many centuries? Get real. Firstly I am talking about Anatolia as a homeland of a people or peoples and whether Anatolia was multi-ethnic in ancient times as the natives of the region, and Anatolia is not the traditional homeland of Kurds, nor Assyrians. Parts of it to the east perhaps, not the areas of traditional Armenian presence. Their homeland is in parts of modern day Iran and Iraq. And I am talking about what happened when the Anatolian races all assimilated circa 500BC (in your view went “extinct” like the dinosaurs). In Ancient times the Kurds came into Armenia to tend to their flocks, then left. The Kurds arrived around the same time as Turks in Anatolia, maybe a century or two earlier, to settle in certain areas. And the bulk of them came when the Ottomans brought them in from Iran to settle in Armenian lands, after the Shah forcibly deported Armenians to Iran a few centuries ago.

    “On the contrary, Anatolia had already been multi-ethnic before the arrival of the Turks… Armenians, Greeks, and Assyrians, there had also been other groups of people such as Akkadians, Hurrians, Kaskians, Hattians, Luwians, Scythians”

    No, on the contrary you are wrong.
    I already stated Greeks were present in ancient times, and Assyrians to the east. The point is, Anatolia became multi-ethnic over time, I am not convinced it started out that way as the homeland for diverse peoples like Turkey and their friends would like to claim, including you. Show me proof. It is not a coincidence when Anatolian groups ‘disappeared’, the ‘Armenians’ became known at the precise moment to the outside world.

    Let’s analyze your “theory” then:
    Ancient Assyrians: ca. 4,000 years ago – East of Anatolia – N/A
    Akkadians: ca. 4,000 years ago – South of Anatolia – N/A
    Hurrians: ca. 4,000 years ago – PROTO-ARMENIANS
    Kaskians: ca. 3,500 years ago, Northeast of Anatolia – N/A.
    Hattians: ca. 4,000 years ago – PROTO-ARMENIANS
    Luwians: ca. 3,500 years ago – PROTO-ARMENIANS
    Scythians: ca. 2,500 years ago – NOT Anatolian, except invasions.

    Arrival of Turks: ca. 1,000 years ago. Gaps in your “theory” between the Anatolians you mentioned and Turks: 2,500 years.

    So Mr Professor, you say “Anatolia had already been multi-ethnic before the arrival of the Turks”, exactly which of those people you mentioned above fits into your theory with a gap of at least 2,500 years??

    Of course as usual you contradict yourself and say “anyway all of those other groups became extinct” right after saying before the arrival of the Turks Anatolia was multi-cultural with a 2,000+ year gap. So they went extinct. How did that happen? Did an alien spaceship come and haul them away to another planet, or what? Or maybe they all decided to stop having sex? And how could Anatolia be multi-ethnic when those groups you mentioned went extinct before the Turks came 2,500 years later??

    The multi-ethnicity of Anatolia-Armenia started with migrations and expansions, not with the natives and likely started with the Greek and Roman imperial expansion, probably most of it started with Islamic incursions when the Arabs invaded and occupied Armenia, then later progressed rapidly after the Turks’ arrival, by which time Kurds and other Islamic groups made their way in. Bring your proof of which people besides Armenians and Greeks were inhabiting Anatolia who were the original settlers and who exist today, you need to try much harder than presenting people who “went extinct” and with 2,000+ year gaps and whose homelands lay outside of the Armenian areas of habitation in Anatolia.

    • Part 3,

      Once again, I was correct in saying that Anatolia had been multi-ethnic before the arrival of the Turks. It’s at least good that you are aware that there happened to be Armenians and Greeks already living in Anatolia before the arrival of the Turks. However, for your own education, there were also Kurds and Assyrians living in Anatolia long before the arrival of the Turks. As a matter of fact, it’s actually a fact that the Assyrian and Kurdish historic homelands both consist of what is now southeastern Turkey, along with northeast Syria, northwest Iran, and northern Iraq. And since you didn’t already know by now, southeastern Turkey translates to southeastern Anatolia. As a result, that’s a total of at least four ethnic groups which were present in Anatolia right before the arrival of the Turks.

      In addition, I never said that there was a presence of Greeks, Assyrians, or Kurds in Western Armenia, prior to the arrival of the Turks. The Greeks inhabited northwestern Anatolia which is obviously west of the Western Armenian provinces; as for Anatolia’s Kurds and Assyrians, they inhabited southeastern Anatolia which was south of Western Armenia.

      Exactly how am I contradicting myself by saying that the ancient Akkadians, Hurrians, Kaskians, Hattians, Luwians, and Scythians became extinct? Yes, they did become extinct and long before the arrival of the Turks. Not a single one of these groups exist today. Why don’t you do some reading on this matter instead of being silly and making a desperate attempt to be funny by suggesting that maybe the reason they became extinct was due to a lack of sexual activity. There’s absolutely no humor in that. As a matter of fact, a nationalist Turk once said something very similar to that; the only difference was that he used Anatolia’s pre-1915 Armenians, Greeks, and Assyrians as his examples.

    • Here’s some more education for you, proving that part of the ancient Kurdish homeland (Kurdistan) was indeed situated in Anatolia (southeast Turkey): http://www.infoplease.com/spot/kurds3.html

      What does it say in the first paragraph of that Kurdish History Timeline article? It says,”The Kurds have lived in a mountainous, roughly 74,000 square-mile region known as Kurdistan for the past two millennia.” Hey, that’s over a thousand years before the arrival of the Turks. Eventually, in the early 20th century, the Kurds’ historic homeland would become divided between Turkey, Iran, Iraq, and Syria.

  21. Part III

    “In terms of the Native American Indian Genocide, it’s certainly not surprising that you don’t recognize it as a genocide. The Herero-Nama Genocide is also another genocide you don’t recognize.”

    You once started ranting that Herero genocide was non-existent and ridiculous and those killed would not constitute genocide, until of course you discovered a wikipedia page for it, remember? And even if “I don’t recognize the Native Indian genocide”, what’s it to you?

    I already stated I don’t know if I consider what happened a genocide, and I haven’t made up my mind fully and that’s it. If you want to satisfy your inflated ego by making me out to be a “genocide denier” then go ahead, and in which case I will say you aren’t anyone special for me to take you seriously with your rants.

    “By the way, exactly which positive moves has the U.S. made in recognizing the Armenian Genocide?”

    Ridiculous question. Only a handful of states are left that have not yet recognized the Genocide, and I would say with each of those recognitions it constituted a positive step. Each time a resolution is about to pass and even if it doesn’t passes, at least that is progress than sitting back and paying attention to pessimists like you, then we wouldn’t get anything done.

    And yes, whenever I have read internet discussions about the recognition of Armenian Genocide, anyone who is opposed to it and also happens to hate America has invariably said “what about the Native American genocide”?, and in most cases Muslims. And I don’t need to prove this to you, if you don’t know about it then it’s your problem. Go search the internet. Suffice it to say, your arguments are pretty close to Genocide denying Turks, such as “it was a state security to remove Armenians” and “what about the Native American genocide”. What’s next on your mind? Are you also about to recognize the “Khojaly genocide”??

    And there is a difference between disliking America and disliking its government. And exactly what is your purpose in bringing up the Native American genocide every time? What is your mission here? Imagine we get to the White House to work on getting justice for the descendants of the Armenian Genocide, then proceed to discuss how “The USA committed genocide against the Native Americans and we need justice”. We would be laughed out of there. God forbid a saboteur like you be involved in Hye Tahd.

    First of all professor, The USA was founded in 1776. Almost 300 years after Europeans started coming to the Americas, and the bulk of damage to the Native Indians was done in this time period, the most devastating being disease, in addition to all the imperialist European nations including France, England, Spain, Portugal. And secondly, the USA recognizes some of its transgressions against the American Indians, which is why the Native Indian nation is a kind of state within a state, but dependent as a dependent sovereign nation.

    The Native American Genocide, if it happened, is nowhere near being comparable to what the Ottoman and Turkish governments implemented during WWI within a small time frame. Why don’t you go learn some real history before coming here and throwing around genocide accusations everywhere.

    Part one was not appropriate to publish, perhaps correctly, and will be rewriting it.

    • To begin with, I have never tried to compare the Armenian Genocide with the genocide of the Native American Indians. I made that perfectly clear in one of my earlier comments. And exactly how am I throwing around genocide accusations by recognizing the true facts of the genocide committed against the Native American Indian people by the United States? It’s rather absurd when you try to suggest that the USA recognizes some of its transgressions against the Native American Indians, which is why the Native American Indian nation is a state within a state. Exactly which state are you talking about? The Native American Indians have no state whatsoever. The only thing they have are those miserable, impoverished reservations. That’s nowhere close to being a state. And exactly which transgressions against the Indians has the USA recognized? They haven’t recognized anything. They neither recognize the extermination of the Native American Indians nor do they recognize the lands they seized from those people. Exactly what sort of recognition is this supposed to be? All of this just comes to show how little you know about U.S. history.

      Since you’re so deeply interested as to why I’ve been bringing up the topic of the Native American Indian Genocide on numerous occasions, the reason is because I happen to be sensitive about other people’s suffering. I really hate it when the human rights of any particular group of people are suppressed and they end up being subjected to brutality. And, in addition to the Armenian Genocide and Native American Indian Genocide, I also talk about other genocides such as the Greek and Assyrian Genocides; I also talk a lot about the history of the African-American people’s suffering.

      How extremely silly to say, “Imagine we get to the White House to work on getting justice for the descendants of the Armenian Genocide.” First of all, my life is devoted to reality, as opposed to you who spends all that time imagining silly things. Secondly, I have absolutely no interest in going to the White House. The White House is certainly not the kind of place where justice will be rendered to the descendants of the Armenian Genocide. Furthermore, recognizing the Armenian Genocide is not the definition of justice. Recognition of the Armenian Genocide has to do with recognizing a horrible crime that took place in history. As for Armenian Genocide justice, it will only be rendered when the Armenian people obtain financial reparations from Turkey for the extermination of 1.5 million Armenians, as well as all the stolen properties along with the stolen Western Armenian lands.

      In terms of committing sabotage to the Armenian Cause, you are indeed a perfect example of this. You neither know what it’s about nor do you know what the Armenian Genocide was about. Are you so desperate that now you’re going to try and suggest that I’m a genocide-denying Turk by stating that the Ottoman Turk leadership’s extreme state security paranoia happened to be a huge impetus for committing genocide against Armenians? The information I provided you in my earlier comment from August 6th in regard to the Armenian Genocide can be found in Peter Balakian’s New York Times bestseller book, The Burning Tigris. It can also be found in Taner Akcam’s book, The Young Turks’ Crime Against Humanity. You should try to sit down and actually read a book on the Armenian Genocide, instead of reading all those false details over on Wikipedia. If you have any further questions on the Armenian Genocide, just let me know, and I will proceed to furnish you with additional education.

      In regard to what you were ludicrously suggesting earlier, what does recognizing the Native American Indian Genocide have to do with being opposed to the Armenian Genocide and hating America? All of this makes absolutely no sense.

      I noticed that in your previous comment, you referred to the Khojali events as the Khojali genocide. This would definitely be very pleasing to President Aliyev.

      “Only a handful of states are left that have not yet recognized the Genocide, and I would say with each of those recognitions it constituted a positive step.” It’s true that there are over 40 states which formally recognize the Armenian Genocide; however, the much more important matter in all this, is that it still continues to not be formally recognized at the national level. Again, that’s not the definition of progress. And how silly it is to say that even if a resolution doesn’t pass, it still constitutes progress. Exactly how? That’s certainly not the definition of progress; on the contrary, that’s the definition of failure.

      In regard to the Herero-Nama Genocide, I was actually totally unaware about it until the subject was brought up by RVDV. It was especially bizarre when RVDV stated that it happened to be the very first genocide of the 20th century. At the beginning, I really did not agree with any of that. However, after conducting extensive research on this matter, I came to the realization that it was indeed a genocide and therefore happened to be the very first genocide of the 20th century. However, the Armenian Genocide still remains the first major genocide of the 20th century, as well as history’s “first modern genocide.”

  22. Some Indian tribes sued for reparations because their tribal lands had gas and oil; the U.S.A.,Obama’s administration, recently made reparations for half of the amount they sued for (billions?); they are using these funds to better the lives of the tribes; others have casinos, but I understand, not all of them are profitable. In addition to wikipedia, I recommend public educational television, pbs.org, where programs on Indians and civil rights and american history are under the “American Experience,” wild west, etc.; just search and find for free downloading. Xenophobia, is irrational fear, that can lead to genocide; In other words, it is fear that has no basis in reality. In addition to Custer’s Last Stand, there is a show “We Shall Remain” with five more stories, including the 1974 American Indian rights civil rights movement at Wounded Knee.

  23. In a way, when Fatih Akin is talking about spaghetti westerns, he is criticizing american film making, which has been plagued by McCarthyism (a form of xenophibia); and the history of american film making would take up too much space here. I did find Howard Fast’s, the “Last Frontier,” made in the 50’s was a good film; I too remember the old films, where cowboys or soldiers were saying “the only good Indian is a dead Indian.” Today I am saying the films are better and more emphathetic. The Turkish govt, btw, criticized “Lawrence of Arabia” for showing Turks in a bad light; but that film went through. They have been trying to stop films on the Armenian genocide, as the one in this article. It is time for the films to be made and shown.

  24. Mr. Yerevanian is correct. It is vital that we, as human beings and as Armenians, have opinions which are consistent with facts. This applies both to the recognition of previous genocides, and also to understanding the true causes of what happened to our own ancestors.

    Additional information on the Herero genocide and Germany’s recognition of it:
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/3565938.stm

    Another video of interest would be the Canadian government’s apology to its Aboriginal population regarding its treatment of them:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ryC74bbrEE

    Turkey should follow the example of the above two democracies.

  25. This is also about how topics are handled in our history books and in our movies; whether the topic is American Indians or Armenians; what you learned in your history books was not always right, as these new movie makers will tell you.

  26. Revisiting Part I-I

    Evan claimed the US taking over north America was a land-grab, while the Turks committing the Armenian Genocide was for “State Security”. I disagreed because to me this implies that the Armenians, in their entirety, were supposedly plotting against Turkey and posed a threat. In my original post I stated: “During WWI, “state security” was an excuse to implement the Genocide, as the subsequent events of the Assyrian and Greek genocides would prove, it was a false pretext.” So anyone who would disagree with this, as one person here, I am assuming that they are trying to legitimize “State Security”, i.e. agreeing with the Turkish perspective.

    First I believe “State Security” is not the right term to use. State Cleansing? Yes. Turanism? Yes. Economic gain? Yes. State Security as an EXCUSE? Yes. State Security NOT as an excuse but a real threat? I am not convinced.

    Let’s first remember, in reading a lot of what official Turkey has to say on the Armenian Genocide, or rather by their view the “Armenian Question” I find that “State Security” is their most often cited “explanation”, typically something along the lines that “the Armenians posed a security risk and had to be deported for betraying Turkey”, or “The Armenians were a danger to the Turkish army and had to be relocated” etc.

    The elimination of the Armenians from the six Armenian vilayets, was it for “State Security” or for the purpose of land conquest? If you see it from the perspective of the Genocidal Turanist Turks you would state “State Security”. The Genocidal Turanist Turks knew that since their plans of glory failed in the first year of the war, there was now a strong possibility for Armenia in those vilayets. So was it really “State Security” to commit Genocide on those Armenians, not to mention everywhere else in the Ottoman empire? Remember, they did not massacre and deport Armenians from just the vilayets, but all over. Since I do not have sympathy for Turkish imperialism, I interpret it as a genocidal plan to deprive a people from self-determination and to confiscate their land and create a new Turkish empire on it. The six Armenian vilayets were exactly that: Armenian.

    And if it is the opinion of any ‘scholar’ that the Armenian Genocide was implemented for “State Security” and not “State Security” as an imaginary threat or excuse then I would place them in the same category as the Turkish government, regardless of who they are. But I don’t believe any legitimate genocide scholar is of the opinion that “State Security” was not just an excuse, i.e. “a necessity”. That is from the perspective of Genocide Perpetrators, and not as a basis in reality. After all, Turkey was eager to enter WWI and was not forced into it like Turks today believe. In fact it was Turkey which invaded and provoked Russia as well.

    That Turanism was a significant driving force behind the Genocide is not disputed by anyone who is relevant on the topic of the Armenian Genocide, and by that idea, Turanism is 100% a land conquest, and not a “State Security” issue. The plan of Turanism involves the elimination of any non-Turkic, non-Muslim peoples from the borders of Greece to the borders of China.

    The “territorial losses” of the Ottomans in Europe is true, and would be a concern to the Ottomans, but the argument next that “thus the Genocide was perpetrated against Armenians as a result” is a moot point, since the CUP was more interested in Turanism and expansion to the east than its territorial losses in Europe.

    Then there is the problem of 1918-1923 during which the Armenian Genocide was ongoing, and in 1918 the Ottoman Empire had already been defeated, but yet, the Genocide continued in the absence of a territory transitioning into a state for Turks. So from 1918 to 1923 there was an issue of “State Security” too, or was it in fact that, now that the Genocide perpetrators were relieved of any semblance of rules they previously had and could now proceed with Turanism with a renewed energy? I would say the latter. No one is going to convince me that the Armenian Genocide was a “necessity”.

    • “The elimination of the Armenians from the six Armenian vilayets, was it for “State Security” or for the purpose of land conquest?”

      I hate to bring this up again because we’ve been through it several times before but I feel I must remind you again about one small detail. THE LAND WAS ALREADY CONQUERED. It was already part of the Ottoman Empire. For 4 hundred years. The Ottoman army did not invade another country and kill its citizens. The Ottoman Empire committed genocide against its own citizens. And as Armenia did not exist at the time, re-conquest was also not possible. Armenians were not eliminated from those six vilayets for purposes of “land conquest”, it was for state preservation because they knew the successful self-determination movements in the Balkans had a very real chance of happening with Armenians too. Only difference was, the Ottomans did not consider the Balkans to be their homeland, they DID consider the Armenian vilayets to be part of their homeland. But that homeland was already someone else’s homeland, and with the empire crumbling around them they had to make sure the “Turkish homeland” would be preserved… for Turks.. at any cost, even if that cost was millions of Christian lives.

  27. Your attempt to rewrite your previously incorrect comment, once again turned out incorrect. After all this time, you still haven’t been able to comprehend that due to the Ottoman Turk leadership’s intense paranoia of its state/national security, they really did believe that Anatolia’s Armenians were attempting to rebel against the Ottoman Empire, which of course was never the case. So therefore, since they viewed the Armenians as a major threat to the security of the Ottoman Empire, this became a huge impetus behind the Ottoman Turk government’s objective to commit genocide against the Armenians, empty out the Western Armenian provinces of its Armenian population, and then proceed to seize those lands. The 1914 Armenian Reform Agreement, was viewed as a serious and permanent threat to the continued existence of the crumbling Ottoman Turkish Empire. Therefore, the Ottoman Turk leaders feared the possibility of Russian occupation in the Western Armenian provinces. And because of this fear, the Ottoman Turk leaders were determined to prevent the Armenians of Western Armenia from obtaining any kind of reforms along with the possibility of becoming autonomous. These elements would form the driving force behind the Armenian Genocide. Since you obviously know so little about the Armenian Genocide, it’s therefore not surprising that you reject Armenian Genocide scholars, such as Peter Balakian and Taner Akcam.

    In regard to pan-Turanism, an ideology based on Turkish expansion into the Caucasus and then into central Asia with the goal of uniting all the peoples of Turkic origin, it was also an impetus behind the Armenian Genocide, but to a much lesser extent than the Ottoman Turk leadership’s false, paranoid view of Armenians being a security threat to the Ottoman Turkish Empire. Actually, it was mostly Enver Pasha who happened to be so deeply attached to the idea of pan-Turanism, as opposed to the others in the CUP, who were more focused on dealing with the Ottoman Empire’s “Armenian issue.”

    In terms of the ongoing Armenian Genocide after World War One, which therefore means from December, 1918 to the last round of killings in September, 1922, the Turks were attempting to finish off the Armenians in Anatolia as they had first intended back in 1915. This has nothing to do with pan-Turanism. After having already been defeated in World War One, as well as being in the process of negotiations with the Allied powers, the Turks were certainly not creating any kind of new plan to drive all the way to central Asia and unite all of the Turkic peoples.

    Instead of doing so much imagining, you should instead make it a “necessity” to do some learning on the Armenian Genocide.

  28. Part I-II

    “And then you proceed to say, “Better the Sultan’s turban than the Pope’s cap.” That actually sounds like something a typical Turk nationalist would say.”

    “you should do some reading on the Crusades, which happened to be religious wars between European Christians and the Muslims of the Near East.”

    In fact you should follow your own advice and do some reading of your own and educate yourself before attempting to educate others and pretending to know about subjects which you don’t.

    “Better the Sultan’s turban than the Pope’s cap.” may well sound strange to you if you never heard it, but that is a well known historic quote from history because of what happened between Rome and Constantinople.

    Contrary to what you believe, there was no Christian solidarity during the middle ages. Politics was alive and well as it is today. The first crusade was in a way quite necessary, but the later crusades turned into something else. Not only this, by the time of the fourth crusade sent by Rome, they caused more damage to the Anatolian Christians than they did to Muslims. And yes that involved raping, looting, pillaging and massacring, Christian against Christian.

    There is even a discussion that had this sack and massacre of Constantinople by the later crusaders not transpired, the Turks may not have won their subsequent battles against a weakened Byzantium.

    The pope even acknowledged this and apologized to the Greek church recently saying something like “the most serious mistake Rome ever made”.

    And as far as “Anatolia being multi-ethnic” I have no idea what your underlying objective is, but I can pretty much say that you are not helping to protect Armenian culture and history, but damaging it with a narrative of history consistent with how the Turkish government wants to present history, or should I say pseudo-history.

  29. @RVDV

    Are you turkish? You have no idea about the Ottomans! The Balkan and nowadays Westturkey was the heartland of the Ottoman Turks, most of their soldiers, pasas and concurbines were of serbian-, bosnian-, albanian- turkish origin. The second language within the military was serbian after turkish for 300 years. What you are speaking about? The loss of the Balkans / Rumeli (Europe) was the greatest loss in turkish history, a traumata till today. Compared with the importance of the Balkans the Eastern borders/provinces with armenian population and the Kurds were always considered as a wall against the persians but not really as homeland.
    But if you lose all the other regions except nowadays Turkey in first world war or in previous wars, you want to keep that in hand, what is left, you understand?! I myself have serbian-turkish ancestors!

    @hagop @ yerevanian

    I followed your postings and i think that yerevanian has the proper informations, turanism is a big illusion and theory, that has no basis and hagop you measure the turanism too much importance due to armenian massacre at that time. The motives for the massacre were wealth change and the Psyche: Imagine you survived the russian genocide to the circassians around 1850 or you survived the christian genocide to the balkan turks around 1912 and now you are living in Turkey and see the orthodox armenians living in relative wealth and peace, which was not given to them by orthodox countrys around Turkey at that time. Of course it is not the fault of the armenians but armenians had to pay for the sins of orthodox countries around Turkey!

  30. Feel free to disagree with the facts as much as you wish; however, there’s just no possible way that you can change the fact that Anatolia happened to be multi-ethnic before the arrival of the Turks. At the very beginning, you attempted to establish that it was only the Armenians who had a historic homeland in Anatolia, but you failed. You then attempted to establish that it was only the Armenians and Greeks who had historic homelands in Anatolia, and again you failed. You tried to establish that the Assyrians and Kurds never had any kind of historic homeland in Anatolia, and you failed at that too. And now, you’re again foolishly attempting to establish that the presence of Armenians, Greeks, Assyrians, and Kurds in Anatolia prior to the arrival of the Turks is not the definition of multi-ethnic. That is indeed quite silly. And exactly what does reciting these facts have to do with damaging Armenian culture and history? One has absolutely nothing to do with the other. On the contrary, by having such little knowledge about Armenian culture and history, it is you who is causing damage to the culture of Armenians.

    “Better the Sultan’s turban than the Pope’s cap.” You seem to be deeply attached to this particular quote? You even proceed to suggest a connection between this quote and what transpired in Constantinople in 1453. By trying to imply that Christian Constantinople desired to come under the rule of the Muslim Ottoman Turks is indeed absurd. That’s exactly the kind of stuff they teach over in Turkish schools. And then, you follow that absurd claim with another absurd claim by stating, “By the time of the fourth crusade sent by Rome, they caused more damage to the Anatolian Christians than they did to Muslims. And yes, that involved raping, looting, pillaging, and massacring, Christian against Christian.” For your own education, it was the Muslim Ottoman Turks who caused damage to Anatolia’s Christians (Armenians, Greeks, Assyrians); it was the Muslim Ottoman Turks who raped, looted, pillaged, and massacred the Christians of Anatolia. And for your own education, it wasn’t the Christian crusaders who sacked Constantinople. It was the Muslim Ottoman Turks who sacked Constantinople, back in 1453, which enabled them to completely possess Anatolia. Once again, you still haven’t learned anything about the Crusades, just like you haven’t learned anything about the Armenian Genocide or any of the other subjects. That’s what happens when you’re not capable of reading a book.

  31. A.
    ““state security” was an excuse to implement the Genocide, as the subsequent events of the Assyrian and Greek genocides would prove, it was a false pretext.”

    B.
    “Ottoman Turk leadership’s intense paranoia of its state/national security, they really did believe that Anatolia’s Armenians were attempting to rebel against the Ottoman Empire, which of course was never the case.”

    “which of course was never the case”

    Really? “which of course was never the case”? You mean it proved to be a false pretext as stated in A?

    “Your attempt to rewrite your previously incorrect comment, once again turned out incorrect”

    I never attempted to “rewrite” what I originally wrote for one second. Only in your mind I did, because you like to conjure up phony ideas and next attempt to ascribe it to my comments so that you can “win” an argument, which as your posts show, are as phony as your tactics.

    What I stated originally still stands exactly as I wrote it, word for word. And on the contrary it is you who is now trying to change your previous comments to come closer to reality, after you read that you are starting to sound like the official explanation of Turkey, as your comment in B above is starting to agree with point A, by stating “which of course was never the case”.

    Remember, you started this argument with:
    “You are wrong in suggesting that the Ottoman Turk government’s extremely paranoid view of their state security had not been one of the reasons in committing the Armenian Genocide.”

    Read this again:
    “state security” was an excuse to implement the Genocide, as the subsequent events of the Assyrian and Greek genocides would prove, it was a false pretext.

    Most importantly, remember, you disagreed that “state security was an excuse”, which means that it was not an excuse in your view but a legitimate reason, that is your only option left in claiming that my statement was wrong. Thus you believe that the Armenians throughout the Ottoman Empire posed a threat to “State Security”.

    In stating my position, I am speaking as an Armenian, not a Turk. This means I don’t care what the “paranoid Ottoman government felt”. I stated what was reality and what came to be true. Only you are presenting your argument specifically for the purpose of opposing my view, and judging from your numerous incorrect posts, you could care less if you are right or wrong, as long as you convince your large ego that I am wrong.

    What my post explored was what ultimately proved to be true, and that is that “State Security” was used as an excuse and ultimately proved it was not a reality but a false pretext, because neither the Ottoman Empire nor the CUP had any proof that the Armenians as a whole group were plotting against Turkey, unless you believe that a million Armenian elderly, women and children posed a threat to “State Security” which is what one can imply that you meant in disagreeing that it was used as an excuse.

    And Paranoia, fear, what could be, what would be, what should be, etc all fall into the excuse-to-commit-genocide category, which is exactly the point I started with.

  32. First of all, for your own education, the Turkish government fully denies committing any kind of genocide to the Armenians. Therefore, how can it possibly give any excuse for a genocide it denies committing? Once again, your excuse turned out false.

    Is your comprehension of English so poor that you don’t understand what I stated in the following: “Due to the Ottoman Turk leadership’s intense paranoia of its state/national security, they really did believe that Anatolia’s Armenians were attempting to rebel against the Ottoman Empire, which of course was never the case.” For your own education, “which of course was never the case,” means that the Armenians never attempted to rebel against the Ottoman Empire.

    And exactly how am I trying to change the direction of my previous comments in regard to the driving force behind the Armenian Genocide? As I’ve said all along, the Ottoman Turk government’s paranoid view of Armenians constituting a major threat to the Ottoman Empire’s state security, happened to be the biggest driving force behind the Armenian Genocide. The two Armenian Genocide scholars, Peter Balakian and Taner Akcam, clearly explain all of this in their books. And for your own education, the Assyrian and Greek genocides also fall into this same category. The only difference here is that the Ottoman Turk leadership viewed the Assyrians and Greeks as a lesser threat than the Armenians.

    In regard to stating your position on the Armenian Genocide, your position is entirely based upon an extreme lack of reality, an extreme lack of knowledge, and absurd theories. And since you have an extremely huge ego, you keep repeating the same absurdity over and over.

  33. (Canazzo // August 18, 2014 at 2:56 pm //)

    {“… or you survived the christian genocide to the balkan turks around 1912”}

    You claim to be of Serbian-Turkish ancestry: it must be a special kind of Serb, since no Christian Serb would make an illogical assertion such as the alleged “….christian genocide to the balkan turks”.

    Some history for you, Turk:
    The homeland of your Turk ancestors is in Uyguristan and regions around it (East and Central Asia).
    Your Turk ancestors invaded Armenian Highlands around 1000 AD.
    If you look at a map, you should be able to see that Armenian Highlands is several thousand kilometers from Uyguristan.
    That’s like totally far, far, far, away — nomad.
    Prior to that invasion there were no Turks anywhere in Asia Minor or the Balkans.
    Your invadonomad ancestors then proceeded to invade Asia Minor and then the Balkans.

    In every country invadonomad Turks invaded, the local populations were forcibly Islamized, Turkified, or massacred.
    ‘genocide’ of Balkan Turks ? what were Turks doing in the Balkans ?
    Who was living there before, whom Turks ethnically cleansed, or massacred, or forcibly Islamized, or forcibly Turkified ?
    And took their lands.

    {“ Of course it is not the fault of the armenians but armenians had to pay for the sins of orthodox countries around Turkey!”}

    Spoken like a true denialist invadonomad Turk.
    btw: very generous of you not to blame Armenians.
    I guess by your logic, when Christians get the opportunity they should make today’s Turks pay for the sins of your Turk ancestors ?
    You know, the ones who wiped out about 4 million Christians from their own homelands ?
    Just asking, Turk.

  34. [HagopD]
    [Yerevanian]

    I have been following the vigorous exchange that you two gentlemen have been having in this thread.
    I also read [RVDV]’s contribution: he wrote it well.

    Although [Yerevanian] made many interesting arguments, overall, I have to side with [HagopD].

    • Hello Avery,

      I’m certainly glad that you side with Hagop. That’s the way it should be. And Hagop, of course, sides with you too. After all, as far back as I can remember, the two of you have always had an alliance with each other. Therefore, it makes perfect sense for the two of you to side with each other.

      On the subject of arguments, it’s not me who’s doing the arguing. It’s Hagop who’s been doing the arguing by presenting various theories which are both false and silly. The only thing I’ve been doing is presenting the facts in regard to the various subjects discussed above.

      In regard to RVDV, he/she indeed made a nice contribution to the discussion. As a matter of fact, he/she happened to come across something which I had totally missed. And this, of course, had to do with the earlier comment in which Hagop stated that land conquest was a reason behind the Armenian Genocide. This, of course, is ridiculous since the Ottoman Turks had already conquered the six Western Armenian provinces several hundred years prior to the start of the Armenian Genocide. Anyway, it was quite noble of RVDV to bring that up.

    • Yerevanian,
      I am pretty sure Avery is not agreeing because of an “alliance”, but instead because there was nothing unreasonable with what he read, so no need to create such concepts and create divisions. I don’t think most here make comments for that purpose. Avery and I may not agree on everything by 100% but I think we are both genuinely interested in our culture’s history, welfare and current events so I typically agree with what he says and I suspect you do too. If I feel you are right about something, I’ll agree. If I feel you are wrong about something I’ll disagree. It is not more complicated than that. You may have a personal vendetta but it is not relevant to me since that is not why I’m here.

    • Hagop,

      Avery did not actually say that he disagrees with me and agrees with you. What he precisely said was that he has to side with you. That sounds like an alliance.

      You’re actually wrong in suspecting that I typically agree with what Avery says. Don’t you think you’re glorifying Avery a little too much? I agree with some of the things that Avery says; however, there are actually more things that Avery says which I happen to not agree with.

      And why do you believe that I have a personal vendetta? Exactly what does this have to do with me finding your theories to be false and unreasonable?

  35. RVDV,

    You stated some facts that I don’t dispute. But your interpretation leads one to believe that “without western Armenia Turkey would not be able to exist”, which I do not buy for one second. I’m pretty sure this is what’s being taught to schoolchildren in Turkey all these years to justify all the unpunished genocides Turkey committed, now being marketed as the “Turkish war of independence”.

    In discussing the “state security” issue and the “land conquest” issue, there is somehow a blurred line here which must be addressed, and that was my initial intention in addressing Evan, because saying that it was “state security” without stressing its fraudulent nature would imply that the Armenians really were plotting against the state. It is not as simple as black and white. As the saying goes, you can’t have your cake and eat it too, in other words, either the Armenians were plotting against the state and thus it was a state security issue, or they weren’t and thus state security cannot be used as a real explanation but one that is used to justify the crime of Genocide. So which is your position?

    Also, I suspect that the term ‘vilayet’ had certain legal implications within the Ottoman Empire, so that at least to some degree, the Ottoman empire must have already recognized an Armenian autonomy. Certainly not full, but enough such that there could be legal implications and/or obligations. If this was not true, and the Ottoman Empire did not recognize these vilayets as the traditional homeland of the Armenians, then going through the trouble of identifying and next calling the provinces the ‘six Armenian vilayets’ makes no sense.

    This brings up a couple of questions. Is it thus a “state security” issue if, in the absence of any proof of an ethnic group plotting against the state, a government commits a Genocide against its own citizens in order to prevent them from having any chance of freedom in the future regardless if that group would try to secede or not?

    Or is it actually a premeditated plan in cleansing a land of its inhabitants in order to take their lands based on imperialistic, turanist ideals?

    Since I think it is the latter, that is the reason that for me the ‘land conquest’ issue cannot be dismissed so easily. Now this applies to the period 1915-1918, but also what about afterwards until 1923 when the Ottoman Empire was on its way out and a new Turkish state based entirely on the principles of pan-Turkic ideals was being established through violence and genocides?

    It’s also ironic that the entity that was ultimately the real security threat to the Ottoman Empire ended up being the CUP itself. The same people that pushed the idea of the Armenians being a security threat yet at the same time including Armenians in talks to improve conditions for them and yet at the same time being the ones that brought the Ottoman Empire to an end.

    • “now being marketed as the “Turkish war of independence”.”

      Well… it was a series of wars, and it did lead to the foundation of modern Turkey, so I’m not sure where the “marketing” comes in.

      Obviously the genocide played a role in the war of independence, Armenia would have been able to defend itself more from the Turkish nationalists if 75+ percent of its population weren’t murdered a few years earlier, but the fact remains that Wilsonian Armenia, the first republic, was born FROM the genocide (well, that and WW1), it was not destroyed directly by the genocide. If Armenia wins that war, western Armenia is not Eastern Turkey today. Turkish nationalists won the war, and the Soviet Union absorbed what remained. I don’t think it’s right or accurate to combine the Armenian genocide and the Turkish war of independence as the same thing. And I don’t like using the word genocide for many cases. Did massacres occur during the war of independence? Yes. Did widespread ethnic cleansing/population exchanges happens? Yes. Were there war crimes? Yes. But the threshold for “genocide” needs to be much higher than this. And was it ALL one sided? No. There is no two-sided genocide. Turkey and Greece fought a legitimate war. So did Turkey and Armenia in 1918-20. So did the Turkish nationalists and the Allied powers. Bad stuff happens in war, civilians die. But those things happen in all wars. Is every loser of every war going to say there was a genocide? I’d say that’s a disrespect to legitimate genocides. Losers of war suffer more than the winners, it sucks, but that’s the reality of the situation.

      “without western Armenia Turkey would not be able to exist” which I do not buy for one second.

      The question is, what is “Turkey”? To the Turkish nationalists it was Anatolia- ALL of it. I believe that for them Turkey without western Armenia would’ve been a country that was not whole. The Turkish “homeland” divided. So I think for them, no, Turkey could not have existed without western Armenia, even though it clearly could have.

      My position on “state security” is this: fear and paranoia can lead you to talk yourself into anything. I believe the CUP government believed that Armenians were plotting against the state.. My personal opinion? Well… Armenian self-determination and nationalist movements existed, and Armenians, I assume, quite naturally wanted their own state. Were they plotting with the Russians to achieve that and rise up against the Ottoman Empire? No, I don’t think so. Is wanting your own state where you aren’t ruled by a foreign power tantamount to treason? No. But if you’re looking for a reason to exterminate a group of people you can talk yourself into believing anything.

      ” If this was not true, and the Ottoman Empire did not recognize these vilayets as the traditional homeland of the Armenians, then going through the trouble of identifying and next calling the provinces the ‘six Armenian vilayets’ makes no sense.”

      The term “six Armenian vilayets” wasn’t used until the late 19th century. Until the 1867 reform, vilayets were known as eyalets. Until 1867, Sivas, Bitlis, and Mamuret-ul-Aziz/Harput (3 of the 6 Armenian provinces) didn’t even exist. As far as legal implications/some degree of autonomy, I mean the Tanizmat reforms were technically supposed to increase civil liberties and integrate non-Muslims fully into the empire, so it is possible. The term “six Armenian vilayets” could only be from 1867 on (given that 3 of the provinces and the term “vilayets” didn’t exist prior to that date), so whether the Ottomans really considered those vilayets Armenian or not, I don’t know. Maybe it was just a tactic to appease the Armenians.

      “Or is it actually a premeditated plan in cleansing a land of its inhabitants in order to take their lands based on imperialistic, turanist ideals?”

      Pan-Turkism/Turanism was a fantasy that the nationalists really bought into, so that plays a part- eliminate the Armenians, join up with the Azeris and on to central Asia. But the issue of taking their lands… By 1915 everyone knew the Ottoman Empire’s fate was sealed, win or lose the war. When the empire collapsed there would be a power vacuum and chaos, of which Armenians, and other people could use to establish their long deserved states. Perhaps there was a preemptive element here for the genocide? Let’s wipe them out before they can retake their lands?

  36. RVDV,

    You made some errors in your previous comment. To begin with, what took place between Turkey and Armenia during 1918-1920, was certainly not a legitimate war. It was a continuation of the Turks’ original 1915 plan to annihilate the entire Armenian population, both in Anatolia and then in the southern Caucasus. Following the departure of the Russian troops from the Western Armenian lands in 1917, the Turks then proceeded to seize these lands; shortly afterward, they marched over to Eastern Armenia which had recently become independent in 1918, and attempted to destroy it. Although Armenia’s tiny army fought valiantly against the enormously bigger Turkish army and even managed to win some battles, such as the historic battle of Sardarabad, numerous heavy massacres were nevertheless inflicted upon the Armenian civilians. As a matter of fact, if Armenia hadn’t joined the Soviet Russians in 1920, the entire Armenian population of Eastern Armenia would’ve been annihilated. As a result of Armenia joining the Russian Soviets in November of 1920, the Turks therefore failed in their mission of wiping out Eastern Armenia. Nevertheless, the massacres committed against the Armenian civilians of Eastern Armenia between 1918-1920, was a continuation of the Armenian Genocide which would last until September, 1922.

    Although the term, “Armenian vilayet,” had not been used before 1867, the Armenian provinces of Sivas, Bitlis, and Kharpert had actually existed long before 1867. These happen to be three of the six Armenian provinces which constitute the western part of historic Armenia. As a matter of fact, in Peter Balakian’s book, The Burning Tigris, there’s a map going all the way back to 500 BC, which shows all six of the Western Armenian provinces along with their names.

    In your previous comment, you made the assumption that the Armenians of Western Armenia probably did want their own independent state shortly before the start of the Armenian Genocide. Actually, that was not the case. At that particular time, they were not quite capable of maintaining an independent state; they were fully aware of this too. Autonomy would be the accurate term in describing what they wanted at that particular time. However, what they really wanted was for the Europeans to become the general inspectors of the Western Armenian provinces, as stipulated in the Armenian Reform Agreement of 1914, which would have finally rendered them their long overdue human rights, and as a result, would’ve ended the persistent horrible abuse they had been subjected to for so many years by the Ottoman Turkish government.

    • “Following the departure of the Russian troops from the Western Armenian lands in 1917, the Turks then proceeded to seize these lands; shortly afterward, they marched over to Eastern Armenia which had recently become independent in 1918, and attempted to destroy it”

      There’s more to the story here. The period from 1917-18 where the Ottoman Empire was poised to, but failed to destroy the newly established First Republic, was WWI. It was under the CUP leadership- who had a clear genocidal policy. After the Ottoman Empire surrendered in October 1918 the CUP and its leadership were disbanded, and most fled the country. What emerged after was the Turkish National Movement- a lot of the same names, but under different leadership: Ataturk- who didn’t enter politics until 1919. Whether there was actually a difference between the CUP and the Turkish National Movement, I would say there was, but not much. I don’t put Ataturk on the same level as Talaat pasha but Ataturk seemed to not have much of a problem taking the a very similar approach to the Armenians, though after the war he tried to distance himself from them:
      “These left-overs from the former Young Turk Party, who should have been made to account for the millions of our Christian subjects who were ruthlessly driven en masse from their homes and massacred, have been restive under the Republican rule”- quote from Ataturk.

      “Although Armenia’s tiny army fought valiantly against the enormously bigger Turkish army and even managed to win some battles, such as the historic battle of Sardarabad”

      Armenian sources estimate the strength of the Armenian forces for the battle of Sardarabad at 9 thousand men. Turkish forces were 10 thousand with a further 3 thousand Kurds. 13k vs 9k isnt an enormous difference, the battle and its significance were significant. Let’s not exaggerate.

      “the Armenian provinces of Sivas, Bitlis, and Kharpert had actually existed long before 1867”

      Well the cities, yes, they are ancient. But as political, administrative divisions in the Ottoman Empire- those three didn’t exist until 1867. Before that, with eyalets (states) these regions were under a different name. The term “Six Armenian Provinces” certainly did not exist before 1867, as provinces were established at that date, but whether the Ottomans referred to the general area as Armenia or Armenian eyalets, I don’t know. It’s possible of course.

      “At that particular time, they were not quite capable of maintaining an independent state; they were fully aware of this too.”

      Why? Why not? I’m being serious, why weren’t they capable of maintaining an independent state- assuming there would be no Ottoman/Turkish aggression?

    • RVDV,

      It seems like you’re attempting to minimize the criminality of Kemal Ataturk. Do you honestly believe that he felt bad for the millions of Christian subjects who were ruthlessly driven from their homes and then massacred? Not a chance! As a matter of fact, upon becoming the leader of the Turkish national movement following the defeat of the Ottoman Turkish Empire in November, 1918, he continued the extermination of Armenians as well as other Christians until September, 1922. In addition, he attempted to destroy Eastern Armenia, but failed due to it becoming part of the former Soviet Union.

      When you say 13k on the Turkish side as opposed to 9k on the Armenian side in regard to the battle of Sardarabad, as listed on Wikipedia, that’s still a pretty big difference. However, these figures are still incorrect. The Turks outnumbered the Armenians, two to one, in that particular battle. That’s an enormous difference! You can find the information on this battle on page 321 of Peter Balakian’s New York Times bestseller book, The Burning Tigris.

      In regard to how the Ottoman Turkish government classified the six Western Armenian provinces, that has absolutely nothing to do with the history of these particular provinces. Sivas, Bitlis, Kharpert, Erzurum, Van, and Dikranakerd, were certainly not cities. They were the names of the provinces which constituted Western Armenia. As a matter of fact, these six Armenian provinces had already existed for thousands of years before the arrival of the Turks from central Asia in 1064. If you get a hold of the book, The Burning Tigris, you’ll find a map going back to 500 BC, which shows these six Armenian provinces.

      In terms of an independent state, it would’ve been extremely difficult for Western Armenia to become independent at that particular time. Eastern Armenia, happened to be independent between 1918-1920, but yet, it ended up being a total disaster. Likewise, a fully independent state would’ve been a disaster for Western Armenia in 1914. If that had taken place, the Turks would’ve attempted to destroy it, which they nevertheless ended up doing in 1915, and would later attempt to do to Eastern Armenia. This explains the reason why Western Armenia badly needed the Europeans to come over there and protect it against Turkish aggression.

  37. FYI: Cspan.org which has book reviews on american history had some excellent reviews on books regarding American Indian tribes and their genocide. One book about the Cree in Montana (there was an Indian Deportation Act in the 1890’s and they were force marched to the Canadian border, their villages burned); there was also the Trail of Tears and the long march. One film on this channel showed a park ranger talking about Custer’s last stand in the South Dakota Custer’s park. There was a policy of genocide against the American Indians that equals what we see in the Balkans today and in Russia yesterday, as many indigenous people were genocided during Russian expansionism. Another station showed how the buffalo were killed to force the Indians to the reservations as their food supply was killed. 60 million buffalo reduced to 500; now 400,000 due to saving them. Any genocide studies program should include these books and pamphlets about the American Indians.

  38. I should add that, what I see as change, is at Custer’s Park in South Dakota, they put up a memorial to the Indians after people asked for it; it is also a cemetery for veterans of the Korean and Viet Nam wars. Little Big Horn being the last major confrontation in the Indian Wars, Wounded Knee was the site of a massacre of women and children; as well as the protest of the life of the Lakota on the reservation in 1974; today ABC7.com followed the Lakota and they still seem to be in bad shape.

  39. I am looking forward to this film, although my main interest is Cyprus Unity and Peace, I am also interested globally in all films that honour people caught in these war crimes. Is there a film which covers in a balanced way the disastrous and shameful ‘population exchange’ (yuck) between Greeks and Turks.. I think hundreds of thousands of greek speaking civilians were killed.. and also the pogroms of the remaining greeks in turkey after 1930? Also the disastrous and savage attack of the greek army on civilians on their retreat through Asia Minor?

  40. I am a Turk who lived in California for many years, befriended the Armenians there first and was blown away by the similarities in cultures. Azeris are a far cry when compared to Armenians and Turks. Unfortunately many Turks are conditioned and brainwashed by 100 years of official version taught in schoolbooks. That is why I don`t find it ironic tat a Turk can best understand and reflect the feelings of fellow Armenians. Please don`t give up hope for a permanent peace and understanding between the two similar people and almost identical cultures.

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