Columbus Day Woes and the Annihilation of the Armenians

 Armenian Genocide, What Does it Mean?

 

Armen & parents

There is plenty on my blog here about my family and their history.  Plenty about my mother and both sets of grandparents escaping to America.  About families and friends lost.  About homes, businesses, and lands lost.  About never being able to return again.  The land of milk and honey violently ripped out of their hands by their oppressors.  

Once the Armenians were expelled from their ancient lands, the victors went to work changing names and history.  They took over their homes and divided up the spoils among themselves.  Their beautiful churches were torn apart so they could use the stones for their own needs. The propaganda machine went into beast mode and full speed ahead on the events, blaming the Armenians for fighting back, for wanting a better life, for not wanting to be sent into the desert of Syria (for their own good), only to die of thirst and starvation.  It's all their fault, the victors said.  Don't pay any attention to witness accounts of young women being hanged naked in the town square.  Of father's taken from their homes never to be seen or heard from again.  Just in case they might fight against us, they said. They might be subversives that we must restrain and send to their deaths in open graves.  Or the best and most comical one, "People die in wars."  Sure, all those women and children lying in the sands of the Deir Ez-Zor [Deir_ez-Zor_camps] desert were no doubt ready to take down the Ottoman Turks with their bare hands.  I challenge anyone to go to that desert and sift through the sands.  The bones are still there, en masse, including my great grandparents seen in the picture above.

Those Armenians were troublesome, always asking for autonomy and to be treated fairly, not as second class citizens.  And they couldn't stop excelling as savvy businessmen and sending their children to school, women included!  What right do they have to complain, don't they know we came in as invaders and conquered them?  We subjugated them and they need to act accordingly.

Finally, the "bloody" Sultan had enough and began a series of massacres in their own ancient homeland of Eastern Turkey.  100,000 Armenians killed here, another 200,000 killed there, totaling nearly 300,000 and producing 50,000 orphans.  My own grandmother was born during one of the Sultan's tirades and massacres.  She tells the story of how when she was born they couldn't find her father. He was in hiding.  Hamidian Massacres

Those Armenians think they have a right to fight back against these massacres.  We'll show them.  And that's exactly what they did.  They whipped up their religious students following their creed of conquering by the sword.  Many women and children were forced into harems and given as gifts to Turkish and Kurdish families after the parents were killed.  Both sisters of my grandmother suffered this fate.  One ran away, but the other was forced to marry at only 10 years old. 

And so the stage is set.  The world watched once before as the first genocide of the 20th century played out in front of their eyes.  There was that brand spanking new railroad going in with Germany which needed it for the war and to supply oil and supplies for their war effort.  Yes, indeed, it was a war and people were dying and the Armenians were smack dab in the way of that railroad so important to their world domination.https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/europe/de-berlin-baghdad-3.htm

Again, Armenia is in the way of these super powers designs.  The world won't care, just take them out, they're too small to survive our mighty armies.  And all the Armenians around the world suffer yet again.  If you see them protesting in the streets, if you see them crying for their homeland around the world, this is why.  Because once again our brothers and sisters are being eliminated. The Republic of Artsakh is part of these ancient lands that is to this day inhabited by Armenians.  Artsakh 

And again, it is in the way of an oil pipeline.  

 

Baku Pipeline

World Denial and Columbus Day

It hurts, as a descendant, it hurts and it hurts bad.  But what hurts even more is the denial, it's the rewriting of history, it's blaming the victim, it's the hatred that continues unabated.  World powers that should know better, ours included, fall into the trap of denial to save their own skin.  After all, Armenia is just a little tiny country of not much significance.  What use are they on the world power stage, they must wonder.  Indeed, one of the last remaining Christian nations in that area.  The rest having been conquered by the sword.

Every Columbus Day I hear from my native American friends about the horrors of colonialism and how this must all change. I certainly sympathize with their plight, I get it.  But there's something they have that I don't get to have and that is validation.  The world knows and the government admits to the atrocities.  I don't get to have that. I don't get to hear the world say, "that was wrong and it shouldn't have happened and here's your compensation."  Every Columbus Day I go though the same thing, I don't want to hear the complaints, I don't want to hear about the oppression.  Maybe it's wrong of me, but it's real.  I know the government gives out money and special services to atone for the mistakes of the past.  I don't get to have that and I don't even get recognition.  My grandmother's tears flowed remembering the genocide and the children she lost to starvation.  Adding insult to injury, in 1919, they were told they could return to their homes but their homes had been taken over by the local population, never to be given back, all their things gone.  And then, they were escorted out once again, this time my mother as a tiny toddler having been born amidst the war torn ruins.

Above photograph of Armenians living in a cave in 1919 after returning home to find their homes occupied.  My mother and grandmother spoke about living in this cave. They fought valiantly to be able to stay but all the super powers left them and Atatürk forces rode in and made them leave yet again.

My mother and my grandparents after leaving their home of Aintab for Syria.

I tell their story over and over again.  I feel I cannot tell it enough.  If I don't, we will forget and I fear the worst.

Please call your congressperson and demand they protect this country and this ancient people.  I would thank you forever.