The Significance of the Armenian Genocide after Ninety Years

The Significance of the Armenian Genocide after Ninety Years Roger W. Smith Each genocide provides a foundation for subsequent horrors. Each historical misrepresentation of efforts to exterminate a particular ethnic group increases the likelihood that such efforts will be undertaken again in another time and place. That over one million Armenian men, women, and children could have been subjected to genocide by the Young Turk government in 1915 and that the world for many years would not remember is profoundly disturbing. Not to remember the suffering of the victims is, above all, a failure of humanity and compassion on our part—a lack of respect and care for fellow humans who have fallen victim to the ultimate outrage against justice, the death of a people. We do not ordinarily think of the dead as having rights, but there is at least one they possess: the right to have the world ‘‘hear and learn the truth about the circumstances of their death.’’1 This is the one right that, ninety years later, can still be restored to them, and surely we can do no less. But genocide is not only a crime against a particular people; it is also a crime against humankind. Its inherent potential is to distort and alter the very meaning of ‘‘humankind,’’ erasing for all time particular biological and cultural possibilities. Furthermore, for a particular group to claim for itself a right to determine what groups are, in effect, human, possessing the right to life, is a threat to the existence of all other humans. In a period in which genocide has claimed an enormous number of victims, with no end to the carnage in sight, the prevention of future acts of genocide becomes a task for all human beings and governments throughout the world. Yet without remembrance of past examples of genocide, there will be no sense of urgency in the present, no perceived need to prevent future atrocities. Further, we will cut ourselves off from the knowledge of the causes and sequences of genocide, knowledge that might help prevent other peoples from being subjected to this crime against humanity. The Armenian Genocide is particularly instructive in that it is the prototype for much of the genocide in the twentieth century and the new millennium. However, when governments look the other way or actively cover up genocide out of short-term self-interest, a signal is sent to would-be perpetrators that they can resolve political and social issues through massive destruction without danger of outside intervention and, through a continual denial of the atrocities, can expect the world to forget these events entirely. Not remembering is not a neutral act—not to remember is to side with the executioners of whole groups and peoples. The Armenian Genocide, in fact, illuminates with special clarity the dangers inherent in the political manipulation of truth through distortion, denial, intimidation, and economic blackmail. In no other instance has a government gone to such extreme lengths to deny that a massive genocide took place. That democratic governments (the United States and Israel) have supported Turkey in that effort raises significant Roger W. Smith, ‘‘The Significance of the Armenian Genocide after Ninety Years.’’ Genocide Studies and Prevention 1, 2 (September 2006): i–iv. ß 2006 Genocide Studies and Prevention. questions about governmental accountability and the role of citizenship in a world in which truth increasingly comes in two forms—‘‘official’’ and ‘‘alleged.’’ Finally, by helping us to recognize genocide for the radical evil it is, the Armenian example makes possible a transformation of consciousness, one that rejects every manifestation of genocide, including denial, as an instrument of state policy. Rulers in an earlier age boasted of their annihilation of whole peoples and erected monuments to commemorate their deeds. More recently, however, denial of genocide has become the universal strategy of perpetrators. Those who initiate, or otherwise participate in, genocide typically deny that the events took place, that they bear any responsibility for the destruction, or that the term ‘‘genocide’’ is applicable to what occurred. Denial, unchecked, turns politically- imposed death into a ‘‘non-event’’: in place of words of recognition, indignation, and compassion, there is, with time, only silence. But denial can...