During the Third Reich, Adolph Hitler, when plotting the murder of the Jewish people of his empire, is reported to have said,
"After all, who remembers the Armenians?"
Today, about 90 years later, there is still debate over whether or not the Turks committed genocide against the Armenian people during World War I.
But this should not be a topic for debate because it, as did the Holocaust, actually happened. My father wrote a short story about a barber who, a refugee from the Armenian genocide, told of his harrowing escape from the Turks and the horrific things the Turks would do to the Armenians--only because they were Armenians. The Armenians were forcibly marched by the Turks through deserts where they were denied food and water, before they either died from hunger, thirst, the heat, and exhaustion, or were murdered. The Turks would rape the women and girls before killing them.
According to an Associated Press article,
Turkish and American officials have been pressing lawmakers to reject a measure next week that would declare the World War I-era killings of Armenians a genocide.
On Friday, the issue reached the highest levels as President Bush and Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan talked by telephone about their opposition to the legislation, which is to go before the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Wednesday
.
The shocking thing about this is how Turkey has so far managed to foil all attempts in Congress to declare that genocide had been committed against the Armenians. So much as I'd like to say it's just the Bush Administration because it has been wrong on so many other issues, it isn't. The Turks have for decades successfully overhyped their strategic value to the United States in order to prevent any such bill's passage.
Both sides have been lobbying intensely, and the Turks have been threatening dire consequences if the bill passes.
Per the AP article,
After France voted last year to make denial of Armenian genocide a crime, the Turkish government ended military ties.
France obviously gets it.
Congress needs to stand up to Bush and the Turks and pass this legislation by an overwhelming margin. If the Turks don't like us anymore after we've officially recognized that their killings of Armenians were genocide, maybe we don't really need them as our friends.
Call or e-mail your member of Congress today.