"Ottomans and Armenians: A Study in Counterinsurgency " Topic
5 Posts
All members in good standing are free to post here. Opinions expressed here are solely those of the posters, and have not been cleared with nor are they endorsed by The Miniatures Page.
Please don't call someone a Nazi unless they really are a Nazi.
For more information, see the TMP FAQ.
Back to the Early 20th Century Media Message Board
Areas of InterestWorld War One
Featured Hobby News Article
Featured Link
Featured Profile Article
Featured Book Review
Featured Movie Review
|
Tango01 | 22 Sep 2014 9:30 p.m. PST |
"It is rare that a military historical study simultaneously informs professional debate and viscerally angers segments of the general audience, but Edward Erickson's Ottomans and Armenians seems destined to do just that. The book provides valuable insights on the interrelationship of insurgency, counter-insurgency, atrocity, and conventional war. Military officers and general readers will find in Erickson's work a nuanced discussion of the dilemmas and shortcomings of counterinsurgency as a mode of warfare. They may also be surprised at the complexity of the situation faced by Ottoman armies in the east in 1915. This is a welcome contribution, given the still unsettled debate on counterinsurgency in the wake of drawdowns in Iraq and Afghanistan and the still contentious history surrounding the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire. The latter issue grants the book policy relevance beyond what one finds in most recent texts on counterinsurgency. This book can help stimulate and inform a higher level political debate that is certain to intensify over the coming year: whether the United States should formally recognize the killings of Armenians in eastern Anatolia during the First World War as genocide, in the centennial year of 1915. Relatively little has been published in English specifically about the Ottoman eastern fronts. Past authors have either covered the charges of genocide without detailed treatment of military considerations (such as Hovannisian), or focused on conventional military operations with little on the deportations (such as Allen and Muratoff). Erickson ignores neither Ottoman strategists nor the Armenian deportees; instead, he argues that the desperation of the former tragically led to the annihilation of the latter. He argues that the Ottoman political and military leadership did not initiate the brutal campaign of Armenian deportations in the Ottoman east in order to destroy a people, but did so in response to serious strategic threats to vulnerable lines of communication and to incitement of Armenian rebellion by the Entente powers. His conclusions are the result of his time studying Ottoman archival materials, providing a logical, evidence-based perspective about Ottoman motives and plans that have been viewed previously through polemical or conjectural perspectives. Under international law, to prove genocide one must have accurate knowledge of the mindset of the killers toward the victims: they must have intended to destroy a people. To date, the lack of an examination of Ottoman perspectives has been a key gap in our historical understanding of the period. Erickson is to be commended for moving the debate forward on this ground. Who might find Erickson's work outrageous? Armenian civil society groups may condemn the book. Such groups frequently assert that assessing Ottoman motives amounts to justification of Ottoman war crimes or minimization of the enormity of Armenian suffering. Scholars of genocide, too, may take umbrage – a good number of them consider the Armenian genocide to be beyond historical debate. Unfortunately, many studies of the Armenian case dismiss contrary arguments or evidence as not worth examining, and frequently conflate presentation of such evidence with denial of an established moral and material fact (Armenian Weekly, Balakian, Smith et al). This approach blurs the important distinction between denying that certain events occurred and debating how to characterize them. More importantly, it attacks the act of presenting a contrary argument as immoral in and of itself. Readers and researchers should be sensitive when their topics are potentially inflammatory or hurtful to other people. At the same time, though, readers should be suspicious of those seeking to shut down debate on controversial topics, especially when documentary evidence and historical argument have not been exhausted. With that in mind, Erickson's study merits a balanced read…" Full review here link Amicalement Armand |
Legion 4 | 23 Sep 2014 6:28 a.m. PST |
The genocide of Armenians by the Turks is another sad case of moslems commiting crimes against humanity, etc. against non-moslems … link Some things never change … it seems … |
Tango01 | 23 Sep 2014 10:40 a.m. PST |
Agree my friend. Amicalement Armand |
mghFond | 23 Sep 2014 9:14 p.m. PST |
Years ago I picked up a ratty old book first printed in 1920 something – I wish I could recall the author or title but I can't, I should try and find it again in my attic – it was a fascinating account of a Venezuelan adventurer who tried to first join the Belgian army at the outbreak of WW1 but was not allowed to. So then he went and joined the Turkish army as an officer. He ended up fighting Russians in 1914 with the Turks and part of the book involves him commanding Turk troops against Armenian rebels. Now thru it all he is remarkably even handed in his comments – he hardly excuses the Turks on many things. But he mentioned how the Russian encouraged the Armenians to rise in Turkish territory, they did and massacred many Muslim villages when things were initially going their way. Later the Turks and Kurds etc came down on them and got their revenge. He did not think any one side was solely to blame but all sides were ruthless and convinced God was on their side. Finally he had to flee the Turk army when some officers decided they did not like him and were determined to charge him with false accusations and probably execute him. Anyhow really fascinating guy and quite the read. |
Legion 4 | 24 Sep 2014 12:15 p.m. PST |
|
|