The Holocaust, genocide and Turkey

Recently the German Parliament passed a resolution branding the deaths of Armenians in Turkey in 1915 as genocide. Slowly but surely, all the European countries have picked up a stick to beat this “bad boy”.

There has been much discussion about the holocaust in Germany and genocide in Turkey (also about Rwanda Burundi, etc, but this has been negligible). Let us first have a look at the exact meaning of these two words. The Oxford University dictionary says that genocide is the deliberate killing of a large number of people from a particular ethnic group or nation. Holocaust has been defined as the slaughter/murder on a mass scale (like the gasification of Jews by Hitler and his cronies). If you look at the definitions, there is just a cosmetic difference. Whether you kill a human being by gun, pistol, sword, dagger, strangulation, poisoning, gasification, etc., it does not make any difference. A murder is a murder, whatever the means used.

Let us take a look at the historical archives. When the Spaniards started a cleansing campaign against non-Christians and the Jews were prosecuted in Europe, Turkey accepted them with open arms. Similarly, people from countries conquered by Turkey came to mainland Turkey for a better life. In the 17th Century, things started changing. The Industrial Revolution took place in Europe and they made great progress, both financially and militarily. The Turks (and many other Muslim nations) totally ignored this transition and paid a heavy price for it. Turkey slowly but surely lost most of the territories it had conquered. During the First World War, young Turks – a strong force – joined Germany and fought against the allies. This was a most critical period in Turkish history. It was only Kamal Ataturk, Ismet Inono and their brave colleagues who managed to save their country against tremendous odds.

While the West was industrialising and becoming strong due to military hardware, Muslim rulers were building and expanding harems, building palaces and mosques and laying out parks. The result was obvious. At one time the rulers of China, England, France, Germany, Hungary, etc. used to send precious gifts to the rulers of Turkey (Topkapi Museum is full of evidence of this), but now Turkey was being called the sick man of Europe and its enemies were only waiting for an opportunity to subjugate it. When young Turks, under Mustafa Kamal, joined Germany in the First World War, the Europeans devised a plan to occupy Gallipoli in order to have access to the Black Sea to connect with Russia and to help them. The main object was to occupy Constantinople (Istanbul). A huge army and a fleet was put together by Britain, France, India, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, etc. and they planned a surprise attack on Gallipoli. However, Kamal Ataturk had erected powerful guns and the Turks and loyal Arab armies not only repulsed the attack but inflicted a loss of almost 27,000 French and 115,000 British and dominion troops. In short, the Turks decimated them. Of those killed and/or injured, almost 74,000 were British and Irish. Turkish and Arab casualties were also very high.

The British soon found a traitor and collaborator in Sharif of Mecca. The British Colonel, Lawrence, together with some troops, joined the Arabs and destroyed the whole Turkish Arabian Empire. They killed thousands of Turks in Mecca and Madina. In return, the Arabs had Israel foisted on them and faced disgrace. Israel is now a cancer in the Arab body and meanwhile the West has managed to destroy Iraq, Libya and Syria and disarmed Iran, all to protect Israel. The Egyptians have been forced to become protectors of Israel.

When the Turks were fighting the Allied Forces and Russia, a large number of Armenians (there were about 2 million present in Turkey enjoying good lives) started a guerilla war against the Turks, hurting them from within while at the same time joining hands with the Russians and the Allies. They even occupied the important city of Van near the Syrian border (the town where Malik Zaheer Baybars had inflicted a devastating defeat on the Mongols). When the Turks survived the Western attacks, they made sure to deal with the traitors. History is full of such occurrences. All collaborators and saboteurs have always been dealt with by meting out severe punishments. We have recent examples of this after World War II.

Now, after almost 100 years, Turkish actions are being branded as genocide. The Western countries have totally forgotten the services of the Turks (i.e. the wars in Korea, allowing its land to be used for anti-Russian activities during the Cold War, joining Nato, etc.)

Let us look at some other cases. During Hitler’s rule, the Germans gassed large numbers of innocent Jews, gypsies, etc. and were responsible for murdering more than 30 million other people. Hundreds of thousands of local Indians were murdered in the Americas. Hundreds of thousands Chinese were killed by the Japanese. Hundreds of thousands of Africans and Indians were killed by the British. The Serbs murdered almost 300,000 Bosnians. The US killed countless Japanese by nuclear weapons and incendiary bombs. Millions of Iraqis, Libyans, Afghans and Syrians were killed by the Western countries. The list is long and gruesome, yet these cases are totally ignored.

The case against Turkey seems but the long arm of the Crusades. They are Muslims and treated as such by the West. It is convenient for them to forget their own heinous crimes but point their finger at Turkey. No matter what name you give it or with what weapon it is done, taking a human life is murder – plain and simple.