As congress enters legislation to pass a bill deeming the Turkish massacre and expulsion of thousands of Armenians residing within their country between 1915-1917 a genocidal attempt, President Bush has spoken out against it. Citing a potential if not probable strain between U.S. and Turkish relations, Bush has urged a democratic majority not to pass the bill. With the U.S.'s Iraqi war operations being largely coordinated and executed through military bases in Turkey, a bill like this would most certainly jeopardize the U.S.'s position and planning pertaining to the war.
Turkish President Abdullah Gul admonished the "serious problems that will emerge in bilateral relations if the bill is adopted". The possibly of air-space restictions as well as a break in cooperation have surfaced, likely making any military operations the U.S. carries out from Turkey an impossibility. The relationship between the U.S. and Turkey has already been a difficult one with the presence of the Iraq war fueling attacks to Turkey's southern region by Kurdish separatist group PPK (Kurdistan Worker's Party). Many Turkish peoples have already openly protested the involvement in the Iraq war and the problems it has brought to their country.
Turkey has already denied that a genocide was ever planned and that the deaths of the many Armenians came about through conflicts linked to World War I. With that said, isn't it time for Turkey to finally take the blame for the the murder, rape, and pillaging that took place during the three year period? The extermination of Armenians by Ottoman Turks is eerily reminiscent of Milosevic's attempt to ethnically clense Serbia and should carry the same weight when discussed, yet this moment in history is largely forgotten and dismissed in Western education and has for many years been completly denied by Turkey as an attempt at extermination by the Ottoman Turks. Shouldn't the arguement end with a renewed understanding of the events and not a strain of relations between those discussing?
The people of the country have begun to accept the blame over the past few decades, why shouldn't the government? I understand the issues within the country between its powerful military and the many non-secular political parties involved in parliament but I think that currently in Turkey, a new leaf needs to be turned and accepting blame for your country's actions is a neccessary step to forging a stronger government and a more unified people. At this point, unfortunately, the self-conciousness of the Turkish government has grown more paranoid and it has become even more offensible to slander "Turkisness" and make statements deemed "untrue" about its history. Hopefully an acception into the E.U. would ease all of these tensions but I remain skeptical. At this point, with Turkey's stance on trade with Cyprus and relationship with Greece, I am not even sure that talks will resume for their E.U. bid for some time. The movement to have a popular democratic vote can only help, but how much?
Should the U.S. continue with its legislation or honor Bush's warning of potential disaster?
Will Turkey ever take blame as a government?
Will policies and positions change that much if Turkey is accepted into the E.U.?
Will Turkey even get accepted in the next ten years?
Turkish President Abdullah Gul admonished the "serious problems that will emerge in bilateral relations if the bill is adopted". The possibly of air-space restictions as well as a break in cooperation have surfaced, likely making any military operations the U.S. carries out from Turkey an impossibility. The relationship between the U.S. and Turkey has already been a difficult one with the presence of the Iraq war fueling attacks to Turkey's southern region by Kurdish separatist group PPK (Kurdistan Worker's Party). Many Turkish peoples have already openly protested the involvement in the Iraq war and the problems it has brought to their country.
Turkey has already denied that a genocide was ever planned and that the deaths of the many Armenians came about through conflicts linked to World War I. With that said, isn't it time for Turkey to finally take the blame for the the murder, rape, and pillaging that took place during the three year period? The extermination of Armenians by Ottoman Turks is eerily reminiscent of Milosevic's attempt to ethnically clense Serbia and should carry the same weight when discussed, yet this moment in history is largely forgotten and dismissed in Western education and has for many years been completly denied by Turkey as an attempt at extermination by the Ottoman Turks. Shouldn't the arguement end with a renewed understanding of the events and not a strain of relations between those discussing?
The people of the country have begun to accept the blame over the past few decades, why shouldn't the government? I understand the issues within the country between its powerful military and the many non-secular political parties involved in parliament but I think that currently in Turkey, a new leaf needs to be turned and accepting blame for your country's actions is a neccessary step to forging a stronger government and a more unified people. At this point, unfortunately, the self-conciousness of the Turkish government has grown more paranoid and it has become even more offensible to slander "Turkisness" and make statements deemed "untrue" about its history. Hopefully an acception into the E.U. would ease all of these tensions but I remain skeptical. At this point, with Turkey's stance on trade with Cyprus and relationship with Greece, I am not even sure that talks will resume for their E.U. bid for some time. The movement to have a popular democratic vote can only help, but how much?
Should the U.S. continue with its legislation or honor Bush's warning of potential disaster?
Will Turkey ever take blame as a government?
Will policies and positions change that much if Turkey is accepted into the E.U.?
Will Turkey even get accepted in the next ten years?
11 comments:
where
did you find this?
I want to say that economic incentives should console any bruised Turkish-Government egos, should the bill come to fruition.
The Armenian genocide is a problem primarily becuase if the turkish gov't admits to it, they admit that their founding father, Ataturk, presided knowingly over it. This would be like Americans being forced to admit that George Washington had set out to systematically massacre all the Native Americans. The Turkish government sees this resolution as an affront to thier national pride and mythology.
But were Turkey to admit to the genocide, I don't think there would be a huge fuss made. The EU, in light of some its members past indiscretions involving genocides, doesn't see historical wrongdoing as a barrier to entry. Only a mild apology is necessary for a country to be allowed entry (perhaps not even this is neccessary, as Turkey may gain entry without acknowledging the Armenian massacre).
Fun Fact: Did you know that much of the Armenian massacre was perpetrated by Kurds on horseback funded by the Turkish government?
Also, the post says, "The movement to have a popular democratic vote can only help, but how much?",when Turkey has a long tradition of democratically elected leaders (albeit only secular leaders vetted by the army).
Check the facts before you hate on Mustafa Kamal Ataturk's secular democracy, son.
Although the Armenian genocide should be admitted by the Turkish governement, or at the very least, the mention of it should be decriminalized, I find it somewhat troubling that the American government feels the need to pass resolutions on it at this point in time. Firstly, the US needs cooperation from Turkey for help in Iraq, and this is foolish timing for this resolution. the moral grandstanding of congress also feels disingenuous. This, along with the resolution against Japan for its use of comfort women, the motion for the censure of moveon.org, and myriad other calls for censure against any mild piece of political stupidity, seems like the kind of posturing usually reserved for cable news, where everyone wants to appear to more outraged than the next to further their own appearance of piety. i feel like congress should be less involved in posturing, and more in actually participating in the governance of the country.
Every post deserves a corresponding picture. Dissertations are lame.
With regards to "The movement to have a popular democratic vote can only help, but how much?",this was meant to point out that as of this year, the Turkish parliament passed a bill to elect the president based on popular citizen vote, democratically, if a deadlock in elections takes place. Previously you can note that it was election by legislators for decades which most recently wound up creating stalemates during election periods, thus the need for change (check your facts SON).
As for America's involvement, I think everyone that has commented thus far are right. The US government cannot afford to make this mistake and certainly doom their current operation in Iraq. The US stance on attrocities or "crimes against humanity" in the past has been confusing. The current bill to cry genocide has been backed by a democrat majority that has been foolishly urging Bush to pull out of Iraq as soon as possible. In that light, I think the choice to pass this bill makes sense. A political strategy like this can dismantle past Republican plans without needing approval by Bush. The problem that I have with this is that an exodus from Iraq will make the government in place vulnerable to collapse. Also budgeting that could have gone elsewhere (health care, education) will be wasted moving our base of operations from Turkey elsewhere with, most likely, the need for a further budget increase into military operations.
And to the anonymous ass-hole (Jimmy), picture books are for kids.
SEE!? this is why i say no anonymous.
AH, shudder!
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