An anniversary we shouldn't forget

It’s been a grim week of anniversaries.

Tuesday marked the 19th anniversary of the disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, an event which will echo for years as new cases of radiation-related cancer are reported in the Ukraine and Belarus.

One year ago Thursday, the dreadful news broke about shameful behavior at Abu Ghraib prison, startling and troubling millions of Americans.

But the grimmest of these anniversaries was last Sunday.

That date — April 24 — is the one used to commemorate the beginning of the Armenian genocide, which was launched 90 years ago.

Haven’t heard of the Armenian genocide? You’re not alone.

Though 1.5 million people lost their lives over a period of two to three years, most folks today are unaware it happened.

In part, that’s because the Turkish government used World War I as cover for its atrocities. And, in part, it’s because the present Turkish government can’t bring itself to admit what happened back in 1915 to 1917.

There’s an oft-repeated story — probably apocryphal — that when Hitler launched the extermination of Jews in Germany and German-controlled lands, he justified his actions with the comment, “Who today remembers the Armenians?”

One genocide gave birth to another.

To understand the Armenian genocide, you have to brush up on a little history.

During World War I, Turkey — led by Enver Pasha and the Young Turks, who had shoved aside the old leaders of the Ottoman Empire — sided with Germany and the Axis. In fact, German officers directed large parts of the Turkish army.

Though the Christian Armenians and the Muslim Turks had lived in relative harmony for generations, tensions began to arise in the 1890s, when — for political reasons — it was useful for the government to have a scapegoat. Just as the czar used pogroms against the Jews as a way of controlling unrest in Russia, the Young Turks used violence against Armenians.

But in 1915, that violence became much more systematic; and by the end of World War I, full-scale genocide was under way against the Armenian residents of western Turkey.

Yet today — while another genocide is going on in Darfur — the world is largely ignorant of the 20th century’s first bloodbath.

Ninety years later, Turkey still refuses to acknowledge that it happened, despite mountains of scholarship and historical records, despite the truth.

This month, Germany — the country’s old ally from that dark period — called on Turkey to admit the past as a first step toward reconciliation.

It would also be a first step toward proving Hitler wrong. — J.R.[[In-content Ad]]