The End of the Ottomans by Hans-Lukas Kieser;Margaret Lavinia Anderson;Seyhan Bayraktar;Thomas Schmutz;

Author:Hans-Lukas Kieser;Margaret Lavinia Anderson;Seyhan Bayraktar;Thomas Schmutz;
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781786725981
Publisher: Bloomsbury UK
Published: 2019-04-17T16:00:00+00:00

… a grand comedy was staged. The Turks solemnly proclaimed a jihad against four belligerent states, Russia, France, Great Britain and Serbia. The first to laugh at this farce are the Turks themselves … In my opinion, the people of the city took no part in this demonstration … [which ended in] attacks on commercial firms belonging to a number of enemy powers and peaked in the demolition of the Tokatlians’ hotels.

The police, Zohrab also observed, played ‘their traditional role, and this time smoothed the way for the work of the vandals’. ‘Poor [Migirdic] Tokatlian,’ he added, ‘who has for five years been selflessly serving all the Ittihad’s members, great and small’, ‘all of whom had been his honored guests’, was punished despite his pains.73

In the months after Turkey’s entry into the war at the end of October 1914, Zohrab frequently encountered people in Young Turk circles who, like Cavid Bey, opposed the war. And now that an implacable system of censorship had been put in place, Cavid became an invaluable source of information.74 Thus, Cavid reported on a meeting on 4 December 1914, convened in his home, at which those attending were from an ‘important Turkish milieu’. The discussion revolved around the Germans’ policy and the Ittihadists’ criticisms of the ARF, which they accused of organizing groups of Armenian volunteers in the Caucasus. Rumours of pillage and massacre in the Erzerum region were also brought up.75 On 17 December, Zohrab met with Nami Bey, Grand Vizier Said Halim’s son-in-law, as well as with Cavid, who revealed that, immediately after the outbreak of hostilities in Europe, the Turkish cabinet had pledged to participate in the war on the German side; the Christian ministers and even certain Muslims who had opposed the Turkish–German alliance had not been invited to these cabinet meetings. According to Cavid, it was Said Halim, Talaat, Enver and Halil (Menteşe) who had put the final touches on the agreement with the Germans. As for Turkey’s entry, that was decided in the course of a meeting of ‘part’ of the Council of Ministers, which Halil and certain members of the Ittihad’s Central Committee also attended. It was Talaat, however, in the view of the former finance minister, who was ‘indispensable to the proper functioning of the Committee’. Without him, its members would tear each other to shreds. Talaat kept an eye on everything; although mild-mannered, he was the most powerful of all.76

As for the Ottoman Armenian population, the situation in which it now found itself was depicted in an anecdote told by Zohrab. A middle-class Armenian came to see Vartkes to tell him about his apprehensions and ask for advice. Vartkes replied that nothing could be easier; he had a very good solution that would cost no more than five kurus: ‘Keep a white tülbend in your pocket. As soon as the Turks start the massacre, pull it out and wrap it around your fez to make a turban. Then declare you’re a Muslim. No one will harm a hair of your head.

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