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Death and Exile: The Ethnic Cleansing of Ottoman Muslims, 1821-1922

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In 1800, a vast Muslim Land existed in Anatolia, the Balkans. and southern Russia. It was not only a land in which Muslims ruled, but a land in which Muslims were the majority or, in much of the Balkans and part of the Caucasus, a sizeable minority. It included the Crimea and its hinterlands, most of the Caucasus region, eastern as well as western Anatolia, and southeastern Europe from Albania and Bosnia to the Black Sea, almost all of which was within the Ottoman Empire. Attached to it geographically were regions in Romania and southern Russia in which Muslims were a plurality among different peoples. By 1923, only Anatolia, eastern Thrace, and a section of the southeastern Caucasus remained to the Muslim land. The Balkan Muslims were largely gone, dead or forced to migrate, the remainder living in pockets of settlement in Greece, Bulgaria, and Yugoslavia. The same fate had overcome the Muslims of the Crimea, the northern Caucasus, and Russian Armenia - they were simply gone. Millions of Muslims, most of them Turks, had died; millions more had fled to what is today Turkey. Between 1821 and 1922, more than five million Muslims were driven from their lands. Five and one-half million Muslims died, some of them killed in wars, others perishing as refugees from starvation and disease. Much of the history of the Balkans, Anatolia, and the Caucasus cannot properly be understood without consideration of the Muslim refugees and the Muslim dead. This is particularly true of the history of nationalism and imperialism. The contemporary map of the Balkans and the southern Caucasus displays countries with fairly homogenous populations, countries that were created in the wars and revolutions that separated them from the Ottoman Empire. Their ethnic and religious unity was accomplished through the expulsion of their Muslim population. In other words, the new states were founded on the suffering of their departed inhabitants. Similarly, Russian imperialism, still too often portrayed as the "civilizing" march of European culture, brought with it the deaths of millions of Circassians, Abhazians, Laz, and Turks. Nationalism and imperialism appear in a much worse light when their victims take the stage.

The Muslim loss is an important part of the history of the Turks. It was they who most felt the consequences of nationalism and imperialism. At a time when the Ottoman Empire was struggling to reform itself and survive as a modern state, it was first forced to drain its limited resources to defend its people from slaughter by its enemies, then to try to care for the refugees who streamed into the empire when those enemies triumphed. After the Ottoman Empire was destroyed in World War I, the Turks of what today is Turkey faced the same problems - invasion, refugees. and mortality. The Turks survived, but their nation was greatly affected by the events of the past century. The new Turkish Republic was a nation of immigrants whose citizens came from Bulgaria, Greece, Yugoslavia. Armenia, Georgia, Russia, Ukraine, and elsewhere. Like the Ottoman Empire before it, Turkey faced all the difficulties of integrating an immigrant population and coping with massive wartime destruction while it was trying to modernize and survive. The challenges of that struggle shaped the character of the Turkish Republic.

Despite the historical importance of Muslim losses, it is not to be found in textbooks. Textbooks and histories that describe massacres of Bulgarians. Armenians, and Greeks have not mentioned corresponding massacres of Turks.

The exile and mortality of the Muslims is not known. This goes against modern practice in other areas of history. It has rightly become unthinkable today to write of American expansion without consideration of the brutality shown to Native Americans. The carnage of the Thirty Years' War must be a part of any history of
religious change in Europe. Historians cannot write of imperialism without mention of slaughter of Africans in the Congo or of Chinese in the Opium Wars. Yet, in the West, the history of the suffering of the Balkan, Caucasian. and Anatolian Muslims has never been written or understood. The history of the Balkans, the Caucasus, and Anatolia has been written without mention of one of its main protagonists, the Muslim population. The "traditional" view of the history of the Balkans, the Caucasus, and Anatolia is less than complete, if not misleading, because the histories of the Ottoman minority groups are taken out of context. A major part of that context is the suffering of Muslims, which took place in the same regions and at the same time as the sufferings of Christians, and often transcended them. The few who have attempted to alter the traditional view have been derided as "revisionists "as if revision were an academic sin and contextual historical accuracy irrelevant. In fact, revising one-sided history and changing deficient traditional wisdom is the business of the historian, and in few areas of history is revision so needed as in the history of the Ottoman peoples. The history that results from the process of revision is an unsettling one, for it tells the story of Turks as victims, and this is not the role in which they are usually cast. It does not present the traditional image of the Turk as victimizer, never victim, that has continued in the histories of America and Europe long after it should have been discarded with other artifacts of nineteenth-century racism.

I am Greek but my origin is Armenian.
I took place in a discussion via internet about the Armenian Genocide in a Turkish Forum. This book is the bible of Denialists. McCarthry tries to put the events of 1915 in a context in order to justify them. I think McCarthy says that the Armenian deads were 200.000 and the Turks deads commited by Armenians were 600.000. The Armenians were traitors who pushed Turks out of Anatolia etc.

If you want to make an informal statistical research about the events of 1915 and who made Genocide, ask a Turk and an Armenian about how did their ancestors die. One clever Armenian made it in the Turkish forum. Almost all the Armenians had victims from their family, and only one Turk declared the same. If you are a denialist read this book. If you want to learn more about the events of 1915 read some other Turks (or Turkish origin) Historians. I recommend you Taner Acsam, Halil Berktay and Fekrit Adanir for starting. They are Turks but they dont agree with Turkish national myths.

Finally a book that brings some objectivity to events that were until recently, just accepted as "genocide" because of the lack of anyone to challenge the assertions or rigorous research that would have made it possible to present credible evidence of a Turkish Holocaust. I am a history PhD and teach at a university. I think this is one of the best researched, yet concise publications out there on the topic. It should be (and it is for my students) required reading for university level history students serious about examining facts in their search for the truth.

Finally a comprehensive account of the history of conflict between Armenians and the Ottoman state that is not written by a pseudo-Armenian scholar propped up by the Armenian diaspora community. This books tells it like it is, with plenty of factual research. It's shameful really that the Armenians tried to use their religion to persuade people in the US and Europe to believe their lies. This was particularly true of the diaspora in the US that was desperate for an ethnic identity and the Turks were easy targets as they were Muslims against whom there was a already a prejudice (due largely to the then small number of American Muslims and a general ignorance in the US at that time about Muslims). So the Armenians used this very deftly to win favor in the West, and cried on anyone they could find--and threatened, bribed or blew up the rest. They still deny the Turkish holocaust!!!

Finally a comprehensive account of the history of conflict between Armenians and the Ottoman state that is not written by a pseudo-Armenian scholar propped up by the Armenian diaspora community. This books tells it like it is, with plenty of factual research. It's shameful really that the Armenians tried to use their religion to persuade people in the US and Europe to believe their lies. This was particularly true of the diaspora in the US that was desperate for an ethnic identity and the Turks were easy targets as they were Muslims against whom there was a already a prejudice (due largely to the then small number of American Muslims and a general ignorance in the US at that time about Muslims). So the Armenians used this very deftly to win favor in the West, and cried on anyone they could find--and threatened, bribed or blew up the rest. They still deny the Turkish holocaust!!!

Finally a comprehensive account of the history of conflict between Armenians and the Ottoman state that is not written by a pseudo-Armenian scholar propped up by the Armenian diaspora community. This books tells it like it is, with plenty of factual research. It's shameful really that the Armenians tried to use their religion to persuade people in the US and Europe to believe their lies. This was particularly true of the diaspora in the US that was desperate for an ethnic identity and the Turks were easy targets as they were Muslims against whom there was a already a prejudice (due largely to the then small number of American Muslims and a general ignorance in the US at that time about Muslims). So the Armenians used this very deftly to win favor in the West, and cried on anyone they could find--and threatened, bribed or blew up the rest. They still deny the Turkish holocaust!!!

McCarthy's book is the result of an excellent research of the historical documents and archives.
ONE-FOURTH O THE MUSLIM POPULATION IN ANATOLIA AND BALKAN DURING 1821-1922 HAD BEEN LOST.
The civilian people of the Eastern Anatlolian villages massacred by the Armenian people without discriminating if they were women, children, or the old. Numerous Mass-Graves are the proves this historical fact.
Despite this fact, there are still fanatic people claiming the opposite in order to make their guilt forgotten. Why does Armenia still not open it's archives? Why can the Armenians still not show any historical proof of theis claims?
Thousands of Armenians had to go on exile at the end of the 1st World War. Why? Because they had massacred so many villages and so many innocent people, it was impossible for them to live there anymore. They were taken under arms joining onto the Russian and French Army. And this Armies have taken the Armenians with them to Russia and France at the end of the war.
Besides all, how can you explain, that the Turks, who lived with Armenians over 900 years, gave them the position of a Vezir (minister), called them 'loyal people', allowed the refoundation of the Armenian Patriarchate in istanbul(1461), charged almost no taxes from Armenians, sudenly decide to kill all Armeinans?
There is no logical explanation, except the fanatic lies.
Despite tall these facts, why have the Turks not asked for an apology and explanation from the Armenians? Why have the Turks kept silent for almost 100 years?
Because after the foundation of the Turkish Republic, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk wanted to open a white page and end all the hostility with the oppents in the war. Not to forget that there were Armenians still living in Turkey.
Unfortunately this have been misunderstood.
McCarthy also found out in the British archives, that the Blue Book was told to be written by the British secret service in order to gain the popularity of Armenia in the cold war against Russia.
This book is of great value, because it shows the historical facts. Whether you like them or not. As long as you cannot show another facts you must accept them.

The only right thing about this book, is the date!
between that dates,1821-1922 , Armenians were massacred by turks and kurds,There are many proofs.recently French government admitted that the Armenian genocide took place. this book says the opposite.
It is like saying i can live without my brain and heart! if you think that is possible or believe that, then you can believe this book.
There are even photos, taken by a german traveler, and these photos are availabe in many websites.
In my opinion, the benefit of this book is that, like this, mr Justin McCarthy can sell more books(80-90 million Turks and kurds compared to 7 million armenians).
Armenians were not the only Victims, hundreds of thousands greeks, bulgarians, lebanese,... were also massacred .This is just to mention few...

After betraying all Arab countries and joining NATO; a few years ago Turkey started its genocide propaganda in order to confuse new people who begin to be interested about Armenian Genocide. Its very easy to understand that Turkey is so scared of it, since if NATO will leave Turkey by itself, no nation in the world, including Muslim states, will support it. But one day justice will be lead by United States because it was the first country to realize about what happened to Armenians in Turkey (see quotes of US pres. Wilson), and hard times of today (9/11) holds USA to make its final say on Turkey (Clinton couldn't pass Armenian Genocide bill because Turkey is the key NATO 'country' that provide its airbases to bomb Iraq).

Funny how McCarthy doesn't explain how modern Armenia is a least 50 times more vulnerable and powerless than Turkey. That Turkey is at least 50 times more powerful politically, economically and militarily than Armenia. That Armenians as opposed to Turks live in exile in great numbers. That they have been living in exile for more than 87 years. That they have not yet been able to return to their homeland, rebuild their towns and cities, preserve their churches, monastries and cross stones. That 'Western Armenia' is hermitically closed off for everyone. Be they tourists, archeologists, forensic researchers, journalists, photographers, even natives. That the Turkish government, as we speak, bribes Universities, media, and politicians around the world with billions of dollars a year to cover up Turkish history. That out of the thousands of authentic books, poems, songs, photos, film, memorial stones and museums that the Armenians have produced to commemorate their victimized families, Turks have bought off European and American academics to forget the memory of 1915.

If Turks had been decent human beings they would have at least commemorated their 5 million victims in a respectful manner and would have certainly asked for an apology and explanation from the Armenians. Since the Turks kept silent for almost 100 years, only raised a monument two years ago and merely began remembering their suffering under so-called Armenian rule less than three years ago, either indicates that Turks are liars or need foreigners to remind them of their history. The latter must be true, else they wouldn't be hiring McCarthy do what a Gunduz should be doing.

All this shows that neither Turks nor Armenians have changed over the last 100 years. The Armenian still tills his own, whilst the Turk steals and plunders and then hopes the foreigner will provide more. In one word: Left alone, Armenia will grow. Left without IMF, Turkey will fall. That's the way it has always been. McCarthy's book proves it once more.

What saddens me most is that instead of McCarthy taking sides with truth and reconciliation, he has provided the Turk with a new weapon he can use to kill the Armenian, namely the written word.