US embassy cable - 05ANKARA1841

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 ANKARA 001841 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/29/2015 
TAGS: PREL, TU, AM 
SUBJECT: THE TURKS AND HISTORY: THRASHING ABOUT ON THE 
"ARMENIAN GENOCIDE" 
 
REF: 04 ANKARA 7106 
 
(U) Classified by DCM Robert Deutsch, E.O. 12958, reasons 1.4 
(b) and (d). 
 
1.  (C) Summary: Although the Turkish public debate on the 
fate of the Armenians in Anatolia is slowly opening up, a 
defensive Turkish nationalist policy of denial remains the 
position of choice for both the Kemalist and more 
Islamist/neo-Ottoman-oriented sides of the establishment. 
Launching an uncompromising public relations offensive, main 
opposition leader Baykal and PM Erdogan are calling for a 
commission of Turkish and Armenian scholars to conduct a 
"scientific" investigation which will "prove" there was no 
genocide.  The Turks plan to ask the UK Parliament to 
denounce the 1916 "Blue Book" on Ottoman treatment of 
Armenians, a move the UK Embassy here thinks is a mistake. 
This latest denial campaign looks certain to antagonize the 
EU; it will do nothing for Turkey's reputation.  End summary. 
 
 
2. (U) On the question of the mass killings and forced 
deportations of Armenians from Anatolia, the Turkish 
establishment -- both the "secularist" Kemalist side and the 
more Islamist/neo-Ottoman side -- is determined to cling to 
denial as history. 
 
Parliamentary Initiative to Find "The Truth" 
-------------------------------------------- 
 
3. (U) In a March 24 address to Parliament, main opposition 
CHP leader Baykal called for formation of a joint commission 
of Turkish and Armenian scholars to research the events of 
1915.  Baykal also called for the commission to include a 
neutral party such as UNESCO to act as an arbiter.  PM 
Erdogan has supported this initiative. 
 
4. (U) The Turkish idea is that "scientific, historical" 
research will prove genocide claims false.  Its purpose, 
according to Baykal, is "to show the world they (Armenians) 
are lying and there was no genocide."  In this assertion, 
Baykal banks on the assumption that neither the Turkish 
Parliament nor the public is prepared for any other result. 
 
Turks Blame Armenians for Ending Last Joint Research 
--------------------------------------------- ------- 
 
5. (C) According to Turkish Historical Society President 
Yusuf Halacoglu, there is currently no other ongoing joint 
history initiative.  The last such project ended because, 
according to Halacoglu, Armenian scholars refused to meet in 
Vienna in May 2005 unless the Turkish side first admitted 
genocide.  Halacoglu's own standards of historiography are 
reflected in his assertion that there could not have been 
mass killings of Armenians since there would have been mass 
graves if such killings had taken place, and no one has found 
such mass graves. 
 
6.  (U) Halacoglu and State Archives Director Yusuf Sarinay 
claim all Turkish historical archives are open.  There are 
three caveats:  intending researchers must speak Ottoman 
Turkish; they must have a visa allowing them to perform 
research; they can only study documents that have been 
"catalogued."  As of last May 2004, 80 million of 150 million 
documents had been catalogued.  Critics charge that 
incriminating documents are purged in the cataloging process. 
 
 
Offensive Kicks Off with McCarthy Lectures 
------------------------------------------ 
 
7.  (U) The Baykal-inspired public relations campaign kicked 
off with lectures by visiting U.S. history professor Justin 
McCarthy on March 23 at Bilkent University and March 24 in 
Parliament.  McCarthy used both lectures to focus on the 
historical context of the events of 1915.  McCarthy's main 
points were that those who charge genocide overlook Armenian 
revolutionary activity and Moslem deaths during the same 
period.  Strikingly, while focusing on events leading up to 
deportations and massacres, McCarthy barely mentioned the 
deportations and massacres themselves. 
 
8.  (U) McCarthy's speech to Parliament, featuring strong 
anti-EU undercurrents, was warmly received by a packed 
Parliamentary audience that included Baykal, FonMin Gul, AK 
Parliament Speaker Arinc, and several AKP ministers. 
McCarthy drew particularly strong applause when, refuting 
missionary sources for genocide claims, he used the present 
tense to declare that "missionaries lie quite often".  It is 
not clear, however, that the Turks will want to continue to 
use McCarthy as a spokesman: in his March 29 column in 
"Hurriyet", doyen of Turkish opinion writers (and an arch 
leftist-nationalist) Oktay Eksi disparaged the idea that 
Turkey should rely on a foreigner like McCarthy to make its 
case. 
 
Attack on UK "Blue Book" 
----------------------- 
 
9. (U) Again at Baykal's instigation, the GOT is 
contemplating sending a letter from PM Erdogan to the UK 
Parliament demanding that the UK Parliament denounce as 
propaganda the 1916 British "Blue Book" on the treatment of 
Armenians in Turkey from 1915-1916.  The "Blue Book" uses 
eyewitness accounts to make the case for a centrally-planned 
genocide. 
 
10. (C) In early March, Baykal reportedly prepared a draft 
letter for Erdogan's signature.  According to UK Embassy 
PolChief Miller, the UK has not yet received the letter. 
Miller views the Turkish public relations campaign as 
"clumsy."  She thinks the letter idea is a mistake.  She told 
us the UK Parliament is one of the few in Europe that has not 
addressed the Armenian genocide issue; she doubts it is to 
the Turks' advantage for them to do so. 
 
Signs of A More Open Approach 
----------------------------- 
 
11. (U) Like their Ottoman antecedents, those who have run 
the Republic of Turkey have never permitted a free, open and 
enlightened discussion of any aspect of history.  Yet the 
Turkish establishment's control of history is no longer so 
firm as it once was.  In this context a fuller and more 
mature discussion of how the Armenian presence in Anatolia 
was wiped out has slowly emerged from below: 
 
--Fethiye Cetin's "My Grandmother" ("Anneannem"), published 
in November 2004 to favorable reviews, tells how, late in 
life, her grandmother revealed that she had been an Armenian 
child caught up at the age of nine in the mass killings of 
1915, taken in forcibly by a Turkish family, and converted by 
them to Islam.  Ms. Cetin's book is likely to create more 
space for the many Turks with such a hidden family story 
(ref) to come forward.  We witnessed an example of this 
evolution in a March 23 discussion with three Turks we have 
known for some time.  Asked what we thought of the Armenian 
issue, we drew their attention to the book.  Two of the three 
then acknowledged they had at least one Armenian antecedent; 
we expect the third -- from an area of Sivas which had a 
substantial Armenian population until 1915 -- will eventually 
do so as well. 
 
--"Armenians in Turkey 100 Years Ago," published in early 
2005 to accompany an Istanbul exhibition of postcards of 
Armenian scenes in Anatolia from the turn of the 20th 
century, lists 1,309 Armenian churches in its index of the 
scenes from the postcards, a subtle partial accounting of 
what has disappeared (one columnist who has taken a leading 
role in trying to deny the claims of genocide, admitted to us 
privately that there were 6,000 Armenian churches in the 
boundaries of the late Ottoman empire). 
 
--"Yeni Safak" ombudsman Kursat Bumin, "Radikal" managing 
editor Ismet Berkan and columnist Haluk Sahin, and Ankara 
University poli sci professor Baskin Oran have written 
columns since late 2004 to try to edge the debate forward on 
the Armenian tragedy of 1915. 
 
--Novelist Orhan Pamuk, to the vengeful resentment of left- 
and right-wing nationalists and the disparagement of Turkey's 
professional intellectuals that he is angling for a Nobel 
Prize, opined recently in an interview with a Swiss 
publication that one million Armenians were killed. 
 
--AK MP Ali Riza Alaboyun (who did his PhD at Penn State) has 
invited two prominent Armenian Turks to testify to the 
Parliament's EU Harmonization Committee in April. 
 
--On March 7, "Milliyet" newspaper published Sabanci 
University Professor Halil Berktay's frank discussion of the 
Ottoman government's behavior toward the Armenians in 1915. 
Among other things, Berktay called the deportation order a 
crime against humanity, said the order contained many 
elements of genocide, and argued the order was a signal that 
the local population was "free to hunt" Armenians.  Berktay 
called claims that Armenians killed 500,000 Turks 
"exaggerated." 
 
12.  (C) Comment: Given Turkey's current apprehension over 
what EU harmonization entails, general and deep lack of 
self-confidence among Turks, and resultant edgy upswing in 
nationalism, the campaign to exonerate Turkey is currently 
louder and more dominant than the voices of a more open 
approach.  This Baykal-generated, defensive and 
uncompromising gambit is likely to do no more than add to the 
degeneration of the official domestic historical "debate" 
here.  It will certainly have no persuasive effect on general 
world opinion and is highly likely further to estrange 
opinion in the EU toward Turkey.  Yet as Baskin Oran remarked 
to us March 30, the last great taboo of the Republic of 
Turkey has been broken, and, after Turkey thrashes its way 
through a new, messy, and unproductive period of unpersuasive 
denial, the debate here will head toward a more enlightened, 
conciliatory resolution.  End Comment. 
EDELMAN