Not formally "a Balkan issue" but in the ballpark.
Posted on 11/21/2008 10:51:20 AM PST by Bokababe
Should the United States formally recognize the World War I-era killing of Armenians as genocide?
Yes. Many scholars agree that the Ottoman Turks systematically killed up to 1.5 million Armenians. Other countries have recognized this as genocide.
OR
No. Historians continue to debate whether the deaths were genocide. Besides, Turkey is too important an ally to alienate when the U.S. has troops in the Middle East.
(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...
President Bush promised before he got elected that he would recognize it.
Not formally "a Balkan issue" but in the ballpark.
Oh, good grief. Not this again. I thought that back in the ‘90s OUR genocide was recognized by Congress.
I am more concerned with the genocide that happens in our country every day. For every two people that enter an abortuary for an abortion, one dies. Sometimes the mother dies, too.
You know, we can go back 2000 years or even more and talk about the Genocides that occured at different times with different Governments. My question is what good does it do. The Turkish Government that was involved in this was part of an empire that no longer exists. It’s time for everyone to move on.
But that was before Afghanistan and Iraq. Besides which, although I voted for him, we can ll pretty much acknowledge that GWB didn't exactly turn out to be "as advertised".
This question is a Tiger-Trap designed for a naive rookie president to fall into. Kinda like Carter allowing the Shah to be deposed. You never know what could happen in Turkey as a result... (OK. I admit that I haven’t addressed the moral aspect of the question... that part is a no-brainer.)
propaganda really is on Islams side.
Does it make the U.S. stronger to be held hostage by “allies,” by pretending something we know happened didn’t happen? Why didn’t we disavow Pearl Harbor happened to Japanese support for the Iraq War?
So, why exactly is this event, which happened over 90 years ago on the other side of the globe, our problem now?
given the small handful of Armenian descendant’s I’ve worked with, I’m not certain we can really blame the Turks entirely....... (it’s a joke, don’t hit me!)
Besides..
That's precisely it. And many Muslim authors are trying to rewrite history today to say that the Ottoman Empire was "benevolent" to non-Muslims.
Muslims don't have a question mark here because they are all against it. But we sit here and weigh the pros & cons of recognizing it, even when we know that it happened.
Haven’t we recognized and condemned it several times already?
It should not. This was done by Ottomans in an empire that no longer exists, not do the people who committed the atrocities. No purpose is served by giving a face shot to an ally who’s already on shaky ground.
Armenian Ambassador to U.S. Responds to Washington Post Article
About a year ago Fred Hiatt in a W-P article "urged the Armenian Diaspora to work as hard for democracy in Armenia as for congressional recognition of the genocide."
Makes sense to me. But regardless of the conditions in Armenia, believe me, we have enough problems already.
Its all about looking for a payout.
Won’t happen.
It was just a bunch of Christians.
....The United Nations has recognized the Armenian Genocide. Over 20 countries, the European Parliament, hundreds of specialists in genocide and Holocaust, historians and other scholars recognized the Armenian Genocide long ago. But, the most important thing is that the US Congress has already approved a similar resolution on the Armenian Genocide in 1975 and 1984. Moreover, in 1981, US President Ronald Reagan signed a Presidential Proclamation designating the events of 1915 as Genocide. Since the US President has admitted the fact of the Armenian Genocide by signing an official declaration and the US Congress has approved the aforementioned resolution twice, the adoption of the resolution for the third time is of little importance. The Armenian Genocide has already been recognized and the resolution will not add anything new
The only problem is that the Turkish side is fighting the resolution, claiming that it is the first resolution of this kind. If the Turkish side did not fight it, I would not care about whether the resolution would be adopted or not. However, since the Turkish side is waging a political struggle, and the resolution has been submitted, we cannot retreat....."
....The following issue must be raised: a cruel crime was committed against the Armenian people. The whole nation was actually annihilated, our lands were seized and our 3,000-year-old culture was destroyed. This is not only a cruel crime, but also a great injustice. Therefore, our true demand is compensation for this injustice. The world must know about what happened, and we have to a great extent succeeded. The Turkish side is well aware that the step to follow the admission of the Armenian Genocide by Turkey will be a demand for compensation and return of the lands. This is the reason why Turkey will not admit the Armenian Genocide, thereby trying to force the Armenians to stop at this stage, so that we keep demanding the admission of the Genocide for hundreds of years and will be unable to go to the next step. I declare with all responsibility that it is not so, the admission of the Armenian Genocide is of no value. Our demands are: Turkey must compensate for the damages and return our lands...
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