Alyssa Lappen interviews the foremost expert on the Armenian genocide, Vahakn Dadrian, at FrontPage:
April 24, 2005 marked the 90th “anniversary” of the Armenian genocide. With the purpose of decapitating the Armenian community, on April 24, 1915, Turkish Interior Minister Mehmed Talaat ordered the arrest of all Armenian political and community leaders suspected of opposing the Ittihad (“Young Turk”) government, or favoring Armenian nationalism. In Istanbul alone, 2,345 seized leaders were incarcerated, and most were subsequently executed. None were nationalists, political or charged with sabotage, espionage, or any other crime. None were even tried. According to Turkish author Taner Akcam, systematic plunder, raids, and murders of Armenians were already occurring daily, under the pretexts of “searching for arms, of
collecting war levies, or tracking down deserters…” Within a month, the final, definitive mass deportations of the Armenian genocide would begin.In recognition of that anniversary, I interviewed Vahakn Dadrian, the world’s preeminent scholar of the Armenian genocide….
Q. Could it happen again.
A. Only if there is an armed conflict. I think, I am convinced that deep in their hearts, the Turks would like to do away with Armenia, because it is a constant reminder of this terrible blot in Turkish history. In fact, I think they would have achieved their goal of wiping out Armenia completely in the Fall of 1920 if it weren’t for the intervention of the 11th Red Army that marched into Armenia and imposed communism. In 1920, the fledgling and ill-equipped Armenian army was defeated by the Turkish armies, and Armenia, or what was left of it, wouldn’t have survived but for the intervention of the Red Army that preempted the Turkish conquest of Armenia by marching into Armenia and for all practical purposes rescuing it from near obliteration.
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