The White House, the Armenian Genocide and the Armeno-Turkish Protocols

On March 4, 2010, the Foreign Affairs Committee of the United States House of Representatives adopted by a vote of 23 to 22 House Resolution 252 concerning recognition of the Armenian genocide. This vote is undeniably the result of the committee members’ justifiable willingness to condemn the denial policies of Ankara and to restore one of the darkest pages in the history of humanity. But the attitude of the American State Department, represented by the secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, reveals the real meaning of the two protocols signed on October 10, 2009 by Presidents Gül and Sarkissian, which were supposed to ratify the Armenian-Turkish rapprochement. The masks have now fallen.

Throughout this process that ended in the vote on March 4, the State Department, which was highly involved in the Armenian-Turkish mediation and the writing of these much talked-about protocols, openly aligned its position regarding House Resolution 252 with the development of this rapprochement — so much so that the process is floundering because of a failure to resolve the discord over the highly important question of Armenian genocide, while having introduced into these protocols a bilateral commission of historic purpose, whose vague outline makes you think that it is ultimately just another strategy for burying the truth despite the fact that it has already been attested to by so many university and historical researchers.

The Armenian Constitutional Court thought to dispel doubts by evoking, in its review of the protocols, an article from the Armenian Declaration of Independence making explicit reference to the Armenian genocide. Without a doubt, it did not imagine that it would prompt the anger of the Turkish government, which accused Armenia of betraying the spirit of the protocols and announced that it would not ratify these texts. As for the White House, it maintained the confusion over how these protocols should be perceived by letting it be known through the intermediary of its ambassador in Turkey, James Jeffrey, that it supported the decision of the Armenian Constitutional Court. Many were disconcerted by this.

Meanwhile, the American administration distinguished itself with remarkable discretion on the subject of House Resolution 252, an attitude which could initially be considered as support for this recognition. It was in reality the expression of approval for Turkey’s refusal to ratify these protocols. The request of Barack Obama to his counterpart Abdullah Gül to announce that these protocols would be put on the agenda in the Turkish Parliament in order to block the vote of the committee on House Resolution 252 was the perfect illustration of it, as was the announcement made by Hillary Clinton, the day after the vote, of her firm intention to derail the resolution’s adoption in the plenary session on the grounds that the United States favored the process initiated by the signing of the protocols. From that point on, the trap snapped shut, revealing in broad daylight the underlying strategy of these protocols of isolation and containment of the Armenian cause.

As for the Turkish government, its visceral reaction to the announcement of a committee vote on this resolution attested one more time to its stubbornness in undertaking a vigorous denial policy. But added to the endless announcements of economic, industrial, diplomatic and military retaliation, to which the White House remains very attentive, was a more insidious argument in opposition to the American willingness to recognize the genocide: the introduction, planned by these protocols, of a joint committee of historians from the two countries. But imagining that this committee, which became the best argument against recognizing the Armenian genocide, would lead to Turkey’s admission of the Ottoman Empire’s genocidal past comes close to absurdity. That the United States could let itself be taken in by that argument assumes a crazy Jesuitism or, worse, a complacency, even compromise of principle, on the part of the State Department toward the denial policies of Ankara. Despite all of that, the opposition of the White House to this resolution is not inconsistent with a certain conception of the protocols, which will become dominant, if indeed the American president’s team succeeds in compelling Nancy Pelosi, speaker of the House, though a supporter of the Armenian cause, not to present this resolution in the plenary session of the House of Representatives.

If this happened, it would leave a question hanging: how to conceive of a reconciliation based on a denial of genocidal crime. An inconceivable hypothesis arouses concern about the prospect of reconciliation. Once again, Washington could offer an effective response. In reconsidering its intentions that run counter to this resolution, by allowing a vote to take place in the plenary session, the American administration would break the stranglehold into which it pushed the Armenian cause. Better yet, Barack Obama, the Nobel Peace Prize president, the one who has made himself the guarantor of humanist values, could, during the next commemoration of the Armenian genocide on April 24, send a strong message to Turkey by finally using the term “genocide” to define the events of 1915. Otherwise, Armenia should learn its lesson and withdraw from this process doomed to failure. And the White House would lose a unique opportunity to contribute to a genuine reconciliation movement, the only one capable of leading to real peacemaking and the prospect of a common future between Turks and Armenians, one based on unconditional recognition of and legitimate redress for the Armenian genocide.

Jules Boyadjian is editor-in-chief of the newspaper Haïastan (Armenia).