Exposing the First 20th-Century Genocide: The Armenian Genocide

Siobhan Nash-Marshall is uniquely placed to offer penetrating and illuminating insights into one of the darkest and most horrific chapters in human history.

The chair of philosophy at Manhattanville College in New York is the author of “The Sins of the Fathers,” a book about the Armenian Genocide, and translator of the newly published novella "Silent Angel” by Antonia Arslan, which is set against the backdrop of the genocide.

Dr. Nash-Marshall’s book exposes Turkish denialism about the genocide and shows how the dehumanizing effects of modern philosophy are responsible for the butchering of a whole people. Her translation of “Silent Angel” has provided readers in the English-speaking world with another book by Armenian-Italian novelist Antonia Arslan, whose earlier novel about the genocide, “Skylark Farm,” was an international bestseller.

In this exclusive interview for The Epoch Times, Nash-Marshall speaks by email of the genocide and about her translation of Arslan’s latest book.

Joseph Pearce: “Silent Angel” is a novella set against the backdrop of the Armenian Genocide. Could you give a brief explanation and description of this genocide and when it happened? Siobhan Nash-Marshall: The Armenian Genocide was the first genocide of the 20th century. The triumvirate at the helm of the Ottoman Empire at the time (Enver Pasha, Talaat Pasha, and Djemal Pasha) took advantage of the World War I and launched a full-scale slaughter of the Armenians. A million and a half of them (that is, three-quarters of the Armenian people who lived in their historic homeland at the time, in what is today called Eastern Turkey) were slaughtered in the most horrendous ways imaginable.

The men were separated from their families. They were usually killed on the spot. The women and children were then forced to “relocate” by foot into the Syrian desert. Every sort of horror was visited upon them along the way. Most of them died of thirst, starvation, fatigue.

The genocide is a very well documented event. Newspapers from every continent chronicled it in gruesome detail. The Allies coined the term “crime against humanity” when they called upon the Turks to stop killing the Armenians. Pope Benedict XV, in his letter to the sultan, called it the “leading of the Armenian people almost to its extinction.” It was part of an operation that the U.S. ambassador at the time, Henry Morgenthau, called the “whitewashing of Anatolia.”

Mr. Pearce: Apart from being the translator of “Silent Angel,” you are also the author of “The Sins of the Fathers,” a book about the Armenian Genocide. Could you tell us a little about the book? Ms. Nash-Marshall: My primary concern in “Sins of the Fathers” is modern philosophy. This is not strange for a Catholic. Pope Leo XIII railed against modernism. He also tried to protect the Armenians during the pre-genocidal massacres (1894–1896) perpetrated by Sultan Abdul Hamid. This is not a coincidence.

In my book, I tried to shed light on five crucial characteristics of the Armenian Genocide.

First, it was predicated on modern Western thought: All of its perpetrators read and carefully studied 19th-century European philosophers.

Second, it shows the price of modern political hypocrisy. The genocide did not happen overnight. It was preceded by nearly 30 years of negotiations in which the European Powers called for reforms in the Armenian provinces, signed treaties of all kinds with the sultan, but let the Armenians be slaughtered. Pope Leo XIII intervened and tried to mediate between the European Powers and negotiate with the sultan because he was well aware of the plight of the Armenians and the hypocrisy of the Powers.

Third, the Armenian Genocide highlights the historical engineering inherent in modern philosophy. Although the actual killing of the Armenians was mostly completed by 1923, the government of Turkey today is still trying desperately to rewrite Armenians out of the history of the lands of modern Turkey.

Fourth, the Armenian Genocide highlights the social engineering inherent in modern philosophy. The Armenians were killed in order to construct a “new Turkey” built along the lines dictated by French and German philosophy. [In “Sins of the Fathers,” Dr. Nash-Marshall shows how the intelligentsia of the “new Turkey” were inspired by Karl Marx and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel and also by the French philosopher Auguste Comte.]

Fifth, the Armenian Genocide was violently anti-Christian.

The Armenian Genocide thus gives us a very good image in which to understand the problems that we are facing today. We too see historical engineering, social engineering, violent anti-Christianity. The Armenian Genocide shows what happens if we don’t pay attention to the signs.


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