The American Response to the Armenian Genocide
Item
Title
The American Response to the Armenian Genocide
Creator
Peter Balakian
Description
This video shows the U.S. response to the Armenian Genocide during WWI
Date
n.d.
Bibliographic Citation
Balakian, P. (n.d.). The American response to the Armenian Genocide.
extracted text
3/16/2021
The American Response to the Armenian Genocide | Facing History and Ourselves
The American Response to the Armenian
Genocide
Professor Peter Balakian describes the American response to the
Armenian Genocide during World War I.
Share to Google Classroom
Place
Turkey
Topic
Genocide & Mass Violence
The Armenian Genocide
School Subject
World History
Scope and Sequence
Transcript (Text)
The war presented the O oman triumvirate, this new leadership, with an
opportunity to solve a problem. We have to think of World War I as a
screen behind which genocide could be carried out.
As the arrests and the mass killings began to happen in Armenian
sections of cities, towns, and villages all over Turkey, the US consul
stationed in those parts of Turkey are sending vivid descriptions of
what's happening to Ambassador Henry Morgenthau, who is stationed in
Constantinople.
I have the honor to further supplement my reports of June 30th and July
11th in regard to the expulsion of the Armenians from this region, or to
speak more correctly, the wholesale massacre of these Armenians. It has
been no secret that the plan was to destroy the Armenian race as a race,
but the methods used have been more cold-blooded and barbarous, if not
more e ective, than I had at rst supposed. It seems to be fully
https://www.facinghistory.org/resource-library/video/american-response-armenian-genocide
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3/16/2021
The American Response to the Armenian Genocide | Facing History and Ourselves
established now that practically all who have been sent away from here
have been deliberately shot or otherwise killed within one or two days
a er their departure.
I do not believe there has ever been a massacre in the history of the world
so general and thorough as that which is now being perpetrated in this
region, or that a more endish, diabolical scheme has ever been conceived
by the mind of man.
When he starts to get the dispatches and eyewitness accounts, he is
shocked, horri ed, engaged. Quickly he becomes a voice of conscience. He
becomes a kind of witness.
He is ge ing these dispatches to Secretary of State William Jennings
Bryan in Washington, D.C. A famous telegram from Morgenthau, July 16,
1915, he says, it appears that a systematic race extermination is in progress
under the pretext of a reprisal against rebellion. He understood the whole
thing. He understood that the O oman government was claiming the
Armenians were seditious and unreliable and traitors.
And he becomes a voice of conscience and intervention with his own
government, and even with the German government, in e orts to get
those governments to stop Turkey from this annihilation program.
Morgenthau was the catalyst for that big grassroots NGO movement in
the US. So it was from Morgenthau's urgings that in October of 1915, a
commi ee was formed in New York City called the Commi ee on
Armenian Atrocities. And then it came to be known by 1918 as Near East
Relief.
The Commi ee on Armenian Atrocities and the subsequent relief
movements in the US had a national reach. President Wilson designated
Sundays to be focused on Armenian relief and Sunday schools giving
money, sending money to -- the phrase became the "starving Armenians,"
it became a popular epithet. I think it's worth noting that the New York
Times alone ran 145 articles on the Armenian massacres just in 1915. I
mean, the coverage of this event was really large given that a World War
was going on. The amount of a ention the Armenian massacres occupied
was signi cant. This was not an ignored or forgo en event at all.
But the key issue comes in the distinction between NGO fundraising for
relief and US government political and military intervention, and here,
the Wilson administration refused to act.
Wilson, of course, as you know, did not declare war on the Central Powers
until 1917. The US entry into World War I was slow and late, and he never
declared war in the East. So he did not declare war on O oman Turkey,
and therefore there was no chance that there could be any military
https://www.facinghistory.org/resource-library/video/american-response-armenian-genocide
2/3
3/16/2021
The American Response to the Armenian Genocide | Facing History and Ourselves
intervention on behalf of the Armenians by the United States. And it
raises this, you know, issue between, this con ict between philanthropic
international rescue and intervention and national self-interest.
Related Content
h ps://www.facinghistory.org/resource-library/video/american-responsearmenian-genocide
Copyright © 2021 Facing History and Ourselves. We are a registered 501 (c)
(3) charity. Privacy Policy
Our headquarters are located at:
16 Hurd Road, Brookline, MA 02445
Accessibility Feedback
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The American Response to the Armenian Genocide | Facing History and Ourselves
The American Response to the Armenian
Genocide
Professor Peter Balakian describes the American response to the
Armenian Genocide during World War I.
Share to Google Classroom
Place
Turkey
Topic
Genocide & Mass Violence
The Armenian Genocide
School Subject
World History
Scope and Sequence
Transcript (Text)
The war presented the O oman triumvirate, this new leadership, with an
opportunity to solve a problem. We have to think of World War I as a
screen behind which genocide could be carried out.
As the arrests and the mass killings began to happen in Armenian
sections of cities, towns, and villages all over Turkey, the US consul
stationed in those parts of Turkey are sending vivid descriptions of
what's happening to Ambassador Henry Morgenthau, who is stationed in
Constantinople.
I have the honor to further supplement my reports of June 30th and July
11th in regard to the expulsion of the Armenians from this region, or to
speak more correctly, the wholesale massacre of these Armenians. It has
been no secret that the plan was to destroy the Armenian race as a race,
but the methods used have been more cold-blooded and barbarous, if not
more e ective, than I had at rst supposed. It seems to be fully
https://www.facinghistory.org/resource-library/video/american-response-armenian-genocide
1/3
3/16/2021
The American Response to the Armenian Genocide | Facing History and Ourselves
established now that practically all who have been sent away from here
have been deliberately shot or otherwise killed within one or two days
a er their departure.
I do not believe there has ever been a massacre in the history of the world
so general and thorough as that which is now being perpetrated in this
region, or that a more endish, diabolical scheme has ever been conceived
by the mind of man.
When he starts to get the dispatches and eyewitness accounts, he is
shocked, horri ed, engaged. Quickly he becomes a voice of conscience. He
becomes a kind of witness.
He is ge ing these dispatches to Secretary of State William Jennings
Bryan in Washington, D.C. A famous telegram from Morgenthau, July 16,
1915, he says, it appears that a systematic race extermination is in progress
under the pretext of a reprisal against rebellion. He understood the whole
thing. He understood that the O oman government was claiming the
Armenians were seditious and unreliable and traitors.
And he becomes a voice of conscience and intervention with his own
government, and even with the German government, in e orts to get
those governments to stop Turkey from this annihilation program.
Morgenthau was the catalyst for that big grassroots NGO movement in
the US. So it was from Morgenthau's urgings that in October of 1915, a
commi ee was formed in New York City called the Commi ee on
Armenian Atrocities. And then it came to be known by 1918 as Near East
Relief.
The Commi ee on Armenian Atrocities and the subsequent relief
movements in the US had a national reach. President Wilson designated
Sundays to be focused on Armenian relief and Sunday schools giving
money, sending money to -- the phrase became the "starving Armenians,"
it became a popular epithet. I think it's worth noting that the New York
Times alone ran 145 articles on the Armenian massacres just in 1915. I
mean, the coverage of this event was really large given that a World War
was going on. The amount of a ention the Armenian massacres occupied
was signi cant. This was not an ignored or forgo en event at all.
But the key issue comes in the distinction between NGO fundraising for
relief and US government political and military intervention, and here,
the Wilson administration refused to act.
Wilson, of course, as you know, did not declare war on the Central Powers
until 1917. The US entry into World War I was slow and late, and he never
declared war in the East. So he did not declare war on O oman Turkey,
and therefore there was no chance that there could be any military
https://www.facinghistory.org/resource-library/video/american-response-armenian-genocide
2/3
3/16/2021
The American Response to the Armenian Genocide | Facing History and Ourselves
intervention on behalf of the Armenians by the United States. And it
raises this, you know, issue between, this con ict between philanthropic
international rescue and intervention and national self-interest.
Related Content
h ps://www.facinghistory.org/resource-library/video/american-responsearmenian-genocide
Copyright © 2021 Facing History and Ourselves. We are a registered 501 (c)
(3) charity. Privacy Policy
Our headquarters are located at:
16 Hurd Road, Brookline, MA 02445
Accessibility Feedback
https://www.facinghistory.org/resource-library/video/american-response-armenian-genocide
3/3
