Full Description
The systematic mass murder and deportation of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire, carried out by the Committee of Union and Progress (Young Turk) government between 1915 and 1916. Approximately 1 to 1.5 million Armenians were killed through mass shootings, starvation, and death marches into the Syrian desert. The genocide was carried out under the cover of World War One and justified as a military necessity, with Armenians accused of collaboration with Russia.
Critical Perspective
Turkey’s century-long denial of the Armenian Genocide is a case study in how states can construct and enforce official historical narratives through legal suppression, diplomatic pressure, and nationalist education. Recognition of the Genocide by foreign governments — including by the US Congress in 2021 — has been consistently blocked or delayed for decades by strategic concerns about the Turkish-American alliance. The genocide’s denial shows that acknowledgment of historical crimes depends as much on geopolitics as on historical evidence.
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