Having been victimized by many conquerors throughout history, Armenians have developed a strong instinct for survival. To stay out of trouble, they have learned to be loyal and even subservient to the states that ruled over them.
While Armenians gained plenty of “moral victories,” their actual battlefield successes have been few and far between. One has to go back 2,000 years to find a rare example of a conquering Armenian ruler, King Tigran the Great (140-55 BC), whose vast empire extended from the Caspian to the Mediterranean Sea. In the modern era, prior to the Armenian Genocide, Armenian freedom fighters (fedayees) fought back against the murderous Turks and Kurdish mercenaries. During the genocide and its immediate aftermath (1915-1923), the Armenians of Shabin Karahisar, Ourfa, Van, Musa Dagh, Aintab, Hajin, Sassoun, and Zeitoun bravely defended themselves, while 1.5 million of their kinsmen were slaughtered like sheep. The heroic Battle of Sardarabad saved the remnants of the Armenian people in Eastern Armenia, culminating in the establishment of the first Armenian Republic in 1918. Finally, beginning in 1988, brave young men and women battled the much larger and better armed forces of Azerbaijan to liberate Artsakh (Karabagh).
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, many western missionaries, tradesmen, writers, and adventurers often described the Armenians they encountered in the Ottoman Empire as “cringing.” The Canadian-Armenian website Keghart.com, in an editorial posted last week, quoted Dr. William Goodell’s depiction of the Armenians of Constantinople in 1871: “Four centuries of torture, of oppression, and of suspense have stamped its impress upon an entire community…constant fear, constant agony, constant humiliation have so crushed out every trace of manhood, that they are still cringing, fawning, an abject race. Several generations of happier descendants can alone efface the mental taints acquired in those long years of vassalage.”
Regrettably, many Armenians have yet to overcome the “slave mentality”—deeply ingrained in their psyche—inherited from ancestors who lived for centuries under foreign yoke. One comes across countless examples of self-effacing behavior in Armenian communities throughout the diaspora and in Armenia itself. All too often Armenians meekly accept injustices and insults heaped on them by others.
It is high time that Armenians throw off their shackles and defend their inalienable rights. They must not remain silent in the face of abuse or physical attack, but respond appropriately without resorting to reckless actions that may endanger their communities or the homeland.
In the United States, for example, when elected officials, journalists, or writers distort the facts of the Armenian Genocide, they must be severely criticized and discredited, so others are warned to refrain from genocide denial.
The most recent example of Armenian inaction is the feeble Armenian response to last week’s nighttime attack by Azeri forces on Artsakh, causing the deaths of four Armenian soldiers and the wounding of four others. Beyond expressions of sympathy for the victims and condemning the attack, no concrete action was taken by Armenian officials.
In the aftermath of this vicious and unprovoked attack, Armenia should have announced the cancellation of the next round of negotiations with Azerbaijan over Artsakh. It is completely unacceptable to conduct peace talks while Azerbaijan is engaged in warfare. Under these circumstances, Armenians have the right to take all possible actions to defend themselves from future attacks. Rather than merely issuing a condemnation, the Armenian side at a time of its choosing should carry out punishing pre-emptive strikes so that Azeris would think long and hard before mounting another attack. Azerbaijan should clearly understand that any further aggression on their part would:
1. Cause the suspension of the peace talks, thus delaying the resolution of the conflict rather than expediting the negotiating process.
2. Lead Armenia to eventually abandon all peace talks, since it has little to gain from these negotiations. Azerbaijan is the one that desperately needs to negotiate in order to secure concessions from Armenia.
3. Signal to the world that the government of Azerbaijan is not interested in finding a negotiated settlement to the conflict and is responsible for its collapse.
4. Discredit the good faith effort of the mediating countries–France, Russia, and the United States.
5. Force Armenia to initiate military action, causing a disproportionate amount of destruction, even damaging the oil pipelines, in order to discourage Azerbaijan from further attacks.
Armenians must realize that they no longer live in the Ottoman Empire and are no one’s slave. They should shake off their psychological shackles and take all necessary measures to defend their national interest!
Harut Sassounian
Right on the mark Mr. Sassounian, very well said.
“Regrettably, many Armenians have yet to overcome the “slave mentality”—deeply ingrained in their psyche—inherited from ancestors who lived for centuries under foreign yoke.”
A peoples survival is not a consequence of self defeating misconceptions of perpetual weakness.
Hye, the leadership of Armenia today are totally inane and incompetant. They have been and are the wrong persons in the wrong place at the wrong time. We need patriotic
and certainly more intelligent leaders to steer our Armenian nation in this most vital and
demanding period of our history. Serge and Edward, resign, leave, stop filling your pockets and leave… go away, any where…. but leave NOW! Manooshag
Harut hi how are you:
I agree with you 100% we should not wait around for the next attack and start telling the world of what happen ,the world i’m sure knows about it what we nned to do is for 4 soldiers that have died by the azeri gun fire should extned our borders 4 miles into the azeri land and draw a new border sothis way they will be far away from Xarabax and for the 4 wounded soldiers thats another 4 miles into azerbejan that makes 8 miles into azerbejan so this way they will thing twice for firing another bullet at us, i beleive these will work very nise in the case that baku will understand how much serious we are, and in the case of firing even 1 bullet toward Xarabax each bullet will cost them lets say 0.5 miles into azeri land, and let them thing twice.
This is the very issue I’ve been talking and writing about all over. Armenia and Karapagh have no other choice than act the way Israel has acted against insurgency. Retaliatory attacks that will resonate in the bones of those who plan and carry out these attacks against Armenian frontiers.
I second Mr. Sassounian’s suggestion to suspend the peace talks so that the Minsk group and the world at large understand our point.
This is a talk of “apricot season” Armenians, who want to play on our patriotism. They call us slaves but still want to play on our patriotism, as they know that Armenians are the most freedom liking nation in the world. But this path will lead to our destruction. The only way out is to create a strong republic and society. We should not make the mistakes of Germany -never fight on two fronts. We have the biggest challenge, the internal enemy: inequality, lack of leadership, profligacy, migration, internal division and all other vices that destroy the society sooner than any foreign enemy.
This whole talk about us being slaves is nonsense. Nobody in Karabagh has any delusions about how to engage the Azeris. Not the officer corps, not the generals, and nobody in the Defense Ministry. There has been retaliation in the form of increased sniper attacks — the Azeris are as scared of us as they were 10 years ago — they have nowhere near the willpower to start a new war anytime soon.
The Armenian side cannot mount an offensive without weakening and exposing itself. We are outnumbered. In fact, neither side has enough manpower or firepower to mount and offensive and most likely won’t for a very long time.
The new war will be sparked by the closing gap between the two side’s military posts, and a hot headed officer or soldier letting it rip. And in that case, the attacking side will lose. Therefore, we should NOT be attacking — especially with our technological capabilities.
We’re not launching any heavy military actions to cause “disproportionate damage” because 1) the oil lines you want us to bomb are our trump card and our implicit threat to the international community, if we bomb them before a war, we might make more enemies than friends 2) pipelines can be rebuilt quickly, we have to go after their main hub in Javakh, which is another event in and of itself, 3) again, mounting an offensive would expose us to unneeded risk, just as it would to them, and 4) we cannot be the party to break peace talks — if we were to recognize the NKR, we’d have to retreat from the buffer zones, which we haven’t been negotiating for. That’s bad diplomacy.
This clearly shows that outside of the safe corridor that is genocide recognition, most of our community leaders have no idea what they’re doing. Don’t worry, the people running the country and our troops, for better or for worse, were the same “slaves” who won the war last time.
Hye, this is a P.S. to my previous comment…
Our leadership in Artsakh is and has been a fine example of patriotic and honest leadership – advances in Artsakh exemplify the courage and the intelligence of the Armenian people… especially when compared with all the leaderships (from day one) we have been given in Yerevan who seek to steal from our Armenian people’s future… for their own selfish and misdirected goals. Our Armenian citizens, all across Haiastan today await and deserve honest and intelligent leaders in Yerevan.
Artsakh, you are an outstanding example, not only to Yerevan, but to the world of our Armenian intelligence and honesty historically…
Aysor, mehr Haiastan-eh took ek… Abreek…
Manooshag (Dikrangertsi, America Hai)
I like Harut’s enthusiasm and message about standing up for our rights but I also heed Henrik’s message of discretion. We all want to fight and we all want revenge but we must follow the teachings of Sun Tzu (just as Monte Melkonian did) “think fast and wait.” Come up with a long-term, decisive strategy. Armenia does have trump cards but to use them now would be futile. In the meantime we must continue to forge alliances, build defenses, build a better Armenia. tt is also correct, Armenia must be strengthened at every level and that starts with new leadership.
While recognizing the limitations of space, the commentary above oversimplifies Armenian history and does a disservice to the sacrifices of Armenians of old. Armenian military history cannot be reduced to Medzn Dikran, fedayees, Sardarabad and Artsakh. As a people and individually Armenians have displayed martial virtues in their own service and in the service of others throughout their entire history. Moreover, it is a real stretch to hold up the Armenians of the above-mentioned towns which resisted the genocide as the “brave” Armenians in comparison to the Armenians of those towns which did not resist. Let us use the village of Havav, near Palu, as an example. The village of Havav produced heroes (e.g., Kayl Vahan) and scholars (e.g., Odian family) prior to the genocide but did not resist. Does the fact that Havav did not collectively fight the Turks mean that Havavtsis are from the “cringing” set of Armenians? Hardly. Indeed, a significant number of Havavtsis (imbued with their own values and not those of Shabin Karahissar, et al.) volunteered as gamavors. Post-genocide Havavtsis, such as Archbishop Mesrob Ashjian, inspired by their ancestors, continued to do good work for the azg. One Armenian can set an example far more profound than a collective act born of desparation. Indeed, the acts of the above-mentioned towns would have been far more exemplary if they occured in the 18th Century or early 19th Century as part of a liberation movement. One cannot overlook the daily bravery exhibited by Ottoman Armenians in creating, preserving and expanding Armenian institutions and gradual nationalism against a diametrically opposed hierarchical system. I knew plenty of Armenians who were “Ottoman Armenians”. They were anything but cringing. Of course, Armeniains existed in a grossly asymmetrical relationship with the Ottoman Turks and needed to act accordingly. However, given these circumstances of the Ottoman Armenians and their accomplishments in the face of these conditions, it is fair to say that they were smarter and braver than most Armenains today. The world is filled with cringing, beaten down people. Step into any workplace and you will find them, fearful of superiors, desperate to get ahead and frightened of falling behind. Contrary to the premise of the commentary above, nothing reveals the insecurity of the Armenian psyche more than using the words of a 19th Century abolitionist missionary (who most likely had a relatively superficial exposure to Armenians) as a measuring stick of Armenian character. If you know who you are and are, consequently, confident and brave, you would not do so. Yes. This is the 21st Century. The world is still an unforgiving place and Armenians must stand up for themselves and Armenia. This does not mean that we distort our own history and character to get this message across. I will continue to follow the examples of my own Ottoman Armenian ancestors. They were brave enough, smart enough and confident enough. The azg would be wise to do the same.
Haven’t there been such border incidents occurring on and off ever since the 94 ceasefire? Please let me know. Where exactly was this battle..artsakh itself or in one of our buffer zones?
Manooshag jan, you must not be aware of the corruption in the NKR. We don’t like to talk about it but your elevation of Artsakh at the expense of our Holy Land was quite offensive and ignorant.
Dear Hatsuni,
I am afraid you missed the point of the article. I hope others did not. The objective of the article, the way I read it, was to throw cold water on us and wake us up. I hope it achieved its objective with some of the readers. We need to concentrate on our next steps and learn form the past. As mentioned in the article we need to take ownership of our nation and move forward with courage and authority which comes from ownership. The Armenian government is approaching this incident the same way they approached the negotiations of the protocols. I am afraid they need to reach in their diplomatic tool box and take out some other tool instead of velvet gloves. This is a different situation. They need to take ownership of the country and the nation’s security and drive the point home with Azeris. Waiting until Azeris are at the gates is not a prudent approach.
Armen,
My issue was not with the obvious message. It was with the means of conveying it. As I noted in my comment, the examples of resistance given are false examples – even according to your logic. Those towns and cities resisted when it was too late to resist. To paraphrase your own comment, they resisted when the Turks were at the gates, not a prudent approach. We should not denegrate generations of heroic Armenians to rally the troops of today. Feel free to read my comment again (and again if you have to) to understand it. I am afraid you missed my point. I hope others did not.
Duman, you are still in the negative mode. Artsakh’s leadership is progressing –
considering its situation… Yerevan’s leaders from day one were dishonest and stealing the future hopes of the citizens of Armenia. These leaders, wrong people, wrong positions in governments, intent on their own selfish needs – still. Manooshag
Manoshag jan — you should read about Samvel Babayan. Just google him.
Passive stance, without retaliatory action or even threat of ending negotiations or maybe even freezing them makes us look weak. That in turn sends a signal to the mediators that more pressure can be applied on Armenia. It is also allows azeri turks to convince themselves of superiority which will encourage them eventually to launch a new war. They will never risk starting new war for as long as they don’t overestimate their capabilities, which they will grow in believing into if let go unopposed.
Armen_yan@Live.com