Wilsonian Armenia

Orthographic projection of the Wilsonian Armenia

History of Armenia

Etymology Timeline Traditional Urheimat
Prehistory Stone & Copper Age Shulaveri-Shomu culture c.6500–3400 BCE Areni-1 Cave Complex Kura–Araxes culture c.3400–2000 BCE Legend of Hayk (?) 2492 BCE Bronze & Iron Age Hayasa-Azzi c.1500–1290 BCE Arme-Shupria c.1300s–1190 BCE Ararat/Urartu Nairi Tribes 1114–860 BCE Kingdom of Van 860–590 BCE Scythian & Mede Invasions 6th Century BCE
Antiquity Achaemenid Period Satrapy of Armina 549–331 BCE Orontid Dynasty Ancient Armenia Armenia Minor 331–72 BCE Kingdom of Armenia 321 BCE–428 CE Artaxiad dynasty 189 BCE–12 CE Empire 84–34 BCE Arsacid dynasty 52–428 CE Roman–Parthian War 58–63 CE Roman Province of Armenia 114–118 CE Christianization 301 CE Kingdom of Sophene c.200–94 BCE Kingdom of Commagene 163 BCE–72 CE Marzpanate period Byzantine Armenia 387–536 Persian Armenia 428–646 Mamikonian dynasty Battle of Avarayr 451
Middle Ages Arabic Period Emirate of Armenia 653–884 Hamamshen 700s–1300s Amatuni Dynasty Medieval Armenia Bagratid Armenia 884–1045 Bagratid dynasty 861–1118 Kingdom of Vaspurakan 908–1021 Artsruni dynasty Sajid dynasty 889–929 Sallarid dynasty 919–1062 Kingdom of Tashir-Dzoraget 979–1118 Kingdom of Syunik 987–1170 Kingdom of Artsakh 1000–1261 House of Hasan-Jalalyan Battle of Manzikert 1071 Cilician & Turco-Mongol Period Seljuq rule 1071–1201 Georgian union 1201–1236 Ilkhanid rule 1236–1335 Principality of Khachen 1261–1750 Turkmen rule 1335–1508 Kingdom of Cilicia 1198–1375 Rubenid dynasty 1000–1261 Hethumid dynasty 1226–1373 Lusignan dynasty 1341–1375
Early modern age Perso-Ottoman Period Safavid & Qajar rule 1502–1828 Five Melikdoms Nakhichevan deportation 1606 Ceding of Eastern Armenia 1828 Ottoman rule 1548–1915 Six Vilayets 1878 Hamidian massacres 1895–1896 Armenian Genocide 1909–1918 Russian period Russian rule 1828–1918 Armenian Oblast 1828–1840 Western Armenia 1915–1918 National Liberation Movement Armenakan 1885 S.D. Hunchakian Party 1887 ARF (Dashnaktsutyun) 1890 Caucasus Campaign 1914–1918 Battle of Sardarapat 1918 Battle of Karakilisa 1918 Modern Armenia First Republic of Armenia 1918–1920 Treaty of Batum 1918 War with Azerbaijan 1918–1920 War with Georgia 1918 Treaty of Sèvres 1920 Wilsonian Armenia 1920 War with Turkey 1920 Treaty of Alexandropol 1920
Modern age Soviet Period Armenian S.S.R. 1920–1991 February Uprising 1921 Republic of Mountainous Armenia 1921 Treaty of Moscow 1921 Treaty of Kars 1921 Territorial claims against Turkey 1945–1953 Independence Armenian diaspora Hidden Armenians Republic of Armenia since 1991 Post-Soviet transition 1991–1995 Modern era since 1995 Nagorno-Karabakh Republic since 1994 Nagorno-Karabakh War 1989–1994
Armenia portal

Wilsonian Armenia according to the Treaty of Sèvres.

Wilsonian Armenia refers to the boundary configuration of the First Republic of Armenia in the Treaty of Sèvres, as drawn by U.S. President Woodrow Wilson's Department of State.^[1] The Treaty of Sèvres was a peace treaty that had been drafted and signed between the Western Allied Powers and the defeated government of the Ottoman Empire in August 1920. The treaty was never signed by the United States of America. The treaty was signed but never ratified by the Ottoman Empire.

The proposed boundaries incorporated the Ottoman vilayets of Erzurum, Bitlis, and Van, which once had Armenian populations of varying sizes. This region was extended to the north, up to the west side of Trabzon to provide the First Republic of Armenia with an outlet to the Black Sea at the port of Trabzon. The proposed state of Pontus was discussed at the Paris Peace Conference of 1919, but the Greek government of Eleftherios Venizelos feared the precarious position of such a state and so it was included instead in the larger proposed state of Wilsonian Armenia.

The United States Senate rejected the mandate for Armenia in 1920. The outbreak of the Turkish War of Independence led to the Ottoman Empire not ratifying the Treaty of Sèvres. Later in that year, the Turkish–Armenian War broke out. Armenia was defeated and signed the Treaty of Alexandropol on November 2, 1920 renouncing its territorial integrity under the Sèvres Treaty. The Treaty of Kars was negotiated between Soviet Russia and Turkey following the annexation of the Democratic Republic of Armenia by the Soviet Army in December 2, 1920, and signed between the Soviet government in Armenia on October 23, 1921. The latter was never accepted, either by the overthrown Armenian government nor later by the Republic of Armenia. The government of Soviet Russia separately negotiated a similar border between what it considered its territory of Armenia and Turkey in the Treaty of Moscow (1921).

The final Turkish and Armenian borders were internationally agreed upon in the Treaty of Lausanne in 1923 which replaced the generally unratified and unimplemented Sèvres Treaty.

Negotiations

During the Conference of London, David Lloyd George encouraged Wilson to accept a mandate for Anatolia, and particularly, with the support of the Armenian diaspora, for the provinces claimed by the occupied Turkish Armenia. Wilson sent the King-Crane Commission and General James Harbord to the region to study the claims made by the Armenian national movement, and to determine if these claims were compatible with Wilson's Fourteen Points. The 12th point was:

"The Turkish portion of the present Ottoman Empire should be assured a secure sovereignty, but the other nationalities which are now under Turkish rule should be assured an undoubted security of life and an absolutely unmolested opportunity of autonomous development, and the Dardanelles should be permanently opened as a free passage to the ships and commerce of all nations under international guarantees."

The King-Crane Commission tackled the issue of whether there should be an Armenian state, and whether or not this state should be created under a US mandate and concluded that there should be one. It has been noted that the arguments the Commission proposed to justify the creation of an Armenian state were similar to later arguments for the existence of Israel after World War II. Harbord recommended against dividing the territories inhabited by Armenians, in order to prevent potential problems such as intercommunal wars. Harbord's report stated that "the temptation to reprisals for past wrongs" would make it extremely difficult to maintain peace in the region.

The King-Crane Commission noted that the Armenians had suffered a traumatic experience, that they couldn't trust the Ottoman Empire to respect their rights any more, and that the Armenians were "a people." The Commission therefore recommended that the hard-won Armenian independence established during the Caucasus Campaign should be respected by the international community and insured by the Allies.

Armenian arguments

The Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF), using their position of leaders of the Armenian national movement, claimed that this region should not be part of the Ottoman Empire based on their assertion that Armenians had the capability to build a nation. Armenians had de facto control over a region surrounding the Van Province of the Ottoman Empire for nearly 3 years (1915-1918). The ARF stated that it was natural to annex this region to the newly established First Republic of Armenia (1918-1920), the first modern Armenian republic created after the collapse of the Russian Empire.

Another argument developed during this period was that the population was becoming increasingly more Armenian, and therefore Armenians were not a minority but a plurality; moving the displaced Armenians to this area should be considered as an option. In 1917, some 150,000 Armenians relocated to the provinces of Erzurum, Bitlis, Muş, and Van.^[2] The Armenians had already begun building their houses and creating their farmlands. In 1917, the provincial governor Aram Manukian stated that a new autonomous state in the region should be founded, under Russia or the Ottoman Empire. Armen Garo (Karekin Pastermajian) and other spokesmen proposed to have Armenian soldiers in Europe transfer to the Caucasus front for the protection and stability of the new establishment. Armenian soldiers began to create a protective line between the Ottoman Army and Armenian front.

Aftermath

In the aftermath of the King-Crane Commissions, events on the ground took their own course. President Wilson asked the United States Congress for the authority to establish a mandate for Armenia on May 24, 1920. The United States Senate rejected his request by a vote of 52 to 23 on June 1, 1920. In September 1920, the Turkish–Armenian War broke out. The First Republic of Armenia was defeated in November 1920 and signed the Treaty of Alexandropol under which it renounced the Treaty of Sèvres along with various territorial claims to "Western Armenia". The government of Armenia was subsequently overthrown. The new Armenian government signed the Treaty of Kars, which reaffirmed the previous Armenian concessions to Turkey and determined the modern-day borders between the two countries.

In late 1922, the various international parties negotiated the Treaty of Lausanne as a replacement for the Treaty of Sèvres. Given previous Turkish-Armenian treaties and the views of the then-current Soviet Armenian government, the issue of Armenian claims to "Western Armenia" was dropped.

Main article: Soviet territorial claims against Turkey

After World War II, the Soviet Union attempted to annul the Treaty of Kars and regain the lands ceded to Turkey. The Soviet claims were backed by much of the international Armenian diaspora, as well as the Armenian Revolutionary Federation.^[3] Armenian leaders attempted to gather British and American support for the reclamation of eastern Anatolia from Turkey, but Winston Churchill objected to the Soviet and Armenian territorial claims. Likewise, the United States State Department backed Turkey as well, saying, as it had since 1934, that its previous support for Wilsonian Armenia had since expired.^[4] The Soviet Union dropped its claims against Turkey after Stalin's death in 1953.^[5]

Modern times

Today, as a continuation of the initial goal, the creation of an independent and united Armenia consisting of all territories designated as Wilsonian Armenia by the Treaty of Sèvres is a stated aim of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation, regardless of the United States's official ending of support for the idea in 1934^[4] and the fact that these territories are now inhabited mainly by ethnic Kurds and Turks.

Armenian historian of the Genocide Vahakn Dadrian argued that, though it began as an effort to improve the lot of Armenians, the Treaty of Sèvres served mainly to compound the misfortunes of Armenians. He wrote that: "However long overdue and deserved its terms might have seemed to the Armenians, its promise of restoring to the Armenians a large chunk of historic Armenia fueled extravagant Armenian hopes and irredentist aspirations."^[6] Genesis of the Sèvres Treaty also coincided with the definitive defeat of the Damat Ferit's Cabinet in Istanbul which had initiated the prosecution against the authors of the genocide. From that period on court martial proceedings slackened and gradually disappeared.^[6]

Notes

↑ Hovannisian, Richard G. (1996). The Republic of Armenia, Vol. IV: Between Crescent and Sickle, Partition and Sovietization. Berkeley, California: University of California Press. pp. 40–44. ISBN 0-520-08804-2.
↑ Hovannisian Richard G. The Armenian People from Ancient to Modern Times: Vol. II: Foreign Domination to Statehood: The Fifteenth Century to the Twentieth Century. New York: St Martin's Press, and London: Macmillan, 1997
↑ Richard G. Hovannisian The Armenian People from Ancient to Modern Times: Foreign dominion to statehood: the fifteenth century to the twentieth century. Palgrave Macmillan, 2004. P. 417
1 2 Suny, Ronald Grigor (1993). Looking Toward Ararat: Armenia in Modern History. Indiana University Press. pp. 169, 175–176.
↑ Ro'i, Yaacov (1974). From Encroachment to Involvement: A Documentary Study of Soviet Policy in the Middle East, 1945-1973. Transaction Publisher. pp. 106–107.
1 2 Vahakn N. Dadrian The History of the Armenian Genocide: Ethnic Conflict from the Balkans to Anatolia to the Caucasus, p. 359

External links

Armenian Cause and International Law.

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