Axar.az presents the article by Andrew Korybko: No, Newsweek, Biden shouldn't recognize the “Armenian Genocide.”

Axar.az reports that the influential American magazine Newsweek ran an opinion piece late last week about why “Biden Should Keep His Word and Recognize the Armenian Genocide”.

It was written by Stephan Pechdimaldji, who's described at the end of the article as a public relations professional who lives in the San Francisco Bay Area and first-generation Armenian American and grandson to survivors of the Armenian “genocide”. He argues that newly inaugurated President Biden would fulfil a campaign promise, send a strong message about “upholding democratic values and principles”, stand up to alleged Turkish pressure, and unify the nation by doing so.

Despite concluding that “the Armenian genocide is not a political issue, it is a human rights one”, his primary arguments are inextricably connected to politics. In fact, the very recognition of “genocide” by a foreign government is by definition a political act. Some countries like Russia already regard the tragic events that unfolded during World War I as “genocide” even though many non-Armenians were also killed during that time. The difference between Russia's stance and the one that Biden's being pressured to take, however, is that Moscow's ties with Ankara haven't suffered but Washington's definitely would if that happens.

Those campaigning across the world for wider recognition of those events as “genocide” know very well that such an act would cause problems between their government and Turkey. That's because Turkey very strongly disagrees with politicizing that dimension of the already over 100-year-old global conflict in which it happened. According to Ankara, this issue should be left to historians to resolve, not politicians, and all the archives must be open and accessible to all in order to discover the truth about what happened. Turkey claims that Armenia and its supporters manufactured evidence to support their claims and are hiding facts that contradict them.

Whatever one's personal opinion is about what happened, they shouldn't pressure governments to agree with them. Armenian-Americans and their supporters are blatantly politicizing that historical event in order to impose current costs on the Turkish-American relationship. They know that Congress is deeply sceptical about the country's military alliance with Turkey after recent disagreements over the Pentagon's arming of Syrian Kurdish groups that Ankara regards as terrorists and President Erdogan's decision to go ahead with purchasing Russia's S-400 air-defence systems. Recognizing the “Armenian genocide” would only make matters even worse.

That, however, is exactly what they want to have happened though. They're hiding their political agenda behind an unconvincing human rights facade, hoping to manipulate well-intended but naive people into agreeing with them. Although governments across the world have recognized various events as “genocides”, they do so for political purposes, which in the present day relates to at the very least offering up political support for the alleged victims as well as potentially sanctioning (or threatening to sanction) the alleged criminals. For public relations purposes, they justify their actions using human rights rhetoric.

One might disagree with the ultimate morality of these actions, especially if they don't support the narrative being pushed by whichever government it may be, but that's just the way that the world works nowadays. This should be recognized above all else instead of playing politics with historical memory in order to impose contemporary costs on a bilateral partnership based on contested claims from a complex event that tragically transpired over a century ago. Newsweek has the editorial right to run Pechdimaldji's opinion piece, but so too does everyone else have the right to criticize the blatantly political agenda that they're pushing.

The future of US-Turkish relations should be determined by realpolitik which corresponds to each of their interests, not the lobbying efforts of a tiny ethnic minority in one of them which has succeeded in generating disproportionate attention in support of their historical grievances. If America decides to worsen ties with Turkey, then it should be due to something which affects its current interests, not an event over a century ago which never directly concerned it. Doing otherwise is an injustice to all those who died in war throughout history if their memory is later abused to push a partisan agenda halfway across the world years later.