Rebellious as Armenians: Ottoman KURDS
You know how Armenian propaganda tells us the Turks and the Kurds were partners in crime against the Armenians? Actually, the main thing Turks and Kurds shared, in regards to the Armenians, is that both groups suffered monumentally under the Armenians' heartless ethnic cleansing policies.
Other than that, the Kurds were constantly a thorn in the side of the Ottoman Turks. In the word of a British consular agent, as you'll be reading below, the Kurds were " unmanageable."
Since the cash-poor Ottoman administration had their hands full with so many other problems and dangers, they never quite succeeded in controlling the Kurds (and as you'll also be reading below, it would be more correct to define this group as "Kurdish tribes" rather than "Kurds"; as opposed to Armenians, the problems these Kurds caused mainly did not derive from nationalism).
In reality, the reason why Sultan Abdul Hamid created the "Hamidiye" (Kurdish regiment) had nothing to do, as Armenian propaganda tells us (see, for example, Peter Balakian's "The Burning Tigris"), with making life hell for the Armenians. This was the sultan's idea in trying to control the Unmanageable Kurds, and also hope that a much-needed fighting force could be utilized for his constantly threatened nation, in the style of the Russians' Cossacks. (It was a short-sighted idea, of course, because such did not stop making the Kurds " unmanageable," nor did it help with making the lives of eastern Armenians and other Ottomans any easier.)
The Kurds, or these Kurdish tribes, surely did make life difficult for Armenians. But one of the many things Armenian propaganda neglects to tell us is that the Kurds made life miserable for everybody. Even an Armenian organization in Britain (back in 1878, before these propagandists became utterly unscrupulous and spoiled) paid grudging recognition to the fact that Muslims were also victimized by the Kurds. In their article, the Armenians also added:
This course of things has gone on for centuries, but has become sensibly worse during the last 30 or 40 years, as the Turkish Government has become weaker and fanaticism has increased. The Government is utterly powerless to control the Kurds, who follow their own chieftains and do not care for the officials of the Sultan. These officials seldom venture to interfere; but if they do, the Kurds take vengeance probably on them, and certainly on the village of the Armenian who has dared to complain.
Note what we are correctly being told: Ottoman control was weak, adding to the Armenians', and other eastern Ottomans', miseries. In areas of governmental strength, as Istanbul and environs, Armenians were prospering and had few causes for complaint.
In other words, aside from tax collection and perhaps the occasional other minor affairs, Armenians had little exposure to the "iron hand" of the Ottoman government. Propagandistic claims of "Turkish tyranny" fall by the wayside when there is barely any contact with the government. (And to stress the point, ironically, it was the lack of such contact that made these easterners so unhappy.) In short, as Prof. Richard Hovannisian has instructed us, Armenians enjoyed what amounted to an internal autonomy.
So, in fact, did the Kurdish tribes.
The idea of this page is to shed light on what horrible and disloyal citizens the Kurds of these tribes were. The idea is to break the myth that the Turks and Kurds always worked hand in hand.
(Yet, getting back to our favorite topic of Armenians, you will note below that if some Kurds operated as predatory lawless bands, so in fact did some Armenians... once again busting the commonly held belief that Armenians are always poor, defenseless victims.)
(Can't let go of our favorite topic, can we? The reader may now gain a better understanding — in these bleak "no man's lands" of eastern and southeastern Anatolia — as to why the poorly-guarded Armenian convoys, during the resettlement process, could easily fall victim to lawless bands who would swoop out of nowhere. Sometimes corrupt gendarmes were in cahoots with these Kurds; yet, most of the time, the gendarmes protected the Armenians. If they hadn't, the majority of Armenians could not have reached their destinations alive.)
Let us refer to Prof. Justin McCarthy's extremely scholarly book "Death and Exile: The Ethnic Cleansing of Ottoman Muslims, 1821-1922," on the issue of Ottoman Kurds. (This book is a must-have for any truthful party interested in this "genocide" matter.)
Afterwards, we'll examine a few other sources related to Kurdish persecution of the Armenians. (Although the idea of this particular page should have little to do with Armenians, once again the focus turns to the Armenians. Amazing.)
It will then be time to explore more background on the Kurds' rebellious ways, in the section called Russians and the Kurds.
Followed up by a New York Times account, "Kurds Disgust the Turks."
THE SITUATION IN THE OTTOMAN EAST
Click for Full Text!
Poster Comment:
One thing we must realize is that the Armenians were Christians and the Turks were Muslims.