Commentary: Historic Anniversary of Hope and Despondence

At that time, patriotic fervor and the sense of revenge were overwhelming.

The Armenian Legion spearheaded the assault on unified Ottoman and German forces, fortifying a hilltop in Palestine called Arara. Armenians made history by breaking the backbone of the enemies on September 19, 1918, turning the tide of World War I in the region.

It was agreed that the volunteer legion would become the nucleus of the Armenian Army after autonomy was granted under a French mandate in Cilicia.

After the Legion entered Cilicia victoriously, 150,000 Genocide survivors returned to their homes there. Nubar Pasha appointed Mihran Damadian as the Cilician  representative vis-à-vis occupying forces.

Euphoric optimism reigned throughout Cilicia, as Armenians prepared to achieve their dreams.

It was a historic moment. The Allies were forcing on the defeated Germans and Ottomans the Treaty of Sevres, which included an independent Armenia crafted by President Woodrow Wilson. Yet Cilicia, where Armenians had been reassembled, was not part of the deal. An elusive historic opportunity was to be missed had the Armenians failed to act.

The defeated Turks had already regrouped on the ground, under Mustafa Kemal and were planning a comeback. Damadian assembled all the minorities — Armenian, Greek, Arab, Assyrian and others, and a declaration was drafted to be submitted to the French Commander Bremon. They were trying to create a fait accompli, like the Turks had done, six days before the signing of Sevres Treaty. The next day, on August 5, a delegation headed by Damadian occupied the government office and announced the formation of the Armenian government in Cilicia under a French mandate.

Damadian named himself prime minister and formed a cabinet to reflect the ethnic diversity of the region, which the French statesman George Picot had defined as a “purely Armenian territory” and where 100,000 other Christian ethnic groups had joined the 150,000 Armenians.

At the dramatic moment of achieving statehood, the French commander dispatched a battalion who forced the Armenians out of the government House at the butt of bayonets and then later in October and November evacuated their forces secretly from Cilicia, leaving the Armenians unarmed and defenseless before marauding Kemalist forces, who came to finish the grizzly mission which the Ittihadists had began during the war, by exterminating Armenians.

“Cilicia is destined to become Armenia’s future window open to the sea, to Europe and to civilization,” wrote Damadian in his memoirs — a dream that never realized.

The August 5 act may have been a last-ditch desperate initiative, but it was a historic necessity, which any prudent leader, with a sense of history, would and should have taken, regardless of the consequences. The French betrayed their formal pledge, because they had negotiated a secret deal with the Turks, not realizing that the Kemalist Milli nationalist movement was also financed, supported and armed by the newly-rising Lenin’s communist forces.

Damadian has a sad yet realistic commentary about this act of betrayal: “The conscience of diplomacy is broad and very flexible. If need be, it can level with rebels and rascals, and can even sit down to negotiate with people like Mustafa Kemal and his cohorts, vile thugs and blood hungry killers and sign armistices.”

The Cilician home rule was a dream so close to being realized, but it was sacrificed by the treachery of the French government. The Cilician dream may be lost forever, but valuable political lessons are learned which can be implemented today in the Karabagh conflict. Muster your forces and don’t trust even the closest allies, because they may sell you down the river for their selfish interests.