The Hatsbanian Case and Others

Incidentally, there are some historians who maintain that Mustafa Kemal Ataturk might have been the one exception, the hero of the Galipoli campaign who ended up being a nation builder, founding the modern Republic of Turkey. The truth however, is that in actuality it was the German generals who won the battle, only allowing the phony hero to take the credit. Ataturk then recruited Ittihadist murderers as a base for his “modern” republic.

I personally witnessed a tragic example of this historic bloodletting. Following the uprising of the Karabakh movement, when independence was in progress, former advisor to President Levon Ter-Petrosian, Prof. Gerard Libaridian introduced me to one of the brilliant intellectual leaders of the Karabakh Committee, Hampartsum Galstyan, who later became the mayor of Yerevan. At that time, Galstyan assured me that all the leaders of the movement were like brothers and he held his hand in a fist. I was exhilarated but worried. I said, “I hope this time around you disprove history, because all previous revolutions have ended up in terror or bloodshed, most of the time the leaders eliminating each other.”

Lo and behold, Galstyan was the first victim, and no cause or culprit was discovered in his assassination, to this day. Of course, the Karabakh Committee eventually splintered, with each member going his own way.

Therefore, it has become a historic adage that revolutionaries never or seldom become efficient peacetime rulers. The misconception for our heroes in Armenia is there. Because they have honestly fought for liberation of Karabakh, they believe they have won the privilege of imposing their position and views on the civilian authorities. They certainly have won an honorable place in society, but they have to know that comes with a price. A case in point is Samvel Babayan, the former minister of defense of Karabakh who proved himself to be a hero in the war of liberation. But in peacetime, he turned into a villain, plotting to assassinate former president of Karabakh Arkadi Ghukassian. He was tried and jailed but under public pressure, he was released only to be caught in yet another assassination plot and currently is serving another jail term.

When the leaders of Sasna Tzerer were put on trial, there was a public outcry that they were being treated unfairly because Armenia lacked civil liberties as they do in Europe. The editor of the daily Aravot, Aram Abrahamyan, a keen observer of the scene in Armenia, and no apologist for the authorities, retorted in one of his daily columns, “Try to storm a police station in a European or American city and murder a cop and see where you end up.”

In any country subject to the rule of law, citizens are well aware of their rights and responsibilities and they know every infraction has a commensurate punishment. But in our society, especially in Armenia, emotions run high, sometimes stifling reason.

The misplaced hero worship is not new in our history. It was once taken up by one of our eminent satirists, Yervant Odian, in a book titled The Parasites of Revolution. Many persecuted Armenians who had fled the Ottoman Empire had found refuge in the affluent Egyptian-Armenian community. There were many former freedom fighters among the refugees who enjoyed the largess of the community. But there were also some phony ones who had never wielded a weapon but manufactured stories of heroic deeds to win the admiration and the generosity of the people, perhaps not too alike another folk hero, Hovannes Toomanyan’s Kaj Nazar. And many times, they had their way with credulous Armenians. Odian, in his witty style, warned the public against those fake heroes. They try to share the honor of true heroes who are not always braggarts.

People who have put their daily lives in harm’s way for a good cause deserve honor and respect. But they should not take for granted their license to act as they wish, without consideration given to rules. Fighting on the battlefront should not be confused with the right to rule a country. General Antranik was a true revolutionary and he graciously received the respect and admiration of people yet he never gave in to the temptation to assume the mantle of a political ruler.

True heroes know well their place in society and in history.