232 ISLAM AT WAR
of 250,000 Armenians in Sasun, Trapezunt, Edessa, Biredjik, Kharput,
Niksar, and Wan. Further massacres followed in 1904 and in 1909 when
30,000 Armenians lost their lives at Adana. These massacres have been
described as a deliberately planned and implemented extermination of the
Armenians.
The pressures of the Russian armies in the Transcaucasus theater in
1915 against the Turkish armies provoked great concern for the internal
security of the Turkish state. The Turkish government began to worry
what might be going on behind their lines. They had already, by either
their ineptness or because of a calculated plan, begun stirring the pot of
Armenian discontent in the 1890s. Having created the mess, they reverted
to old methods that had worked in previous crises—slaughter the prob-
lem—and this led to the infamous mass murders of 1915, described as the
first case of genocide in the twentieth century and discussed at length in
Chapter 8.
If one looks at the Armenians’ situation in 1915 within the context of
the jihad, the logic flows as follows: The Armeniandhimmiswere non-
believers. They were co-religionists of the attacking Russian army, and
they had, in the past, made appeals to the Russians to aid them. As a
result, they were a threat to the Islamic state of Turkey. The jihad is a
holy war to either expand or defend Islam. The Armeniandhimmiswere
a threat to the state as it defends itself against the assault by the infidel
Russians and, therefore, they became a legitimate target for military opera-
tions. Surah XLVII, 5, says,“And when you meet in regular battle those
who disbelieve, smite their necks[cut off their heads];and, when you have
overcome them, by causing great slaughter among them, bind fast the
fetters.”Clearly this is an injunction to kill and enslave those that threaten
the state. In the Turkish mind in 1915 the Armenians fell under the pre-
scription established in this surah. Sadly, these genocides seem to have
deeply impressed Hitler, and he may well have seen the lack of world
reaction to them as a model for his later genocidal attacks on the Jews.
This genocide of the Armenians was the first genocide of the twentieth
century and was but the natural culmination of a divinely sanctioned pol-
icy toward non-Muslims. It was nothing less than a jihad, implemented
by Muslims, who alone benefited from the booty. Historically the posses-
sions and the land of the victims went to the murderers, while the women
and children were reduced to slavery. Armenia in 1915 was not an iso-
lated incident, but a deliberate policy to eliminate any possible escape
of Armeniandhimmisfrom Muslim domination and to keep the con-
quered territory under Islamic jurisdiction. The inner logic of the jihad
could not tolerate religious emancipation or equality before the law by