Remembering the Great War in the Middle East: From Turkey and Armenia to Australia and New Zealand

Description

This book addresses the conflicts, myths, and memories that grew out of the Great War in Ottoman Turkey, and their legacies in society and politics. It is the third volume in a series dedicated to the combined analysis of the Ottoman Great War and the Armenian Genocide. In Australia and New Zealand, and even more in the post-Ottoman Middle East, the memory of the First World War still has an immediacy that it has long lost in Europe. For the post-Ottoman regions, the first of the two World Wars, which ended Ottoman rule, was the formative experience. This volume analyses this complex configuration: why these entanglements became possible; how shared or even contradictory memories have been constructed over the past hundred years, and how differing historiographies have developed. Remembering the Great War in the Middle East reaches towards a new conceptualization of the “long last Ottoman decade” (1912-22), one that places this era and its actors more firmly at the center, instead of on the periphery, of a history of a Greater Europe, a history comprising – as contemporary maps did – Europe, Russia, and the Ottoman world. Cover Halftitle page Title page Copyright page Contents Contributors Acknowledgements Introduction Hans-Lukas Kieser, Pearl Nunn, Thomas Schmutz Myth and Memory of the Great War in Ottoman Turkey A Transnational Perspective Atatürk in New Zealand and Australia The chapters of this volume Macro-Conditions for Remembering the Ottoman Great War Part One History Writing and the Politics of Commemoration 1 Turkish History Writing of the Great War: Facing Ottoman Legacy, Mass Violence and Dissent1 The Historiographical Narrative established by the Military and Kemalism A Chronological and Geographical Framework proper to the Ottoman Fronts New Actors, New Sources, New Fields and New Approaches: A change in the writing of History? A Break with the Culture of Denial in Turkey Conclusion 2 National Remembrance and Anzac Day in Australia and New Zealand, 1916–2015 Introduction Imperial-Civic Commemoration, 1916–1945 Post-War Anzac Day: Protest and Crisis The ‘Anzac Revival’: Post-Imperial State Commemoration, 1990–2015 Conclusion 3 April 24. Formation, Development and Current State of the Armenian Genocide Victims Remembrance Day Introduction The First Commemorations of the Victims of Mets Yeghern The First Commemoration of the Mets Yeghern Victims in Constantinople The Question of Commemoration of the Remembrance Day of the Victims of the Mets Yeghern in the First Republic of Armenia The Soviet-Turkish Treaties. The Issue of Nationalism and Impossibility of Commemoration the Remembrance Day under Stalinism The Armenian Church and the Problem of Observation of the Memory of the Mets Yeghern Victims in the 1920s–1960s Commemoration of the Remembrance Day of the Victims of Mets Yeghern in Armenian Communities of Diaspora in the 1920–1960s Commemoration of the Remembrance Day in Soviet Armenia Monument Dedicated to the Remembrance of the Victims of Mets Yeghern Commemoration of the 50th Anniversary of the Mets Yeghern by the Armenian Church The Peculiarities of the Mets Yeghern Remembrance Day Commemoration in Diaspora Further Commemorations of the Remembrance Day of the Victims of Armenian Genocide in Soviet Armenia and the Legislative Consolidation of 24 April The Karabagh Movement and the Changes of the Content of the Armenian Genocide Victims’ Remembrance Day Commemoration of the Remembrance Day of the Genocide Victims in the Context of the Commemorative Rituals of the Armenian People The Remembrance Day of the Victims of Armenian Genocide as a Political Factor The Problem of Re-formulating 24 April 4 Unremembering Gallipoli: A Complex History of World War I Memorialization and Historical Remembrance in Turkey Promoting the Child-Martyrs of Gallipoli Myth Gallipoli and the Nature of Representation Early Examples of Gallipoli Remembrance New Magazine ’s Special Gallipoli Issue in 1918 as the Initiator of New Remembrance Conclusion Part Two National Narratives in the former Ottoman World 5 Official and Individual Lenses of the Remembrance of the First World War: Turkish Official Military Histories and Personal War Narratives Establishing the War History division The Impact of the War of Independence War History in the Cold War Context First World War History and the Commemorative Boom Conclusion 6 National Narratives Challenged: Ottoman Wartime Correspondence on Palestine Historical Background: Collective Memory, and Historiographical Debates Examining Ottoman Wartime Coded Telegrams Attitude toward Zionist Activity Treatment of the Civilian Population Treatment of Arab and Jewish Nationalists Conclusion Part Three Australians’ Embrace of Gallipoli 7 From Unspeakable to Honourable: The Great War and Australian Narratives of the Turks Pre-war Perceptions: The ‘Unspeakable’ Turk The Declaration of War: Growing Anti-Turkish Sentiment The ‘Noble Enemy’ Emerges: The Gallipoli Experience The Interwar Period: Graves and Geopolitics Challenging the Narrative: Prisoners of War Conclusion 8 ‘Strong and friendly bonds . . . out of shared tragedy’1? The Gallipoli / Canakkale battles in Canberra’s City Planning and Architecture of Memory Early designs for the new capital of Canberra The impact of the First World War and the Gallipoli / Canakkale battles on the early city planning and construction in Canberra The National Capital Development Commission, the Gallipoli / Canakkale battles and the development of Canberra in the 1950s and 1960s Renewed interest in the Gallipoli / Canakkale battles and the impact on the architectural shape of Canberra’s parliamentary triangle Conclusion 9 Gallipoli in Diasporic Memories of Sikhs and Turks Migration and Military Service Integrating Military Histories and Heritages Commemorating Gallipoli Conclusion Part Four Contested Memories: New Zealand, Turkey and Armenians 10 ‘To Have and to Hold’: Chunuk Bair and the Foundations of New Zealand’s Gallipoli Imagining Introduction Annexing Anzac Bargaining with corpses Marking the Missing Making a Memorial Conclusion 11 New Zealand and the Armenian Genocide: Myths, Memory and Lost History Introduction The Nineteenth Century Armenian–New Zealand Connection The Armenian Genocide and the Gallipoli Invasion The Aftermath and a Resurgence of Killing Selective Memory and Active Forgetting Anzac Day and Reframing the First World War A Transformation: From ‘Unspeakable Turk’ to ‘Friend’ The Rise of Atatürk in New Zealand: Past versus Present Aiding Denial: New Zealand and the Armenian Genocide Erased from New Zealand History 12 Can the Survivor Speak?1 The life and work of an Ottoman bureaucrat: Madt‘ēōs Ēblighatian (1881–1960) Halajian: The cemetery of the living dead, known as Anatolia The first and foremost reservoir of denial: Ermeni Komitalarının Amâl ve Harekât-ı İhtilâ liyesi: İlân-ı Meşrutiyetten Evvel ve Sonra In lieu of a conclusion Afterword Select Bibliography Index