I believe that this was the Ottoman mindset before and during the First World War. For that reason, it appears to me no coincidence that the decision behind the Armenian Genocide was made during the fierce battles of the Gallipoli campaign, when the Ottoman Empire’s very existence seemed to balance between life and death. The hopeless situation into which Ottomans had fallen produced a willingness to rely on extraordinary acts of cruelty. (1)
The fierce resistance of the Turks at Gallipoli caused the Entente immense losses in personnel, money and equipment and was at least partially responsible for the war dragging on for another two years. Against subsequent criticisms of the Sèvres Treaty, which claimed that it had made very severe judgments against the Turks, British prime minister David Lloyd George specifically referred to Gallipoli in claiming that ‘the Turks’ deserved this harsh judgment. (2)
Almost everyone believed that the capture of Istanbul was only a question of time … It was not a coincidence that the Armenian genocide took place soon after the Sarikamis disaster and was contemporaneous with the empire’s struggle at Gallipoli … A nation that feels itself on the verge of destruction will not hesitate to destroy another group it holds responsible for its situation … A prediction made by the German ambassador Wangenheim is worth mentioning. With the outbreak of the war in August 1914, Henry Morgenthau [the US ambassador] warned him that the Turks would massacre the Armenians in Anatolia, to which Wangenheim replied, “So long as England does not attack Canakkale [the Turkish fortress at the Dardanelles] … there is nothing to fear. Otherwise, nothing can be guaranteed.” However, this is precisely what happened. (3)
Those who characterize Erdoğan’s statement as offering something ‘totally new’ and ‘historical’ are wrong. Outside of the Prime Minister’s speech, there is nothing really new being said here. These ideas and opinions have all been expressed dozens of times and in many different venues and manners, most notably by Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu, and usually as part of a call to preserve a “just and equitable memory” (adil hafıza), a protective rubric used in an effort to equate the horrors of the Armenian deportations with Turkish losses at Gallipoli and Sarıkamış. (4)
(1) Taner Akcam, “From Empire to Republic: Turkish Nationalism and the Armenian Genocide”, Zed Books, 2004, p. 54
(2) Taner Akcam, “From Empire to Republic: Turkish Nationalism and the Armenian Genocide”, Zed Books, 2004, p. 183
(3) Taner Akcam, “A Shameful Act: The Armenian Genocide and the Question of Turkish Responsibility”, New York, Metropolitan Books, 2006, p. 24.
(4) Taner Akcam, “Approaching 2015: How to Assess Erdoğan’s Statement on the Armenian Genocide?”, June 4, 2014, http://www.e-ir.info/2014/06/04/approaching-2015-how-to-assess-erdogans-statement-on-the-armenian-genocide/