Critical Reading Response #1:
Having learned about World War II first and now learning about World War I second, comparing and contrasting is Talaat to Hitler. Talaat acted very similarly to Hitler in ways of how to commit the crimes and how they avoided the truth to be revealed to the world. During World War I, an empire named Talaat located in Turkey decided to ally with Germany against Britain, France, and Russia. This war was about racial discrimination. Christians were Talaat’s target in wanting to get rid of. “… No more room for Christians in Turkey,” stated Talaat (Power, page 2). The only way to put a stop to the war would have been to overthrow the German-Austrian-Turkish alliance.
Some of the language they used was said very carefully. For example, “corpses be ‘buried at once,’ or at least hidden from view,” stated Talaat (Power, page 10). During the Holocaust, Hitler attempted different methods in how to exterminate the Jewish population with out leaving evidence. For Talaat, hiding the corpses of the Christian population was his way of hiding his evidence of crime. An additional phrase Talaat said was, “We don’t give a rap for the future! We live only in the present!” (Power, page 8). Both Talaat and Hitler both had identical philosophies in the involvement of mass extermination of innocent races.
According to Lemkin, “both the physical and cultural existence of groups had to be preserved.” (Power, page 21). Lemkin proposed and a new law and got it approved involving “barbarity” and “vandalism.” He defined “barbarity” as “the premeditated destruction of national, racial, religious and social collectivities,” and “vandalism” as “destruction of works of art and culture, being the expression if the particular genius of these collectivities.” Both the Jewish and Christians underwent the robbery of art and cultural beliefs. Due to both of the races suffering through horrific events such as these, Lemkin got his law approved to protect the future races from getting robbed ever again.
As Germans fell under Hitler’s rules, Armenians fell under Talaat’s rules. Not did they all fall under rule, they suffered under the harsh rules. At the end of World War I, Germany, Austria, and Turkey were held responsible of the mass extermination of the Christians in Turkey. From the samples of quotes Talaat said, he did not take responsibility in his decision-making. Talaat and his associates were convicted for death being their penalty. However, Hitler and his associates were not convicted to death because some of them were able to flee from Russian occupancies, while others were sentenced to life in prison.
Before the peak of World War II, the Nazis invaded Poland in 1939 by Hitler. When 1942 comes, Hitler recovered Talaat’s ashes and returned them to Turkey.
