In the apologies for Turkish policies have shaped a credible case against the Armenians, the critics have refuted the arguments point for point and have concluded that the deportations and massacres were calculated, irresponsible, and brutal crimes. Utilising scores of documents and the testimony of many European witnesses, these critics have insisted that the overwhelming majority of the Armenians fulfilled every obligation of Ottoman citizenship during the first months of war. Exhortations of the Patriarch, the revolutionary organisations, and many other societies urging the Turkish Armenians to maintain a correct attitude have been cited. Moreover, the dedication of Armenian soldiers was acknowledged by Enver himself, who, upon returning from the Sarighamish debacle, informed the Patriarch and other high-ranking clergy of the unsurpassed bravery of these troops. 63
The gravest Turkish accusation involved Armenian rebellion during time of war; the "Revolt of Van" became the classic charge. The Lepsius-Toynbee school of critics labelled the indictment as fabrication. The city rose in self-defence only after the deportations and massacres had begun in Cilicia and after Jevdet Bey, brother-in-law of Enver and Armenophobe vali (governor) of Van, had ordered the destruction of the Armenian villages in the outlaying districts. 64 If, as Turkish sourced claim, the revolt were premeditated, why would Ishkhan, popular leader of the Van Armenians, leave the city at the behest of the vali to restore peace between feuding Moslems and Christians in an isolated upland of the vilayet? Only after the treacherous murder of Ishkhan, the imprisonment of Arshak Vramian, a member of the Ottoman parliament, and the siege of the Armenian quarter by Jevdet's forces did Van rise in self-defence, barricade the streets, and inaugurate in the last half of April, 1915, the month-long obdurate resistance. This sequence of events was substantiated by testimony of American eyewitnesses. 65
Turning from the question of Van, the castigators of Turkish policies then negated the other contentions. The hopeless battles in the interior of Turkey at Shabin Gharahisar, Ourfa, and Cilicia were indications of an Armenian revolution fermenting throughout the Empire, but simply reflected the resolution of a condemned people to fall fighting rather than be slaughtered. That the Armenians possessed weapons was not astounding; they had carried arms for decades to defend their homes and fields from depredation. Among the photographs published by the Ittihadist government were pictures of bombs and grenades, but these explosives belonged to the era when both Turkish and Armenian opposition groups were struggling against Abdul Hamid II. Since the attempted Hamidian coup of 1909, when Ittihad leaders had requested that these weapons be used against the forces of reactions, they had not been touched by the Armenians. 66 to the charge that Ottoman subjects, as volunteers in the Russian Army viciously attacked the Empire, Arnold Toynbee drew an analogy to the Polish units, which, joining the Austro-Hungarian forces, battled against the tsarist armies. If the entire Armenian nation could be condemned for the activities of several hundred or even several thousand men, then should not Russia, on the same basis, annihilate the millions Poles within its borders? 67
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