Meanwhile, Armenian militarist had determined to "make an example" of Ulukhanlu, which, despite several warnings, still prevented the passage of troops headed for the front. On the morning of March 7, Aram, Dro, and Silikian led the bombardment and pitched combat. The battle raged until evening, when the Tatars finally broke ranks and fled. Ulukhanlu and the surrounding villages were razed and thousands of homeless Moslems scattered throughout the Sharur and Nakhichevan districts. The victorious troops reopened that the railway to Alexandropol and Kars and then pushed southward to Khamarlu and Davalu, rescuing several beleaguered military units and escorting the population of isolated Christian villages to Yerevan. 62 the hostilities did not cease with Ulukhanlu; on the contrary, news of the capitulation of Erzurum provoked greater turbulence. Typical of many other incidents was the ambush of an Armenian convoy by one of the six Moslem villages on the south-western shore of Lake Sevan between Elenovka and Novo Bayazid. Armenian soldiers and peasantry responded by destroying all six villages and driving the survivors to the mountainous region east of the lake. 63
Turkish violation of the Erzinjan Truce and the interracial friction at home fostered cohesion among the Yerevan Armenians. Recognising the need for iron discipline in order to surmount the deepening crisis, a conference of military and civil leaders in mid-March proclaimed Aram "Dictator of Yerevan." Selecting directors for internal affairs, provisions, finance, and defence, Aram gave Yerevan an exclusively Armenian administration for the first time in centuries. In the succeeding months, this Directorate extended its jurisdiction over much of the Plain of Ararat and, until it was relieved by the cabinet of the Armenian Republic in July, 1918, exercised the prerogatives of a de facto government. 64 It restored partial order, provided for a fraction of refugees teeming throughout the province, and secured the transportation routes to the front. In these operations, tens of Tatar villages which "stood in the way" were not spared in what might be termed a precursor to the Moslem "treachery" and the Armenian "reprisals" that were to vex the Republic of Armenia throughout its existence.
The state of affairs in Yerevan was not an exception. Events in the Kars oblast and the Elisavetpol guberniia were no more reassuring. Grigor Dsamoev, the civilian commissar of Kars, urgently wired the Seim that armed Tatars and Kurds had encircled Ardahan and Merdenek. 65 The Ardahan crisis distressed the Mensheviks in particular, for they considered the region indisputably Georgian. During the March 18 session of the Seim they vilified the "enemy within the country." That foe would no longer be tolerated. Martiros Haroutounian of Dashnaktsoutiun seized the opportunity to remind the Georgians that the treachery in Ardahan was no different from recent hostile acts in Elisavetpol and Yerevan. He regretted that many members of the Transcaucasian legislature had chosen to ignore the grave realities until being aroused by the events in Ardahan, where the same "dark hand" was at work obstructing the government's defence efforts. Shafi Bek Rustambekov of the Musavat fraction agreed that anarchy was not permissible, especially at the critical moment when negotiations were proceeding in Trabizond. He strenuously objected, however, to the insinuative statements of Mensheviks and Dashnakists and denied the existence of a conspiracy. 66 The Musavatists and Mensheviks, having often acted in harmony, now upbraided one another. Irakli Tsereteli shouted, "There is no difference at present between anarchy and treachery!" He contented that Transcaucasia had thus far been spared the disastrous fate of Russia only because the local democracy had not been permitted to splinter and plunge into civil war. Addressing the Musavatist legislators, the veteran Menshevik voiced astonishment that the leading Moslem organisation had the audacity to rise in defence of anarchy. Was it not proper that the Seim fraction with the greatest influence on the elements causing the unrest should take active measures to restrain the transgressors? 67 As the members of the Seim bellowed at one another, Moslem insurgents captured Ardahan and disarmed soldiers of the Transcaucasian government. 68
|
