YEREVAN, 24 FEBRUARY, ARMENPRESS. What role did the German Empire play in the planning and perpetration of the Armenian Genocide? On February 20, Reinhard Baumgarten, correspondent for the ARD (First Channel of Germany) in Istanbul, aired a 6-minute program devoted to that question as part of the Tagesschau television program (first news release of ARD). As “Armenpress” reports, the correspondent talks about the hundreds of thousands of Christian Armenians who were killed in the Ottoman Empire during the years of the First World War. The German and Ottoman Empires were allies during the Armenian Genocide. They were allies when hundreds of thousands of Christian Armenians were dying in Eastern Anatolia. Question: What did the German ally know about the mass killings and the crime? “Many things,” creator of the program, journalist Jürgen Gotschlich says, adding that Berlin’s goals in the war were more important.

 The creator of the program concludes that Germany had a huge impact on the Ottoman government.

Slaughter of the Armenians: “Brutal, but helpful”

 Jürgen Gotschlich found the following manuscript writing in a document kept at a German military archive: “The slaughter of the Christian Armenians was brutal, but helpful”. “Germany participated in planning the deportations,” the journalist says with certainty and believes the Germans could have told the Turkish authorities to stop at the decisive moment.

Genocide, or deportations?

 ARD’s correspondent reports that to this day, Turkey continues to deny the allegation of genocide with determination and considers the event a consequence of the First World War when “Armenians and Muslims were killed…” Turkish publicist Aydın Engin counters that and says he is certain that it was truly planned. During the program, he mentions that the essence of the plan was not to eliminate the Armenians entirely, but to remove them from their homes, without any exceptions.

 Turkish historian Taner Akçam is certain that this policy was planned before the war. The creator of the program also presents figures showing the number of Christians in Anatolia before the war, stating that there were 25-30 percent of Christians (4-5 million people).

Christians: The “cancer” of the Ottoman Empire

 Akçam says the Christians of Anatolia were viewed as a potential danger that had to be eliminated. According to the historian, the Turks would use the term “internal cancer”, as if there was a bacillus in the body that had to be removed.

Berlin was informed

Gotschlich says the Germans were fully aware of the slaughter of the Armenians. Moreover, Ambassador of Germany to the Ottoman Empire Hans Freiher Fon Vangenheim had received warnings, as well as notes and telegrams of protest from different cities across the Ottoman Empire. In July 1915, the diplomat literally wrote the following: “We have to judge from the fact that what’s going on there is for the annihilation of the Armenian race”. Berlin didn’t respond. The German authorities were afraid of losing their ally.

 Gotschlich says the next Ambassador, Paul Graf Meternich suggested threatening the Ottoman authorities with sanctions if they didn’t stop the slaughter. German Foreign Minister Gotlib Fon Jagov wasn’t against that, but Chancellor Theobald von Bethmann-Hollweg was categorically against it. In his book “Favoring the Genocide”, Gotschlich concludes that Germany had a political weight, as well as the economic and military levers to stop the mass killings of the Armenians.