I wish to salute at this time the gallant people of Armenia. who on February 18. .1921. overthrew Communist rule forcibly imposed on them on December 2. 1920. and for 6 months rid their country of Soviet domination. The Armenians lost their independence many centuries ago. Their historic homeland was overrun and conquered by Asiatic hordes long before Columbus discovered America. During all that time they have been subjected to one oppressor after another. Many of them have been forced to leave their homeland. and all have had to struggle hard to make their livelihood. Yet in the midst of endless vicissitudes and sufferings they had not forsaken the idea of their national independence. They have. throughout their long subjugation under foreign rule. worked most persistently to regain it. Their most recent history may be characterized as mass deportation and- wholesale massacres. During World War I more than 600.000 Armenians met their death in coldblodded massacres. while another 600.000 are said to have died of starvation. At the end of that world conflict. the survivors of that holocaust staked out a part of their ancient land at the very foot of their Mount Ararat. and proclaimed their national independence.
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Asiatic deportation