One this occasion. people of decency and conscience should honor the memory of those who perished. as well as pay tribute to the courage and valor of those who survived. While it is unfortunate to have to dignify the claims that the Armenian genocide did not occur with a response. let us be absolutely clear on this point: the Armenians are not the only historical witnesses to this crime against humanity. The Ottoman policy of deportation. enslavement. and murder was immediately recognized for what it was from the earliest weeks and months. Newspaper accounts from that period paint a clear picture of a pattern of horror for which no word then existed. but which we today call genocide. The United States Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire Henry Morgenthau. spoke out against the program of "race extermination under a pretext of reprisal against rebellion." He said that "I am confident that the whole history of the human race contains no such horrible episode as this." and noted that Turkish officials "made no particular effort to conceal" the goal of the deportations of Armenians. namely. in Morgenthaus words. "the death warrant to a whole race." Protests were organized. while United States and international relief agencies tried to provide comfort and relief to some of victims. Armenian orphans were taken in as foster children. The United States Archiveshardly a source of fictional accounts of historycontain voluminous documentation of this event.
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deportation deportations