Chapter I

World War I: The General Suppression of Information in Germany

The beginning of World War I in Europe in 1914 coincided with the wave of deportations, executions, and genocide directed against the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire. One of the chief participants in the war, Germany, was the main and strongest ally of the Empire led at the time by the Young Turks. Knowledge of the Armenian massacres was not uncommon among the German diplomats in Turkey, as well as in Germany. The handling of the issue of the Armenian massacres by the diplomats is only part of the total picture of the treatment of the Armenian Genocide in Germany. There were other elements in German society whose opinions on the extermination of the Armenians produced interesting implications for understanding the politics in and the identity of Germany of the World War I era and partially for the following time periods in relation to this genocide. While one cannot say that there was a debate in Germany during the World War I about the Armenian Genocide, I have found a fair amount of materials that reflect the opinions of various individuals or groups on the brutal measures against the Armenians in the Turkish provinces. Understanding these perspectives serves as the starting point for the historiography and analysis of the treatment of the Armenian Genocide of 1915-1918 in Germany throughout the twentieth century.

During the First World War, Germans generally enjoyed relative freedom of movement throughout Turkey. Among those working in Turkey at the time were diplomats of all ranks, military and medical officers, engineers, missionaries, nurses, and teachers, many of whom had spent a considerable number of years in Turkey and acquired personal ties with local inhabitants of all nationalities. The nature of their work often allowed them to gain insight into everyday events and tactics related to the deportations and massacres of the Armenians. Most successful in gaining information and personal encounters with the massacres were Germans working in various provinces of the Ottoman Empire and the top military and diplomatic officials.

Because of the military and political alliance with Turkey, German officials carefully censored any reports or expressions of opinions about the events in Turkey published in Germany during the war that would create a negative portrayal of a valuable ally. Consequently, articles about the genocide remained very few in number. Published works were limited to missionary newspapers and magazines, namely Der Christliche Orient, Mitteilungen aus der Arbeit, and Der Orient, as well as one or two early women’s magazines such as Die Frau der Gegenwart.

These publications contain gruesome details about the massacres of Armenians in Turkish provinces. Most of the authors were German Red Cross nurses, missionaries, and teachers of the German schools in the Ottoman provinces. These articles include reports about the cruelty of the Turks against a Christian population; they generally did not accuse Germany of complicity in the genocide, as the Entente publications did. Generally, these German articles were reprints of diaries, letters, or calls for help, many of which ended up in the hands of the Entente press, which used them in its coverage of the war, as well as for documentary publications. One such book came out in London in 1917 and brought to light many of the German eyewitness reports, since most of them would not have appeared in print in wartime Germany. The number of articles published in Germany remained small until after the war; and due to the nature of the magazines they were printed in, their audience remained limited. Therefore, according to Hellmut von Gerlach, editor of Welt am Montag and famous pacifist, the majority of the German people did not know (or did not want to know) "what the whole world knew: that our ally, Turkey, committed the worst manslaughter." However, one may conclude that there was some general awareness about the events from these publications, as well as from the common rumors.

These Christian publications had many similar descriptions even though they came from various people living in different provinces of the Ottoman Empire. Their reception included horrifying depictions of brutal murders, robberies, rapes, conversions, and burnt villages. In one of his letters published in Sonnenaufgang in October 1915, Herr Spörri of the German Mission at Van describes a number of burned villages, schools, and churches he encountered on his way through the province. He set the devastation against the beauty and stillness of the natural landscape:

In a letter of July 12, 1915, describing her journey from Bagdad to the Passes of Amanus, Sister L. Möhring, a German missionary, depicts her numerous encounters with the Armenians on their way to the sites of so-called resettlement:

Sister Möhring also describes the destitute state of the deportees and the absence of food or water on the way to the "resettlement" sites, which lay through a desert.

Missionary publications also contained pleas for help. Fräulein O. sent a message to Germany, which was printed in Sonnenaufgang in April 1916 as the deportations and massacres continued:

Notes such as these helped raise awareness among German Christians, as well as raise money that, nevertheless, generally did not reach the intended destination. As Sister Möhring notes, local Turkish authorities prevented any help from reaching the Armenians.

German missionary and Christian organizations also approached Ludwig von Bethmann Hollweg, German Chancellor during much of the war to seek his support for the Armenians. Two October 1915 petitions were signed by fifty members of the German Evangelical Society, including its authors Dr. Werthmann, Dr. Bachem, and Reichstag member Erzberger. Like other petitions from German missionary organizations in Germany and Turkey and private individuals, these two petitions contain extensive descriptions and scope of the murders with the purpose of appealing to the Chancellor in seeking his support on the Armenian issue. They call for the German government to interfere and terminate atrocities against the Armenians in the Ottoman Empire by putting pressure on the Turkish officials. These petitions once again represent some level of activism in responding to the news of the Armenian Genocide on the part of certain religious, social, and political groups in German society. They rarely received a direct answer from the authorities. For instance, Chancellor Hollweg’s answer was printed one month later in the Norddeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, one of the official government newspapers in Germany, where he promised to do everything in his power to protect Christian minorities in the Ottoman Empire without mentioning anything about the Armenians who were the main topic of the petition.

When speaking of the organizations aware of the tragedy of the Armenians in the Ottoman Empire during the war, one must mention the German-Armenian Society (DAG). It was founded in June 1914 by Johannes Lepsius and ten other persons of both German and Armenian origins. In its charter the founders specified that the organization’s primary purpose to enhance cultural awareness. Nevertheless, its activities contributed much to the promotion of awareness of the Armenian culture and history, as well as of the massacres. Its activities attracted the government’s attention at the same time as the government needed to show the Entente powers that they tried to do everything in their power to help the Armenians. There was no better candidate than the society for the mission the German government planned for that purpose: to travel to Turkey in order to persuade the Armenians to remain loyal to the Ottoman government in exchange for Undersecretary Arthur Zimmermann’s written promise to try to persuade the Ottomans to undertake Armenian reforms laid out a few decades earlier, but never carried out by the Ottoman officials.

The society’s work was also useful, for instance, in counteracting state-sponsored propaganda of the German-Turkish Society for the Enlightenment of the People, one of several organizations, Tessa Hoffman has noted, that were "established in Germany during the First World War to propagate the idea of German-Turkish military alliance and political friendship between the two nations." The Society’s extensive correspondence provides a valuable insight into the reception of the genocide in Germany during the war.

Johannes Lepsius, one of the most active members of the society became one of the most outspoken advocates of the Armenian cause. His activism went back to late nineteenth century, when Lepsius publicized the atrocities against the Armenians in Turkey in 1895-96. During World War I, he published pamphlets, worked with relief organizations seeking to help Armenian refugees, and met with the highest German and Ottoman officials in his quest to end the persecution of the Armenians and to punish the guilty. In 1916 he published Bericht über die Lage des armenischen Volkes in der Türkei; most of the book’s 20,000 copies ended up in the hands of pastors, members of the DAG, several members of the Reichstag, and a few other individuals, not the general public. The government confiscated the rest and prohibited any additional printing and dissemination. The German government began persecuting Lepsius for his publication as well as for his wide press campaign in neutral Switzerland against the Ottoman government and its actions against the Armenians. Forced to leave Germany, Lepsius went to Holland, where he continued to work for the Armenian cause throughout his yearlong exile.

Missionary publications were not widely read, which partially explains their relative freedom from censorship. However, in case of strikingly horrific descriptions that directly incriminated Turkish authorities, the censors stepped in. Such was the case with information available to Sonnenaufgang and published in October 1915. The magazine tried to publish collected reports in a more-widely read Allgemeine-Missions-Zeitschrift in November 1915; however, the text was largely cut and later confiscated by the censors. On the occasion, the November issue of Sonnenaufgang presented an editorial note:

By the "political situation" the editor clearly meant the severe censorship of the German press during the World War I.

The official German propaganda machine, having begun its work at the beginning of World War I, reached its peak by mid to late 1915. With the increasing number of missionary reports, as well as growing awareness of the atrocities among the Entente powers that inevitably led to accusations of German complicity, Kaiser Wilhelm’s government held a press conference on October 7, 1915. At this conference, journalists were given official guidelines for handling the Armenian question:

During the next press conference on December 23, 1915, the official instructions in dealing with the Armenian atrocities were the following: "It is best to avoid any mentioning of the Armenian question. Behavior of the Turkish authorities on this issue does not deserve praise." Despite this obvious disapproval of Turkish "behavior," the German government remained silent most of the time, thus offering tacit approval of the Ottoman authorities’ assault against the Armenian population of the empire. Nevertheless, in the face of increasing pressure on Germany by the Entente press in connection with the Armenian Genocide, the German mainstream media did not stay silent for long; in 1916 it entered a phase of deceptive and weak protests in order to avoid future accusations in complicity.

The German government skillfully used the press to manipulate public opinion during World War I. Its main tools were major newspapers including the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, the Norddeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, and the Berliner Neueste Nachrichten. Well into 1915 these papers remained silent about the Armenian genocide. Beginning in June 1915, however, articles about the massacres began to appear. They all contained material prepared for them by the Wolff’s Telegrafisches Büro, an official information source of the German Reich. In its communiqué of June 7, 1915, the Büro denied any massacres against Armenians in the Ottoman Empire. It further reported that any measures undertaken were directed to putting down uprisings or removing suspicious persons from the war zone areas. The author also accused Russia and England of inciting Armenians through their agents to revolt against the Ottoman authorities, an act of treason punishable by law in any country, particularly during a war. The article asserts that the Ottoman government dealt only with the rebels and not the rest of the Armenian population. For instance, the author continued, out of 77,835 Armenians in Constantinople, only 235 were arrested, and only the Armenians in war zones were affected ["betroffen"]. The report then proceeded to accuse the Russians of massacres against the Muslim population and Turkish prisoners or war. It ended with a declaration that it was not the Turks, but rather the governments of the Entente that should be held liable for any massacres in the empire. This tone of covering the events in Turkey related to the Armenian massacres was adopted by all the major German newspapers during World War I.

Two days after publication of the Wolff’s report, the Norddeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung reproduced a memorandum sent by the Turkish authorities to the German Foreign Office, in which "they claimed that the deportations were a temporary measure of relocation [übersiedeln] and that they were being applied only to the war zones." In November 1915 the same newspaper published a short article that introduced a petition of the members of the Evangelical Church Missionary Society on "the Armenian Question" and the Chancellor’s response to it. Bethmann Hollweg’s response was an excellent example of the vague and evasive language used by the German officials and the official press. Not once did he refer to the Armenian question; instead, he focused his response on promising the inquirers that the German government was doing everything possible to protect Christian peoples. He failed to mention the land where he intended to protect Christians, namely the Ottoman Empire. The evangelical press war correspondent was quoted in the Norddeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung to simply confirm Bethmann Hollweg’s statement and reassure the readers of the efforts and intentions of the German government in relation to the state of Christians (another avoidance of speaking directly about the Armenians) in the Ottoman Empire.

In September 1915, the German press got a pretext for their stand on the Armenian massacres. On September 23 the Daily Chronicle, a British newspaper, published an article entitled "Our Seventh Ally. Armenia’s Flight for National Existence." In this article the author introduced the public to a small nation that "began to fight on the side of the Entente from the very beginning" and "is fighting on the side of the Allies. . ." Writing Armenia into the Entente alliance allowed the German government to transfer the responsibility for any misfortunes experienced by the Armenians from the Ottoman Empire and the Germans to the Entente powers.

Such a connection was made in the speech by the Undersecretary of the Foreign Office, Arthur Zimmermann, at the Reichstag meeting on September 29, 1916. Zimmerman began his report on this "extraordinarily sad issue" with arguments about Armenians’ pre-war faithfulness to the Young Turks’ government that turned into open disloyalty and revolt caused by the Entente instigative tools such as "money, espionage, and other measures." Zimmermann then described "deportations" that at times turned into massacres due to the "fanaticism" and "understandable" hatred from the Turks. He insisted that German and Turkish officials did all they could to help the deportees. This was the undersecretary’s way to respond to the Entente accusations of German complicity in the genocide. He then concluded:

Zimmermann made yet another interesting observation. He expressed interest in publishing a White Book on German handling of this issue after the war, when the German position "would not be so delicate as today." Such treatment of the issue clearly corresponded to what the German government expected of the press in covering the Armenian question during the war—caution and defense against any accusations in complicity.

These and few other articles in the media exemplify not only cases of anti-Armenian propaganda in order to save Turkey’s face during the war, but also Germany’s burning desire to avoid current and future accusations of complicity. The accusing side it this case consisted primarily of the Entente governments, as well as a few Germans who generally remained publicly silent during the war. The Entente powers issued a joint declaration on May 24, 1915, condemning the massacres and their organizers and executors. The authors declared that "in view of these new crimes of Turkey against humanity and civilization, the Allied governments announce publicly … that they will hold personally responsible … all members of the Ottoman government and those of their agents who are implicated in such massacres."

Throughout May and June 1915, international pressure on Germany increased. During those months extensive reports appeared in the major newspapers of the neutral nations, such as Switzerland, Denmark, and the United States. While Germany preferred to remain silent when accusations were directed against its ally, response to the accusations of German complicity was rather quick. On July 4, 1915, the German Ambassador to Turkey, Hans Freiherr von Wangenheim, issued his memorandum of protest. This memorandum is perhaps the best representation of the German official stand on the Armenian Genocide. Its focus was on saving Germany’s image and its commercial interests in the Ottoman Empire in the manner of the official German propaganda machine. It began with expression of support for the Ottoman overall scheme for the Armenians:

The measures of repression by the Imperial Government [Young Turks] against the Armenian population of the eastern Anatolian provinces having been dictated

by military considerations and constituting a legitimate means of defense, the

German Government is far from opposing their execution inasmuch as these

measures have objective of consolidating the internal security of Turkey and

avoiding attempts at insurrections.

Wangenheim then proceeds to the core of the protest:

On the other hand, the German Government cannot disguise the dangers created

by these rigorous measures and notably by the mass expatriations which include

the guilty and the innocent indiscriminately, especially when these measures are

accompanied by acts of violence, such as massacre and pillage.

This statement contains all the pressure Germany was willing to exert on Turkey, which indicated that Germany was far from trying to threaten Turkey in any way. On the contrary, German officials revealed the reasons why Germany needed Turkey to alter its behavior. They included "enemy powers" profiting from the situation, as well as damage to German commercial interests in the zones of "expulsion of the Armenians."

This public statement was followed by an unpublicized memorandum on August 4, 1915. Despite its secret character (it was not published in the media), this statement nevertheless is important in that it reveals the treatment the Armenian Genocide received by the highest political and military echelons of German the government, both in Germany and in Turkey. In the August memorandum Ambassador Wangenheim, under orders from Undersecretary Zimmermann, instructed the German staff in Germany and Turkey to compile "pertinent material with a view of exculpating Germany." This material was intended to be the basis of a future White Book with the following themes: placing the core of blame for the deportations and any massacres on the Armenians; "justifying or explaining away" the severity of the Turkish measures; deploring the excesses as accidental; and finally, emphasizing that Germany did all it could to ease the suffering of the Armenian people through two notes of protest to the Ottoman government.

Such treatment of the genocide remained dominant at the highest levels of the German government throughout the war, although its focus by 1917 switched largely to a defense of Germany from the Entente’s accusations in complicity. The materials for the White Book became the basis for a policy declaration in early 1917 that focused on Germany’s recognition of the actions of the Turkish government as justified measures of self-defense and Germany’s inability to interfere without illicitly intervening in the internal affairs of Turkey. This declaration followed an article in the Kölnische Zeitung in early January 1917 that publicly denounced any foreign attempts to blame the Germans for the dreadful fate of the Armenians.

Immediately following the August 4, 1915, directive, a second German official memorandum was issued. Its author was Ambassador Ernst Wilhelm Hohenlohe, who served as an interim German ambassador in Constantinople while Wangenheim was on leave. The tone of this protest appears to be stronger than the first one, although most of its points were repetitive. Upon analysis it can be concluded that this memorandum was largely a public relations tool, especially since a number of copies were sent to the Entente powers as well as to neutral countries that voiced protests to Germany on the Armenian issue (Sweden, Switzerland, Norway). The document once again clearly rejected any German responsibility for the massacres:

In light of these events, the German Embassy, by order of its Government, is

Obliged to remonstrate once more against these acts of horror and decline all

Responsibility for the consequences which may result therefrom. It finds itself

and ally of Turkey, has approved or even inspired these acts of violence.

As the text shows, this protest had no other purpose than public relations. Although it rightly criticized the "acts of horror" committed by the Young Turks against the Armenians, it failed to question the inhumanity and illegality of the massacres; thus one many conclude that Germany’s official treatment was based on condoning the genocide.

One of the sources of Germany’s condoning attitude was Kaiser Wilhelm II, the last German emperor. He served as German ruler during the first wave of Armenian atrocities (1895-1896), when he barely expressed some indignation. By the time the large-scale massacres in 1915 began, he remained silent and ignorant about the fate of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire, thus serving as a link between the two instances of the genocide. Moreover, his attitude to the two genocides exemplified continuity in Germany’s approach to the Armenian genocide prior to and during the First World War, but also since then. One example is typical. A missionary of the Deutscher Hülfsbund für christliches Liebeswerk im Orient was able to secure an audience with Emperor Wilhelm II. When she arrived at the Kaiser’s office, his aides told her that "if she came to discuss the Armenians the Kaiser would be unable to see her." Although there might have been some initial confusion in setting up an audience, the meeting immediately was cancelled, thus confirming the Kaiser’s stated policy on the Armenian question: "on the Armenian matter noli me tangere (touch me not as that matter is tabu around here)."

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Despite the overall anti-Armenian stand of German officials, there were a number of exceptions. The list of those who were shocked to learn the scope of the massacres and who truly tried to help the Armenians includes generally medium-level diplomatic staff members (consuls, medical doctors, minor military officers), but also an ambassador. The historiography of their treatment of the massacres is not lengthy, primarily because most of their reports were not published during or even after World War I. Nevertheless, their reports filled numerous shelves in the archives. The implications of their reports are large; they indicate widespread knowledge of the massacres among military and diplomatic circles at all levels, including the locations of the massacres, of the means used to carry them out, and their scope. Some of their reports were used for the post-war publications, as well as during the trial of Sogomon Tehlirian, the assassin of Talaat-Pasha, the man considered to be the mastermind behind the genocide.

Among the most outspoken German officials during World War I were Dr. Max Erwin von Scheubner-Richter, the German Vice Consul in Erzerum (February 17-August 6), Dr. Walter Rössler, the German Consul in Aleppo (1910-May 10, 1918), and German Ambassador to Constantinople Count Paul von Metternich (December 1915-August 1916). There were a few other German officials, including generals von Lossow and Kressenstein, who during their years in Turkey risked their positions and at times their lives in order to help Armenians and prevent the massacres. Even Ambassador Wangenheim reacted sharply to the reports about the atrocities and the duplicity of the Turkish propaganda. The top German diplomatic figure in Turkey, he nevertheless, often defended Turkish measures publicly as well as privately in his conversations; for instance, with the American Ambassador in Constantinople, Henry Morgenthau. However, by mid-1915 he sent detailed reports to Berlin about the real meaning of the "deportations." In one of his communications he informed the chancellor that "deportations are not determined by military considerations only"; that the deported Armenians were slaughtered [abgeschlachtet] en route; and that he heard Talaat-Pasha "point-blank" admit that he was taking advantage of the war to clear Turkey of Christians in order to prevent any future intervention in Turkish affairs by the European powers.

While Wangenheim did not go further in his diplomatic communiqués to Berlin, his successor Paul von Metternich reacted much more strongly to the news of the massacres. His open defense of the Armenians was so strong that the Turkish authorities labeled him "the Ambassador of the Armenians." In August 1916, two top Young Turkish leaders, Enver and Talaat, signed a memorandum demanding Metternich’s recall. Their chief reason was the ambassador’s stance in the Armenian Question. Enver and Talat did not appreciate Metternich’s constant interference on behalf of the Armenians. They also expressed determination to do "the work that is to be done now" since "after the war it will be too late."

As soon as Metternich assumed his office in December 1915, he met with Grand Vizier Said Halim. During the meeting the Ambassador stated that the Turkish measures against hundreds of thousands of Armenian women, children, and the elderly could in no way be justified as "legitimate defense of the state." Throughout 1916 Metternich’s position deteriorated rapidly. He was often left uninformed about Turkish intentions on various political and military issues, while his reports to Berlin were often censored. Later, a few weeks before his dismissal as German Ambassador, Metternich submitted another report to Berlin, which he concluded by saying that "in the implementation of its scheme to settle the Armenian Question through the annihilation of the Armenian race, the Turkish government did not allow itself to be distracted."

Dr. Rössler’s reports were among the most detailed ones on the massacres. Their dating (as early as spring 1915) has important implications in discussing German complicity, a topic thoroughly researched by a leading Armenian Genocide scholar today, Vahakn Dadrian. Throughout 1915 and 1916, his communications to Berlin and Constantinople are full of descriptions of the massacres, as well as revelations of the real intents behind so-called deportations—complete destruction of the Armenians. His disbelief in the military necessity of the "deportations" was shared by Dr. Scheubner-Richter, German consul in Erzerum, who in June 1915 sent one of his detailed reports to the German Embassy in Constantinople. The report contained an evaluation of the Turkish intentions and claims of military necessity: "The order of Kamil Pasha [Commander-in-Chief of the Third Army] to deport all Armenians from Erzurum is not legitimate from a military point of view and in my opinion in founded on racial hatred." He also charged that "the partisans of Ittihad [the Young Turks] are unabashedly conceding that their ultimate aim [Endziel] is the total annihilation [gänzliche Ausrottung] of the Armenians of Turkey. . ."

Through his outspoken behavior, Dr. Scheubner-Richter, Vahakn Dadrian has noted, "incurred the displeasure of General Bronsart [the Chief of the Ottoman General Staff at Ottoman General Headquarters]" and endangered his position as consul, while through his open "efforts to mitigate the suffering of the Armenians of his district" he risked his life "as a result of his confrontation with General Mahmud Kamil, the Commander-in-Chief of the Ottoman Third Army, during which consul ridiculed the argument of "military necessity" by sneering bitterly [lächelt bitter]. Scheubner-Richter further notes that following the conversation, he received a warning: if he did not change his attitude towards the deportations, the governor could "not guarantee [his] safety here [in Erzerum]."

Unfortunately, the consul’s reaction to the genocide was not common among most German diplomatic and military figures in Germany and Turkey. As in the cases of Metternich and Scheubner-Richter, any protests carried potentially dangerous consequences.

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German knowledge and treatment of the genocide were not limited to the sources mentioned above: reports also were presented to the Reichstag during World War I. These presentations shed light on a number of interesting questions related to the reception of the Armenian Genocide in wartime Germany, including abandonment of the previous myth of the unawareness of the Reichstag members due to the official propaganda about the Armenian massacres. As a well-known scholar on the Middle East, Josef Marquart, would conclude in 1919, the Reichstag was as responsible for German attitudes towards the massacres as the ruling circles of Germany, because they "knew exactly what was going on [in Turkey]." There were at least two reports presented to the Reichstag. The first report was written for the Reichstag by Dr. Martin Niepage, a teacher at the German Realschule in Aleppo from 1913 to 1916, and signed by the headmaster of the school, Dr. Huber, and two other colleagues, Dr. Eduard Graeter and Ms. Marie Spieker. This report appeared in Germany in its full version under the title Ein Wort an die berufenen Vertreter des deutschen Volkes (A Word to the Accredited Representatives of the German People).

The report was presented to the Reichstag as Eingabe an den Reichstag. Der türkische Bundesgenosse Deutschlands! In it Dr. Niepage and his superior Dr. Huber not only depicted horrifying pictures of murders, tortures, rapes, and pillage, but also discussed treatment of the genocide by Germans living in the Ottoman Empire, as well implications of the atrocities for Germany. He further asserted the common belief among many local Turkish inhabitants that the source of the atrocities was Germans; and "even if the German people do not support these horrors, the German government does not interfere into these atrocities due to respect for the Turkish government." Niepage noted that even mullahs mention German officers and not the Ottoman Porte responsible for "destruction of the Armenians and cruelties towards them." Niepage, being a German patriot, was worried that these events would leave a "shameful stain on the honorable German name." He reminded the readers that "we [Germans] would be later accused of criminal complicity or in despicable weakness, if we continue closing our eyes to these awful horrors born through the war, and stay silent on the facts already known to the whole world." He closed his report with the following statement: "Those who believe that the Turkish government would stop murdering women and children without German pressure, are mistaken."

People like Niepage and Marquart were generally alone among German scholars in their assessments of German (and Reichstag’s) ability to interfere in the Turkish anti-Armenian actions. Their assertions, together with Niepage’s observation that Germany had influence on Turkey, cast doubt on contemporary claims later supported by some pro-German historians, like Ulrich Trumpener, that Germany did not have much say in Turkey and therefore was unable to do anything for the Armenians. Yet the assertions do not necessarily prove that even German pressure could have ended the Genocide, thus suggesting that the treatment of the Armenian Genocide was much more complicated than scholars have often assumed.

Niepage’s and Graeter’s report put them in serious danger. In his collection of documents pertaining to the genocide, Johannes Lepsius included a communiqué from consul Rössler in which the latter informed Chancellor Bethmann-Hollweg on November 11, 1916, that one of the highest Turkish officials informed him that two German teachers—Dr. Niepage and Dr. Graeter—were in September 1916 "tried and found guilty before a military war court for their public statements on the Armenian issue." The police searched the school in order to arrest the two. However, both teachers had already left Turkey in June 1916.

Karl Liebknecht’s inquiry into the Armenian Question took place at a Reichstag meeting on January 11, 1916. Liebknecht first openly challenged the Chancellor:

Is it known to Herr Chancellor that during the present war on the territory of our

Ally, Turkey, hundreds of thousands of Armenians were removed [vertrieben]

from their residencies and massacred [niedergemacht]?

The responding side was represented by an official of the Foreign Office, Dr. von Stumm, who asserted, evasively and deceptively, that the Armenians were simply being resettled. In the meanwhile, "due to certain reactions these measured aroused, an exchange of ideas is taking place between German and Turkish governments," details of which, von Stumm noted, could not be disclosed. Liebknecht then asked whether the Chancellor was aware of Johannes Lepsius’ claims of "extermination of the Turkish Armenians." Immediately, the president of the Reichstag interrupted Liebknecht by declaring that his statement was "a new inquiry, which [he] could not allow." This incident was a startling example of German official attitudes towards the issue of the Armenian Genocide, as well as a case of an attempt of discuss it on the political level. Even though it failed, Liebknecht’s questioning showed that German officials were experiencing pressure not only from the Entente and neutral states’ press, but also internally through challenging statements and publication by persons like Liebknecht.

This incident was presented in the German press. The Norddeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung reprinted von Stumm’s response without quoting Liebknecht’s inquiry directly, thus avoiding using terms "massacre" and "destruction." The author also refered to the Entente propaganda that sought to accuse "German consuls in [Turkey], particularly consul Rössler in Aleppo, of encouraging the Turkish population to commit horrors against the Armenians," to which the author replied with evasive arguments. He claimed that the integrity of German consuls was high and need not to be questioned; therefore, the Entente press presenting purely wartime propaganda rather than truthful reports.

Liebknecht’s left-wing comrade and activist Rosa Luxemburg followed his example and published an article, "Das Engagement der deutschen Imperialisten in der Türkei" (German imperialistic engagements in Turkey) in 1916 in a brochure Die Krise der Sozialdemokratie (Crises of Social Democracy), in which she referred to the Armenian Genocide and Germano-Turkish relations related to it. Luxemburg and Liebknecht’s open disagreement with and questioning of the German official stance towards the genocide was significant in that it shows a strong reaction on the left similar to that of the missionaries, Christian organizations, and a few dedicated individuals like Lepsius and Reichstag member Erzberger in the face of the general apathy, government propaganda, and pressing wartime concerns.

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During World War I most Germans were not receptive to the news of the Armenian Genocide, especially since the scant news they received generally came from the press of the Entente powers and often accused Germany of complicity in the massacres. Most of the population at all social and political levels was preoccupied with the immediate events of the war: hardships on the fronts as well as everyday hardships of life under wartime conditions. Millions of German soldiers died and Germany still was not winning the war. As Wolfgang Gust suggests, very few Germans were preoccupied with humanitarian ideas. Concerns over survival and victory in the war were of higher priority than distress over the sufferings of a faraway people. Moreover, many Germans remained under the spell of the official propaganda that placed the blame for the atrocities on the Armenians themselves.

The issue of the Armenian Genocide remained limited to Christian missionaries and a few politically leftist circles, but did not gain wider publicity and discussion. Major reasons also included belief in the necessity of keeping Germany’s ally, Turkey, happy, as well as avoidance of discussion of the German role in the genocide stressed by British, Russian, French, and American spokesmen. Information about the genocide was scarce and remained largely unpublished until after the end of the war and the fall of the Kaiser Wilhelm II’s government in 1918. Even Johannes Lepsius, perhaps the most outspoken defender of the Armenians, was unwilling to reveal all the issues related to the massacres, including possible German responsibility for the massacres. Only after the end of the war would Germans become more receptive to the events of the Armenian Genocide and open discussions on some aspects of it while still curtailing others.