Yes, even before World War II, there was a genocide, and not too long before that, actually. We are talking about the Armenian deportations that killed between 1 and 2 million innocent civilians, an atrocity the Turkish government still doesn't fully acknowledge. Rock bands like System of a Down have complained in their music about it, historians have turned pieces of evidences into large books, and when you talk to Armenians, they still remember what their ancestors told them about it.
At the time of World War I, the Ottoman Empire committed the Armenian genocide, which led to the organized death of around one million ethnic Armenians. It was primarily achieved by mass executions, death marches resulting in the Syrian Desert, and the pushed Islamization of Armenian women and kids, led by the judgment Committee of Union and Development (CUP). The Ottoman Empire was collapsing, and in a cruel act of desperation and vengeance, they decided to take out their empirical frustrations on the Armenians and "take care of the Armenian problem." Mass rapes, murder, deportation, theft, robberies, starvation, and mayhem was the consequence. It became one of the ugliest faces of the First World War in history.
Become more familiar with the gruesome events in in Eastern Anatolia, which is now divided into Turkey and Armenia. Learn what moved the perpetrators, what they did, and what the aftermath was like. You can do all that through this concise book.
