Hendryk
Banned
Indeed, between the rump Turkey and the huge Israel, he has created the perfect conditions for widespread anti-Christian sentiment throughout the Middle East. Not that his TL doesn't have serious other issues.Oh the irony!![]()
Indeed, between the rump Turkey and the huge Israel, he has created the perfect conditions for widespread anti-Christian sentiment throughout the Middle East. Not that his TL doesn't have serious other issues.Oh the irony!![]()
Saying the Entente "reneged" on Sevres is kinda like saying Hitler "reneged" on Lebensraum.
However, I think the Armenians would have preferred Russian rule to Ottoman one. No religion-based discrimination, no having to pay a special religious tax, etc.
You're right about the pragmatism of the WWI situation, but there was also the very strong, very deep-rooted, very real feelings of Christian solidarity and anti-Turkism that existed between the Russians and Armenians.
there should be an award for those members who accomplish the seeming impossible....like summoning Godwin in the 1800s.
(that was a compliment)
[/SIZE][/FONT]Somehow I can't picture Tsarist Russia having a light hand on people they see as heretics.
It's awfully inconvenient that it, in fact, did, isn't it? Armenians if anything were pretty privileged even before WW1.
Likewise, the Russian governement relaxed religious pressure on other faiths if it was convenient - all those boddhist mongols come to mind. They weren't good guys, but they certainly weren't religiously fanatical unless there was some political reason for it (Panslavism or such).
The only people who really got in trouble consistently were heretics from orthodoxy (Like Skoptsy or Imyaslavtsy) and such (old Believers excepted), and, in the very last decades leading up to WW1, Jews.
It's awfully inconvenient that it, in fact, did, isn't it? Armenians if anything were pretty privileged even before WW1.
and the same was true in the Ottoman Empire. heck, there were Armenians who were part of the Ottoman Royal Family - I'm unaware of any Armenians in the Russian Royalty.
...and that Armenians aren't part of the Orthodox.
Exactly. Protestantism in the Baltics, Finland, and amongst the Volga Germans was left largely unmolested, and the same goes for Catholicism (though there were some issues in the Ukraine, but that was by and large perpetrated by locals, not sanctioned by the Tsar and the Okhrana.)
To Russians, Christians were Christians (for the most part) and again I have trouble seeing them making things tough for the Armenians.
...Buddhists didn't run into any trouble
The Greeks may be a bit iffy (they always saw Russia as an upstart Orthodox power, not the Byzantine successor Russia always claimed to be) but the Armenians would probably have welcomed the Russians.
Exactly. Protestantism in the Baltics, Finland, and amongst the Volga Germans was left largely unmolested, and the same goes for Catholicism (though there were some issues in the Ukraine, but that was by and large perpetrated by locals, not sanctioned by the Tsar and the Okhrana.)
To Russians, Christians were Christians (for the most part) and again I have trouble seeing them making things tough for the Armenians.
After they all die in Siberia.![]()
Amplify it a bit (say having the Cossacks burn down Armenian churches and/or do pogroms in Armenian areas or forced conversions)
...and the Armenians could settle in the Ottoman Empire in droves.
Because that happened incredibly often. In fact, there's more than one example of ALL of an ethnic minority dying in "Siberia".
Again, becasue Cossacks totally did that to other Christians all the time because everyone really cared about Chalcedonian Christianity.
...where nothing resembling a pogrom could ever happen, of course. Oh wait.
...where nothing resembling a pogrom could ever happen, of course. Oh wait.
Thanks, RGB. Not bad for being tired after a long week of work finally done.
Basically, what I was trying to say was that the Russians basically used the Armenians as pawns in their own game - as such, it was only an alliance of convenience. If the Tsar decided to turn on them - which could easily happen, especially since some of the later monarchs (such as Nicholas II) were a bit batty, IMO - that could probably force the Armenians to reconsider their options.
Or maybe if the Russians send settlers in, like they sort of maybe eventually planned to (probably after they "reconquered Tsargrad")