UNITED STATES OFFICIAL DOCUMENTS ON THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE

Compiled and Introduced by Ara Sarafian

The United States Official Documents on the Armenian Genocide, in five volumes, is a systematic compilation of eyewitness reports filed by American officials on the treatment of the Armenians in the Ottoman Empire between 1915 and 1917.

Eyewitness reports from points as far apart as Adrianople, Smyrna, Samsun, Trebizond, and Mersin - each portray the actual experiences of the Armenian people. They illustrate the suffering of women and men, of the elderly and the newly born. They describe the actions and attitudes of officials and bystanders, native and foreign. Taken together, these reports attest to a coordinated effort to exterminate the Armenian people. The reports of United States consular officials, filed with the embassy at Constantinople and the Stare Department in Washington, allowed contemporaries like Ambassador Henry Morgenthau to put together the pieces of the puzzle and see before them a horrible crime as it was being committed by the nationalist Turkish state. These reports are required reading for anyone who wishes to understand the contemporary histories of Armenia and Turkey and for students of genocide.

Armenian Review (1994-95)