Intent of the Turkish authorities to commit the Armenian Genocide.

Three points covering the intent of the Turkish authorities to commit the Armenian Genocide.

1.   INTENT is proven indirectly by the systematic approach; I call this the brawn, the brain and the remainder argument.  Conscription into working battalions (not frontline duties) for Armenian youth, and then their eventual murder (or death by exhaustion), followed by the arrest and murder of all the thinkers and leaders, followed by the ‘mopping up’ of the remainder.  The sequence with which this is done, specifically, through WWI of using it as a pretext to first get rid of the brawn (the ability to fight back) and then once that is taken care of within the first six months to get rid of the brain (the ability to plan a resistance, organize for survival etc.), leaving Armenians like a ‘cadaver’ of a people to be picked by the scavengers, is in itself proof of a planned approach.  It is a demonstration of a planned approach to kill, therefore of INTENT.  Deductively, it is, what I would suggest, the ’JACK THE RIPPER’ analogy.  From the way those murders were committed; we know that the murderer must have had serious training in anatomy and surgery of the period, hence the popular thesis that the killer was likely in the medical profession.

2.      INTENT is proven by definition of the word, by the mouth of the person who defined it.  This is simply the Lemkin argument.  The person who invented the word, clearly and unequivocally says that he wanted to create the word to describe what happened to the Armenians.  This sounds like a cop out, but it isn’t.  You cannot have a more powerful position than him saying it on video for the world to see and hear.  For those who have not seen it, it is here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-d992mJ27hs

3.      INTENT is proven by Talaat Pasha himself.  Through his private papers, which were entrusted to his widow, which ended up with the Turkish historian Murat Bardakci, which also ended up being published with full commentary and analysis by Ara Sarafian of the Gomidas Institute.  The book is available for free download here http://www.gomidas.org/books/show/23  ; again, you may or may not have known about this work or the details inside.  But it shows the meticulous records kept by Talaat of what was happening with the Armenians (very much like the Nazi records kept of what was happening with the Jews in the concentration camps).  Information is requested by him at regular intervals from all corners of the Ottoman Empire and is being recorded by him.  I call this the project argument.  If one wants progress reports, then that is a decision making tool, to adjust for further actions, therefore the progress report is related to a project, and hence to a plan to execute that project, and hence INTENT.