OUR DUTY IN ARMENIA.
WE do not see any particular advantage in holding more meetings about the Armenian question. The English people are quite convinced that the Turkish government of all Christians, in Macedonia scarcely ks3 than in Armenia, is atrociously bad, so bad as to deserve the terrible sentence in which Mr. Gladstone described the government of Ferdinand of Naples. It was, he said, "the negation of God erected into a system." They know that the Pashas let loose on these unhappy provinces commit oppressions so ghastly that they could only be described in a Blue-book ; that there is no redress for the wronged, or punishment for the wrongdoers ; and that if the people, driven mad, attempt resistance, the soldiers receive instructions which almost, or in isolated instances quite, point to an intention to exterminate the rebellious. The sufferings of Germans in the Thirty Years' War, which were horrible, are the sufferings of Armenians and Greeks in time of peace, aggravated by the fact that the marauding soldiers have the foul passions of Asiatics. The entire Press, with scarcely an exception, has agreed as to the facts, and so far as we can perceive, the general mind believes that any extent of interference with Turkey has been amply justified. We have as much right to interfere with Constantinople as with Coomassie; that is the nearly universal opinion. It is not as to the facts that opinion is weak, but as to the line of action that the facts justify, and this is the fault of the House of Com- mons. Occupied with internal affairs, none of them of pressing importance, the Members have abstained from pressing the Government to act, and the weak Govern- ment in the absence of such pressure, has shrunk from incurring any responsibility. It has been afraid of the vague dangers involved in stirring the Eastern question, it has been afraid of making an opening for Russian aggression, and it has been afraid of the traditional Tory feeling that the Turk must always, under all circumstances, be protected. It has therefore allowed itself to be content with a compromise, suggested by Russia though supported by France, which appears to all who desire a thorough re- form in Turkey to involve the maximum of interference with the Sultan's Government and the minimum of safety for the unhappy Christians. There is to be a High Com- missioner to watch future oppression, but he is not to be the Viceroy, and will therefore be only a dignified reporter ; he is not to appoint all officials and command all gen- darmes, and will therefore not be genuinely responsible ; and he is not to be a European, and will therefore not even try to govern for the great European ends of equal justice, personal safety, and industrial advance. Such an appointment, considered as a remedy for outrageous oppression, much of which is interwoven with the Turkish system of keeping Christians down, is an unstatesmanlike subterfuge, which might have been suggested by the most cunning of Pashas. They will still be the practical rulers, and they will still of necessity be intrusted with the power of "arrest,"—that is, of inflicting tortures such as Dante never imagined,—on any one who resists their will.
It seems to us that the time has arrived when the House of Commons itself should remonstrate against this fiasco, and should inform the Government, in unmistakable terms, that, rather than suffer the atrocious misgovern- ment of Armenia to go on, the people of Great Britain are willing to encounter a certain amount of risk. That risk, for it is necessary to speak plainly, can only be of one kind. The Russian Government cannot permit the British Government to take up the position of Foremost Protector of the Christians of the East, and cannot there- fore either resist her action or threaten her with war. The one thing the Czar could do, if England were in advance of him in coercing the Seraglio, is to insist on full protection for Armenians, and occupy Armenia with his troops as a material guarantee that his full demand should be con- ceded. It is at least possible that Nicholas IL might take that resolve, and at least possible also that the with- drawal of those troops might be matter of infinite negotia- tion, or might be delayed for ever. France will not resist ; the movement would be of no importance to Germany ; and Great Britain will not fight a great war in order to replace enfranchised Christians under a loathsome slavery. We admit fully that this risk exists ; and we say deliberately that rather than the present condition of Armenia should continue, the risk ought to be incurred. The Russian system of government is not a good one ; but it is as much better than that of Turkish Pashas as Italian Government is better than government by Dahomey. The Russian Government at least requires provocation before it orders slaughter ; and its soldiers, when resistance ceases, abstain from outrage and murder. It does not, either, grudge prosperity to its subjects, and as regards Armenians, at all events, it does not hold a difference of creed to be an excuse for rejecting evidence of wrong. That Russia would be strengthened by the acquisition of such a pro- vince we greatly doubt ; but if she were, our duty ought to be done, even though that evil consequence must necessarily follow. We have no more right to sell the Armenians, to whose protection we are pledged, for a political advantage, than we should have to sell them for money.
In reality we do not believe that the risk to be run is at all serious, and conceive that had Mr. Gladstone been in power and aware of the frightful facts known to the Foreign Office, his policy would have been substantially this. He would have warned the Sultan that the patience of Great Britain was at an end, and that a European Viceroy, responsible to the Powers, must be appointed by July 1st, or the British Government would seek a. material guarantee in the shape of a great Turkish Custom-house. And the Mediterranean Fleet would at the same time have appeared off Smyrna ready for immediate action. The Sultan did not face that menace before, and he could not face it now, for he knows that it would affect the security of his Mahommedan possessions. He understands that his Christian subjects will ultimately be liberated, and cares nothing how they suffer, but he hopes to retain the Mussulman Khalifate, and to that one condition is essential. He must reign over both Osmanlis and Arabs, the latter of whom loathe the former with a hatred which springs not only from difference of race, but from centuries of baffled hope. If the Arabs can revolt they will, and with any loss of prestige within tracts of which the Desert people know the history, the Turkish Khalifate, the greatest misfortune which ever befell Islam, would come at once to an end. Neither the Sultan nor his advisers would run that risk even for the luxury of absolutism in Armenia; the "impossible" would at once be done, as it was in the case of Thessaly, the Viceroy would at once be conceded, and the Palace would console itself with the thought that at least the tribute from Armenia would be regularly paid. The Sultan, in fact, would act too rapidly and too decidedly for the Czar to set a corps d'arrtale in motion, or provide for the eventualities of a possible second Turkish war. This, we say, is our belief; but our counsel that the Fleet should be sent to Smyrna is independent of that calculation. Nations have disagreeable or dangerous duties to perform sometimes, like individuals ; and the rescue of Armenia has fallen to the lot of the British people. No one denies our right of interference, whether it be based on specific treaty, as it is, or on the ordinary right claimed by the civilised Powers of arresting any acts which constitute those who commit them enemies of the human race ; and possessing the right, we are, in a case so terrible, to blame for not employing it. We are, to put the matter plainly, skulking from a task which, nevertheless, we acknowledge has fallen to our lot. We need not say we acknowledge fully the need of judgment and caution in all foreign affairs ; but there is need of boldness too, and this has in the Armenian matter hitherto been lacking. We have temporised and delayed with full information in our hands ; and even now we shall probably be told that we must wait for the Report of the Commission, which, when the object was to put off the nations with a feeble compromise, has not been waited for.
There is one more risk connected with interference in Armenia which is so unreal that we are reluctant to allude to it, but which we mention because "practical men" are fond of throwing it in our teeth. It is said that if we coerce the Sultan into doing justice, we shall alienate the sympathies of our Indian Mahommedan subjects, who look to the Sultan as their Khalif. The objection is demonstrably unfounded. The Mussulmans of India care no more about the Khalif than French soldiers when fighting Catholics care about the Pope. In 1855 we spent fifty millions and wasted at least 50,000 lives in defending the Sultan. That defence was successful, and in 1857, two years afterwards, the Mussulman soldiery were spring- ing at our throats, and both Hindoos and Musulmano strove to supersede us by a Mussulman dynasty. There was no gratitude for service to the Sultan, and there will be no anger at disservice done him. It is not as if the Khalif were going to be dethroned, though even in that ca,e, so long as Mecca was safe and accessible, the Indian Mussulmans would not care a jot. The dangerous section of the Indian Mussulmans are under Wahabee influence, and the Wahabees are all Arabs.
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