Defense of Van | |||||||
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Part of the Caucasus Campaign of World War I and the Armenian genocide | |||||||
![]() Armenian fighters holding a defense line against Ottoman forces in the walled city of Van, May 1915. | |||||||
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Belligerents | |||||||
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Armenian fedayi![]() | ||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||
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![]() ![]() Aram Manukian Armenak Yekarian Vana Ishkhan | ||||||
Strength | |||||||
5,000[1] | 1,300[2] | ||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||
Unknown but heavy 2,000 captured, 30 guns[3] | Unknown | ||||||
55,000 Armenian civilians massacred[4][5] |
The defense of Van (Armenian: Վանի հերոսամարտ, romanized: Vani herosamart) and in Russian Van operation (Russian: Ванская операция, romanized: Vanskaya operatsia) was the armed resistance of the Armenian population of Van and Russian army against the Ottoman Empire's attempts to massacre the Ottoman Armenian population of the Van Vilayet in the 1915 Armenian genocide.[6][7] Several contemporaneous observers and later historians have concluded that the Ottoman government deliberately instigated an armed Armenian resistance in the city[8][9] and then used this insurgency as the main pretext to justify beginning the deportation and slaughter of Armenians throughout the empire.[10] Witness reports agree that the Armenian posture at Van was defensive and an act of resistance to massacre.[11][12] The self-defense action is frequently cited in Armenian genocide denial literature; it has become "the alpha and omega of the plea of 'military necessity'" to excuse the genocide and portray the persecution of Armenians as justified.[13]
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Still today, this alleged uprising in Van holds a central place in the denialist and justificationalist arguments.16 It also served as a pretext and a justification for anti-Armenian measures at the time, not just in Van itself, but in general. It epitomized and once more "proved" the alleged treacherousness of the Ottoman Armenians—it became, as Vahakn Dadrian put it, "the alpha and omega of the plea of 'military necessity.' "
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