00:00 On April 24th, 2022, Joe Biden formally recognized the Armenian Genocide as a genocide, which had not been done by any previous US president, and this episode will discuss the contentious and conflicting narratives surrounding the Armenian Genocide.

04:24 The speaker discusses the fragility of historical records and the disappearance of Armenian stones and monuments in Turkey, highlighting the destruction and erasure of Armenian cultural heritage.

08:23 The Armenian community in the Ottoman Empire was concentrated in three locations: Constantinople, Antakya and Alexandreta, and the Caucasus region, with a population in the millions, making them the largest Christian community in those areas, but not a majority in any one place. Unlike the Greeks, the Armenians did not have a hinterland to which they could be deported, and the Russo-Turkish war in 1878 led to the dominance of Armenian communities by the Russian Empire.

12:28 The Armenians in the Ottoman Empire were compromised because they were seen as a client of Russia, which was the enemy of the Ottoman state, and some Armenian intellectuals even went to Russian territory for support, leading to tension and violence.

16:11 The massacre of Armenian communities in Adana in 1909 remains a mystery, as the Armenian community had no role in the counter coup, but tensions between communities and the level of brutality and atrocity surpassed imagination.

20:19 The Ottomans become aware of growing interaction between Russians and Armenians, leading to an uprising in the Alexandria region, which in turn raises concerns in the Armenian community and prompts the Ottomans to clamp down and lead to an uprising.

24:48 The Ottoman Empire becomes paranoid about threats from the outside and doubts the loyalty of Armenians serving on the front lines, leading to a vicious cycle of distrust, hatred, and murder.

28:42 The Ottoman Empire implemented both public and secret orders to eliminate the Armenian threat, including a public law for deportation and verbal orders for mass murder, as evidenced by trials, testimonies, and requests for written authorization.

32:49 Notices were posted instructing Armenians to gather their possessions and follow officers to a holding place, where men were killed and women were marched under difficult conditions to places of preliminary detainment, with eyewitness accounts of extreme brutality including rape and violence against children, and the secretive intelligence agency allegedly recruited prisoners to carry out the mass murder.

37:18 The episode concludes by highlighting the mass killings and brutal conditions faced by hundreds of thousands of Armenians who were marched to their deaths without food or water, leaving the question of the ultimate fate of these women, children, and old people unanswered.