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Mikael Minasyan, former Armenian ambassador to the Vatican, delves into the roots of conspiracy theories that are ingrained among Armenians. Writing for the newspaper Hraparak, the author analyzes how historical tragedies and contemporary challenges have fueled these dangerous fantasies.
His findings prompt thinking about how to combat disinformation and build a future based on facts rather than myths.
The following is the text of Minasyan.
World history clearly shows that all nations go through the life cycle described by Gumilyov in his theory of national formation. In these cycles, nations are formed, grow, stabilize, reach a peak of development and power, and then enter a new stage of decline, often with tragic consequences, disappear completely or transform into another nation, or embark on a path of revival. The Armenian nation, with its thousands of years of history, has gone through these stages many times, including an accelerated development in the last 150 years.
In human history, there are extremely rare examples of a people being able to withstand such a devastating tragedy as genocide. The Armenians endured the 1915 genocide with dignity. Despite the pain, loss and suffering, they remained sane and rationally assessed the situation, which allowed them to quickly self-organize and restore national life. This was reflected in the establishment of the Armenian Diaspora Protection Agency and the establishment of Armenian orphanages and schools, which eventually led to the establishment of the First Republic of Armenia. Soviet Armenia, in turn, became the logical continuation of the mission of the First Republic. Although the two parts of the Armenian people – the Diaspora and the Armenian SSR (Eastern Armenia) – developed in different ways due to historical circumstances, they often intersected and pursued similar national goals.
The two parts of the Armenian people – Soviet Armenians and the Diaspora – are united by similar behavior and a common understanding of the national interest. From the governor of Soviet Armenia to public figures and opinion leaders in California, the country’s leaders are aware of the tasks facing the country and actively work to solve them, using all available resources. They are also united by the lack of tendency to theorize and conspiratorial interpretations of obvious facts and events.
It is noteworthy that until the late 20th and early 21st centuries, the Armenian Genocide was hardly discussed by Armenians in the context of conspiracy theories. Even those who were far from the science of history understood that the Ottoman Empire was destroying the Armenians in order to create its own nation-state and turn Turkey into a country in its own image. In the genocide on the territories of the Ottoman Empire and in the subsequent genocide in Eastern Armenia, it was mainly those Armenians who resisted who survived, while those who believed in the promises of a better life from the Turks were killed or starved to death in the Syrian desert. In the collective memory of the Armenian people of that time, the stories of the heroic self-defense and rescue struggle in Van and other settlements in the region, Musadag, Urfa, Shapin-Qarahisar and other places occupy an important place. Armenians remember those who rose up to resist and were rescued, as well as those who did not surrender, accepted the martyr’s sacrifice, and at the same time preserved their own and their people’s honor. These memories help them to continue living and creating. The survivors of the genocide are not ashamed. They remember and are aware of the sacrifices of the martyrs.
This narrative gained new momentum in the mid-1950s when the Soviet Armenian leadership succeeded in transforming the memory of the Armenian Genocide into a part of state policy, first at the Union level and then at the international level. This led to intensified political and socio-cultural efforts in Armenia to gain international recognition and preservation of the memory of the Armenian Genocide, as well as to strengthen scientific research. Armenians began to feel proud of their ability to survive. The number of scientific works on the Armenian Genocide in various languages increased rapidly. In this context, it is noteworthy that John Kirakosyan’s monograph “The Trial of the Young Turks” was awarded the USSR State Prize. A similar process took place in the Armenian diaspora.
Thanks to the efforts of Vahagan Dadrian and other prominent Armenian scholars, the number of people interested in the Armenian Genocide and demanding justice continued to grow. This trend continued until the early 1980s, when a generation of “irresponsible poet-patriots” took up leadership positions in Soviet Armenia with the mentality of satisfying the people. These leaders, perhaps with good intentions, unknowingly sowed the seeds that later led to the emergence of conspiracy theories. Although they were not the only cause, it was their actions that contributed to the development of the “missionary state” idea among Armenians in the mid-1980s. Although the diaspora retained a more sober and objective view of history, among the second and third generations of Soviet Armenians began to spread the idea that “Armenia disappeared due to genocide”, “the cause of the genocide was Russia, partly due to the unwillingness of the British Navy to occupy the Armenian Highlands”, “the United States wanted to create a Greater Armenia across the entire ocean, but was prevented by Russia and Turkey”, and “the Jews organized the genocide in order to seize the capital of the Ottoman Armenians”.
Gradually, these theories were mixed with the socio-political problems of the USSR in the 1980s, accompanied by “rabiz” slogans like “You are the masters of this country”. This soon turned into a misleading idea that selling apricots and other local brands would be a panacea for all existing problems. As a result, the intellectual leadership and the general public had very different views on the national movement of 1988. By that time, the intellectuals had already lost their influence, as conspiracy theories dominated at the time. The first warning sign of this process was the Spitak earthquake in 1988, when many people began to believe in stupid theories that “the earthquake was organized by Moscow using special weapons to prevent Armenian demands for Artsakh” or “the United States created the earthquake to destroy the USSR”.
Another important point is that after gaining independence, the Armenian political elite tried to cater to public sentiment in order to gain trust and votes, which led them to further give in to imagination and emotions and reject rational cognition. In the context of the collapse of the Soviet Union, the situation of folklore and conspiracy theories became more complicated. This is obvious: as the famous researcher Rob Brotherton pointed out, powerful social upheavals and global disasters completely changed people’s worldview, confused them, and forced them to seek explanations in conspiracy theories, which sometimes had a greater impact on behavior than the actual consequences of the disaster.
Thus, despite the varying attitudes toward the Soviet Union, and despite the anti-Soviet demonstrations of millions in Yerevan and elsewhere, the idea that Gorbachev was a foreign spy who caused the collapse of the Soviet Union quickly became ingrained in the public consciousness.
Moreover, after the difficult first years of independence, those who had brought Levon Ter-Petrosyan to power began to believe that he had been a Freemason and that his wife was Jewish, which supported the conspiracy theory that Ter-Petrosyan was acting in accordance with a Masonic/Jewish plan initiated since the genocide. In the early and mid-1990s, various theories that Armenians were the chosen nation or victims of a global conspiracy began to spread with new vigor. These conspiracy theories had such detailed, vivid and convincing “logic” that even residents of the most remote villages in Armenia could easily believe them to be the truth.
Armenian politics has been entangled in folklore and conspiracy theories since the late 1990s. The terrorist attacks of October 27, 1999 quickly turned into a debate about “give up Meghri or not” and subsequently became the subject of political speculation for decades, in which representatives of the so-called “deep state” were particularly active. Even the current government, which has been the main beneficiary of these speculations for many years, and the brother of Vazgen Sargsyan, who has close relations with the current authorities, “did not do enough” to directly tell the public that there was no conspiracy behind the crime. Or reopen the case and conduct a thorough investigation, because except for the victims of the terrorist attack, everything remains the same: the law, the investigators, the courts and the terrorists themselves.
The culmination of all this was the revolution of 2018. This long-awaited revolution was so unexpected and shocking that Armenians began to deny the obvious from the very beginning. According to the classic principles of conspiracy theories, the most active participants in the street protests began to blame those whom they had previously rejected and who brought Nikol Pashinyan to power. This shameful madness swept almost everything: the more unpopular Nikol became, the more people adopted new conspiracy theories, the dominant idea of which was “what can this stupid guy do: nothing depends on him”. They just continued to live in their own imagined reality.
All groups, big or small, are inherently irrational, and nations are no exception, and every nation’s irrationality ultimately hurts itself. In other words, it is natural for a peasant overwhelmed by his many problems to find simple reasons for his misfortune without considering his own responsibility. The tragedy is that such reasons are advocated by those who are called upon to lead the people to rationality.
Armenian political forces also assess the current situation through fascinating conspiracy theories that are filled with accusations against dozens of internal and external actors – from specific people or countries to global geopolitical stakeholders.
Today, this situation is further exacerbated by social networks, which experts point out allow those with morbid imaginations to quickly find each other, unite, spread, root and approve their delusions without being restricted by geographical boundaries. As a result, they become online mobs, not only ready to actively suppress anyone who disagrees with their views, but also reject any rational thoughts and ideas.
What makes Armenians so fond of conspiracy theories? Why do they prefer to escape reality and live in a fantasy world? The answer is simple: in the current crazy environment, all participants, i.e. the general public, Nikol himself, the opposition, active civic groups and others, have a simple idea – escape from reality and inability to take responsibility, which leads them to want to use conspiracy theories to justify the increasingly serious situation (everyone has his own way, depending on his interests, tastes and intelligence). Is there any other explanation for this phenomenon? I call it the national disease of Armenia in the early 21st century.
Any mistake can be corrected. Everything that was lost can be restored – from Artsakh to Van, but this cannot be achieved by living in a fictional world of conspiracy and denying reality – without fully evaluating the facts.
Will this truth return as it did after the Holocaust? Will the Armenian nation recover from this disease? If so, victory, success, honor and dignity will return.
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