Monte Melkonian

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Monte Melkonian on an Armenian postage stamp
Bust of Melkonian in the Victory Park of Yerevan

Monte Melkonian (born November 25, 1957 in Visalia , California , † June 12, 1993 in Mərzili , Azerbaijan ; Armenian Մոնթէ Մելքոնեան ( classical ) , Մոնթե Մելքոնյան ( reformed ) , scientific transliteration Mont'ē Melk'onean ) was an American political activist of Armenian descent and militant in the Nagorno-Karabakh war. He was one of the leaders of the Asala .

Life

Monte Melkonian was born on November 25, 1957 as the third of four children of the self-employed carpenter Charles Melkonian (1918-2006) and the primary school teacher Zabel Melkonian (1920-2012) in Visalia and grew up with English as her mother tongue (in California there is a large one Armenian community, especially in Glendale ). Melkonian is described by contemporaries as a child who fully identified as an American and participated in both the Scouts and the baseball pitcher in the Little League . His parents hardly spoke to him about their old homeland, which they called the "old country".

In 1969 the family went on a long trip to Europe, during which Monte Melkonian attended Spanish classes in Spain . There, his teacher asked him several times where he was from and was not satisfied with the answer that he was an American. His brother Markar Melkonian describes what a different image the teacher had of her siblings than she did and that she did not see them as American. So Monte began to wonder where he was from.

In the spring of the same year, the family traveled through Turkey and came to the city of Merzifon , where Zabel Melkonian's parents came from. According to the last census, Merzifon had 23,475 inhabitants, but almost none of the Armenian population, which once numbered around 17,000, was left - they were deported in the course of the Armenian genocide in 1915 . They met one of allegedly three Armenian families in the city, but they learned that the family was only allowed to stay because they had betrayed all the Armenians in the city to the Turkish authorities. Monte later told his wife that this experience completely changed him. He saw the place that was lost.

Back in California, Monte attended high school with great success. Instead of getting an early graduation, as his headmaster had advised him, at the age of fifteen he went to Japan on a student exchange with the support of his father, where he learned martial arts and Japanese . Allegedly he made contacts with the Japanese Red Army . Monte Melkonian stayed in Japan for a year and then traveled through several countries in Southeast Asia. He earned his living by teaching English. In 1975 he visited North Vietnam , which was on the verge of defeating South Vietnam , where he learned important skills for armed struggle. In a 1992 interview, he described the successful guerrilla fight as an inspiration for the fight in Nagorno-Karabakh . Melkonian returned home, graduated from high school and began studying at the University of California at Berkeley . His major subjects were ancient Asian history and archeology . In 1978 he helped to create an exhibition on Armenian cultural goods at one of the university libraries. At the request of the Turkish Consul General in San Francisco , the university administration had the part of the exhibition on the Armenian Genocide removed, but after protests by students, it had to allow the part of the exhibition to be re-installed. Monte graduated from Berkeley in less than three years and was accepted into Oxford University . He decided, however, not to continue studying, but to work for the "Armenian cause".

In the spring of 1978 Melkonian traveled to Iran , where there is a long-established Armenian minority , and there witnessed the harbingers of the Iranian revolution of 1979. At the school in Tehran where he taught, he helped organize a strike and was near Jaleh Square when many protesters were shot dead by the Shah's troops on Black Friday . Soon afterwards he went to see Kurdish partisans in Iranian Kurdistan . Years later, he still occasionally wore the uniform he had received during that period.

In the autumn of 1978 he went to the Lebanese capital Beirut , where there has also been a large Armenian community since the Armenian genocide in 1915 , mostly descendants of Armenian refugees who had survived death marches in Anatolia . Civil war raged in Lebanon from 1975 to 1990 , and Christian Kata'ib forces attacked neighborhoods in the Armenian-influenced Beirut suburb of Bourj Hammoud, angry that the Armenians would not support their operations . Melkonian was close to the Social Democratic Huntschak Party and was involved in the defense of Bourj Hammoud, West Beirut, Antelias and East Beirut for almost two years as a permanent member of the Armenian militia . He also worked behind the lines in areas ruled by Kata'ib for the left-wing Arab national movement. In Beirut he also met his future wife Seda Kbranjan . He learned the Armenian language , which he was fluent in as the fifth language after English, Spanish, French and Japanese. He also spoke Arabic, Italian and Turkish as well as some Persian and Kurdish .

In the spring of 1980 he became a member of the Leninist Armenian underground organization Asala in West Beirut, for whose magazine Hayastan ("Armenia") he wrote articles over the next three years. He received military training from several Palestinian organizations and participated in several armed operations. It is certain that he participated in the planning and training of the fighters for Operation Van on September 24, 1981, during which four Asala fighters held the Turkish embassy in Paris for several days. Occupation of the Turkish Embassy. In November 1981, French police arrested a young suspect with a Cypriot passport named Dimitri Georgiu. Soon after, several bombs exploded in Paris demanding the release of the young Cypriot. Eventually he was deported, ended up in Beirut and announced that he was a Monte Melkonian.

In July 1983 the Asala split into two groups, one of which supported the previous leader Hagop Hagopian and the other, to which Monte Melkonian belonged, was against him. After two close friends of the Hagopians were shot dead by a loose friend of Melkonians in a military camp in Lebanon, Hagopian had two close friends of Monte Melkonians, Garlen Ananian and Arum Vartanian, arrested, personally tortured them and killed them.

Melkonian continued to live underground for over two years, first in Lebanon and then in France. After testifying on behalf of an Armenian militant, Levon Minassian, who had been accused of bank robbery, he was arrested in Paris in November 1985, tried himself and sentenced to six years' imprisonment for forged papers and illegal possession of weapons. Melkonian was in Fresnes and Poissy for three years . In early 1989 he was released and deported to the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen ( South Yemen ), where he met his partner Seda again. They lived together underground for about a year and a half in different countries of Eastern Europe, which in 1989 saw the fall of real socialism one by one.

On October 6, 1990, Monte Melkonian reached the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic , where he spent eight months at the Armenian Academy of Sciences preparing a scientific paper on the Urartu Cave Tombs, which was published posthumously in 1995. Monte Melkonian and Seda married in August 1991 in the Geghard monastery .

At this time, the conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh, which was populated by the majority of Armenians, flared up again. During this time, Monte Melkonian recognized that Soviet power was nearing its end and was convinced that there could only be a future for the Armenian people if this conflict was won. If we lose Karabakh, then the last days of our people will have dawned, he said in the newspaper of the armed forces of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic . If the Azerbaijani forces succeeded in driving the Armenians out of Karabakh, they would advance to Sjunik ( Sangesur ) and other regions of Armenia. Therefore, the fate of Karabakh is decisive for the long-term security of the entire Armenian nation.

Between September 12 and 14, 1991, Monte drove to the Shahumyan province north of Nagorno-Karabakh, where in autumn 1991 he fought for the Armenians for three months and took part in the capture of the villages of Erkej, Manashid and Buzlukh.

On February 4, 1992, Melkonian came to the Martuni Province as regional commander . The changes were immediately noticeable upon his arrival: the Armenian civilians felt safer because the Azerbaijani troops were pushed back and the residential areas could no longer be hit with their GRAD missiles.

In April 1993, Melkonian was one of the main strategists who organized the capture of the Karvachar region in the Azerbaijani region between the Republic of Armenia and the former Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast. In the four days of heavy fighting, the Armenians suffered far fewer losses than the enemy.

death

Grave in Jerablur
Bust of Melkonian in the Victory Park of Yerevan.

Monte was killed in the abandoned Azerbaijani village of Merzili in the early afternoon of June 12, 1993 in the Battle of Agdam. According to Markar Melkonian, Monte Melkonian died in the early evening from enemy fire in an unexpected battle that resulted in some probably dispersed Azerbaijani soldiers.

Monte was buried with full military honors on June 19, 1993 in the Jerablur military cemetery on the outskirts of Yerevan, where his coffin had been brought from the Sorawar Church in the center of the city. Around 50,000 to 100,000 people (some even spoke of 250,000), including Armenia's President Levon Ter-Petrosyan , Defense Minister Vazgen Manukyan and Deputy Foreign Minister Gerard Libaridian , took part.

Honors

The city of Martuni in Nagorno-Karabakh was renamed Monteapert (Monteaberd, Մոնթեաբերդ ) after Monte Melkonian .

evaluation

Monte Melkonian enjoys hero status among many Armenians. Arkadi Ghukassjan , President of the internationally unrecognized Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh , awarded him the honorary title "Hero of Arzach " and the order "Golden Eagle" on September 2, 1999 . In Turkey, Azerbaijan and the United States, however, he was considered a terrorist.

Political and social positions

Melkonian was an Armenian nationalist and, as a revolutionary socialist, represented positions of Marxism-Leninism , which were also part of the Asala program . His brother Markar writes about him in his biography that Melkonian always hoped for a reform of the Soviet Union towards democracy and personal freedom and only with the collapse of the Soviet Union did the idea of ​​a unified Soviet Armenia including Nagorno-Karabakh and western Armenia with Kars, Van and Erzurum appear gave up as part of the Soviet Union. In the 1980s he called for a joint guerrilla struggle between left-wing Turks, Kurds and Armenians against the “chauvinist” leadership of Turkey. With his internationalism he stood in opposition to the Dashnaks ( Armenian Revolutionary Federation ), which were also positioning themselves as socialist .

He saw the liberation of Nagorno-Karabakh from the "Azerbaijani yoke" as vital for the survival of the Armenian people, since in the event of the loss of Artsakh the rest of Armenia would also be wiped out by the Azerbaijanis.

Monte Melkonian did not smoke or drink, and he also banned his soldiers from consuming alcohol. He levied a tax on wine from Martuni in order to get fuel and ammunition. He also intervened against war crimes . For example, his widow Seda reports how he punished an Armenian civilian who beat a wounded Azerbaijani prisoner of war . The brutality and ineffectiveness of the Armenian fedayeen in Shahumyan, as well as the use of fascist symbols, upset him. He strictly forbade the fighters - according to his brother's judgment - the practice adopted by the Azerbaijanis of shooting captured soldiers. In at least one case, he brought Azerbaijani civilians to safety in an armored vehicle. In Karwachar he assured Azerbaijani soldiers safe conduct by megaphone in Turkish (a language that is quite easy to understand with Azerbaijani) if they lay down their arms and withdrew. In an interview shortly before his death, he said it was a shame for the Azerbaijani military leaders how ill-prepared soldiers sent them to certain death.

Monte Melkonian rejected the strongly patriarchal structures of Armenian society. He demonstratively washed dishes and encouraged women to fight at the front. At the same time, he described the radio operators and cooks as being on par with the soldiers at the front.

During the war he tried to implement socialist models in Nagorno-Karabakh. He supported a baker's cooperative and planned to set up a carpet factory that should belong to the local carpet weavers. According to his brother's reports, he shared his military wages with cooks, cleaning women and families of wounded fighters.

Works

  • Monte Melkonian: The Right to Struggle: Selected Writings of Monte Melkonian on the Armenian National Question . San Francisco, Sardarabad Collective, 1990 ISBN 0-9641569-1-1

literature

  • Markar Melkonian: My Brother's Road, An American's Fateful Journey to Armenia . IB Tauris, New York City 2005. ISBN 1-85043-635-5
  • Thomas de Waal: Black Garden: Armenia and Azerbaijan Through Peace and War (2nd edition), NYU Press, New York City 2013.
  • Michael Krikorian: Portraits of Hope: Armenians in the Contemporary World. Berghahn Books, 2007, ISBN 978-1-84545-257-5 , pp. 237-242.
  • Joseph E. Vorbach: Monte Melkonian: Armenian revolutionary leader. In: Terrorism and Political Violence. 6, No. 2, 1994, pp. 178-195. doi: 10.1080 / 09546559408427253
  • Christopher Zurcher: The Post-Soviet Wars: Rebellion, Ethnic Conflict, and Nationhood in the Caucasus. NYU Press, New York City 2009, ISBN 978-0-81479-724-2 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ This article uses the English spelling of his name because he was a citizen of the United States . The German transcription would be "Melkonjan", which reflects the Armenian pronunciation more precisely.
  2. ↑ Jim Steinberg: Armenian Hero's Father Dies At 88. The Fresno Bee, September 20, 2006.
  3. ↑ Commander Monte Melkonian's mother dies at 92nd PanARMENIAN.Net, December 10, 2012.
  4. ^ Markar Melkonian: My Brother's Road, An American's Fateful Journey to Armenia . New York 2005, p. 4.
  5. ↑ a b c Mark Arax: The Riddle of Monte Melkonian. Los Angeles Times , October 9, 1993, pp. 1-4 ( 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 ).
  6. ^ Markar Melkonian: My Brother's Road, An American's Fateful Journey to Armenia . New York 2005, pp. 10-12.
  7. ^ Markar Melkonian: My Brother's Road, An American's Fateful Journey to Armenia . New York 2005, 12-18.
  8. ↑ Zurcher 2009, p. 176.
  9. ↑ Zurcher 2009, p. 176.
  10. ^ Markar Melkonian: My Brother's Road, An American's Fateful Journey to Armenia . New York 2005, p. 344.
  11. ^ Markar Melkonian: My Brother's Road, An American's Fateful Journey to Armenia . New York 2005, p. 344.
  12. ↑ "Հայաստանի հնագիտական ​​հուշարձաններ, հ. 16 [Archaeological Monuments of Armenia, vol. 16], Yerevan, Institute of Archeology and Ethnography of the Academy of Sciences of Armenia, 1995.
  13. ↑ Markar Melkonian: Which "Avo" was Monte? Hetq , = 25. November 2011.
  14. ↑ > Michael P. Croissant :: The Armenia-Azerbaijan Conflict: Causes and Implications. Praeger, London: 1998. ISBN 0-275-96241-5
  15. ↑ Thomas de Waal: Black Garden - Armenia and Azerbaijan Through Peace and War. 2nd ed. New York University Press, New York 2013, p. 208.
  16. ^ Markar Melkonian: My Brother's Road, An American's Fateful Journey to Armenia . New York 2005, p. 264.
  17. ↑ a b c Commander Mourned. Armenian International Magazine 4 (5), June 1993. ISSN 1050-3471.
  18. ^ Michael Krikorian: Portraits of Hope: Armenians in the Contemporary World. Berghahn Books, 2007, p. 242.
  19. ^ Raymond Bonner: Foreigners Fight Again in the Embattled Caucasus. The New York Times , Aug. 4, 1993.
  20. ↑ Seven Years of Conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh. Human Rights Watch , 1994. ISBN 1-56432-142-8 , pp. 113f.
  21. ^ Robert Joseph Krikorian Masih: Armenia: At the Crossroads. Routledge, 1999. ISBN 978-9057023453 , p. 44.
  22. ^ Christoph Zürcher: The Post-Soviet Wars: Rebellion, Ethnic Conflict, and Nationhood in the Caucasus. 2007. NYU Press. ISBN 9780814797099 , p. 177.
  23. ↑ Հերոսի հիշատակը հարգելով. ուխտագնացություն դեպի Եռաբլուր. Hetq , June 13, 2011, Մոնթեաբերդ-Մարտունու.
  24. ↑ Thomas de Waal: More War in the Caucasus. The National Interest , February 9, 2011.
  25. ^ Senor Hasratian: The fighter for the idea. Sona, Stepanakert 2007. ISBN 9789994158232 , p. 7.
  26. ↑ Patrick Wilson Gore: 'Tis Some Poor Fellow's Skull. Post-Soviet Warfare in the Southern Caucasus . iUniverse, 2008. ISBN 978-0595486793 , p. 19.
  27. ↑ Philip Marsden: Road to revolution: PhD? I'd rather be a terrorist. The Times, London, March 12, 2005.
  28. ↑ Mark Arax: The Riddle of Monte Melkonian. Los Angeles Times , October 9, 1993, pp. 1-4.
  29. ^ Maile Melkonian: The Facts of the Case. Foreign Affairs, Council on Foreign Relations, November / December 1997, No. 76 (6), p. 184. [Note: Maile Melkonian is Monte Melkonian's sister.]
  30. ↑ a b Thomas de Waal: Black Garden - Armenia and Azerbaijan Through Peace and War. 2nd ed. New York University Press, New York 2013. p. 220.
  31. ↑ Michael Krikorian: "Excuse me, how do I get to the front?" The Brothers Monte and Markar Melkonian (Los Angeles). In by Huberta Voss: Portraits of Hope: Armenians in the Contemporary World. Berghahn Books, 2007. pp. 237–242, here p. 241. ISBN 978-1-84545-257-5 .
  32. ^ Onnik Krikorian: A conversation with Seta Melkonian. The Armenian Weekly, Yerevan, March 4, 2000.
  33. ^ A b c Markar Melkonian: Editor's preface to the second edition. In: Monte Melkonian: The Right to Struggle: Selected Writings of Monte Melkonian on the Armenian National Question. Second edition . Sardarabad Collective, San Francisco 1993. ISBN 0-9641569-1-1
personal data
SURNAME Melkonian, Monte
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Մելքոնեան, Մոնթէ (Armenian); Melk'onean, Mont'ē (scientific transliteration)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American political activist, terrorist, and irregulars of Armenian descent
DATE OF BIRTH November 25, 1957
PLACE OF BIRTH Visalia , California
DATE OF DEATH on June 12, 1993
Place of death Nagorno-Karabakh