Armenian Genocide_The First Genocide Of 20th Century

But when the war went badly, the Turkish high command turned its ire upon the Armenian men in arms. For the purpose of the undeclared and secret war against the Armenians, the men in uniform were selected as the first group from the Armenian population for extermination. Their disposal was critical in assuring that the only element capable of resisting the plan about to unfold proved no hindrance. First disarmed and forced into labor battalions, the Armenian soldiers became the first victims of mass executions. Their hands bound, they were usually taken a certain distance from their camps and killed by gunfire. Before anyone had the smallest inkling about the government's intentions, the Turkish military carried out the first phase of the genocide. .
             While reports of atrocities accompanied news of the Ottoman campaigns on the eastern front from the very start of the war, the first indications of the systematic execution of the Armenian servicemen may be dated to February 1915. With the arrival of spring in April, the plan to annihilate the Armenians went into full operation. Once again the male population was targeted, this time the adults. All across the empire orders issued by the government required Armenian men to appear at designated government offices on a certain date. Storekeepers, school teachers, and farmers from the fields came voluntarily only to be summarily arrested and thrown into prisons. .
             At the same time the government began openly to arrest the leadership of the Armenian communities. Clergymen, headmasters, professors, political activists, and well-to-do merchants were hauled to prison. The public hanging of some and the disappearance of the others were the first indications that the Armenian population was about to face another ordeal. Alarm about the magnitude of the catastrophe about to strike spread widely on April 24, 1915, when the most important figures of the Armenian community in Constantinople-newspaper editors, authors, churchmen, and even parliamentarians-were taken from their homes and summarily deported to remote regions.