This article is about the short lived Armenian "provisional government". For other uses, see Armenia.

Administration for Western Armenia
1915–1918
Flag
Status	Provisional government
Capital	Van of Van Province
Common languages	Armenian
Governor
• Apr 1915 - Dec 1917	Aram Manougian
• Dec 1917 - Mar 1918	Tovmas Nazarbekian
• Mar 1918 - Apr 1918	Andranik Toros Ozanian
Historical era	WWI period
• Van Resistance	28 May 1915
• Battle of Van	August 19, 1915
• Transcaucasian Federation	24 February, 1918
• Ottoman take over	7 April 1918
Preceded by Succeeded by Ottoman Empire Democratic Republic of Armenia

The Administration for Western Armenia is an Armenian provisional government with the autonomous region initially set up around Lake Van. ^[1] It was briefly referred to as Free Vaspurakan.^[2] But after an Armenian setback during the Battle of Van, it was reestablished in June 1916 as "Administration for Western Armenia" [1] under the war zone. During the early stages of the establishment of Democratic Republic of Armenia, it was included with other Armenian National Councils in a briefly unified Armenia.^[3]

This provisional government stabilized itself using Armenian volunteer units, forming an administrative structure after the Van Resistance around April 1915. Dominant representation was from the Armenian Revolutionary Federation. Aram Manougian, "Aram of Van," was the administration's most famous leader.

Population distribution

During the Van Resistance, there were approximately 185,000 Armenians in the Van Province. In the city of Van itself there were around 30,000 Armenians, but more Armenians from surrounding villages joined them during the Ottoman offensive.

Activities

Formation

The conflict began on April 20, 1915, with Aram Manougian as the leader of the resistance; it lasted for two months. In May, the Armenian battalions and Russian regulars entered the city and drove the Ottoman army out of Van.^[4]

Departure from Van

After two months of self-government under the leadership of Manougian, the battle turned against the Armenian militia. 250,000 Armenians retreated to the Russian frontier.^[5] The Ottoman Army, under Pasha Kerim, launched a counterattack in the Lake Van area and defeated the Russians at the Battle of Malazgirt. The Russians retreated east from Kara Kilise towards Bayburt.

During the Battle of Van, Manougian and Sampson Aroutiounian, president of the Armenian National Council of Tbilisi) helped refugees from the region reach Echmiadzin.^[6] As a result of famine and fatigue, many refugees suffered from disease, especially dysentery.^[6]

Return to Van

The governor declared strict measures to prevent pillage and destruction of property in December 1915. Some threshing machines and flour mills resumed work in the district so bakeries would reopen. The restoration of buildings commenced in some streets. ^[7]

Expansion, 1916

At the turn of 1916, Armenian refugees returned to their homes, but the Russian government raised barriers in prevention. ^[8] During 1916-1917, 8,000 to 10,000 Armenians were permitted to inhabit Van.

One report said:

"Men are going in large numbers; caravans of those returning to the fatherland enter via Igdir. Most of the refugees in the Erevan province returned to Van":^[9]

The government confiscated Russian property, turning it into communal farms and dividing it among Armenian adult males. Over 40% of the population of Van left the city to go work on the farms. The Armenian government started a weapons and ammunition industry. Most of the formerly Russian mines were scrapped and used for building projects in Van. The Armenian government tried to impose taxes, but most ignored the tax collectors.

Russian plans

In April 1915, Nikolai Yudenich reported to Count Illarion Ivanovich Vorontsov-Dashkov:

The Armenians intend to occupy by means of their refugees the lands left by the Kurds and Turks, in order to benefit from that territory. I consider this intention unacceptable because after the war it will be difficult to reclaim those lands sequestered by the Armenians, or to prove that the seized property does not belong to them, as was the case after the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-1878 consider it very desirable to populate the border regions with a Russian element . . . with colonists from the Kuban and Don and in that way to form a Cossack region along the border^[10]

The agricultural possibilities located off the Black Sea coastal districts and the upper reaches of the Euphrates were considered suitable for Russian colonists.^[11] The Rules for the Temporary Administration of Turkish Areas occupied by the Right of War was signed on June 18, 1916, instructing a governorship under the established system of Aram Manougian.

However, the February 1917 Revolution disposed Tsar Nicholas II of the Russian crown; and the new establishment promised to reverse the policies to gain support of the Armenians.

The settlement, 1917

Approximately 150,000 Armenians relocated to the provinces of Erzurum, Bitlis, Mush and Van in 1917.^[12] The Armenians began to build houses and till farmlands in preparation for the 1917 autumn harvest. The prospect of a new autonomous state seemed favorable for provisional governor Aram Manougian with the administrative seat favorably located between Russia and the Ottoman Empire.

Although military front lines were relatively stable, 1917 marked the year of the Russian Revolution. Armen Garo and others asked for Armenian regulars in the European theater to be to be transferred to the Caucasus front, a move aimed to increase the stability of the provisional government.

Special Transcaucasus Committee

The Viceroy of the Caucasus was abolished by the Russian Provisional Government on March 18, 1917; and all authority, except in the zone of the active army, was entrusted to the civil administrative body called the Special Transcaucasian Committee or Ozakom. Dr. Hakob Zavriev was instrumental in having Ozakom issue a decree about the administration of the occupied territories. This region was officially identified as "the land of Turkish Armenia" and transferred to a civilian rule under Zavriev, who oversaw districts Trebizon, Erzurum, Bitlis, and Van.^[13] Each of the districts had their own Armenian governor with Armenian civil officials.

National frontline

The Russian army in the Caucasus was organized along national and ethnic lines, such as the Armenian volunteer units and Russian Caucasus Army on the eve of 1917.^[14] However, the Russian Caucasus Army disintegrated, leaving Armenian soldiers to become the only defenders against the Ottoman Army.^[15]

The frontline had three main divisions, led respectively by Movses Silikyan, Andranik Toros Ozanian and Mikhail Areshian. Armenian partisan guerrilla detachments accompanied these main units. The Ottomans outnumbered the Armenians three to one on a frontline 300 miles long with high mountain areas and passes.

Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, March, 1918

The ACEA representatives on the Duma joined their colleagues in declaring independence of the Transcaucasus from Russia. Once they were free from Russia control, the ACEA established the Democratic Republic of Armenia. The ACEA devised policies to direct the war effort as well as the relief and repatriation of refugees, passing a law organizing the defense of the Caucasus against the Ottoman Empire using supplies and ammunition left by the Russian army. The Congress also selected a 15-member permanent executive committee, known as the Armenian National Council. The chairman of this committee was Avetis Aharonyan, and he declared the Administration for Western Armenia was part of the Democratic Republic of Armenia.

A new border was drawn by the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, signed between Russian SFSR and the Ottoman Empire on March 3, 1918. The treaty assigned the Van province alongside the Kars, Ardahan and Batum regions to the Ottoman Empire.

The Resistance, March, 1918

Armenian Congress of Eastern Armenians did not recognize the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, and the Ottoman Empire struggled against the Democratic Republic of Armenia. The Ottoman Empire's War Minister, Enver Pasha, sent the newly established Army of Islam to Armenia. Under heavy pressure from the combined forces of the Ottoman army and the Kurdish irregulars, the Republic was forced to withdraw from Erzincan to Erzurum.

The Battle of Sardarapat. (May 22-26, 1918) proved General Movses Silikian could cause an Ottoman retreat. R.G. Hovannisian explains the conditions of the resistance during March 1918:

"In the summer of 1918 the Armenian national councils reluctantly transferred from Tiflis to Yerevan to take over the leadership of the republic from the popular dictator Aram Manukian and the renowned military commander Drastamat Kanayan. It then began the daunting process of establishing a national administrative machinery in an isolated and landlocked misery. This was not the autonomy or independence of which Armenian intellectuals had dreamed and for which a generation of youth had been sacrificed. Yet, as it happened, it was here that the Armenian people were destined to continue [their] national existence."^[16]

— R.G. Hovannisian

Further southeast, in Van, the Armenians resisted the Turkish army until April 1918. The Armenians were forced to evacuate and withdraw to Persia. The Azerbaijani Tatars sided with the Ottoman Empire and seized the lines of communication, cutting off the Armenian National Councils in Baku and Erevan from the National Council in Tbilisi. The British sent a small military force under the command of Gen. Lionel Charles Dunsterville into Baku, arriving on August 4, 1918. Enver Pasha's movement disintegrated with the Armistice of Mudros. ^[17]

On October 30, 1918, the Ottoman Empire signed the Armistice of Mudros and all military activity in the region ceased.

Recognition Efforts

The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, between the Ottoman Empire and Russian SFSR, included the establishment of Armenia in Russian Armenia. The Administration for Western Armenia had a setback with the Treaty of Batum, forcing the Armenian boarders to be pushed deeper into Russian Armenia.

The Armenian Diaspora argued it was natural to extend the borders to Armenian control, since as after the Russian Revolution the region was controlled by Armenian volunteer units, and later by Armenia. The Armenian provisional government used as an argument, "the ability to control the region" in Wilsonian Armenia.

The majority of the population was becoming Armenian, as the Turkish inhabitants of the region moved to the western provinces, became a secondary argument. With the defeat of the Ottoman Empire at the end of World War I, the triple Entente Powers tried to determine the fate of Anatolia.

During the Conference of London, David Lloyd George encouraged Wilson to accept a mandate for Anatolia, particularly with the support of Armenian diaspora, for the provinces claimed by the Administration for Western Armenia during its largest occupation in 1916. Wilsonian Armenia became part of the Treaty of Sèvres.

The realities on the ground, however, were different. This idea was blocked in both the Treaty of Alexandropol and the Treaty of Kars. The Treaty of Sèvres was superseded by the Treaty of Lausanne. The fight for the "Administration for Western Armenia" was dropped from the table.

Today, as a continuation of the initial goal, the creation of a free, independent and united Armenia including all the territories designated as Wilsonian Armenia by the Treaty of Sèvres, as well as the regions of Artsakh, Javakhk, and Nakhichevan, is the main goal of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation^[18]

Administration

Governors

• Jun 1916 - Dec 1917 Aram Manougian (interim)
• Dec 1917 - Mar 1918 Tovmas Nazarbekian
• Mar 1918 - Apr 1918 Andranik Toros Ozanian

Civil affairs

• May 1917 - Dec 1917 Hakob Zavriev

Civil Commissioner

• Dec 1917 - Apr 7, 1918 Drastamat Kanayan

Timeline

• April 19, 1915: Fire in the powder stores of the Van armoury.
• April 20, 1915: Armenians in the city of Van, the countryside, and small towns begins a local uprising.
• April 24, 1915: Ottoman governor asks permission to move the Muslim civilian population to the west.
• May 2, 1915: Ottoman Army moves close to Van, but withdraws because of the presence of the Russian Army.
• May 3, 1915: Russian Army enters Van.
• August 16, 1915: Ottoman Army besieges Van, Battle of Van.
• September 1915: Ottoman Army is forced out by Russians.
• August 1916: Ottoman Army moves to the west of the region (Mush and Bitlis), but is forced out within a month.
• February 1917: Russian units disintegrate. Armenian volunteer units keep formation.
• September 1917: The Armenian Congress of Eastern Armenia merge Armenian volunteer units into a single militia under its control.
• February 10, 1918: The Duma of the Transcaucasus convenes.
• February 24, 1918: The Duma of the Transcaucasus declares the region to be an independent, democratic, federative republic.
• March 3, 1918: The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk gives Kars, Ardahan and Batum regions to the Ottoman Empire.
• March 4, 1918: The Administration for Western Armenia condemns the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk.
• March 9, 1918: The Administration for Western Armenia presents its position to the Ottoman Empire.
• May 22, 1918: Battle of Sardarapat; Armenian militia fight against the Ottoman Empire.
• May 28, 1918: The Armenian Congress of Eastern Armenia declares the formation of the Democratic Republic of Armenia and its independence from the Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic.
• August 4, 1918: General Lionel Charles Dunsterville leads a British expeditionary force into Baku, becoming the city's military governor.
• October 30, 1918: The Ottoman Empire signs the Armistice of Mudros, agreeing to leave the Transcaucasus.
• September 24 - December 2, 1920: The Turkish National Movement invades the DRA, seizing control of Wilsonian Armenia.
• December 4, 1920: The Red Army enters the capital of the DRA, bringing the DRA under Soviet control.
• October 23, 1921: The Treaty of Kars is signed, recognizing Turkish annexation of Wilsonian Armenia and granting Turkey the Province of Kars.

References

See also

• Garegin Njdeh

External links

• Bryce Report: A summary of Armenian history to 1915
• Self-defense Battle Memorial of Artsiv Vaspurakan in Agarak village, Armenia