General Harbord and the Silence of the Sürmeli Plain (1919)

1919 was a year not only of the Ottoman Empire's defeat but also of the fragmentation of borders, memories, and neighborly relations in Eastern Anatolia and the Caucasus. The war seemed to be over, but the anger, hunger, migration, vengeance, and distrust it left behind had not yet subsided. The maps being drawn in the halls of the Paris Peace Conference struggled to comprehend the human reality on the ground. The Armenian question, the future of the territories remaining from the Ottoman Empire, the new republics emerging in the Caucasus, the possibility of an American mandate, and the true state of relations between Turks, Armenians, Kurds, and Azerbaijani Turks had become impossible to understand from behind a desk.

It was at this critical juncture that the American military mission, led by General James G. Harbord, was sent to the region. This was not a courtesy visit. Washington wanted the land to speak, not just the files. General Harbord's mission was to examine on-site the political, military, geographical, administrative, economic, and social conditions America would face if it were to assume potential responsibility in the region. In other words, General Harbord set out not only to see the situation in Armenia but also to understand whether America could undertake a mandate, and how much military personnel, money, administrative capacity, and time such a responsibility would require.

General Harbord was no ordinary officer. He had served in the high command of the American expeditionary forces during World War I; he was a disciplined individual, attentive to detail, capable of combining military observation with administrative assessment. America sought not only a brave soldier but also a man of cool judgment to understand a complex geography like the Near East. General Harbord was chosen for this reason.

The composition of the delegation also reflected the gravity of the mission. It included generals, staff officers, engineers, doctors, cartographers, economic experts, transportation specialists, lawyers, interpreters, and clerks. Because the issue was not merely one of security. It was an inventory of all the wreckage that emerged after the collapse of an empire.

The official title of General Harbord's report was "Conditions in the Near East: Report of the American Military Mission to Armenia". The report was prepared and submitted by Major General James G. Harbord on October 16, 1919, aboard the U.S.S. Martha Washington. It was later printed by the Government Printing Office in Washington in 1920 and presented to the U.S. Senate on April 13, 1920. Thus, General Harbord's journey did not remain merely a military observation trip; it became one of the important documents of American foreign policy, the Armenian question, the Turkish War of Independence, and the history of the Caucasus.

General Harbord's delegation first arrived in Istanbul by sea. The city still appeared to be an imperial capital; however, its harbors held foreign warships, and the silence of defeat permeated government offices. They then proceeded to Adana via the Baghdad Railway. Tarsus, Ayas, and Mersin were visited. Afterwards, the route of Aleppo, Mardin, Diyarbakır, Harput, Malatya, Sivas, Erzincan, and Erzurum was followed. This itinerary was not accidental. General Harbord was tracing the veins of collapse.

After Erzurum, the journey entered a more critical phase. Because now they would pass not only through Ottoman provinces but also through border regions directly shattered by the war. General Harbord's delegation arrived at the Horasan line on September 25, 1919. Here, a part of the delegation split off to conduct investigations in the direction of Bayezid. The main delegation proceeded towards Kars and the Republic of Armenia.

On September 27, 1919, General Harbord's delegation reached Kars. Kars stood out with its stone buildings, barracks, regular roads, and military presence remaining from Russian administration. But no matter how solid the city appeared, its political future was uncertain. General Harbord did not just see a city here; he saw the traces of Russian administration, the new quest for dominance by the Republic of Armenia, and the military fragility of the region all at once. In Kars, there were ceremonies, receptions, official contacts, and activities of American aid organizations. But behind this official facade stood poverty, migration, hunger, and fear.

In the evening of the same day, General Harbord's delegation departed from Kars and headed towards Kağızman. The road was not easy. Rain, bad roads, mechanical failures, and security concerns made the journey difficult. The delegation reached Kağızman around midnight. This point is important. Because after Kağızman, General Harbord would now enter the region directly opening to the Aras line, that is, the Sürmeli geography.

On the morning of September 28, 1919, General Harbord's delegation departed from Kağızman and proceeded towards Yerevan via Kulp. Kulp here is today's Tuzluca. Therefore, General Harbord's entry into the Tuzluca line was on the morning of September 28, 1919. This date is not just a route detail. Because after Tuzluca, the road opens to the Aras basin and the Sürmeli Plain, that is, the Iğdır region.

General Harbord's arrival in Iğdır should be understood not as being officially welcomed in the city center, but as physically entering the Sürmeli/Iğdır geography. The historical route clearly shows this: General Harbord's delegation reached Kars on September 27, 1919, Kağızman on the same night, the Kulp/Tuzluca line on the morning of September 28, 1919; passing through the Sürmeli and Iğdır region between September 28 and September 29, they arrived in Etchmiadzin on September 29, 1919, and in Yerevan on the same day.

This phase is the most important and least understood part of General Harbord's journey.

Because the Sürmeli Plain that General Harbord faced was not an ordinary agricultural region. This was a historical transit area connecting the two banks of the Aras River, Kars, Kağızman, Nakhchivan, Bayezid, and Iranian Azerbaijan. On the map, it looked like a plain; but in reality, it was a fault line. Throughout history, armies had passed through here, villages had changed hands, roads had been cut, and peoples had come to fear each other.

In those years, Iğdır was within the borders of the Republic of Armenia, established on May 28, 1918. When General Harbord left Ottoman territory behind and entered the domain of the Republic of Armenia, he was not only advancing towards Yerevan; he was also passing through the traces of the great catastrophe that Iğdır, Sürmeli, and the Aras valleys had recently experienced.

The great catastrophe that occurred in the Iğdır region in August 1919, known in local memory as Kaça-Kaç (Flight and Escape), is at the center of this scene. My field research and the documents I have accessed show that in August 1919, armed and organized elements of the Dashnak-led Republic of Armenia initiated a severe process of violence and massacre, especially against the Muslim population settled in the plain, namely Azerbaijani Turks and Sunni Kurds. This process was not merely a military conflict; it was a great wave of forced migration that led to the emptying of villages, the fragmentation of families, and the disintegration of the social fabric.

The directions of this catastrophe were also shaped by faith and geography. Azerbaijani Turks, due to their Shiite identity and historical ties, headed towards Western Azerbaijan, which they considered close to them, i.e., the Iranian side. Sunni Kurds, on the other hand, took refuge in Ottoman territories, which they considered closer to them. Behind them remained Kurdish and Azerbaijani Turkish militia forces, who had retreated from the plain to the mountains, entrenched themselves, and continued their resistance.

Therefore, when General Harbord passed through the Sürmeli line in the last days of September 1919, there was no Muslim population to be found. In the Iğdır city center or on the plain, there was no established Muslim gentry to welcome General Harbord, hold ceremonies, or host the delegation. The Muslim population had either retreated to Iran, to the Ottoman side, or to mountainous regions. What was visible on the plain was not the ordinary flow of life, but a collapsed silence after recent catastrophes.

This point is historically extremely important. In later years, some local heroic narratives claim that when General Harbord arrived in Iğdır, he was met by some Muslim notables who explained the situation of the region to him. This narrative does not align with historical circumstances. General Harbord, after leaving Tuzluca, proceeded without delay towards Yerevan via Iğdır. On the contrary, the route and the course of events indicate that General Harbord and his delegation were met by the authorities and military elements of the Republic of Armenia.

To be clearer: General Harbord did not have the opportunity to meet with local Muslim notables in the Iğdır region.

General Harbord's report clearly conveys the sense of a security vacuum in the region. While the delegation traveling on the Ottoman side did not encounter serious obstacles, in the regions that had emerged from Russian administration, it was observed that security of life and property was absent in many places. The fact that the delegation came under fire in some places, that cars were hit by bullets, and that some members were detained by armed Muslim groups are also signs of this collapse. These Muslim groups stated that they had been driven from their villages by Armenians. This statement shows that the fracture in Sürmeli and the Aras basin cannot be understood solely through the narrative of one side.

This is where the silence of the Sürmeli Plain begins.

This silence is not the silence of an empty geography. It is the silence of a plain whose villages had been burned, families scattered, people fled, and mountains filled with militias just a few months earlier. Yesterday, migrant caravans passed through the paths where flocks once roamed. Yesterday, only the wind blew in the squares where threshing floors were set up. Yesterday, open doors were closed today not from within, but from absence.

General Harbord entered the Aras valley not as a conqueror, but as a witness to a collapsed world. What General Harbord saw was not just the Armenian question. General Harbord faced the entire broken spirit of post-war Caucasus.

On September 29, 1919, General Harbord's delegation reached Etchmiadzin. He was received by Catholicos George V in Etchmiadzin, the historical center of the Armenian Church. On the same day, they proceeded to Yerevan. At the entrance to Yerevan, there was now a different scene: Armenian administrators, orphans, students, official representatives, and crowds welcomed General Harbord. This welcome took place in Yerevan, not Iğdır.

In Yerevan, General Harbord was presented with demands for security, aid, recognition, and a mandate. The newly established Republic of Armenia was struggling with hunger, masses of refugees, epidemics, economic collapse, and border tensions. But General Harbord was measuring not only the demands but also the state's capacity. Armenian leaders expected aid and protection from America; General Harbord, on the other hand, was calculating how much military personnel, money, administrative responsibility, and time this protection would require.

The historical value of General Harbord's Report emerges here. This report is not a one-sided propaganda text. It describes the great catastrophe suffered by the Armenian people in grave and striking terms. But it also records that Muslim peoples were killed, displaced, their villages burned, that Kurds appealed to the delegation for protection from Armenians, and that mutual massacres occurred between Azerbaijani Turks and Armenians.

General Harbord's conclusion was clear: there are no easy solutions in this geography.

Borders drawn from outside would not be enough to resolve the intertwined lives within. Villages were mixed. Markets were shared. Rivers were common. Mountain roads were used together. Sufferings were not one-sided. General Harbord clearly saw that the Armenian question could not be resolved solely within the borders of Armenia. According to General Harbord, there was a question that needed to be answered: What would Turkey and Russia do?

Today, re-reading General Harbord's journey from Kars to Kağızman, from Kağızman to Tuzluca, from Tuzluca to the Iğdır/Sürmeli line, and from there to Yerevan, does not only mean remembering the route of an American general. It also means purifying local memory from bombast and fabricated heroic stories produced later.

The lines of General Harbord's Report describe Armenia, Anatolia, the Caucasus, and the debate over an American mandate. But the silence of the Sürmeli Plain whispers another truth that lies between the lines of that report: In these lands, the issue was not just land. It was a human tragedy, with souls and selves shattered, that had managed to remain on the land.

 Who was General James G. Harbord?

James G. Harbord was born on March 21, 1866, in Illinois, United States. He rose from a modest life. First, he worked as a teacher, then joined the American army as an enlisted man. His rise to officer rank through his own efforts was the first major defining characteristic of his personality.

He was trained in the cavalry. He gained experience in the Spanish–American War, the Philippine campaign, and duties on the Mexican border. He rapidly rose through the ranks thanks to his discipline, organizational skills, and composure.

During World War I, Harbord's star shone. He was appointed Chief of Staff of the American forces in Europe by John J. Pershing. He played a decisive role in the enormous organizational task of moving, supplying, and bringing millions of soldiers to the front in France. Later, he commanded brigades and divisions on the front. His name came to prominence especially during the battles of Belleau Wood and Soissons.

After the war, he was seen not only as a soldier but also as a diplomat. His dispatch to the Near East in 1919 was a result of this. Harbord prepared his famous report by examining a wide region from Armenia to Anatolia, from the Caucasus to Palestine. This report became one of the documents frequently referred to in post-war Eastern policy.

After leaving the army in 1922, he transitioned to civilian life. In America's new technological age, he became the head of RCA, a company operating in radio and communications. Thus, a general trained on the battlefields transformed into one of the leaders of the modern communication era.

He died near New York on August 20, 1947, and was buried in Arlington National Cemetery. Harbord's life is an example of how a soldier can be effective not only on the battlefield but also at the diplomatic table and in the establishment of the modern world. He was a representative of a generation that completed a career that began with a rifle with reports, strategy, and institution building.