The Greek Genocide and Extermination of Pontic Greeks

The Greek genocide, which included the Pontic genocide instigated by both the Young Turks and the Ottoman Empire, is one of the darkest chapters in all of Greece’s long history.

An organized plan to eliminate the indigenous Greek population of Asia Minor, it included massacres, forced deportations involving death marches, expulsions, executions, and the wholesale destruction of Eastern Orthodox cultural, historical, and religious monuments.

The Turks feared that the Greek-speaking Christian population would welcome liberation by the Ottoman Empire’s enemies.

At the same time, the nationalist Turks believed in the creation of a modern nation without strong, influential ethnic and religious minorities; this was one of the main factors that led to the Greek genocide.

At the outbreak of World War I, there were many minorities that had been living in Asia Minor long before the creation of the Ottoman Empire, including Greeks, Pontic Greeks, Caucasus Greeks, Cappadocian Greeks, Armenians, Kurds, Assyrians, and Jews among others.

The Ottoman Empire was in rapid decline, headed by the Committee of Union and Progress (“CUP”). The CUP were, among other things, proponents of Turkish nationalism.

When the Ottomans joined the Central Powers of Germany and Austria-Hungary in 1914, the stage was set for the first genocide of the twentieth century.

Using Christian rebels colluding with the Russian Army as a pretext, the Ottoman government announced a policy of property confiscation and deportations against the Christian minorities of the empire—first amongst them being the Armenians.

The extermination of the Armenian population in 1915 was the first atrocity that paved the way for the Greek genocide with it culmination in 1923 following the Burning of Smyrna.