final invasion of Anatolia. This operation he began on 13 January 1916. Defeating the Ottomans at Pasinler with an army three times the size, the Russians entered Erzurum on 16 February. [^247]

[^247]:Danişmend, iv, 420, 427, 431.

The Russians had long been inciting the Armenians to acts of terrorism against the Ottoman state, and providing material and moral support for their revolutionary societies. Now, in pursuit of an independent state in eastern Anatolia, the Armenians collaborated with the Russians on a large scale, many entering the Russian army. Just as Armenian officers had played a prominent role in the 1877 invasion of north-eastern Anatolia. Distorted and exaggerated accounts by Armenian separatists of the events of 1915 were seized on by the Entente Powers and used in their propaganda war against the Turks, as they had been doing for years. Indeed, the same propaganda is still being used at the present time. Since Bediuzzaman was present and actively engaged in the defence of the Empire against the Russians and Armenians, we include the following facts concerning those events, all of which are taken from the second volume of History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey by the American historians S. J. and E. K. Shaw. Indeed, both his nephew's biography and other contemporary sources describe his humanitarian efforts, both during the fall of Van and subsequently to save from certain slaughter, Armenian women and children along with Muslim ones. [^248] Some are mentioned later in this chapter.

[^248]:Abdurrahman, Tarihçe, 36.

Upon the Russian withdrawal in January 1915, the Ottomans ordered the evacuation of all Armenians from the provinces of Van, Bitlis, and Erzurum as part of their preparations for the inevitable second invasion. It was arranged that they should settle in the Mosul area of northern Iraq. A special commission was set up to record the Armenians' property, all of which was to be handed back on their return after the War. Just as the army was specifically instructed to protect and provide the needs of the deportees on their journey. Armenian propagandists claimed that over one million Armenians were massacred in the War. But according to the Ottoman census, the population was 1,300,000, not 2.5 million as claimed. And the number of those transported was no more than 400,000. The figure that died was probably around 200,000, "and not only of transportation, but of war, famine, and disease that killed 2 million Muslims at the same time." In April 1915, the Armenians staged a revolt in Van. In May, the Russians reached the city and a massacre of Muslims followed. An Armenian state was proclaimed under Russian protection, and by July some 250,000