Monte was born into a family of Armenians who miraculously survived through the genocide and forced expulsion of the Armenian population between 1915 and 1923. His father Charles passed on the memory of these events to his sons and even organized a family tour of the lost lands of Western Armenia. This event played an important role in shaping the basic elements of Armenian identity for the curious American teenager. It was at this stage that the internal struggle between Americanism and Armenianness began. Personalities who changed the history of their people have always gone through this most difficult phase of inner transformation. The father of Irish statehood, Eamon de Valera, who was born into a mixed Irish-Basque family in New York, the young socialist intellectual from Płońsk, Poland, David Green, who later became the Israeli statesman Ben-Gurion, the provincial Saxon rebel Otto Leopold, who would become Otto von Bismarck, the unifier of Germany and founder of the unified German nation.
For none of them there was a question of completely abandoning one for the sake of the other. On the contrary – multi-identity (multiple identities) has been an indisputable advantage providing more flexibility, plasticity, broad outlook, ability to think outside the box, etc. Furthermore, a person with a single identity is usually unable to recognize all of its strengths and weaknesses, because it lacks a second internal element for comparative self-analysis. The question is which identity becomes the alpha that determines life priorities and motives for certain actions. Having become the basis of inner self-determination, it subordinates the second and other identities, utilizing their positive and destructive energy to achieve the goals and objectives set by the alpha. Monte Melkonian came to a deep Armenian identity through a difficult, dangerous and thorny path, perfecting himself day by day as a person (the form) and integrating his conscious Armenianness (the content).
The key attributes of his personality were modesty, ambition, commitment and determination. From his school days, he was characterized by his curiosity and hunger for knowledge. He gathered information about the world around him everywhere, spending months and years in different educational institutions in America, Europe and Asia. It is not surprising that he chose the profession of historical archaeologist. People who consciously choose this career initially prepare themselves not just for paper-based academic work, but to find answers to complex questions. These answers can be found only in the past, if you know the subtleties of its structure and learn to work with it correctly. Not every specialist is ready to get close to the history’s closed treasury. Monte was one of those who managed to do so. His broad outlook, self-education, discipline and hard work created a strong personality that could accommodate more than one complex identity. He could have taken the easy route and chosen a ready-made attractive model – American, European or even Japanese one. In that case, massive success would have been guaranteed, no matter what he did next.
But the true greatness of Monte Melkonian lies in the fact that he consciously chose the most difficult path of building the Armenian identity in himself and transmitting it through himself.
One story illustrates well how he envisioned Armenianness and the Armenian. During the Lebanese Civil War of 1975, the local Armenian “elites”, due to a complete lack of strategic thinking, created a dangerous situation in which the Armenian factor was used pragmatically in external interests by all parties to the conflict. At the same time, the phalangists – right-wing Maronite nationalists (Christian Arabs) – murdered unarmed Armenian civilians, kidnapped entire families and asked for ransom. They believed that Armenians supported the Palestinians and therefore acted extremely harshly. The so-called local “Armenian leadership” chose the worst possible tactic – appeasement of the aggressor through endless unilateral concessions. The British statesman Winston Churchill once noted that “an appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last.” Apparently, his writings passed by the then Lebanese-Armenian “elite” or they simply did not consider him such a significant historical figure to spend time studying the “nonsense” he wrote. Of course, appeasement did not work, and as a consequence, Armenians continued to perish.
One day armed phalangists started shooting at the Airplane Building in the Armenian neighborhood. They knew that only women and children were in the house, as the men were at work during the daylight. No security, no protection. One of the residents, Manushak Stepanyan, saw the nationalists walking towards the house and quickly contacted the Aragats organization, which was supposed to be responsible for the protection of the Armenian population. They sent two unarmed young men to repel the aggression, who were confused by the sight of two armed militants. Monte arrived there a few minutes later, loaded his rifle and opened fire from behind a sandbag barricade. He broke the rules set by the local “leadership” not to take weapons without permission and not to shoot without authorization.
As the Phalangists retreated to the far side of the highway to take cover, Monte dashed crouching to the other end of the barricade and fired a burst, and then he scurried to the middle and fired a couple of shots from there, too. From the Phalangists’ perspective on the other side of the highway, it must have appeared as if a full detail of guards were defending the building. Monte kept up the illusion for about an hour, “jumping right and left like a monkey,” as Manushag later described it, and holding the Phalangists at bay until the men of Airplane Building returned from work and reinforcements arrived from the Club.
From Markar Melkonian’s book “My Brother’s Road”
This is not a description of an action-packed Hollywood blockbuster, but a real episode, which was later depicted in all colors by the tenants of that house, by two frightened Armenian boys who were sent by their leadership to defend the Armenian house without weapons, and by the Phalangists themselves, who believed that they were fighting against a dozen armed fighters. He did what was akin to insanity for most Armenians at the time – he took charge with logic, equanimity and common sense. Monte did not behave like a reptile, which unwillingly and thoughtlessly follows the orders of an absolutely incompetent (at least) leadership, putting the lives of Armenians on the line. Later in his work “A Self-Criticism” he would name the Lebanese period of his life as one of the key periods in the context of the maturation of his Armenian identity. In Beirut, Monte had time to study the local “Armenian elites” well and realized that the “leadership” was dominated by materialism and politics. They often simply used young motivated Armenian boys from all over the world in their games for their own personal gain.
Monte, like many of his peers, was encouraged by the news that there was finally an organization that could lead the fight to restore historical justice and resolve the Armenian question on Armenian terms. The organization in question was the Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (ASALA). Melkonian, who had already mastered several foreign languages and gained some combat experience in Lebanon, became the main driving force behind the organization. He combined traits that are extremely rare – a strategic mind and the ability to operate in the fields. Monte could plan the most complex operation from start to finish and be its direct executor. During his time in ASALA, he came to the conclusion that the leadership of the organization was doing about the same thing as the Armenian “elite” in Beirut. He and many other guys were not satisfied with the fact that ASALA’s resources (human and material) were being misused and served as a tool in the hands of external forces. This led to an open conflict with the founder of the organization, Hakob Hakobyan.
By way of background.
In many sources Hakob Hakobyan is presented as Harutyun Tagushian. According to the same sources, he was born in Iraqi Mosul and joined the Palestinian movement at the age of 15. His teacher was Dr. Wadie Haddad, the founder of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. Prominent fighters of the period such as Venezuelan Ilich Ramírez Sánchez (Carlos the Jackal), Leila Khaled and Japanese Red Army head Furaya Yukata united around Haddad. Haddad’s group enjoyed financial and political support from Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi and Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.
The situation after Gurgen Yanikian shot the Turkish consul and vice-consul in Santa Barbara, California, opened an opportunity for Hakobyan to present the “Armenian project” to the leaders of the Palestinian movement. Those were strongly in favor, as they were looking for allies in the Middle East, especially in Lebanon. That is why Monte, after learning many details of these talks, was extremely irritated. He began to see in Hakobyan a man who simply sold the “Armenian issue” to outsiders and built the Armenian factor into a struggle that had nothing to do with the liberation of Armenia. He was convinced of this not only by the ease with which Hakobyan sent Armenian fighters on meaningless missions unrelated to Armenian affairs, but also by the fact that ASALA had no real strategic road map.
During this period, Monte clearly decided that it was necessary to remove the Armenian factor from the status of “manipulated and used”. In order to achieve ultimate success, the most difficult task is to give the Armenian issue an Armenian subjectivity.
At the same time, he was not going to give up the global leftist umbrella in the form of “world revolution”. On the contrary – it was necessary to use the resources and capabilities of its sponsors in his own interests. The Basque ETA (Basque Country and Freedom Movement) declared its adherence to the ideas of Marxism-Leninism, but in reality it was only concerned with one struggle – for the independence of the Basque Country; the Irish Republican Army (IRA) declared war against world imperialism, but its real goal was the reunification of Northern Ireland with the independent Ireland. The Palestinians were also willing to flirt with pan-Arabists, communists and religious fundamentalists to achieve their mission. Before the advent of Monte Melkonian, the Armenian issue was a convenient and fairly cheap tool for serious, organized and meaningful movements. It was used by everyone – the intelligence services of the great powers, the European right and left, the nationalists and communists, the Egyptian, Iraqi and Syrian Mukhabarat, the Turks, Iranians, Basques, Palestinians, etc.
The first step towards this sovereignty was to leave the organization that had become not just an appendage of someone else’s movement, but had begun to commit reckless acts detrimental to Armenianness (e.g. the bombing of the French Orly airport). Monte and his supporters left Hakobyan and created ASALA-RM (Revolutionary Movement). It was distinguished by having a political program, a clear strategy and a plan of action. In essence, we are talking about the first meaningful Armenian subject-based military-political movement.
In 1985, Monte, who had by then planned many successful operations (including “Van”1), was arrested in France. Another stage that he took with dignity and interest. In one of his letters he noted, “it is almost an honor to be in such a place.” The fact is that Melkonian had the status of a “particularly important prisoner”. There were very few such prisoners, and all of them were extremely ideological individuals from whom one could adopt invaluable experience. He treated this period as a philosophical examination to understand all the components of the complex phenomenon of freedom. He realized that his temporary lack of personal physical freedom was only a small price to pay in the struggle for the freedom of Armenians. And it is neither a reason nor a hindrance to stop or even pause this struggle.
Constant struggle, dignified acceptance of its consequences and unswerving devotion to his mission are the traits of a true national aristocrat. Monte became their bearer and disseminator, creating a fundamentally different model of Armenianness and Armenian identity.
In 1989, he was released from prison. In his homeland, the “Miatsum” process, a movement for the reunification of Armenia and Artsakh, was underway.
Monte was a military strategist, ideologist and philosopher in one person, a living Armenian aristocrat in whom the three beginnings of the Armenian world – Armenia, Artsakh and Spyurk – were united.
Unlike most, he was not proud that representatives of Armenian communities had returned to Armenia and were taking part in the liberation of Artsakh. Monte considered it perfectly natural for anyone who considers himself an Armenian to do so, and was amazed at how few of his compatriots from Spyurk were participating in the nationwide struggle where the fate of all Armenians was being decided. In spades, he articulated the concept of inseparable security as a philosopher, declaring that with the loss of Artsakh, Armenian history would be terminated. His great predecessor Garegin Nzhdeh believed that the path to immortality lies through death in a conscious struggle. That is how Monte Melkonyan’s physical path ended. Was he ready for it? There is no doubt about it. Just as there is no doubt that it was a great honor for him to fall in the struggle for the preservation and independence of the Armenian nation.
Unfortunately, the leaders of the country did not even set the task of understanding the scale of his personality. He became a living and real example of an elaborated conscious Armenian identity, and the state concept of nation-building (who is an Armenian) should have been developed on the basis of this example.
Many ask: Would power and money have changed Monte’s character if he had stayed alive? Definitely not. If these mortal categories had any value for him, he would have become an extremely wealthy man back in the 80s. Most of the so-called freedom fighters of that era, once they got a taste of money, became commonplace hitmen and took private assignments (like Carlos the Jackal). He was woven of steely principles that could not be bought with any material goods. In some ways, Monte could be compared to the celebrated French statesmen Jean Victor Moreau and Gilbert Lafayette, who accepted neither office nor salary from Napoleon Bonaparte, who, in their view, had broken his oath of allegiance to the principles of the Republic for the sake of personal power.
The greatness of Monte Melkonian was narrowed down to just the scope of detached military operations, and his memory was desecrated by the fact that the “leadership” of the country closed its doors to the Armenian world, considering it not as a resource base, but as a threat to the preservation and reproduction of its power. They nullified all the achievements of the nationwide struggle, abandoned Artsakh, and returned the country and all Armenians to the status of “used” once again. Today Monte would be angry, but he would not waste a second in frustration, getting down to the only work required – teaching, cleansing and building. Without that, there is no way to lead Armenians out of this quagmire and kingdom of crooked mirrors.
- Attack on the Turkish consulate in Paris on 24 September 1981. ↩︎
