LETTER TO EDITOR. Forethoughts Pertaining to The Armenian National Progress
Posted on March. 25. 2021
Z. S. Andrew Demirdjian
Dear Mr. Jabarian,
You have six fundamental questions pertaining to the Armenian national progress in the future, stated in the USA Armenian Life Magazine issue #1773, dated March 19-25, 2021. They all require forethoughts from your readers, but for implementation, unity of mission would be elusive.
As you know, over time, mountains erode and become hills; hills break down and turn into meadows; and meadows, if blessed with life-giving rivers, turn into fertile valleys to give bountiful harvests. This process of transfomation has been taking place in Armenia all throughout the ages. One thing has not changed, though, since Tigran II the Great: no change in the personality of the Armenian people, despite facing many calamities, as an ethnic group, they lack the crucial quality of unity.
Your timely, though-provoking questions require forethought, thinking or planning for the future, and most importantly, unity. Some of USA Armenian Life Magazine readers will resort to foretelling, or predicting, others will resort to forecasting in responding to your seminal questions. All of these processes are synonymous and mean to tell about or announce something before it happens. If accuracy matters, they do substantially differ in terms of precision. In reality each method requires different efforts and information on which to draw conclusions. For example:
Foretell may suggest the use of extraordinary powers to reveal the future (e.g., the wizard foretold a great war with Azerbaijan). Predict may suggest a fairly exact statement that is the result of the gathering of data/information and the use of scientific methods (e.g., scientists can sometimes predict earthquakes). Forecast often suggests that one has weighed available evidence and is telling what is most likely to happen (e.g., The Diaspora forecasted that Artsakh will fight a third survival war in five or ten years).
Of the six questions, I shall try to respond to the second question by means of “forecasting” method of forethought: “How important is it for world Armenians to set a national agenda and a master plan?” A short and a crisp answer would be very important. However, the realization of the plan is very remote on account of lack of unity of Armenia, Artsakh, and the Diaspora as one nation, but three different “states”.
Putting the cart in front of the horse will take us nowhere. First of all, we need to form a “group” (e.g., an organization) with similar mission, vision, and work together to accomplish the goals and objectives of this group. Therefore, without a viable world organization, Armenians would be deprived of having “a world agenda and a master plan”.
This is my forecast based on the evidence of working for years diligently, on two separate occasions, and after writing two books on the subject of unity, to form an international Armenian Diaspora organization. Lack of unity of purpose prevented us from forging ahead; finally, it caused the demise of the well-intended organizing committee to disband before accomplishing its essential mission.
The solution is in the hands of each and every Armenian. First accept your being blindly individualistic, accept you are hurting the national progress for being a lone star, a lone ranger, accept the fact that one “rotten apple” can spoil the whole barrel, accept the need for you to change and accept the fact that for the national progress getting along with the rest to fulfill the plans for progress is imperative.
Once we have a cohesive group without a temperamental prima donna(s), the sky would become the limit. Then and only then, we would have an achievable “world agenda and a master Plan”.
Wishing you continued success with your much-needed publication to keep us abreast of what is going on in the Armenian communities and the international world. Thank you for all your vital contributions to advance the Armenian community around the world by publishing an informative journal.