We, Armenians are fond of the conditional tense. Sports commentators say if the blow had been a little stronger and a little more to the left, the rival team’s goalkeeper would have been powerless to catch it. The chance of the goal is already missed, but the commentator keeps on convincing us that it was a great chance, and “if our players had taken the chance, the score would be…”, etc. A driver, turning to the right and driving a few miles along that road, throughout the course of driving is thinking, “well, I would have better turned to the left, if I turned to the left …”. The same in political life: “if in 1996 Levon Ter-Petrosyan handed the power to Vazgen Manukyan, then…”. We cannot empirically review what would have happened, perhaps it would be even worse, who knows? Though I think that in case you fail, you should pass the power to your official opponent, I’m far from “if-s”.
My colleague Tatul Hakobyan has published a lot of interesting articles about the First Republic, which reveal that the leaders of that republic have made many errors, mistakes, even sins being guided also by personal ambitions. Whether to what extent those interesting documents are complete I’m not sure about, I’m not a specialist to judge. But in these cases, another factor is important: there is no anti-scientific, anti-historical, and even anti-journalistic conditional tense in those articles. For example, if one or another leader was to do otherwise, we would now have an area of not less than 29,000 square km, but of 56,000 square km. By the way, this is one of the favorite topics of our compatriots: “oh, so much we had, and so much we have lost because of this or that person”. This is one of the most popular ways of pecking wounds. Meanwhile, the problem, in my opinion, is not the size of the area, but living with dignity in any area.
The experience is in not making the same mistakes in similar situations, rather than moaning over the already made mistakes, the already spilled water, the already departed train. Let me bring a specific example: our American fellows are spending huge amounts of money and time so that this or that US state makes an official statement on the Armenian Genocide. We proudly state, “The 48th state has recognized the genocide”. The recognition by the 49th and the 50th states will take several more dollars and several more years. And in the meantime, judgments will be made why the US President did not utter the word “genocide”. If he had uttered… But what would happen, if he uttered? And, by the way, one of the presidents has once uttered. Again, it is impossible to check what would happen. To live with “ifs” means to rotate the head for 180 degrees. One cannot move forward while looking backward.
Aram ABRAHAMYAN
