Stepan Shahumian was a great leader, who functioned in a very difficult circumstances, as the commisar of the Baku Soviet in 1918. I understood that he did a lot of good things for the city of Baku and he tried to resolve problems by peaceful means and negociations. It was the blindness of the Dashnak representatives in Baku Soviet, who could not foresee the aim of the Duntersville, the British commander coming from Persia to Baku. that aim was to fail the Bolsheviks, headed by Shahumian so that the British will get the oil of Baku. the Bolshevik voted against the mission while the Dashnak joined the others to vote for accepting Duntersville mission, thinking that he will save baku from the Turkish army. It triggered the resignation of Shahumian and his 26 commissars. What happened later was after Duntersville loused up the situation, he withdrew from Baku and allowed the Turks to enter Baku. 20,000 Armenians were slaughtered after they entered and many Armenians fled Baku. the Dashnak were eluded with the allies promiss of Severes Treaty, which promissed to give the Armenians a good portion of western Armenia. But the allies were deceiving the Armenians. they cancelled the treaty and shafted the Armenians and sold them to the Turks, after they secured the minerals and the tobaco of Turkey to their companies. Interesting enough that when President Wilson wanted to offer 400,000 sq. km to establish Armenian country on Turkish land of today and grant Armenia the American mandate. The leader of the Republican party in the senate Henry Cabbot Lodge the first stood and said "The British and the French took the oil rich Arab land and left us the Barren land of Armenia to protect. We do not want this deal." The mandate resolution failed. This shows the naievity of the Dashnak party. The Armenians would have been better off to leave the barren Armenian land to the Turks and join forces Dashnak and Armenian Bolshevik represented by Shahumian to consolidat their forces in Baku which had 200,000 Armenian citizens in it and make it Armenian city. In that case all the western power, British, French and American would have negociated with the Armenians for the oil of Baku and give the Armenians more than what they were promissed to get in tht fake Severes Treaty. Any one thinks that the Armenians learned a lesson? Never.
