“An Armenian View of the Baghdad Railway”, c. 1915

“An Armenian View of the Baghdad Railway”, an illustration from about 1915, from the Hulton Archive / Getty Images collection. It shows that Kaiser Wilhelm II had promised the Ottoman Empire military and political support in its persecution of the Armenians in exchange for cooperation in building the Berlin–Baghdad railway. The railway was financed and built by the German Empire.

At the top, a man in a fez shakes hands with a soldier in a helmet, beside an angel holding a scroll. Below is a map with the names Constantinople, Adana, Marash, Urfa, Erzurum, Van, Mount Ararat and Baghdad, and the word “Armenia”. In the English inscription, “the mightiest military king in Europe” addresses his “beloved friend” Abd-ul: “Give me my railway and keep all the massacres you want.”