Armenian Revolutionary Federation in the context of "Garegin Nzhdeh"

Western Armenia (Western Armenian: Արեւմտեան Հայաստան, Arevmdian Hayasdan) is a term to refer to the western parts of the Armenian highlands located within Turkey (formerly the Ottoman Empire) that comprise the historical homeland of the Armenians. Western Armenia, also referred to as Byzantine Armenia, emerged following the division of Greater Armenia between the Byzantine Empire (Western Armenia) and Sassanid Persia (Eastern Armenia) in AD 387.

The area was contested during the Ottoman–Persian Wars and was conquered by the Ottoman Empire during the wars of 1532–1555 and 1623–1639. The area then became known also as "Turkish Armenia" or "Ottoman Armenia", and included six vilayets. During the 19th century, the Russian Empire conquered sections of Western Armenia, including Kars.

United Armenia (Armenian: Միացեալ Հայաստան, romanized: Miats'eal Hayastan), also known as Greater Armenia or Great Armenia, is an Armenian ethno-nationalist irredentist concept referring to areas within the traditional Armenian homeland—the Armenian Highlands—which are currently or have historically been mostly populated by Armenians. The idea of what Armenians see as unification of their historical lands was prevalent throughout the 20th century and has been advocated by individuals, various organizations and institutions, including the nationalist parties Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF or Dashnaktsutyun) and Heritage, the ASALA and others. The Republic of Armenia comprises 10%-15% of the Armenian homeland.

The ARF idea of "United Armenia" incorporates claims to Western Armenia (eastern Turkey), Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh), the landlocked exclave Nakhchivan (Nakhichevan) of Azerbaijan and the Javakheti (Javakhk) region of Georgia. Javakheti is overwhelmingly inhabited by Armenians. Western Armenia and Nakhchivan had significant Armenian populations until the early 20th century, and Nagorno-Karabakh until 2023, but no longer do. The Armenian population of Western Armenia was almost completely exterminated during the 1915 Armenian genocide, when the millennia-long Armenian presence in this region largely ended and Armenian cultural heritage was mainly destroyed by the Ottoman government. In 1919, the ARF-dominated government of the First Republic of Armenia declared the formal unification of Armenian lands.

The Three Pashas (Ottoman Turkish: اوچ پاشالر, Turkish: Üç Paşalar), also known as the Young Turk triumvirate or CUP triumvirate, were the dominant political and military figures who effectively ruled the Ottoman Empire after the 1913 Ottoman coup d'état and the subsequent assassination of Mahmud Shevket Pasha. It consisted of Mehmed Talaat Pasha, the Grand Vizier (prime minister) and Minister of the Interior; Ismail Enver Pasha, the Minister of War and Commander-in-Chief to the Sultan; and Ahmed Djemal Pasha, the Minister of the Navy and governor-general of Syria.

The Three Pashas were all members of the Central Committee of the Committee of Union and Progress, a political movement that had begun with reformist ideals but by the 1910s had become an autocratic and nationalist ruling faction. The trio were largely responsible for the Empire's entry into World War I in 1914 on the side of the Central Powers and also largely responsible for the genocide of some one million Armenians. The Turkish public has widely criticized the Three Pashas for drawing the Ottoman Empire into World War I and its subsequent defeat. All three met violent deaths after the war—Talaat and Cemal were assassinated by the Armenian Revolutionary Federation as part of Operation Nemesis, whilst Enver died leading the Basmachi Revolt near Dushanbe, present-day Tajikistan.

Fedayi (Eastern Armenian: Ֆիդայի, romanized: Fidayi; Western Armenian: Ֆէտայի, Fedayi, Turkish: Ermeni milisleri, çeteleri, fedaileri, French: Fédaïs arméniens), also known as the Armenian irregular units, Armenian militia, or Armenian Hayduks were Armenian civilians who voluntarily left their families to form self-defense units and irregular armed-bands in reaction to the mass murder of Armenians and the pillage of Armenian villages by criminals, Turkish and Kurdish gangs, Ottoman forces, and Hamidian guards during the reign of Ottoman sultan Abdul Hamid II in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, known as the Hamidian massacres. Their ultimate goal was always to gain Armenian autonomy (for Armenakans) or independence (for Dashnaks and for Hunchaks)–depending on their ideology and the degree of oppression visited on Armenians.

Some of the key fedayi figures also participated in the Iranian Constitutional Revolution that commenced during the same period, upon agreement of the ARF leaders.

Armenian nationalism in the modern period has its roots in the romantic nationalism of Mikayel Chamchian (1738–1823) and generally defined as the creation of a free, independent and united Armenia formulated as the Armenian Cause (Հայ Դատ Hay Dat). Armenian national awakening developed in the 1880s in the context of the general rise of nationalism under the Ottoman Empire. The Russian Armenia followed with significant causes. The Armenian Apostolic Church has been a great defender of Armenian nationalism, with leaders like Khrimian Hayrik who devoted his life to the peasantry. The establishment of modern Armenia (1991) and Armenian social fabric becoming more complex gradually decrease the political influence of Hye Dat and shifted towards a modern Armenian nationalism modeled as a liberal nationalism.

Christapor Mikaelian (Armenian: Քրիստափոր Միքայէլեան, romanized: Kristapor Mikayelian; 18 October 1859 – 17 March 1905) was an Armenian revolutionary who played a leading role in the Armenian national liberation movement.

Born in Nakhichevan, he became a teacher and worked to educate migrant workers from Western Armenia. During the mid-1880s, after the Russian Empire decreed the closure of parochial schools in Armenia, he became involved in revolutionary activism. He moved to Moscow and joined Narodnaya Volya, through which he met Stepan Zorian and Simon Zavarian, and which informed his conversion to revolutionary socialism and Bakuninism. Upon returning to the Caucasus, he established the revolutionary organization Young Armenia and began organizing violent actions against the Ottoman Empire. Together with Zorian and Zavarian, Mikaelian established the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF), in which he became a leading figure.

Stepan Zorian (Armenian: Ստեփան Զօրեան, 1867–1919), better known by his nom de guerre Rostom (Ռոստոմ), was one of the three founders of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation and a leader of the Armenian national liberation movement.