They were characterized Justifying by unprecedented ferocity , wholesale destruction Destroying , mass deportations , and immense loss Earnings_and_losses of life due to combat , starvation , exposure , disease , and massacres .

The genocide was carried out Action during and after World War I and implemented Action in two phases—the wholesale killing Killing of the able-bodied male population through massacre and subjection of army conscripts to forced labour , followed by the deportation Removing of women , children , the elderly , and the infirm on death marches leading to the Syrian Desert .