Armenia has a huge Pakistanesque problem. The focus of Armenia, just like Pakistan is not perseverance and survival. It is integration of Nagorno-Karabakh into Armenia. What happens to Armenia in the process, who cares? And as like in Pakistan anyone who says let's talk with Azerbaijan and fix Karabakh issue for good will be treated like Zulfiqar Bhutto or Yahya Khan.
Armenia has a huge Pakistanesque problem. The focus of Armenia, just like Pakistan is not perseverance and survival. It is integration of Nagorno-Karabakh(Karabakh Highlands) into Armenia. What happens to Armenia in the process, who cares? And as like in Pakistan anyone who says let’s talk with Azerbaijan and fix Karabakh issue for good will be treated like Zulfiqar Bhutto or Yahya Khan.
But, there is one fundamental difference. Pakistan’s vision is imperialism but Armenia’s vision is reclaiming what it is. That’s where the differences end. The rise of Safavids on one side and Ottomans on the other side means there was no place for a third power and territories till Crimea were distributed between both the countries – with Georgia and Dagestan going the Persian Way and Crimea and others, the Ottoman way. Armenia was divided between both the behemoths.
But, it was not much of a problem for Armenia because it became a part of a multilingual and multi-ethnic super-states. The troubles for Armenia started when Russians started encroaching into Transcaucasia.
By the time of Nadir Shah, the whole Persian Transcaucasia was fragmented into Khanates, but under Persian control. When the centre became weak, they had to fend the Russians on their own and things became more complicated when Georgia formally tilted towards Russia.
When the territory from Baku to Karabakh was taken in multiple campaigns starting with Ganja in 1804, all these territories – Karabakh and Ganja were merged into a single province, Elizabethopol and Shirvan, Kuba and Baku into Baku Governorate. Erevan Khanate fell in the next capaign and hence, became a part of a different Russia Province. Kars, which was annexed from Turkey became a different province.
Thus, we would see, even though much Armenian territory became a part of Russia, the situation is that Armens are split across three provinces. Russian collapse at the end of First World War led to the creation of Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic which fragmented in no time amidst massive infighting.
Before Russia was able to stabilize it’s position, it asked Turkey to stabilize the southern borders and that means Kars was taken back by Turkey and immediately after the Armenian Massacres of 1915-1917 means that Kars, Van and other other Armenian areas were almost depopulated of Armenians.
The main point regarding these fights and their relevance to today is Karabakh. Karabakh is a part of Elizebathopol and not Armenia and with the Armenian majority it has, it wanted to merge with Armenia. Naturally, Karabakh was up in arms with the support of Armenia and when Azerbaijan was busy crushing the rebellion amidst much brutality from both sides, Russia invaded and annexed both the countries.
The Soviets didn’t make any changes except granting some territory to Armenia in the South. Azerbaijan retained most of it’s territory but on the other hand, it created an autonomous Oblast of Nagorno-Karabakh which it tailor-made to ensure it contains only Armenain majority villages.
In this map of 1500s with modern maps overlaid, one would see that Karabakh highlands is an enclave of Armenian control. But, again, even the Russian arrangement was a temporary one.
After Glasnost and Perestroika, the disruptive forces in Soviet Russia mean that the Karabakh issue will blow up again – Karabakh wanted to join Armenia and in February 1988, the Parliament of Nagorno-Karabakh passed a resolution to merge itself with Armenia but Soviet Russia rejected it. In no time, it escalated into a fight and in November 1989, the Soviets retaliated by cancelling the autonomous status of Karabakh. Armenia countered this by passing a resolution to merge Karabakh with Armenia and with the collapse of Soviet Russia at the same time, this fight between provinces became a fight between countries. There was another war and Armenia, by having the initiative, seized vast swathes of Azerbaijani lands and continued to hold them against international resolutions. Susha was destroyed yet again. From 1994 till September 2020, a tenuous peace ensured.
Come September 2020, Azerbaijan invaded Nagorno Karabakh and Armenia had to sign a humiliating surrender which immediately led to protests in Armenia leading to the lynching of Speaker of National Assembly to death and thrashing the Prime Minister in public. It is probably the first surrender announced on social media.
Only after Nikol Pashinyan revealed in his formal address, the world got to know the desperation Armenia was in.
Many can say that if we had already lost Hadrut, Shushi, we could have lost Stepanakert as well, and not much would change. The reality, however, is a little different, because if we had lost Stepanakert, which as Artsakh President Arayik Harutyunyan already confirmed in his public remarks, was by and large defenseless at that time, then Askeran and Martakert would have been predictably and inevitably lost just because these cities were in the rear at the time the war started as they were located far enough from the front line and lacked defensive structures and fortifications. Nor were there so many fighting forces that could actually defend these cities.
And what would happen after the fall of these cities? The second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh defenses of the Defense Army would be under siege by the enemy, which means that more than 20,000 Armenian troops and officers could find themselves surrounded by enemy troops, inevitably facing the prospect of being killed or captured. Under these conditions, of course, the fall of Karvachar and Kashatagh regions would be inevitable, leading to a complete catastrophe.
But, what went wrong for Armenia? While Armenia banked on Pakistanesque rhetoric and bravado, Azerbaijan modernized it’s army and when the blow eventually fell, Armenia was outgunned and outclassed in every aspect. Neither was it’s economy in a position to support a war nor is it’s military strength. Azerbaijan, in fact, transformed the face of modern war with successful use of drones against traditional formations with devastating effect.
Azerbaijan is no saint either. All history, it has proven itself to be as brutal and as motivated to wipe out the Armenian pocket of Nagarno-Karabakh and given the chance, it would do exactly what it did to the Armenian legacy of Nakchivan.
It’s not as if Armenia didn’t understand the problem. As early as 1997, the then Armenian President Levon Ter-Petrosyan asked Armenia to be realistic.
“it is impossible to maintain the status quo for a long time – neither the world community nor the economic potential of Armenia would allow it.“
But, Armenia didn’t take those statements lightly and ejected him out of office. That was the point at which Armenia took a wrong road. The public show of bravado was all that is needed to win the elections. Robert Kocharyan, Serzh Sargsyan and even the post revolution Nikol Pashniyan – all were hardliners who dreamt of Greater Armenia and merger of Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia. But, was the country ready to wage that war? Levon Ter-Petrosyan’s observation turned out to be true.
But, peace still held inspite of the world not happy with it.
As observed by Yevgeny Prigozhin, one of the strongmen of Putin’s Russia in an interview with the Turkish Newspaper Aydinlik,
As long as the Turks do not cross the Armenian border, they have the full legal right to intervene in the Karabakh conflict. Armenia and Azerbaijan have had the opportunity to stop the conflicts in Nagorno-Karabakh for many years, so that Russia put them at the table of agreement. After the 2018 orange revolution, that is, with Pashinyan’s coming to power, a very large number of American NGOs appeared on the territory of Armenia. This is the core of the problem. The Americans are provoking the conflict.
one would notice that there are two major issues Russia sees with the Armenians – the Velvet Revolution of 2018 which brought Pashniyan to power, especially his desire to make Armenia closer to Europe and the west weren’t something in Armenian interests.
Navigating a tricky relationship with Russia will also prove challenging. The country is dependent on Russia for military protection, and income from Armenian expatriates in Russia is critical for its economy. At the same time, Pashinyan’s electoral bloc promised closer relations with Europe in earlier campaigns. Although he promised to maintain the current geopolitical balance during the Velvet Revolution, Pashinyan must still tread carefully to avoid antagonizing Vladimir Putin or going against Russian interests. Anything that does could provoke damaging economic or military responses.
Moreover, a festering conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh, an Azerbaijani territory populated by ethnic Armenians, has recently flared up. Azerbaijan accused Armenia of violating the current ceasefire by carrying out military drills in the disputed territory, allegations that Armenia reciprocated. Pashinyan has promised to finally make the territory part of Armenia, but this proposition guarantees conflict with Azerbaijan, which could have serious repercussions for both countries and regional stability. While Pashinyan should follow a policy of restraint, it will be challenging to do this and placate Armenian nationalists.
And as time proved, Pashniyan failed.
Since it positions itself as democratic, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s government does not impose any limitations on media freedom, which has led to a lot of critical publications about Russia, as well as many praising the West. These are reported to the Russian leadership, which, in keeping with the traditions of Russian diplomacy, is used to searching the media for signs of change in the official position.
Worse still, Pashinyan welcomes the activity of Western NGOs, including those funded by the U.S. philanthropist George Soros, who has been accused by ultraconservatives of financing color revolutions. As far as the Kremlin is concerned, allowing these NGOs to operate freely is nothing short of a security breach. The current Armenian government’s second deadly sin in the eyes of the Kremlin is the prosecution of former president Robert Kocharyan.
Russia’s reticence where Armenia is concerned is also linked to the fact that, regardless of Putin’s role, Russian diplomats—both in the 1990s and now—feel that Yerevan wasted time when it could have resolved its territorial dispute peacefully. Moscow understands that the military victory of Armenia, a small and poor country, over richer and more populous Azerbaijan was down to chance as much as anything else.
Russia discussed a possible solution with Armenia that would entail Armenia gaining legal recognition of most of Karabakh in exchange for giving up some of the territories that it won during the war. But the democratic nature of the Armenian government prevented it from making the compromise. Any concession on the issue of Karabakh threatens to bring down the Armenian leadership.
As it turned out, during the course of war, it is understood that Azerbaijan approached Armenia for a peace deal early in October but Armenia rejected. When the fight actually erupted, there was none to help Armenia – Russia was aloof, West limited itself to statements. NATO openly said,
I reminded the [Armenian] president that NATO is not part of this conflict. Both Armenia and Azerbaijan have been valued NATO partners for more than 25 years…NATO is deeply concerned by ongoing violations of the cease-fire, which have caused tragic loss of life…It is vital that all sides now show restraint, observe the cease-fire, and de-escalate. Any targeting of civilians is unacceptable and must stop.
With no one helping Armenia, it’s a matter of time Armenia capitulated. Going back to what Prigozhin said, one would notice that there is another fundamental thing – Pashniyan came to power through street protests and he cannot afford to ignore the demands of those on the street – integration of Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia. The dream of Greater Armenia, not just integration of Karabakh, still persists. This means that Armenia is not ready for talks and with the Russians perceiving Armenia is tilting towards West, they refused to engage. In fact, one would see that Russia is still powerful enough to summon the heads of both Armenia and Azerbaijan into the same talk show on a Russian TV channel when the fight was raging.
Ultimate result is that Armenia lost everything it gained between 1991 and 1994 – not just that, it lost territories which were even a part of Armenian SSR to carve out a land link to Nakchivan from Azerbaijan proper. Everything is undone and if Kars or Nakchivan is any proof, with Armenia losing control of Kalbajar, the whole future of not just Karabakh, but also Armenia is at stake.
This Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict teaches the world a few important lessons which you can never dare ignore
There are many instances of this even in the current world, Nepal being a prominent example. One may want to chafe at the undue influence the neighbour wields but, can you afford to oppose it? Simply put, without Russian money, Armenia becomes bankrupt. Without Russian influence, Armenia doesn’t have someone to shield it. Without Russian weapons, Armenia can’t protect itself.
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