A year later: Alexander Svarants: “The Armenians are waiting for the army of their” Camille…
13 NOV 2021 – Мaterik.ru – Inglish translation – lousavor-avedis.org.
A year has passed since the end of the Second Karabakh War, but neither the conflicting parties, nor the interested forces, nor the rest of the world have yet seen the final resolution of the Karabakh issue. The tripartite statement of November 9, 2020 with the participation of Azerbaijan, Armenia and Russia, nevertheless, is not a peace treaty by definition (I do not know the legal precedent for the ratification of the statement), but became only a confirmation of the decision to end hostilities in the Karabakh conflict zone.
In other words, the war of Armenians and Azerbaijanis for Nagorno-Karabakh has not yet ended, because we do not have a peace treaty, but only an armistice. Moreover, if the 1994 Bishkek Protocol and subsequent Moscow agreements 1994-1995. upon reaching an armistice following the results of the First Karabakh War, had an indefinite character, then the statement of November 9, 2020 under the dictation of Russian President V.V. Putin (by the way, he himself said that what to read when he himself wrote) are limited to a period of 5 years, that is, the first period of stay of Russian peacekeepers in the still remaining part of Armenian Karabakh.
What will happen after November 9, 2025 – no one today can say with certainty. Of course, some experts in Russia, Armenia and Azerbaijan argue that, they say, “the Russians came seriously and for a long time” (or “where the Russian soldier came, Russia did not leave from there”, “Putin outwitted Aliyev with Erdogan”, “Russia is the main winner in the Second Karabakh War, since he received a military presence in the de jure recognized part of the territory of Azerbaijan ”, etc.). However, these statements are not indisputable, since from the history of Russia itself it can be argued that often the Russian soldier achieved great success on the battlefield, and the Russian diplomat, with his mediocre policy, reduced the army’s achievements to a failure in the negotiations. A Soviet soldier stood in Afghanistan for 10 years, but Gorbachev withdrew the army and surrendered Kabul. A similar action took place in Eastern Europe with the same East Germany and other states of the region at the end of Soviet rule. Everything ends someday, especially if there is no conscious policy and understanding of the tasks.
There are forces (for example, in the same Armenia, represented by representatives of the National Democratic Pole), which claim that allegedly Russia in Karabakh will follow the path of Abkhazization, or almost Crimeanization with the inclusion of Artsakh in its composition. In part, a number of Azerbaijani bloggers living in the United States also agree with these pro-Western Armenian colleagues (for example, the same Beydul Manafov, who links most of his criticism of President I. Aliyev to his secret agreement with V. Putin on the alleged transfer of the upper there is an Armenian, part of Karabakh of Russia in exchange for the preservation of their billions of dollars exported to the Russian Federation). Did the Russians really appreciate Karabakh so dearly that its price is determined by the billions of personal wealth of the Aliyev family? It turns out that Alexander Lukashenko deceived Serzh Sargsyan when he conveyed to the latter Ilham Aliyev’s request for $ 5 billion to cede “the regions occupied around the former NKAO,” because B. Manafov claims the opposite – it was Aliyev who paid billions to Putin for Karabakh … Karabakh is really worth more than billions of Ilham Aliyev, because it has no alternative for the geopolitics of the leading forces of the time.
However, the reality of the post-war year in Karabakh is such that Azerbaijan and Turkey, having strengthened their relations in all azimuths, are not going to tolerate Russian peacekeepers in the conflict zone for a long time. Baku not only did not join the Russian Eurasian and near military alliances, but, on the contrary, did not even grant a mandate to the Russian peacekeepers in the same Nagorno-Karabakh. Accordingly, Aliyev and Erdogan intend: first, to oust the Russian peacekeepers from Karabakh; second, to fully establish Azerbaijani control over Karabakh with the total ousting of the Armenian autochthonous population; thirdly, thereby putting an end to the Russian military-political presence in Armenia itself and ending the geopolitical presence and domination of Russia in the Caucasus. Among serious Azerbaijani experts (such as ex-foreign minister Tofig Zulfugarov or ex-adviser to the president Eldar Namazov) there is a strong opinion that after the 5-year period of Russian peacekeepers stay in Karabakh, Baku will not agree to extend the time of the “Russian mission”. For this very purpose, the same T. Zulfugarov, as if recalling the words of Kemal at the Lausanne Conference of 1923 about the completion of the value of Russia before the capabilities of the West (primarily Great Britain), notes that Russia did everything it could in Karabakh, now Azerbaijan must take into account relations with the West and not abandon the OSCE Minsk Group format. In turn, the Turkish parliament will soon discuss the issue of extending the stay of the Turkish military in Azerbaijan, which causes delight in Baku.
At the same time, over the past year we have witnessed the active offensive policy of the President of Azerbaijan I. Aliyev against Armenia, who, relying on the alliance with Turkey and the “weakness” (or perhaps some kind of agreement with the ruling elite) of Russia, began to demand: 1) opening of the “Zangezur corridor” in the logic of an exclave for the shortest route of communication through the Armenian Meghri with the Nakhichevan autonomy and further with Turkey; 2) delimitation and demarcation of the Azerbaijani-Armenian state border with the recognition of Karabakh as part of the territory of Azerbaijan; 3) signing a peace treaty.
Aliyev, even without an agreement to the whole world, declares that it was he who, by military means, contrary to the opinion of the leading world powers – the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs (Russia, the United States and France), resolved the Karabakh problem in his favor. And today there is no Karabakh conflict, as well as the very concept of “Nagorno-Karabakh” due to its own administrative-territorial reform. Moreover, I. Aliyev, with the consent of Turkey and the connivance of Russia, actually invaded the territory of neighboring Armenia (Gegharkunik and Syunik regions) on May 12, 2021, allegedly under the guise of border delimitation using GPS, followed by periodic shelling along the Azerbaijani-Armenian border from Kelbajar. and Nakhichevan, which the Russian Foreign Ministry, together with the CSTO, described as a “border incident”.
The formidable rhetoric of Ilham Aliyev against Armenia with the next threats of military aggression began to be accompanied by the so-called. “Road war” in order to force Nikol Pashinyan to make more concessions on the “Zangezur corridor”, which ultimately led to a provocation against Iran (the case of the establishment of Azerbaijani extortions against Iranian drivers on the 23-km section of the Armenian-Iranian highway Goris – Kapan, crossing the territory of Azerbaijan, as well as the arrest of two Iranians). This destructive policy of I. Aliyev, who imagines himself a regional leader, seriously spoiled Azerbaijan’s relations with Iran. The new administration of the Conservative President Ibrahim Raisi came out categorically opposed to changing the internationally recognized borders of the countries of the South Caucasus (in particular, neighboring Armenia) and determined for itself “red lines” associated with the inadmissibility of the logic of the exclave on the so-called. “Zangezur corridor”. Otherwise, the loss of Armenian control of Meghri for Yerevan means a serious geopolitical defeat for Tehran. In such dynamics, Iran may find itself blocked from strategic communications in the north and receive a new threat from the strengthening of Turkey’s pan-Turkist vector, with which a number of leading Western countries (including the US and the EU), as well as India, China and, objectively, Russia, do not agree. Iran, already under the guise of major military exercises “Conquerors of Khaybar”, has deployed a powerful military group on the border with Azerbaijan (from Nakhichevan to Horadiz), which has set military targets in the adjacent Azerbaijani territory as its targets and is ready to enter the Armenian Syunik if anything happens.
Naturally, Armenia’s position in the negotiation process after the Second Karabakh War became extremely critical, since the war was lost, and the army needs serious reform and rearmament. In this regard, Ilham Aliyev began to stubbornly stake on his next threats and increase the degree of military rhetoric in the hope of Nikol Pashinyan’s unconditional surrender. However, to what extent this course of Azerbaijan’s diplomacy has justified itself after a year from the date of the signing of the armistice of 9
October 2020?
History knows many examples when a side, having lost a war, wins at the negotiating table, because it skillfully uses the current international situation and the balance of interests (approaches) of leading external forces in its own interests. You don’t need to look far for examples. The same Ottoman Empire, having lost the Russian-Turkish war of 1877-1878, was able to use the Anglo-Russian contradictions with honor and replace the conditions of the San Stefano peace of 1878 that were unfavorable for Istanbul with more than satisfactory solutions of the Berlin Treaty of the same 1878. Turkey, having lost in the First World War, was able to once again play on the Anglo-Russian contradictions in connection with the October Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 and prevent the full realization of the extremely unfavorable conditions of the Sevres Peace of 1920 in part of the same Armenia, Greece and Kurdistan.
However, in this regard, I was surprised by the position of some (like serious and competent) Armenian experts. In particular, my observations of the Armenian socio-political thought and the expert community over the past year allow us to conclude that a consolidated opinion of the analytical cluster has not yet formed in Yerevan on the possibility of localizing the next Azerbaijani-Turkish threats after the Second Karabakh War. For example, respected political scientist and director of the “Caucasus” Institute Alexander Iskandaryan (by the way, who repeatedly took part from Armenia at the Valdai forum with the participation of President V.V. The “Zangezur corridor” and delimitation with the demarcation of the state border repeats the well-known saying “Woe to the losers” as if like a hackneyed disc (they say, since Armenia lost in the Second Karabakh war, it has no choice but to agree with the enemy due to the lack of resources for resistance).
A.M. Iskandaryan gives the impression of a serious and competent expert, which, however, does not at all mean agreement with him on all estimates and forecasts. Once, during the presidential and parliamentary elections in Karabakh in March-April 2020, I expressed my criticism of Alexander Maksovich’s analyzes regarding incorrect ratings of the then NKR Foreign Minister Masis Mayilyan and the ex-commander of the NKR Defense Army Samvel Babayan. Time has shown that M. Mayilyan, largely thanks to S. Babayan’s supporters, got into the second round of the presidential elections, because his party could not even get into parliament, but Mayilyan also lost because of Babayan’s position. Well, come on, who does not happen to. Analysts are not prophets or predictors, but just people with the right to make mistakes.
As is known from ancient history, the expression “woe to the losers” is associated with the events of 390 BC. (in particular, with the crushing defeat of the Romans from the leader of the Gallic Senone tribe Brenna, which allowed the Gauls to penetrate the territory of the Apennine Peninsula, and then enter Rome and lay siege to the Capitoline Hill). Brennus tried to persuade the Senate to conclude a peace in order to prevent the army of Mark Fury Camille from the city of Veii from admitting to the defenders of the Capitol, and even agreed with the military tribune Quintus Sulpicius a ransom amount of one thousand pounds of gold. But when the Gauls weights turned out to be false and the tribune refused to use them to estimate the mass of gold, Brennus threw his sword on the scales and declared to the Romans: “Woe to the vanquished!”
This is what Alexander Iskandaryan often mentions in his speeches and answers. However, the Armenian political scientist either forgot Roman history (which cannot be said given the level of his education), or deliberately does not finish the second part. And the story here is such that, unexpectedly for everyone, as Titus Livy noted, the army of Marcus Camille appeared, who, as a dictator, declared the decision of the consuls invalid and declared: about wives, children, about native land “…
Therefore, dear Alexander Maksovoich, the same Armenians should not agree without a fight with all the whims of their opponent. The Iranian factor, the disagreement of the United States with the Turkish-Azerbaijani platform “3 + 3” approved by Russia, the appearance on the horizon of Armenia of India with its interest in the strategic transit of goods through the Persian Gulf to the Iranian southern port of Chehbehar (formerly Bandar-Beheshti) – Iran – Armenia – Georgia to Russia and Europe, created a new situation in the “Armenian corridor”. The statement of the Russian Foreign Ministry of November 6, 2021, with the simultaneous confirmation of Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Overchuk about the absence of the logic of the “Zangezur corridor” and plans to unblock all previously (that is, from Soviet times) existing communications while maintaining full jurisdiction over its territory, radically changed the situation. , where Armenia has been able to withstand so far in this round of the “diplomatic duel”.
Armenia agrees in the logic of peace, the solution of humanitarian and economic issues to unblock all communications with Azerbaijan (besides, it was not Armenia that blocked Azerbaijan and Turkey, everything happened from the side of Baku and Ankara in the early 1990s). However, in the trilateral statement of November 9, 2020 and January 11, 2021, there was no mention of “corridors” (except for the “Lachin corridor” for connecting Karabakh with Armenia). If we are talking about the restoration of all the previous (Soviet) communications (and there were no others because of the Karabakh conflict), then only the railway connection of Azerbaijan with Nakhichevan, but not the highway, passed through the same Meghri region of Armenia in Soviet times. Accordingly, Armenia does not plan to build a road for Azerbaijanis, and the restoration of the railway from Horadiz to Zangelan and Meghri will take a long -Zangelan direction, and in Meghri itself, a 43-km section of the former railway during the reign of Serzh Sargsyan was dismantled and sold as scrap metal to the same Iran). Roads can be opened through Dilijan, Ijevan, Yerevan, Yeraskh and Gyumri.
True, in the situation of designating, after Iran, a special interest in the territory of Armenia for the creation of a strategic South-North corridor from New Delhi (including the first visit of Indian Foreign Minister Subramanyam Jaishankar to Yerevan on October 12, 2021), some Russian experts (for example, C Tarasov and S. Bagdasarov) met with bewilderment.
Stanislav Tarasov is surprised at this step of New Delhi (they say, why does India enter the “field” of Russia, because the strategic transit of goods through Armenia can lead to geopolitical changes in the region in the foreseeable future). However, why did not S. Tarasov ask himself and his readers (including Russian politicians) when the West and Turkey laid oil and gas pipelines and a railway from Azerbaijan through Georgia to Turkey and Europe, bypassing Russia?
Semyon Bagdasarov (often posing as a “greater Catholic than the Pope” in the case of the Russian Empire) repeatedly, in his conversations on V. Solovyov’s Channel, expresses a misunderstanding of India’s behavior regarding Armenia and his intention to pave a strategic road through the homeland of his ancestors (they say, how so Armenia is smaller in size than any of the 28 states of India, but their foreign minister arrived in Yerevan to discuss the issue of transit, but where is Russia?). For the information of Semyon Arkadievich Bagdasarov, India has no direct borders with Russia, for communication with the Russian Federation, Indians should cross the territories of the unfriendly border countries of China, Pakistan, or Afghanistan, and then move through Tajikistan and the rest of Turkic Central Asia. Where is the geographic, economic and political logic here for New Delhi, while through the Persian Gulf they can enter Iran and further through Armenia and Georgia to Russia and Europe? Why was Baghdasarov so worried, since Armenia remains an ally of Russia, a member of the Russian EAEU and CSTO unions, where Russian capital holds a leading position? And over the last 2-3 months, Russia, in response to EU investments in Armenia worth 2.6 billion euros, announced its readiness to allocate a total of $ 6 billion to Yerevan ($ 800 million, head of Tashir company Samvel Karapetyan, $ 4 billion owner controlling stake in the Zangezur Copper-Molybdenum Combine Roman Torotsenko, $ 1-1.5 billion, the Ministry of Economy of the Russian Federation following the results of the autumn regional business forum in Yerevan). So what is Russia afraid of when forming a strategic transit through Armenia?
It is not Armenia that says that Russia, Azerbaijan and Armenia are developing the same partnership, but the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation. And this is in the case when Russia and Armenia signed various documents on a strategic alliance, when a Russian military base and border troops are based in Armenia free of charge, when Armenia remains a member of the CSTO and the EAEU, when a joint grouping of troops and joint air defense are being created with Armenia. And what kind of Russian troops are located in recognized Azerbaijan if Baku still does not sign an agreement on the status of Russian peacekeepers in Karabakh (I’m not even talking about how the Azerbaijani authorities drove the Russian military out of their territory in the 1990s and 2000s). ? Which Russian unions did Azerbaijan join after the Second Karabakh War, which A. Dugin speaks so zealously, hopes and, obviously, already regrets? So why is a strategic transit from Azerbaijan uncontrolled by Moscow to Turkey and Europe permissible, but not from Russia-controlled Armenia to Russia and Europe? Where is the logic of the orientalist and military S.A. Bagdasarov?
As for the process of delimitation and demarcation of the Armenian-Azerbaijani border, it should be noted that sooner or later such a process should begin and end between neighboring states, taking into account international legal norms. First, the delimitation and demarcation of the border is carried out in the case of the presence of diplomatic relations between the parties, which is not so far in the case of Armenia and Azerbaijan. Secondly, the process of delimitation and subsequent demarcation itself takes quite a long time in terms of its duration (today the same Azerbaijan has not completed this process with its friendly Russia and Georgia, the same Armenia in a similar situation on the part of the border with Georgia). Third, what should be taken as a basis, what maps, agreements and borders between Azerbaijan and Armenia?
I have repeatedly noted in my publications that since the Third Republic of Armenia at the time of its formation in 1991 proclaimed succession not from the First Republic of Armenia 1918-1920, but from the Armenian SSR 1920-1991, the borders of modern Armenia are based on decisions of the Treaty of Kars of 1921, confirmed by Russia and signed by Turkey with Azerbaijan. Why Armenia did not proclaim the succession from the First Republic, this is a question for the Armenian politicians of that time (although this is also the case, because the authorities changed the Constitution of Armenia three times in 1995, 2005 and 2015, and they have never returned to this important issue since independence) … In my opinion, Armenia does not proclaim legal succession from the First Republic with claims to the decisions of the Sevres Peace on the arbitration borders of “Wilsonian Armenia”, since it lost in the war imposed by the Bolshevik-Turkish tandem in the fall of 1920. For a different decision, Yerevan needs serious military-political support from the leading centers of the world (first of all, the USA and Russia).
At the same time, since Armenia in December 1991 after the referendum in Nagorno-Karabakh and the declaration of independence of the NKR changed its “miatsum” course, it should be understood that the settlement of the Karabakh issue by political or military means implied two options: 1) Karabakh gains independence from Azerbaijan as an entity independent of Armenia, but with unknown borders along part of the corridor for communication with Armenia; 2) Karabakh with or without high status remains within Azerbaijan. In all the above options (bet on two Armenian states or, alas, defeat), it was assumed that borders with Azerbaijan were determined in accordance with the borders of the Armenian SSR after the Treaty of Kars of 1921.
Moreover, Azerbaijan today speculates on the part of Soviet cards, marking the cards of 1977-1988 that are advantageous to it. However, Armenia, as well as Azerbaijan (unlike the same, for example, Kazakhstan), was part of the USSR on December 30, 1922 with its own borders, which were determined by the Treaty of Kars. All those administrative changes to the internal borders of the union republics in the period from 1923 to 1991. for economic reasons, they did not have an internationally recognized basis (in fact, the Treaty of Kars, except for Russia, Turkey and the Transcaucasian puppet republics, was not recognized by anyone in the same 1921). But in all cases, Armenia can negotiate with Russia and Azerbaijan on the maps of 1922 and 1926, when for the first time in the USSR demarcation lines were drawn between the republics.
However, Azerbaijan, which today claims its late Soviet borders in a dispute with Armenia, oddly enough, in the same 1991 proclaimed its succession not from the Azerbaijan SSR (that is, together with Nakhichevan and Karabakh), but from the First Azerbaijan Democratic Republic (ADR ) 1918-1920 It turns out a political and legal incident, for the ADR did not have either Nakhichevan or Nagorny and Plain Karabakh within its borders. The League of Nations in the same 1920 did not recognize these territories for Azerbaijan, but defined their status as “disputed territories with Armenia.” At the same time, Armenia, unlike Azerbaijan, was recognized by a number of states and the League of the Nation.
In such a case, how will Armenia agree to the inheritance of the Soviet borders of 1922-1926, according to which, by the way, the area of Armenia exceeded 31.1 thousand square meters? km, and today Armenia has 29.8 thousand square meters. km. Where did 1.3 thousand square meters go? km, then Lachin and Kelbajar were part of Nagorno-Karabakh and the region was adjacent to Armenia. It was in 1923 that Nariman Narimanov drew the administrative borders of the NKAO, tearing off a number of territories in the west from Karabakh to form the “Red Kurdistan” region, and in fact creating a “sanitary corridor” between Armenia and the NKAO. In this regard, Armenia should also appeal to the borders of 1918-1920, that is, the First Republic. And here Russia can hardly become an independent arbiter, since then Russia did not participate in the work of the League of Nations. Therefore, the issue of the borders between Armenia and Azerbaijan should automatically be transferred either to the UN (although the UN does not resolve the issue of borders between states, but there is an International Court of Justice in The Hague for this, which can consider similar claims of states), or to the OSCE Minsk Group on a broad settlement of the Armenian – Azerbaijani relations (including Karabakh). Moreover, by the time of secession from the USSR, Azerbaijan, according to Soviet laws (the same USSR Law of April 3, 1991, “On the procedure for secession from the USSR”) and international law (the right of nations to self-determination) did not have Nagorno-Karabakh , since a referendum was held there on secession from the Azerbaijan SSR and the proclamation of the independence of the NKR.
Consequently, Armenia can, within the framework of negotiations on the delimitation and demarcation of borders with Azerbaijan, recognize the borders of a neighboring state in 1918 (according to the very declaration of independence of the Republic of Azerbaijan in 1991). As for the fate of Karabakh, Yerevan considers this issue to be resolved within the framework of the OSCE Minsk Group without recognizing Artsakh as a part of modern Azerbaijan. However, such a logic of the negotiation process is unlikely to lead Baku to its cherished goals, which makes it impossible to sign a peace treaty with Yerevan in the foreseeable future.
Meanwhile, the armies of the two countries continue to replenish their arsenals. Military reform began in Armenia, but it was not completed in Azerbaijan. There are many experts who believe the Third Karabakh War is possible, because Russia is unlikely to achieve agreement and mandate from Azerbaijan with Turkey for the long-term presence of its peacekeepers in Karabakh, and its withdrawal will bring the parties closer to a new war. Armenians are waiting for the army of their “Camille” …
Alexander Svarants – Doctor of Political Science, Professor
