RUSSIAN-ARMENIAN MILITARY EXERCISE ANACHRONISTIC
By Vladimir Socor

Eurasia Daily Monitor,
Jamestown Foundation
Sept 16 2005

On September 10-13, Russia and Armenia conducted a tactical
military exercise at the Marshal Bagramian training grounds, close
to the Armenian-Turkish border. President Robert Kocharian and other
Armenian officials attended the final, live-fire stage of the joint
exercise. Each side committed a motor-rifle regiment, artillery, and
tank company, for a total of 1,300 ground troops, to the four-day
exercise. In addition, four Su-25 and four MiG-24 planes from the
Armenian side, S-300 air defense systems, and four MiG-29 planes from
the Russian side, and combat helicopters from both sides took part.

Armenia’s Deputy Defense Minister, Lt.-General Mikael Grigorian, acted
as coordinator of the exercise in the presence of Maj.-General Andrei
Popov, commander of Russia’s Group of Forces in the Transcaucasus
(GRVZ), to which the Russian forces stationed in Armenia are
subordinated. The GRVZ command headquarters has yet to be moved out
of Tbilisi by Russia’s Defense Ministry, presumably to the Russian
base at Gyumri in Armenia. Russia stations an estimated 5,000 troops
of all types in Armenia, including 3,000 officially reported to be
based at Gyumri.

The exercise aimed to test the interoperability of Russian and
Armenian forces. It rehearsed a defensive battle against “aggressor
forces from the direction of Turkey” that attacked on the ground
and in the air, advancing into Armenia during the first stage of
the battle. In the follow-up stages, Russian and Armenian forces
counterattacked and destroyed the invader’s forward elements, then
encircled and attacked the main invasion grouping, forcing it to
surrender. This type of scenario is traditional at Armenian-Russian
annual tactical exercises, but it now seems out of step with the
bilateral rapprochement between Russia and Turkey on all levels,
including that of regional security. This year’s exercise scenario
added for the first time an “anti-terrorist operation” to suppress
a diversionary terror attack by the invading force.

Armenia’s Su-25 planes made their first public appearance in the
country on this occasion. Armenia took delivery of 10 planes of
that obsolescent type from Slovakia’s air force last year. They are
co-located with the Russian base in Gyumri.

Addressing all troops in Russian after the exercise, Kocharian
characterized Armenia-Russia relations overall as “brotherhood…thanks
to which the Russian military base exists and we conduct joint
exercises to ensure our countries’ security.” If viewed in those terms,
however, the exercise scenario of battling Turkey seems anachronistic
and unrealistic. For his part, Defense Minister Serge Sarkisian cited
Azerbaijan as a source of threats to Armenia’s security; he expressed
confidence in the Armenian army’s readiness to face that challenge.

While Yerevan portrayed the exercise accurately as a bilateral
event, Moscow billed it as an undertaking of the CIS Collective
Security Treaty Organization (CSTO). Russia’s Security Council
Secretary Nikolai Bordyuzha, also attending the event, listed the
Russia-Armenia “group of forces” as a CSTO component, together with
a Russia-Belarus group of forces and the Collective Rapid Deployment
Forces in Central Asia. However, those two “groups of forces” exist
only virtually, in Russian planning for wartime operations, and remain
at any time a matter of Russia’s bilateral relations with Armenia or
Belarus. Armenia’s participation in CSTO exercises remains confined
to the annual air defense practice.

Moscow traditionally relies on bilateral relations for alliance
management. However, Russia is interested in advertising the CSTO in
order to enhance Russia’s own status vis-a-vis NATO. Attending the
NATO-Russia meeting of Defense Ministers on September 13 in Berlin,
Russia’s Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov cited the Russian-Armenian
exercise as part of ongoing CSTO activities. He sought to portray the
CSTO as an operational reality and urged NATO to establish cooperation
with this Russian-led organization. Armenia, however, is interested
in developing its own ties with NATO through an Individual Partnership
Action Plan.

(Interfax, Regnum, Arminfo, Armenian Public Television, September
12-14; Air Force Monthly, August 2005)

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress