ARKADY TER-TADEVOSYAN: AZERBAIJAN NEEDS 200,000 SERVICEMEN TO START WAR
Azg
Dec 17 2008
Armenia
According to the Armenian National Statistical Service, the birth rate
in 1990-1992 stood at around 70,000. In 1995 it was 48,000. The annual
birth rate was 37,000 in 2006, and it is growing at a rate of 2,000
each year. According to the Armenian military commissar, about 40,000
boys were born in 1990. Up to 70 per cent of conscription resources
are drafted for the mandatory military service every year. "The other
30 per cent are students, those with health problems and others,"
Armenia’s military commissar Kamo Kochunts says. The Defence Ministry
has calculated that the number of conscripts would be 11,000 in
2016. "We need to maintain today’s number of our army," Kochunts says.
"Fifty thousand troops are serving in the Armenian army today, another
20,000 are serving in the defence army of the Nagornyy Karabakh
republic. The Azerbaijani army has 125,000 servicemen. Azerbaijan
has calculated that they need up to 200,000 troops to start a
war. They can bring their army to 140,000 in the coming years,"
Arkady Ter-Tadevosyan, a commander in the Artsakh [Karabakh] war, says.
To prevent the army’s combat capacity downfall due to demographic
reasons, the Ministry of Defence and the Ministry of Education and
Science have drafted amendments to three laws – on military service,
on education and on higher education and post-graduate studies. Sedrak
Sedrakyan, head of the Defence Ministry’s legal department, says:
"According to the amendments, all boys, regardless of whether they
are students or not, will have to serve in the Army when reaching
the age of 18."
"The positive effect of these amendments would be short-term. Science
would suffer. The development of sciences requires an uninterrupted
process. We would have a less educated society because not every
young man continues education after being discharged from the army,"
Heritage party faction member Vardan Khachatryan says.