NEW WAR FOR KARABAKH ON THE AGENDA
by Stepan Ter-Melkonyan
Golos Armenii (in Russian)
March 30 2010
Armenia
The possibility of a resumption of hostilities in Karabakh has
sharply increased. Most Armenian and Russian experts see no reason
to worry about this issue, assessing the likelihood of a resumption
of hostilities as low.
However, we have some facts indicating that Azerbaijan is preparing to
resume hostilities in the area of the conflict. Apart from these facts,
some of which we are going to give below, we would like to share our
assessments of reasons for the start of a war in the current period.
It is obvious that Azerbaijan will not launch a war without notifying
Turkey of this. Moreover, many things indicate that at present no-one
but Turkey would benefit from giving Azerbaijan the "go-ahead" for
a new war. Ankara has no better option to distract the international
attention and neutralize the growing pressure upon itself other than
persuading Baku into an intense and large-scale military provocation
in the area of the Karabakh conflict. To get its benefits, Ankara may
mislead Baku that, on the whole, the USA and Russia are not opposed to
the Azerbaijani leadership’s desire to use force to achieve something
that it wishes to get in the current settlement process. Eventually,
Turkey may get Azerbaijan interested in a way that if the latter
opposes the ratification of the Armenian-Turkish protocols, then it
should help the "elder brother" [Turkey] get out of the confusing
situation by launching a war Karabakh.
Previous expert assessments that no super power will allow hostilities
in the area of the conflict for more than a week or two are still
topical today. However, there is one important correction here:
If Azerbaijan manages to achieve success in the first days of a new
war, then the period may be prolonged. In that case, it will be very
important for the Armenian side to strike counter attacks in the very
first days, and maybe the hours of the hostilities, and to go into
offensive at a certain sector of the front, meanwhile not only in the
immediate area of hostilities. A prolonged war could have side effects
for clear reasons, that is why it is in our interests to expand the
area of the conflict at directions that are weak for the Azerbaijanis,
and to deploy troops there.
THIS IS ABOUT NAXCIVAN [capital letters as published]. The deployment
of Armenian forces into Naxcivan would solve a number of very
important issues:
1) It is necessary to guarantee a narrow corridor of terrestrial
communication with Iran to the maximum possible extent.
2) The deployment of troops into Naxcivan, even volunteer squads
made up of veterans of the previous war, would have Turkey to face a
hard choice – to intervene or not (that is to deploy its troops into
Naxcivan or not).
3) The wider the area of the hostilities is, the more likely foreign
intervention will be to secure a ceasefire as quickly as possible,
and that is why the Armenian side should avoid localization of
hostilities on the Karabakh line of front only.
Turkey would never take military action against Armenia along the
current Armenian-Turkish border. This is not only because of the
existence of a Russian military base [near Armenian-Turkish border]
and action of guarantees in the framework of the Collective Security
Treaty Organization [CSTO, which says any aggression against a CSTO
member state is aggression against the whole of CSTO]. Turkey would
not take military action against the Armenian territory, because in
that case it would become clear to anyone that it was Turkey that
instigated Azerbaijan into war. Apart from that, one can say with
certainty that official decisions of major Western countries on the
recognition of the Armenian genocide and also on the recognition of
the independence of the Nagornyy Karabakh republic would immediately
appear on the agenda. Turkey’s intervention – in case Armenian
troops are deployed into Naxcivan – would bring it to the edge
of a confrontation with Iran, and would require coordination with
other NATO member states. On the whole, this would become not an
Armenian-Azerbaijani confrontation but an Armenian-Turkish one in
nature, and also a confrontation between the blocs – NATO and the CSTO.
Now, here are the promised facts about Azerbaijan’s serious
preparations for a resumption of hostilities.
There are all the grounds to consider as objective and true reports
in recent weeks that emissaries from Baku are collecting money for
war from Azerbaijani merchants and entrepreneurs in Moscow. According
to the reports, Baku emissaries are strenuously hiring servicemen
not only Azerbaijanis but also Russia’s Turkic peoples in Russian
military units. Special attention is being paid to the North Caucasus
Military District, where people are being hired not based on ethnic
but rather religious factor (people who practice Islam).
We would like to draw the attention of the Russian authorities to these
blatant facts. If the collection of fees from Azerbaijani merchants in
Moscow can be justified by law-enforcement agencies of the [Russian]
capital based on the principle "this is the internal matter of the
Azerbaijani community", the propaganda in regular military units
in Russia’s South to persuade Russian servicemen into taking leave
and participating "in a sacred war for Karabakh" does not fit into
the framework of the efficient work of Russian special services. If
the latter have little interest in the national security of Russia’s
strategic ally [Armenia], then let them at least take care of Russia’s
security at its southern borders, in the very restless regions of
the North Caucasus.
Stepan Ter-Melkonyan, the "Trabzon-Ardvin-Batum" patriotic Union,
Armenia Today.