https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.newsmax.com/amp/briggenblaineholt/blinken-lavrov-moscow/2023/07/__;!!LIr3w8kk_Xxm!uXAYV0GUXPF8ajtBpvDIyEBcH01KjDXatu5Gj5KrzNPsg-iI20og6kYPbO6TD6GvzLvx3qp2cKE4qHH9qA$ 27/id/1128670/ Demonstrators in support of Karabakh demanding the reopening of a blockaded road linking the Nagorno-Karabakh region to Armenia, and to decry crisis conditions in the region, in Yerevan: July 25, 2023. Karabakh has been at the centre of a decades-long dispute between Armenia and Azerbaijan, which have fought two wars. (Karen Minasyan/AFP via Getty Images) By Brig Gen (ret) Blaine Holt Thursday, 27 July 2023 06:47 AM EDT ET Current | Bio | Archive Perceiving a threat to his power (1932-1933), then-Russian leader Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin implemented policies in motion to bring agrarian satellite state, Ukraine, to heel. The Holodomor (Ukrainian: "Death by Hunger") was a man-made famine killing millions of Ukrainians. Stalin's message to the rest of the Soviet States and Russians was chillingly clear. Looking the other way is a key ingredient in mass murders. As the peasants in the world's former breadbasket resorted to suicides and cannibalism, as a result of the Russian Army enforced famine, Moscow-based correspondents (mostly American) denied the horrors, refusing to consider reporting on the genocide until it was far too late. When pressed by fellow denier, Ralph Barnes of the Herald Tribune, The New York Times' Walter Duranty would say, "What are a few million dead Russians in a situation like this? Quite unimportant. "This is just an incident in the sweeping historical changes here. I think the entire matter is exaggerated." Since the fall of the Soviet Union, there has been some form of war between Armenia and Azerbaijan. In 2020, the Russians brokered a ceasefire with Armenia ceding five of seven districts in the enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh. The Russians have deployed so-called "peacekeepers" to the region since then. An uneasy ceasefire ensued for the Armenian population, that is, until December of 2022. (Additional/comparative background may be found here and here.) That is when the Azeri's enacted an illegal blockade of the enclave, inhibiting the flow of goods and people along the Lachin corridor, the lifeline to greater Armenia. Russia ignored the blockade along with most of Europe, while Azerbaijan helped both, in re-labeling Russian gas as Azeri so Europe could skirt its own sanctions on Russia. In mid-June, the Azeri's did the unimaginable, tightening the noose, blocking all food, energy and medical supplies from reaching the enclave. Using the Russia-Ukraine War as convenient camouflage, Azeri President Ilham Aliyev is taking a chapter from the Stalin playbook. Where Stalin killed millions, Aliyev only need "eliminate" 120,000 (30,000 children) and potentially the enclave becomes Azerbaijan's. The weakest are dropping. Over this past weekend, a woman living in Nagorno-Karabakh we will call "Anna," gave this writer a very dark account of the fate now befalling her community. Perhaps the state employed priest knew what was ahead when the blockade began. He announced to the people that he would pray for them to be blessed in their next life. How's that for an optimist? Anna's parents are diabetic. If no medical resupply arrives, their medication will be exhausted in less than 30 days. Anna and her family are subsisting on some carrots, dandelions, and nettles. One of her relatives walked 13 kilometers carting pounds of potatoes delivering them to Anna and her parents. Additionally, clean water is getting harder to come by. Since there is no gas, getting out to the countryside to forage is near impossible. There are phases to a man-made famine. Anna and her folks are in the early days of this. Domestic animals are dying and left in the streets while the vulnerable, elderly and children, are falling weak and ill. When asked whether her people know what is going on between the, she sorrowfully says, through malnourished, sunken eyes, "We can't think beyond getting another piece of food or another cup of water; the one hour of TV news we see every day repeats the message that we must hope for the best." It is almost merciful that Anna and her people are spared the truth. She might be broken were she to understand the palpable indifference to this intentional genocide. Even the U.S. Ambassador to Armenia had to recently walk back her tone deaf comments in a July 3 interview where she said "the U.S. believes it is possible to ensure the security of the people of Artsakh as part of Azerbaijan." Meanwhile at the edge of the sealed transit route, just kilometers from those dying, the Armenian people continue to collect and stockpile, food and medicine, hoping for diplomats to engage. There was a day when we were better than this. Does anyone remember how we turned the other cheek on a vanquished enemy and saved 300,000 Germans in Berlin from starvation with our airlifters? Where is U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken? Where is the mainstream press? Where are the non-profit aid agencies? Where is our compassion and care for humanity? On Tuesday, President Aliyev went to Moscow to consult with Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov; at the same time the phones are ringing across Nagorno-Karabakh telling residents they will have safe passage if they leave now and walk to Armenia. Is the grand compromise an ethnic cleansing versus a genocide? If the global community doesn't care here, will it care when millions in Africa have died due to a collapsed grain deal and missile strikes on over 60,000 tons of life-saving food? Has human life become so cheap? At the time of this writing, a deal was brokered in Brussels to move a delivery of 400 tons of life saving food and medicine to the enclave only to have the Azeris renege on the deal, stopping the aid at the border checkpoint. The siege continues - unabated. Meanwhile, medicines and food sit in the backs of trucks as summer temperatures soar. Before the State Department writes this off as another unsolvable problem, let's remember how spread thin we are with wars and potential wars. Turning our back's diplomatically to 120,000 being murdered in plain view will come with significant consequences. Their screams won't be silent. Think the Bosnian war of the 1990s. Soon we may well be forced to listen to those screams, and get at their root cause, whether we choose to or not. Will we be prepared? As long as the left holds sway over the rank swamp that is Washington, D.C. don't count on it. Brig. Gen. Blaine Holt (retired) is a co-founder of Restore Liberty, a former deputy representative to NATO, a lifetime member on the Council on Foreign Relations, and a Newsmax contributor. The views presented are those of the author and do not represent the views of the U.S. government, U.S.Department of Defense, or its components. Read Gen. Holt's reports - More Here. Brig. Gen. Blaine Holt (retired) is a co-founder of Restore Liberty, a former deputy representative to NATO, a lifetime member on the Council on Foreign Relations, and a Newsmax contributor. The views presented are those of the author and do not represent the views of the U.S. government, U.S.Department of Defense, or its components. Read Gen. Holt's reports - More Here. 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