Nagorno-Karabakh: Now a Central Issue in the US Campaign to Curb the Russian-PRC Rise in Eurasia

Defense & Foreign Affairs Special Analysis

Thursday

Special Report

 

 

Analysis. By Yossef Bodansky, Senior Editor, GIS/Defense & Foreign Affairs.

Major cracks have been emerging in the regional order, almost a quarter of a century after reaching, in May 1994, the Bishkek Agreement which brought the bitter Azerbaijani-Armenian war to an end and imposed a fragile ceasefire regime. The durability of that the fragile ceasefire has held longer than most observers could have expected, given the regional dynamics.

 

The original Bishkek Agreement was intended as a short-term ceasefire which would lead to meaningful negotiation of a permanent solution. The ceasefire froze the opposing forces in their positions, pending negotiations over a permanent solution and restoration of Soviet-era boundaries. Indeed, the Budapest Summit decision, in March 1995, mandated the OSCE's Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe's Minsk Group to facilitate a negotiation process leading to meaningful conflict resolution. Co-chairs the Russian Federation, the United States, and France have since been responsible for the largely futile negotiations process of the last quarter of a century.

 

In recent months, there has, however, been a discernable increase in ceasefire violations along the Nagorno-Karabakh line of contact. The OSCE is now recording an average of 25 to 30 violations a day, the majority initiated from the Armenian side. Most of these violations are minor, and most likely the result of local errors and recklessness. However, there is enough tension and frustration along the line of contact for any significant violation to escalate into a major clash and even war.

 

How fast a local provocation could be exacerbated into a war-level clash was demonstrated in April 2016.

 

Then, an Armenian ambush of an Azerbaijani patrol near no-man's land escalated into a major Azerbaijani counter-offensive which lasted for four days and resulted in Azerbaijan reclaiming a small portion of the occupied territories. Russian military experts concluded that Azerbaijan "won the first round of fighting," and that the Azerbaijani Armed Forces liberated "small but strategically important pieces of land" during the fighting of early April 2016.

 

The main lingering lesson of the April 2016 mini-war is just how quickly a localized ceasefire violation or provocation could escalate into major fighting. Given the currently growing tension and frustration, it is highly likely that a near-future provocation might very well escalate to a full-scale conflict.

 

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The crux of the long-term danger stemming from the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is the profound dichotomy between the core positions and policies of the two sides, Azerbaijan and Armenia.

 

Azerbaijan is the driving engine for a genuine long-term solution for the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. Azerbaijan wants to see the return of the occupied lands. Some of 20 percent of the country's territory has been in Armenian hands since the early-1990s. And Baku is ready to grant the Armenian enclave wide autonomy derived from the legal-administrative precedents set by the Soviet era's Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast.

 

The main motive for Baku is the on-going regional transformation, and, in recent years, that of the entire Eurasian Sphere. Azerbaijan is eager to benefit fully from the promise in the new arteries of transportation — mainly railways and hydro-carbon pipelines — crisscrossing the region as a byproduct of the emerging New Silk Road. The export of Azerbaijan's own vast oil and gas resources is set to expand markedly in the context of the regional transformation and development.

 

However, the growing tension and instability originating from Nagorno-Karabakh hangs as a specter over regional development. The Armenian forward deployments of R-17E SCUD surface-to-surface missiles, starting in April 1997, and the deployment of Armenian special sabotage units constitute threat to Azerbaijan's national infrastructure, and thus hinder foreign investment and development. Simply put, Baku is determined to reach a long-term, negotiated solution to remove these threats once and for all so that Azerbaijan can focus on the growing role in, and benefit from, its position as a regional crossroad on the New Silk Road.

 

In contrast, Armenia is determined to sustain the current status quo and prevent a negotiated solution at all cost. Yerevan knows that the self-declared Republic of Artsakh in Nagorno-Karabakh will not gain independence. After the fiasco of Kosovo's unilateral independence, the international community will not tolerate a repeat. Moreover, with a formal population of about 150,000 (with close to a quarter or a third of them actually living in Armenia) and a non-existent economy, the enclave is poised to become a failed state, and, like Kosovo, a haven for organized crime as the sole venue for economic sustenance.

 

At the same time, official Yerevan, for domestic-political reasons, is unwilling to reach any compromise. The "Karabakhi Mafiya " which ruled Armenia from post-Soviet independence until the ascent of Nikol Pashinyan in May 2018 used the lingering crisis in Nagorno-Karabakh as the raison d'etre for its hold onto power and the economy. Prime Minister Pashinyan has adopted even harsher positions vis-a-vis conflict resolution in Nagorno-Karabakh in order to prove that he does not betray the sacred cause.

 

The US, France, and most Western powers encourage Yerevan to stick to its hardline, uncompromising position. Although interested in regional development and stability in order to further regional interests in the context of the Eurasian Sphere and the New Silk Road, Russia is not pressuring Armenia on account of the Russian military bases and strategic infrastructure in the Yerevan area.

 

Hence, Yerevan has no incentive to break the status quo and negotiate a genuine end to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

 

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The great powers, particularly the Co-Chairs of the Minsk Group — the Russian Federation, the United States and France — do not make things any easier.

 

The latest round of visits to the South Caucasus by Co-Chairs of the Minsk Group in late October and early November 2018 reiterated the gravity of the situation and the gap of positions. While actual violence along the Nagorno-Karabakh line of contact has declined since the peak of 2016, the visit focused on preventing the resumption of widespread violence under current conditions. Meanwhile, neither side has changed its core negotiations positions. Hence, the OSCE could only hail the mere existence of a process. "The Co-Chairs stressed the importance of sustaining a climate of trust for intensive negotiations on the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict," the OSCE communique said.

 

Ever the pragmatic, Moscow realizes that no progress was possible while Yerevan was undergoing the transformation of governance and its quest for self-identity. On November 2, 2018, the Kremlin pointedly deviated from the pro forma optimism of the Minsk Group. "Serious negotiations on the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict are unlikely until the political situation in Armenia stabilizes," Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said. "We understand that until such turbulent internal political processes, which we are now observing, are completed, it is hardly possible to seriously consider certain ways out of this crisis and ensure a full-fledged settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict."

 

The likelihood of the OSCE's Minsk Group delivering a subsequent agreement is minuscule in lieu of the profound differences between the three Co-Chairing states.

 

Russia, whose position is supported by the People's Republic of China (PRC), is committed to regional stability and development in pursuit of further consolidating the Eurasian Sphere. Both Russia and the PRC put heavy emphasis on arteries of transportation of goods via railways and of hydro-carbons via pipelines as part of the east-west New Silk Road and the International North-South Transport Corridor (INSTC).

 

Azerbaijan is one of the key junctures where these two global arteries intersect.

 

Hence, it is in the long-term interests of both Russia and the PRC to alleviate any threats to Azerbaijan and the region-wide development dynamics, including the threat of a Nagorno-Karabakh clash escalating to a major war.

 

At the same time, however, Russia must balance between Azerbaijan and Armenia. While Azerbaijan provides key long-term energy and transportation infrastructure and routes, the Russians maintain in Armenia strategic bases crucial to their anti-NATO A2/AD bubble for the entire Greater Black Sea Basin (GBSB). The Russian dependence on the Yerevan-area bases has direct and delicate impact on the stability of Nagorno-Karabakh. Back in 2015, Russia committed to providing Armenia with $200-million worth of military equipment as payment for these bases. Although Yerevan committed formally that these weapons would remain on Armenian territory, there has been a discernable seepage of weapons to the Armenian forces in Azerbaijan's occupied territories and Nagorno-Karabakh. Russia has elected to look the other way on these violations.

 

In the late-1980s, France, for sentimental reasons, pushed its way into the Minsk Group. France has long had an historic attachment to Armenia's heritage, cultural, and culinary legacy. The tendency was reinforced by a political campaign led by the late singer, Charles Aznavour. Consequently, official Paris continues to side with the Armenians and endorse their most extreme demands.

 

The US has complex interests in the South Caucasus, many of which are byproducts of global dynamics rather than local issues. Consequently, the US is essentially in favor of sustaining the current status quo with a tilt toward the Armenian position (largely on account of the domestic-political power of the Armenian-American Lobby).

 

In principle, the US is beholden to the Helsinki Final Act of 1972 even though the inherent contradictions therein all but prevents a solution to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. The US is concerned lest any political/legal/judicial process could challenge the US facilitation of the unilateral independence of Kosovo. UNSC resolution 1244 of 1999 guaranteed wide autonomy and self-rule for Kosovo while retaining Serbian sovereignty (even if symbolic). Kosovo's unilateral independence in 2008 contradicted and disregarded the UNSC resolution. Thus, any resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict codifying autonomy as a permanent status would constitute a legal challenge to the viability of the Kosovo precedent as set by Washington.

 

The US Donald Trump White House, meanwhile, focuses on tightening the noose around Iran.

 

On top, the Trump Administration is inclined to resist and object to anything which Russia supports.

 

Both issues are a far higher a priority than resolving the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

 

These priorities were articulated to both Baku and Yerevan during National Security Adviser John Bolton's visit to the region on October 24-26, 2018. During his meetings, Bolton was harsh on his Azerbaijani interlocutors but forgiving to his Armenian interlocutors to the point of offering to sell Armenia US-made weapons in order to reverse the Russian presence and influence. Much of Bolton's overall forgiving attitude toward Yerevan was a manifestation of the importance of the Armenian-American Lobby in Trump's Washington.

 

For Trump and Bolton, addressing the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is yet another instrument of pressure against regional states in the pursuit of higher objectives.

 

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Ultimately, whatever happens in and around Nagorno-Karabakh and the Greater Black Sea Basin (GBSB) as a whole must be examined in the context of greater dynamics dominating not only the region but all of Eurasia. Regional dynamics are being exploited and manipulated mainly in the context of the US struggle against the consolidation of a Eurasian Sphere dominated by Russia and the PRC, a process which is increasingly attracting a Germany-led Europe.

 

The US grand strategy was articulated by Wess Mitchell, Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs in the US State Department, in testimony to the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee on August 21, 2018. Mitchell stated that a key US national security interest was "to prevent the domination of the Eurasian landmass by hostile powers", especially Russia and the PRC. He asserted that the US would do anything, even go to war, in order to prevent the domination of the Eurasian Sphere by Russia, the PRC, and countries cooperating with them.

 

The US campaign against Iran and the tacit alliance with Turkey are key facets of this struggle.

 

While the Trump Administration's approach to Armenia is a balance of the Armenian-American Lobby as a domestic policy asset and Yerevan's problematic policies, the approach to Azerbaijan is derived solely from Baku's policies simply because there is no comparable Azerbaijani presence in the US domestic scene. The Trump White House does not fear a domestic backlash emanating from US pressure on Azerbaijan.

 

The US insists that Azerbaijan confront Russia, the PRC, and Iran in order to prevent them from prospering in the Caucasus and the entire GBSB.

 

Azerbaijan is the up-and-coming regional crossroad for both railways and pipelines. This has been Azerbaijan's historic role due to both geographic location and economic richness. As the Eurasian Sphere is returning to pursuing heritage-based mega-trends, Azerbaijan is fully integrated and no US diktat seems likely to alter this reality. Similarly, Azerbaijan cannot escape its regional stature and the ramifications of its civilizational heritage, both of which affect Azerbaijan's relations with Iran.

 

Independent Azerbaijan is morally responsible for the sustenance of the civilizational heritage of the large Azerbaijani population of northern Iran, enabling them to maintain an Azeri identity within a modern form of "Persianification", even though the Azeri population had historically dominated the Persian Empire in pre-Muslim years. Azerbaijan is now also dependent on Iran for access to the exclave of Nakhchivan.

 

For Trump's Washington, these realities do not exist.

 

Hence, from Washington's standpoint, Baku has to be pressured and penalized where it hurts — starting with the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict — in order to coerce Azerbaijan to deliver on Iran, Russia, and the PRC.

 

Meanwhile, the frustrations and tension building in and around Nagorno-Karabakh have been getting worse, as the situation is getting ever more explosive.

 

The threat that any regional exacerbation could hasten the spark is growing. Moreover, many powers with their own interests in the Caucasus, the GBSB, and the entire Eurasian Sphere are cognizant of this. Hence, the possibility can no longer be ruled out of any one of them provoking or sparking a clash along the line of contact so that it could spread and escalate into a regional war, frustrating or delaying the consolidation of the New Silk Road, the Eurasian Sphere, or similar grand developments.