"The eternal enemy" or an ally?

The main trump card of Armenians in the negotiations on Karabakh is the territories (occupied) in exchange for the status of Nagorno-Karabakh (independence is implied) is losing their significance. Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan, finally, for the first time on October 6, announced Armenia's readiness to compromise on the condition that Azerbaijan would take a counter step. Pashinyan's rhetoric has changed significantly in ten days. At the beginning of Azerbaijan's military campaign, the Armenian prime minister belligerently declared a crushing response, and then about his readiness to negotiate within the framework of the OSCE Minsk Group, but now the political rhetoric has descended to the level of compromise.

However, the statement of compromises, the details of which were not disclosed, cannot be regarded as a final decision on the way to the settlement of the Karabakh conflict. First, President Ilham Aliyev, unlike Pashinyan, did not change his position, which throughout the entire military campaign contains a demand for the unconditional withdrawal of the Armenian armed forces from the territory of Azerbaijan, as a condition for establishing the truce. At the same time, official Baku issued a statement on the guarantee of the provision of rights to Armenians, natives of Karabakh, which the citizens of all Azerbaijan have, their security and protection from the state. Secondly, the further development of hostilities inevitably leads to the loss of all conquests on the territory of Azerbaijan by Armenia, which it received because of the expansion policy launched in 1987.

In this situation, no matter how paradoxical it may sound, in the conditions of Armenia’s foreign policy isolation, which we are observing, Azerbaijan can act as the only guarantor of the security of the Armenian community of Nagorno-Karabakh, restoring its jurisdiction over previously lost territories.

Throughout the peace negotiations and during the current hostilities, Azerbaijan sent clear messages about the commitments for the security of the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh and, in fact, today, because of the change in the military-political balance in the South Caucasus, is becoming the only possible guarantor of peace in the region.

First, it is necessary to note: 1) the military actions between the armies of Armenia and Azerbaijan in the occupied territories were practically considered impossible and the Armenians did not believe that Azerbaijan would start such, in their opinion, a suicidal operation even in the foreseeable distant future. 2) The Armenians could not imagine that Turkey would intervene on the side of Azerbaijan in the 30-year-old conflict. 3) The Armenians did not believe that they would be left without the protection of the suzerain of Russia. 4) The Armenians did not believe that the great powers would allow a military solution to the conflict by Azerbaijan. 5) The Armenians did not believe that Iran would turn away from them. 6) The Armenians did not believe that they would be left alone with their fate.

Ten days of attempts to involve Russia, the CSTO, the OSCE Minsk Group in the conflict, or to enlist the help of the powers to at least stop Azerbaijan were unsuccessful. The reasons for the refusal to provide real assistance lie not in the contradiction of the international centers interested in the region, but in the tiredness of the conflict, which has turned into a deterrent to the civilized development of the region.

The consistent and principled refusal of the Armenians to compromise, which consists in the synthesis of two conflicting international principles: the territorial integrity of the country and the right of nations to self-determination, that is, the self-determination of Armenians within the framework of the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan, led the negotiations to a dead end. All the projects of the mediators: Russian, American, French, failed due to the unwillingness of the Armenian public to abandon historical myths in the name of a peaceful future, which never came 30 years after the start of the conflict.

Azerbaijan, which for many years has been trying to resolve the problem peacefully and made all possible compromises, despite national humiliation, loss of territories and human lives, today is applying radical measures that Armenia used 30 years ago, conquering the historic great Karabakh, which includes seven occupied regions and the mountainous part of the Karabakh region, which is called Nagorno-Karabakh.

Azerbaijan's actions for 30 years show a variability in approaches - from peaceful to partly military, although Armenia all this time has invariably adhered only to a forceful argument for resolving the Karabakh issue in its favor. Over the past 200 years, this policy has included methodical ethnic cleansing (Armenia has been cleared of more than a million Azerbaijanis), both in Armenia itself and in the part of Azerbaijan that was eventually occupied.

Today the situation has changed dramatically and Armenia is losing all its gains and losing positions not only in Azerbaijan, but also in the region as a whole due to not only the military actions of Azerbaijan, but also the involvement of the regional powers - Turkey and Iran - in the conflict on the side of Baku. The emerging mosaic limits the actions of Armenia as a sovereign state in the South Caucasus, Western Asia, and in the post-Soviet space, where it has no allies and sympathizers left.

Paradoxically, under the new realities, Azerbaijan is also the guarantor of security for Armenia, as well as for the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh. Peaceful Azerbaijan, an ally of Turkey, Georgia, Iran, Russia in the region, is capable of projecting these relations onto Armenia and ensuring its peaceful coexistence with its neighbors. The union with Azerbaijan becomes a guarantee of its development and Armenia has no other way out to become an ally of the "eternal enemy".