Azerbaijan in the late 1980s (1)

In the aspect of the January tragedy of 1990, there are still stereotypes in some layers of the world community, up to the current historical period. In particular, again and again there sometimes ideas in the internet that one of the reasons the Kremlin used the Soviet army against its own people 29 years ago was a religious background in Azerbaijan.

Without doubt, the divergence of this opinion manifested came from the light the then head of the USSR Mikhail Gorbachev, immediately after the bloody crime sanctioned by him on January 20, 1990, who announced about the manifestations of "Islamic fundamentalism" in Azerbaijan at that period.

What could be hidden behind this passage of M. Gorbachev, and for what reason was this topic thrown into society? An Azerbaijani researcher Teymur Atayev tells about it in his interview.

1.About the artificial "introduction" of the "Islamic threat" slogan into the world space

- How do you think, what served as a religious curve bent in declaring by M. Gorbachev to the world community about the reasons for such the most severe anti-Azerbaijani action in January 1990?

- Probably, today it is no secret for anyone that the preparation for the tragedy was carried out in the depths of the relevant Soviet departments. It is another matter that the central allied authorities led methodically and thoroughly in several directions, including the religious field, to aggravate the situation in Azerbaijan, and first of all, in Baku.

- Could you explain what you have said?

- Let's first try to look at some moments of that period. In the summer of 1989, a declaration on the principles of relations and friendly cooperation was signed between Moscow and Tehran, including, among other things, Moscow"s agreement to assist Iran "in strengthening" its "defense capability". It is noteworthy that this document was signed by the parties against the background of the absence of diplomatic relations between Washington and Tehran, moreover, at the period when the White House was lobbying the creation of an international anti-Iranian coalition (in order to effect the political and economic isolation of Iran). In particular, the initiation of a kind of Soviet-American "front" in the vector of weakening the position of the Iranian regime was carried out. The approbation of this path was originally sounded on the ideological field.

- What do you mean?

- Very Serious Russian expert, Alexander Shevyakin, notes that period, the American strategic research center RAND Corporation, close to the presidential administration, was working on the formation of a Russian-American platform for joint activities. The implementation of the plan was carried out through the active mediation of the structure "in the merger of the KGB-CIA. The platform, which presented the world with a new "common enemy" in the face of "international terrorism", became the basis for the mutual alignment of previously opposing organizations. Taking into account the fact that the newly-minted "evil empire" was expectedly Iran, within the framework of the world community, the aspect of the "Soviet threat" was accurately repurposed to the threat of "Islamic" as the dominant offshoot of that very "international terrorism".

Thus, the geopolitical palette of the late 1980s began to take shape through the prism of the declared struggle of the entire "civilized world" with "Islamic fundamentalism" (in the direction of Tehran itself and, unlike today, without affecting individual Arab regimes). The mutual understanding between Washington and Moscow manifested itself in this politico-confessional compartment leveled the possibility of becoming a reality the Iranian-Soviet alliance.

- We can agree that at the geopolitical field in the late 1980s, described by you, the White House confidently developed the anti-Iranian activity in terms of combating "international terrorism". But what steps in terms of confronting the global "Islamic threat" took the Kremlin?

- Here I will again refer to the data mentioned by A. Shevyakin. According to the information he has, a political observer of the literary newspaper Igor Belyaev, incredibly popular in the Soviet Union, became the "coordinator" of contacts "through the KGB - CIA" from the Soviet side. He took an active part in bilateral negotiations - both within the framework of the LH editorial staff and at the RAND Corporation headquarters in Santa Monica (USA). A. Shevyakin represents this LH correspondent as the author of the "provocative article "Islam" published in the LH, which laid the beginning of conflicts along the axis of Muslims - the rest."

I remember very well this article by I. Belyaev, published in 1987, which had a sharply anti-Islamic character. And I agree with the assessment of this material by the famous Soviet and Russian writer Yuri Pompeyev. According to him, the essence of Belyaev"s material was that "Muslims are insidious and treacherous people," and the fact that most of the Soviet soldiers returned from Afghanistan, to their homeland "in zinc coffins" as a result of combat, turned readers against the representatives of the Islamic religion.

The then head of the analytical center ("A" department) of the USSR KGB, Vyacheslav Shironin, says that he understands I. Belyaev, and "the purpose of his article was to attract public attention". At the same time, the head of this counter-intelligence unit voiced a very important remark that the material signed by I. Belyaev was, coordinated "in time with some other notable events". In particular, with the establishment in 1987 by the European Parliament of the day "in memory of the victims of the genocide" in Turkey and the publication of works by writers Zori Balayan and Silva Kaputikian, "in which hatred for the Turks was openly transferred to the Azerbaijani neighbors", called by the authors only "Turks." V. Shironin focuses on the fact that Z. Balayan, one of the directors of the separatist tendencies in Nagorno-Karabakh, was a correspondent for the "Literary newspaper" in Yerevan. (We will agree in brackets that the last parallels of the veteran of the Soviet KGB suggest significant reflections in the light of the starting point in the birth of the separatist movement in Nagorno-Karabakh, but this is another topic.)

Thus, in the aspect of the aforementioned, it is difficult to call it accidental that, according to Sheviakin, the "mediator and coordinator" in the context of the "association of the KGB-CIA" from Moscow was not defined by the organization "directly from the secret services or other institutions with a strictly state status ", and "such a body" as the Literary Gazette." The leadership of I. Belyaev in this scenario also was not coincidence. According to the deputy editor-in-chief of the LH, Yuriy Izyumov, "there was a long-term social work in the Middle East", when he returned from "in co-authorship" as Yevgeny Primakov, "defended his doctoral thesis."

Meanwhile, by the end of the 1980s, a competent ideological background of the proof of the "aggressiveness" of Islam took place. Azerbaijan, a number of areas of which border Iran, was chosen to demonstrate the viability of the slogan "Islamic threat" in defiance of the USSR.

- Our conversation turns out to be extensive and multilateral. Therefore, let"s discuss the question of how the Kremlin used the geopolitical solitaire, you have described, in terms of Azerbaijan (in 1989-1990), in our next conversation.

- Of course.

(To be continued)