Hrachya Arzumanyan: The ‘four-day war’ has given a unique chance to Armenian diplomacy to get rid of Madrid principles

 The ‘four-day war’ unleashed by Azerbaijan has received various assessments ranging from reconnaissance to an attempted blitzkrieg with far-reaching plans. What tasks do you think the two brigades of the Azerbaijani armed forces were to carry out?    

I think it was more like a blitzkrieg. It was an attempt to breach the defenses of the Karabakh forces. We would face quite a different situation now, but for our soldiers on the frontline that resisted and threw the enemy back. Azerbaijan failed to shift to the next stage of its offensive to use tank spearheads to enhance its success.  Fortunately, our boys stood their ground and the military threat has been generally liquidated. The war Azerbaijan unleashed in the first days of April can be called "an offensive reconnaissance" from the geopolitical, not military, point of view.  It was an attempt to find out how strongly Russia controls the Caucasus and whether the regional and geopolitical centers of power can exert pressure on it.

Did Azerbaijan resume the aggression against Artsakh for domestic reasons or did anyone instigate Aliyev to do so?  

Artsakh and the Caucasus, generally, are in the focus of the geopolitical confrontation. Consequently, many factors affect the processes here. Both domestic and regional reasons made Azerbaijan resume the aggression. I not rule out personal motives of Aliyev's clans either.  

What about Turkey? Did it play the role of a secondary mechanism or an instigator in the Azerbaijani aggression? 

Turkey certainly has its own interest in the Azerbaijani aggression. But one should not exaggerate its role. The Armenian side should consider Turkey's factor in the Armenian cause and in the Karabakh conflict settlement as an invariable. Whatever the outcome, on the regional or geopolitical arenas Turkey remains hostile to Armenia. Though Ankara is said to have instigated Azerbaijan to aggression, nevertheless, the Turkish policy has remained stable and unchanged over the past few years. There are no cardinal changes or force-majeure that might have instigated Azerbaijan to such an unusual and unpredictable step as the 'four-day war'. Turkey has an extensive political and military experience and it realizes that any war is unpredictable by its consequences. Amid the serious problems in Syria, it is illogical to open one more front in the Caucasus, where Russia's role remains crucial. I am not inclined to treat Erdogan as an insane politician. I think it is a wrong point of view.

The arrangement on truce was reached in Moscow, which announced intensification of the negotiation process. Do you think Russia itself decided to take such active steps or it was forced to take more active part in the Karabakh conflict settlement process?    

The Caucasus is still under the Russian security umbrella. "The four-day war" has demonstrated to the geopolitical force centers that it is Moscow that resolves the problems in the Caucasus and that any attempts of other centers to outline their military presence here will result in war. The experience of Georgia in 2008 and Azerbaijan in 2016 is the direct evidence of that. It is necessary to analyze what forces have once again decided to challenge Russia's monopoly in the Caucasus. I do not think it might be the United States, which is preparing for presidential elections.  Under such conditions, Washington has no reason to start a big game in the Caucasus. It is the regional players that might have challenged the reaction of the "Russian bear" in the Caucasus. First of all, the matter concerns Saudi Arabia, Israel and - to a lesser extent - Turkey, which directly borders on the region. So, unleashing another proxy war for Iran and Russia is quite a good move. 

What about Great Britain or the United States?

I do not see a single reason that might have made Great Britain to initiate the hostilities. The British Petroleum interests are protected. In this light, it is at least unclear why Great Britain should endanger its own assets and harshly break the balance of forces in the Caucasus. Washington had no reason to accelerate the developments either. It would be a too straightforward step. Such a step would be possible in Ukraine, not in the Caucasus, where the centuries-old interests of the powers intersect. The United States realizes that by blowing up Armenia it will inevitably explode Azerbaijan. After that the entire Caucasus will be involved in a big game and Moscow's reaction will be harsher than in Syria.

Doesn’t the United States benefit from the anti-Russian sentiments in Armenia, complete inefficiency of the CSTO, Russia's loss of Armenia's public confidence?

Russia has certainly lost the "four-day war". In the meantime, one should not forget that after the outbreak of the war, all the processes were initiated through Moscow.  For instance, no one forced Rogozin to make the statement I would call "a nuclear blow" against the Armenian-Russian relations. It was a step of a Russian high-ranking official, not a US one. Does it mean that the Russian deputy prime minister works for the United States? The Armenian side has not right to make such a conclusion. One should not use primitive models when speaking of the US influence on the "four-day war" and the post-war processes. One should put up with the fact that the Russian policy has always been and will be inhomogeneous. It contains forces that may just as well stake on the collapse of Russia and no 'intrigues' of Washington will be compared with those forces by their destructive consequences. It happened during the collapse of the USSR and it may happen again, why not?

It is what it is…

Anyway, it is the Russian policy, not "the US trace" in Moscow. These are inadmissible nuances for the Armenian people, which are at war. Today it is Russia, not the US, that delivers the main blow against the Armenian-Russian relations. Russia is doing it through the statements of its officials, supplies of modern offensive weapons, etc. The capacities of Armenian political science and diplomacy do not allow revealing the complicated models, in which it would be possible to identify the interests and steps of geopolitical force centers other than Russia. Today one can clearly identify the interests and steps of Russia, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Israel, and Iran on our arena, but not the steps of the United States or Europe. Certainly, there may be such interests but they have not become vivid yet. It would be correct to focus on the current challenges and threats. 

One way or another, all this has intensified the negotiations. There have even been some statements about the need to deploy peacekeepers in Karabakh. Do you think the matter concerns the Madrid Principles or the Kazan package of documents?  

I think the talks on Karabakh will most likely intensify on the basis of the Kazan documents. At the same time, he believes that Armenia and Artsakh should firmly state that the Armenian sides consider both the Kazan and Madrid approaches unacceptable. An unacceptable frame of negotiations was once imposed on Armenia and it resulted in diplomatic defeat. It is necessary to differentiate politics from diplomacy when working at the new plan of the Karabakh conflict settlement. Armenian politicians had no right to agree to the negotiations, which imply cession of territories. I think the Armenian side should realize that diplomatic talks are held before and after war. Moreover, the war 'zeroes out' what has been achieved before it. The talks based on the Madrid principles were held between the two wars - the first Artsakh war and the four-day war. The four-day war formed a new reality and today we have an opportunity to state that the pre-war political arrangements are no longer effective. It is the Azerbaijani aggression that swept the Armenian side's obligations away. That is to say, the Armenian politicians and diplomats have a unique chance and a small window of opportunities to get rid of the Madrid principles. The window will close as soon as the presidents or the foreign ministers agree to hold a meeting, at which the word combination "Madrid principles" will be uttered.      

Has the ‘four-day war’ caused new threats such as Artsakh residents’ discontent with Yerevan’s policy of the conflict settlement? 

We have no right to think that the presidents of Armenia and Artsakh may take different views of the conflict settlement. This is an overt threat to the Armenian statehood, and if it arises, both presidents will have to resign. Armenian people have recently resisted a new war and they cannot admit even the possibility of any games. The Armenian states have always conducted and should keep conducting a synchronized policy on the Artsakh problem. The question is whether the Armenian side has a conflict settlement strategy meeting the realities of XXI century. I think there is no such a strategy. And it is a big problem. The Armenian strategy of the Karabakh conflict settlement in the early XXI century is a big challenge faced by the Armenian politicians. We should concentrate the available intellectual potential to prepare the response as soon as possible. The diplomatic talks around Artsakh are in the offing, however, at the moment the Armenian politics and diplomacy have nothing to offer to the Armenian people and to the world.