I read the latest on blogs in the magazine, which highlighted cilicia and a couple of others and also gave a list of blogs, and I saw that they included our humble blog in their list. Quite exciting, but it made me realize that I haven't updated this thing in a while (Arman you are guilty of this too). BTW, that AGBU magazine is great, I learned a few new things in their articles, and being the Armenian political junkie that I am, I greatly appreciate the journalism that the magazine puts in.
I especially read up on the article by Richard Giragosian on Armenia's relationship with Russia. Again, an excellent article covering a lot of important facets of Armenia's bilateral relations with Moscow, but I had to disagree on a few points. First, the article mentioned Armenia's emulation of Russia's political system and how it serves to the detriment of a democratic Armenia. Granted, the prevalence of corruption is a remnant of the old Soviet model, but Armenia can benefit from Russia's leadership in dealing with this problem. Putin, although consistently bashed in the western media, plays a strong hand when dealing with oligarchs and Armenian leadership can learn by example. Again, I ain't completely supporting Putin (that's Arman's job), but I do believe emulating Russia's government does have its merits.
Also, the article also portrays Armenia's reliance on Russia for security in a negative light. Although Russia greatly benefits from the alliance, Armenia does so too. The Russian base in Gyumri offers protection from Turkey (even though the chance for military conflict is low, it's still substantial to warrant protection from Russia), and although Russia supported Azerbaijan as well as Armenia during the Karabakh conflict, Armenia right now still needs Russia's military support.
There's a lot of Russia bashing going on, and yea the Soviet Union produced was the bad guy in the Cold War, but you know what? It did more to protect Armenia than any western country during the time. While Britain backed the Azeris during Andranik's campaigns in Zangezur and the American Congress overturned the creation of Armenia with its borders in the Treaty of Sevres, Russia offered the best protection against Turkey. Yea, they did screw us with Karabakh, they ain't perfect, but overall give Russia some credit, since the West doesn't do much either.
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7 comments:
One thing I've noticed about the information regarding the NK war is that there are many conflicting views - one side says one thing, another side says something completely different. I guess that's just typical when discussing a subject as polarizing as an ethnic conflict, particularly when the conflict involves Armenians.
There is a book that was published last year: Sons of the Conquerors by Hugh Pope. If you can get your hands on it, check out the section that discusses the NK war (it's about ten pages long and is very well written). The author states that a Russian investigation discovered that the Russian government spent approximately one billion dollars supporting Armenia during the war. No references are cited by the author, but I do find it more than plausible that Russia supported Armenia during the war, instead of remaining neutral.
KG, Russia's support to Armenia came in form of CHEAPER weapons, and nothing was given away for free (except the legally required amount of ex Soviet weaponry that EACH EX SOVIET REPUBLIC HAD THE RIGHT TO KEEP). Other wise Russia sold weapons to Azeris too, they just got it for the regular price.
When the war started and till about 1992 Russia was fully supporting Azeris. The infamous operation RING (the forced eviction of the Armenian population from Karabakh) was initially successful thanks to Russians; Russian paratroopers would encircle the village while the Azeri OMON (special police unit) would enter and clear out the village.
So yes Russia helped us by selling us weapons for cheaper, but thats pretty much it.
Arman hit the nail on the head, yes Russia helped Armenia but they aided Azerbaijan too. This is a big talking point by Azerbaijan to explain why they lost, but in reality it doesn't hold up.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karabakh_War
Scroll down all the way to the bottom, you'll see that indeed Russia did support both sides, but Azerbaijan also had the support of Turkey, Israel, Afghanistan, and Iran
Ey Levon give me the link man
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karabakh_War
Azerbejian has support because of the oil pipelines that are currently running through its territories. You see the conspirators of history look at timelines of 50-100 years. The plan for over a decade had been to run the pipeline through the strategic territory of the crypto-Jewish Azeris.
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