The Azerbaijani-Turkish Terrorist Tandem
"We are talking about a substantial region that has been retaken, and a potentially substantial number of people being able to return to their homes once the conflict is finally over.""For nearly 30 years we have been waiting for the return of these territories. There is a lot of building and de-mining work that will have to be done, but every village that is retaken is a success for the Azeri people."Hikmet Hajiyev, chief foreign policy adviser, President Ilham Aliyev, Azerbaijan"Nagorno-Karabakh has been fighting against the Azerbaijani-Turkish terrorist tandem for over a month now.""I share the grief of the people of Austria. [Nagorno-Karabakh was] at the front of the anti-terrorist war ... without exaggeration, the fate of civilization is decided here."Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan"Russia is doing everything in our power to end the conflict in the South Caucasus as quickly as possible and to save lives."Russian President Vladimir Putin
 |
| A shop in Nagorno-Karabakh's main town, Stepanakert, destroyed by a missile strike. Stanislav Krasilnikov/TASS |
Azerbaijan has the good fortune to have discovered a trove of natural resources within its borders, petroleum products that enriched its coffers enabling it to acquire expensive new state-of-the-art military weapons that were earmarked for the conflict that has now erupted. Armenia, by contrast has no such natural resources as energy products in a world hungry for them, despite current depressed prices, and cannot match Azerbaijan's battlefield weaponry, placing it at a distinct disadvantage in helping Nagorno-Karabakh in its defence against the Azeri military.
The international community may consider the territory to be within Azerbaijan's boundaries, but the administration of the mountainous region is Armenian in reflection of the fact that the majority of the population also is majority Armenian. The attack was unexpected, and the region was unprepared although it has no resources of its own aside from antiquated tanks inherited from the era of the Soviet Union. Azerbaijan has been supplied by Turkey with modern military assets in its sweep of the countryside it claims as its own.
Its military has retaken four key territories throughout the five-week conflict with its neighbours, Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh; enough land in the enclave to have 500,000 Azeris it claims were displaced citizens to resettle there. The Armenians who had lived in those villages fled as the Azeri military advanced and shelled the area, and are now themselves homeless, living in the capital, internally displaced.
 |
| Troops parade in Stepanakert to mark the 20th anniversary of what Nagorno Karabakh calls its independence |
A poor country by comparison, Armenia cannot possibly match the weight of Azerbaijan's military assets significantly aided and abetted by Turkey's intervention and its installation of Syrian jihadis to fight alongside the Azeri soldiers. The drone weapons used by Azerbaijan have destroyed over a hundred Armenian tank positions and over a thousand Armenian troops have been killed. Azerbaijan keeps its casualty count to itself divulging nothing but claiming victory and mission (almost) accomplished.
Russia, with its support of Armenia may not wish to enter the conflict beyond using its diplomatic skills to try to have both countries come to an accord. Turkey, acting for Azerbaijan, is disinterested in aiding Russian diplomacy, rather than inciting Azerbaijan to continue its winning trajectory; lives lost are of little concern to Recep Tayyip Erdogan who cannot and will not see beyond the urgency of yet another Islamist conquest, as the self-professed champion of militant Islam.
During a conflict 28 years earlier between Armenian-dominated Nagorno-Karabakh and Azerbaijan, acts of ethnic cleansing took place on both sides, with an estimated 700,000 Azeris fleeing the region to spread themselves around Azerbaijan. It is Azerbaijani President Aliyev's plan to repatriate them to their former villages that his own troops have of late bombed, claiming that Armenian forces deliberately destroyed them. He also claims that his military action is legitimate in the face of stalled diplomacy by Russia, France and the United States.
 |
Labels: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Nagorno-Karabakh, Russia, Turkey
posted by Pieface @ Friday, November 06, 2020
<< Home