The brief analysis and Introduction of "Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict" (20 February 1988 – present)

 

Objectives:

• Introduction to the conflict
• Impact on Regional Geopolitics of South Asia
• Impact on future Warfare South Asia

Armenia-Azerbaijan: Why did Nagorno-Karabakh spark a conflict?

• Nagorno-Karabakh is part of Azerbaijan, but its population is majority Armenian. As the Soviet Union saw increasing tensions in its constituent republics in the 1980s, Nagorno-Karabakh voted to become part of Armenia - sparking a war that stopped with a ceasefire in 1994.
• Since then, Nagorno-Karabakh has remained part of Azerbaijan but is controlled by separatist ethnic Armenians backed by the Armenian government. Until recently, negotiations mediated by international powers had failed to deliver a peace agreement.
• Armenia is majority Christian while Azerbaijan is majority Muslim. Turkey has close ties to Azerbaijan, while Russia is allied with Armenia - although it also has good relations with Azerbaijan.

• A peace deal has been agreed between Armenia and Azerbaijan, two former Soviet Union republics in the Caucasus region.
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• It brings to an end six weeks of fierce fighting in which thousands of people were reported killed and many more displaced.
• At the heart of the conflict was the Nagorno-Karabakh region. It is recognised as part of Azerbaijan, but it is controlled by ethnic Armenians.
• The two countries fought a bloody war over the region in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and it has been the trigger for further violence in the years since.

• Nagorno-Karabakh region is a mountainous land-locked region in the South Caucasus. It is a forested region and geographically lies within the boundary of Azerbaijan.
• The region is also called Artsakh (chiefly by Armenians).
• South Caucasus or Transcaucasia is a region on the southern Caucasus Mountains on the border of Eastern Europe and Western Asia. It roughly comprises of the modern countries of Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia.
• Nagorno-Karabakh lies in the mountainous range of Karabakh.
• Nagorno-Karabakh is internationally recognized as a part of Azerbaijan, although it is ruled by the Republic of Artsakh (formerly known as the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh).
• The Republic of Artsakh is autonomous but controlled by Armenia.
• The major ethnic group of the region is Armenian.

Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict Origin

• The root of the problem lies in the manner in which the Soviet authorities under Joseph Stalin divided the area after the Red Army conquered it in the 1920s.
• The Soviets had placed the majority-Armenian region of Nagorno-Karabakh into Azerbaijan. The region was an autonomous oblast within Soviet Azerbaijan.
• The present conflict arose in the 1980s during the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
• Nationalist forces on both sides started using Nagorno-Karabakh as a rallying point.
• In 1991, the ethnic Armenians in the Nagorno-Karabakh enclave declared independence.
• Armenia supported this move of the ethnic Armenians and war broke out between Azerbaijan and the Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh.
• The war went on till 1994 when a ceasefire was brokered with the help of Russia. Many people were killed and displaced during this war.
• By this time, however, Azerbaijani forces were driven out of the enclave and also from large swathes of the surrounding area. Currently, much of the area is occupied by Armenian militias.
• Even though the region is self-governed by the Armenians, it is not recognised as an independent nation by any country (not even Armenia) and the United Nations.
• Armenia supports the region militarily and economically.
• A ceasefire violation occurred in 2016 when the Azerbaijani forces clashed with the Artsakh Defence Army backed by Armenian forces.

Nagorno-Karabakh as Part of Geopolitical Rivalry

• The year 2020 brought a turning point in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. The flare-up in the fighting between the Azerbaijani military and ethnic Armenian forces of the breakaway region resulted in a peace deal that humiliated Armenia that had to return 75 percent of Nagorno-Karabakh to Azerbaijan as well as all transit routes from the disputed enclave to Armenia.
• Many experts saw the peace agreement as a triumph of Russia that mediated in the conflict.
• As the peace treaty imposed new rules, the geopolitical situation shifted in the South Caucasus, from where withdrew Western nations, thus losing their political influence in the region. Turkey now seems to be filling the void left by both the United States and the European Union.
• As the Russian military stepped into the war theater, the Nagorno-Karabakh issue might stall.

It has remained unsolved since the demise of the Soviet Union while sparking tensions in the South Caucasus. The conflict lingered for the past three decades, causing some persistent frictions in the geopolitically fragile spot of the South Caucasus. The fighting that the Azerbaijani military waged between September 27 and November 9, 2020, shifted the geopolitical balance of power, notably building up a strong position of Russia and Turkey as top geopolitical actors throughout the region.

Limited role for the European Union and the United States in the Nagorno-Karabakh mediating process

• Western European nations and the United States clearly showed no involvement in the mediating process between the warring parties, a somewhat surprising attitude as both France and the United States co-chair the OSCE Minsk Group, a mechanism created to encourage a peaceful solution to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. Their stance is in stark contrast to that adopted during the 2008 Russia-Georgia war when then French President Nicolas Sarkozy was personally involved in mediating a ceasefire on behalf of the European Union as France held the bloc’s presidency at the time.
• Perhaps the EU’s approach stemmed from two reasons. Firstly, the Nagorno-Karabakh military offensive broke out as the pandemic rolled across the world while Brussels was wrapping up its trade talks with the United Kingdom. For the European Union, the clash that erupted between Azerbaijan and Armenian-majority Nagorno-Karabakh was not important enough to take action in face of the bloc’s complex internal situation. The second issue – far more embarrassing for the European Union – is that it has no adequate political and economic tools to influence the situation in the South Caucasus. The EU’s cooperation with Armenia and Azerbaijan under the Eastern Partnership resembles a facade. Fearful of dropping Russian military assistance, Armenia abandoned plans to sign the EU Association Agreement in 2014 while the 2017 Armenia-EU Comprehensive and Enhanced Partnership Agreement, or CEPA, is not an alternative to the Moscow-offered schemes bringing together Eurasian partners. The EU-Azerbaijan partnership does not involve solely trade issues. Any efforts to forge political cooperation fail amid the authoritarian system in Azerbaijan.
• In the United States, all eyes were back then on the election campaign that ran simultaneously to the Nagorno-Karabakh military offensive, preventing Washington from becoming more involved. The dispute over the enclave is a problem for U.S. diplomacy. The Armenian community of the United States enjoys a strong position in the U.S. Capitol whose members are lobbying for Armenians in both Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh. At the same time, the United States sells military hardware and weapons to Azerbaijan. In 2019, Washington signed a $10 million worth of military deal with Baku. The United States is offering military aid to Armenia albeit symbolically, compared to other political actors present in the region. The top leading arms suppliers to Azerbaijan are Turkey, Israel, and Russia while Armenia gets weapons essentially from Moscow.
• The situation seems complex amid Washington’s geopolitical pursuits throughout the South Caucasus. Russian domination in the region is perilous to U.S. interests. Washington is seeking to keep military and energy partnership with Azerbaijan, a country that once under Moscow’s political control loses its strategic importance for the United States. At the same time, the regional threat to Washington is aligned with the policy followed by Ankara. Formally a NATO member, Turkey is attempting to build its independent position as a regional power capable of influencing the Western Balkans, the South Caucasus, and the Middle East. With the attempt to free these regions from Western impact, Turkey has an intention to forge an alliance and cultural communities with what is known as Turkic countries. Azerbaijan occupies a particular place between them. It can be assumed that Washington has not developed a clear stance on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict as it cannot grant its full support to either side.

Russia-Turkey regional competition

Both Moscow and Ankara have lively interests in the South Caucasus. Turkey sees it as a top strategic region in areas like politics, economy, and military. Its top ambition is to secure transport corridors running to and from Azerbaijan. Turkey’s huge political influence there may result in a robust alliance, which could in the future expand onto Central Asian nations, thus forming a major political bloc under the Turkish authority. It seems that after Turkey relinquished EU integration efforts, the country needs fresh coalitions that would be easiest to create within the Turkic world.

Azerbaijan’s trumph in the Nagorno-Karabakh war does not mean the country’s recapturing the whole region. Nonetheless, as part of peace deals, Baku secured a land route running through Armenia and being a direct link with its exclave of Nakhchivan and an indirect one with Turkey. It is thus planned to build a railway connection through Armenia. Compared to the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway, which connects Azerbaijan to Turkey via Georgia, the road within the new corridor will be about 340 kilometers shorter. This would foster trade ties between Azerbaijan and Turkey, being beneficial for both nations, although the project is politically costly. Russia will ensure the security of the corridor as the country guarantees the maintaining of communication links between Azerbaijan and Nakhichevan, and between other Armenian-controlled territories in Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia proper. Before Azerbaijan’s latest military offensive, Armenia had remained in possession of the Lachin corridor, a narrow strip providing a pathway between Armenia and the enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh. After the 2020 flare-up, Armenia lost the connection, while the Russian military will guard the route from now on.

Possible scenarios for Nagorno-Karabakh – a geopolitical perspective

Probably in the future there will be some attempts to freeze the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. The Russian military will seek to keep the peace deal in force as only in this way Moscow would guarantee full control of the region. In case of more strains, Azerbaijan would possibly recapture the whole territory, a situation that results in Baku’s freeing from Russian influence and a cemented military alliance with Turkey.

Ankara is likely to fill the void Western nations left in the Nagorno-Karabakh peace process that will thus narrow down to rivalry between Turkey and Russia as two dominant powers regionwide.

The Nagorno-Karabakh war also affects neighboring nations, notably Iran, whose borders saw the fighting last fall. Although Tehran has in the past displayed no initiative to mediate between the two countries, it repeatedly warned that renewed strains might bring escalation. 

The 82-million country is inhabited by some 100,000 ethnic Armenians and roughly 15 million Azerbaijanis. The mostly-Muslim Azerbaijanis, who form a populous ethnic group in Iran, are far more influential there than the Armenians, whose members live in Iran in a closed community. Nonetheless, Tehran shapes its geopolitical ties with the two nations differently. Christian-majority Armenia enjoys friendly relations with neighboring Iran that offers a visa-free regime for its citizens. As Armenia had its borders closed with Azerbaijan and Turkey, Iran was its only remaining trade partner only to Georgia. Both countries have no territorial claims against each other. There were some skirmishes between Azerbaijan and Iran amid West Azerbaijan Province, a northern province of Iran, whose mostly-Azerbaijani inhabitants find it challenging to assimilate into Iranian society. Another impediment to cooperation between these two is the U.S.-Israel-Azerbaijan military partnership, which is something Tehran cannot accept. What seems is that Iran will observe both the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute and geopolitical shifts throughout the region, but without involving militarily, politically, or economically.

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is ushering in a new age of warfare

• Drones, sensors and long-range weapons have given one side a clear edge in the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
• Both Armenia and Azerbaijan, traditional enemies, have been building up their armed forces over the last decade. They fought a bloody war that ended in 1994, in which tens of thousands of people were killed and hundreds of thousands were displaced on both sides. Azerbaijan’s army collapsed and Armenia took control of several regions, including the key regions of Fuzuli and Jabrayil in the south, bordering Iran. President Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan has been explicit in his desire to return these regions to Azerbaijan.
• The country has a defence and mutual assistance pact with its neighbour and ally Turkey. Extensive joint exercises were held in late July and early August with, according to Azerbaijan, as many as 11,000 Turkish troops taking part, with units training alongside each other. Turkish Air Force fighter jets, armed drones and long range-artillery trained alongside the Azerbaijani armed forces.

The use of drones or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) has been increasing in battlefields across the world and the current conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia is no exception. Images of armoured vehicles being destroyed, regardless of attempts at camouflage, flooded Western media outlets as Armenian tanks were swiftly targeted by armed drones. Azerbaijan has been steadily building up its force of UAVs.

Israel, a major drone exporter, has been supplying the Azeri armed forces with loitering munitions like the Harop, which were used to great effect in the previous major skirmish in 2016, dubbed the “Four Day War”. This is a new class of munition which is essentially a Kamikaze or suicide UAV. A combination of bomb and drone, it loiters over the battlefield, its remote operator searching for targets. Once found, the drone is flown into the target, destroying both itself and the target.

• While long-range artillery and air attacks have been around for over a century, their increasing accuracy is something that militaries are only now coming to grips with.
• Combined with the clouds of sensors saturating the battlefield, these new systems have the ability to travel further with pinpoint accuracy, no longer needing to blanket an area with warheads in order to guarantee destruction of a target. They are now able to find and destroy a target sometimes hundreds of kilometers away.

Azerbaijan, despite falling oil revenues, has invested heavily in these systems, buying Israeli LORA ballistic missiles that have a range of up to 400km (about 250 miles) and an accuracy of 10 metres (about 33 feet). These, as well as other long-range attack weapons, were part of a $5bn military and security equipment deal signed between the two countries in 2016. Azerbaijan is considered a strategic partner of Israel, supplying it with nearly 40 percent of its oil.

Conclusion

• It is difficult to calculate the human toll of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict as the number of casualties as detailed by Armenia and Azerbaijan was not confirmed by any data from international institutions. Azerbaijan said 2,783 of its forces died in the Nagorno-Karabakh war. In early December 2020, Armenia announced its death toll at 2,317 people while in January 2021, the country raised the tally to 3,330 upon properly identifying casualties. However, people in Armenia and members of the ethnic Armenian population in Nagorno-Karabakh remain skeptical about the toll, arguing that the government in Yerevan is trying to hide the actual scale of the defeat.
• The Nagorno-Karabakh conundrum is viewed mostly through the geopolitical prism. Sandwiched between Russia, Iran, and Turkey, the South Caucasus might in the future become an important transport hub for emerging Asian superpowers. The only certain part of the “geopolitical puzzle” is that Turkey grows in importance there while Russia maintains its dominant position. Moscow still holds the lead in the region, or its sphere of influence, thus the current solution to the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute cannot come as a territorial gain for Moscow, but as keeping the Russian grip on the post-Soviet areas.
• The primary lesson from the air war over Nagorno-Karabakh is the importance of full-spectrum air defense. Both Armenia and Azerbaijan’s short-range air defense (SHORAD) arsenals were limited in size and quality. Azerbaijan was able to exploit this gap with its large fleet of sophisticated drones.
• Major powers like the United States, China, and Russia are in the process of developing and deploying their own drone countermeasures, including kinetic interceptors, electronic jammers, and even counter-drone drones. While these technologies exist today, there are difficulties in developing them at an affordable rate to provide defense at multiple echelons, including the tactical level. Armor and other heavy ground units will likely remain vulnerable until mobile SHORAD systems improve and proliferate.
• The conflict also provides yet another reminder about the importance of passive defense. In an age of highly proliferated sensors and shooters, militaries will need to consider new ways to camouflage and harden their forces. Ground force tactics on dispersal and deception ought to be reinvigorated. Soldiers should train to limit their electronic and thermal signatures for longer distances and times. The video and imagery available online suggest that neither Armenian nor Azerbaijani forces had adequate resources or training on passive defense. We see this time and time again with both sides operating out in the open, static or moving slowly; poorly camouflaged; and clumped in tight, massed formations.

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict also illustrates that while individual weapons systems will not revolutionize the nature of warfare, the synchronization of new weapons makes the modern battlefield more lethal. Azerbaijan’s combination of drones and artillery effectively targeted Armenia’s high-value military assets, most notably in attacks on T-72 tanks and S-300 air defenses. In particular, strikes on air defense units constrained Armenia’s ability to counter Baku’s UAVs, amplifying their effectiveness. The use of UAVs and missiles to suppress and destroy air defenses gives greater validation to an observation of the U.S. Army’s Air and Missile Defense 2028 strategy: “The most stressing threat is a complex, integrated attack incorporating multiple threat capabilities in a well-coordinated and synchronized attack.”

The lessons here are not new. The importance of both full-spectrum air defense and passive defenses have been shown in battles across the Middle East and in planning for potential conflict with Russia and China. The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict provides a small but important case study in the character of modern air and missile warfare.