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| Conflicts in the former Soviet Union |
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| Nagorno-Karabakh – South Ossetia – 1st Abkhazia – Georgia – North Ossetia – Transnistria – Tajikistan – 1st Chechnya – 2nd Abkhazia – Dagestan – 2nd Chechnya |
Nagorno-Karabakh is currently a de facto independent republic in the South Caucasus, but is officially recognized as part of the Republic of Azerbaijan.
The Nagorno-Karabakh War refers to the armed conflict that took place from February 1988 to May 1994, in the small ethnic enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh (I) in southwestern Azerbaijan, between the predominantly ethnic Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh backed by the Republic of Armenia against the Republic of Azerbaijan. As the war progressed, Armenia and Azerbaijan, both former Soviet Republics, became enveloped in a protracted, undeclared war in the mountainous heights of Karabakh as Azerbaijan attempted to curb a secessionist movement in Nagorno-Karabakh. The enclave\'s parliament had voted in favor of uniting itself with Armenia and a referendum was held with the vast majority of the Karabakh population voting in favor of independence. The demand to unify with Armenia, which proliferated in the late 1980s, began in a relatively peaceful manner; however, in the following months, as the Soviet Union\'s disintegration neared, it gradually grew into an increasingly violent conflict between the two ethnic groups, resulting in claims of ethnic cleansing by all sides.Rieff, David (June 1997). Without Rules or Pity. Foreign Affairs v76, n2 1997. Council on Foreign Relations. Retrieved on 2007-02-13.Lieberman, Benjamin (2006). Terrible Fate: Ethnic Cleansing in the Making of Modern Europe. Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, 284–292. ISBN 1-5666-3646-9.
The war was the most destructive ethnic conflict in both terms of lives and property that emerged after the Soviet Union collapsed in December 1991.The casualties of the war are conflicting and exact numbers are unknown due to the fact that exact body counts were never properly ascertained by either side or by international organizations. In the initial years of combat, casualties were reported to be much lower than what was later asserted after the war ended. Most sources however place the figures near 25–35,000. Time Magazine, for example lists the number as at least 35,000 people on both sides [1]. The US State Department [2] and NPR [3] put the numbers slightly lower at around 30,000. There have been subsequent casualties which resulted from the tripping of land mines, often by civilians. Numerous cease fire violations on the borders also result in the deaths of several soldiers each year. Other ethnic conflicts with comparative casualties included the First Chechen War and the civil war in Georgia. Inter ethnic fighting between the two broke out shortly after the parliament of Nagorno-Karabakh, an autonomous oblast in Azerbaijan, voted to unify the region with Armenia on February 20, 1988. The declaration of seceding from Azerbaijan was the final result of a "long-standing resentment in the Armenian community of Nagorno Karabakh against serious limitations of its cultural and religious freedom by central Soviet and Azerbaijani authorities,"Duursma, Jorri C. (1996). Fragmentation and the International Relations of Micro-states: Self-determination and Statehood. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 93. ISBN 0-5215-6360-7. but more importantly, as a territorial conflict regarding the land.Croissant, Michael P. (1998). The Armenia-Azerbaijan Conflict: Causes and Implications. London: Praeger. ISBN 0-275-96241-5.
Along with the secessionist movements in the Baltic republics of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, the succeeding movement characterized and played a large role in bringing the downfall of the Soviet Union. As Azerbaijan declared its independence from the Soviet Union and removed the powers held by the enclave\'s government, the Armenian majority voted to secede from Azerbaijan, and in the process proclaimed the enclave the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh.It should be noted that at the time of the dissolution of the USSR, the United States government recognized as legitimate the pre-Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact 1933 borders of the country (the Franklin D. Roosevelt government established diplomatic relations with the Kremlin at the end of that year. Because of this, the George H. Bush administration openly supported the secession of the Baltic SSRs, but regarded the questions related to the independence and territorial conflicts of Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan and the rest of the Transcaucasus as internal Soviet affairs.
Full-scale fighting erupted in the late winter of 1992. International mediation by several groups including Europe\'s OSCE failed to bring an end resolution that both sides could work with. In the spring of 1993, Armenian forces captured regions outside the enclave itself, threatening the involvement of other countries in the region. By the end of the war in 1994, the Armenians were in full control of not only the enclave but also held and currently control approximately 9% of Azerbaijan\'s territory outside the enclave.Using numbers provided by journalist Thomas de Waal for the area of each rayon as well as the area of the Nagorno Karabakh Oblast and the total area of Azerbaijan are (in square kilometres): 1,936, Kelbajar; 1,835, Lachin; 802, Kubatly; 1,050, Jebrail; 707, Zangelan; 842, Aghdam; 462, Fizuli; 75, exclaves; totaling 7,709km² or 8.9%: de Waal. Black Garden, p. 286. As many as 400,000 Armenians from Azerbaijan and 800,000 Azeris from Armenia and Karabakh have been displaced as a result of the conflict. A Russian-brokered cease fire was signed in May of 1994 and peace talks, mediated by the OSCE Minsk Group, have been held ever since by Armenia and Azerbaijan.
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The territorial ownership of Nagorno-Karabakh today is still a heavily disputed issue between Armenia and Azerbaijan. Called Artsakh by Armenians, its history spans several centuries, where it came under the control of several empires. Debate, however, is mired mainly in the aftermath of World War I. Shortly before the Ottoman Empire\'s capitulation in the war, the Russian Empire collapsed in November 1917 and fell under the control of the Bolsheviks. The three nations of the Caucasus, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia, previously under the rule of the Russians, declared their independence to form the Transcaucasian Federation which dissolved after only three months of existence.
Fighting soon broke out between the Democratic Republic of Armenia and the Democratic Republic of Azerbaijan in three specific regions: Nakhichevan, Zangezur (today the Armenian province of Syunik), and Karabakh itself. Armenia and Azerbaijan quarreled as to where the boundaries would fall in accordance to the three provinces. The Karabakh Armenians attempted to declare their independence but failed to make contact with the Republic of Armenia. After the defeat of Ottoman empire in World War I, British troops occupied the South Caucasus in 1919. The British command provisionally affirmed Khosrov bey Sultanov (an appointee of the Azerbaijan government) as the governor-general of Karabakh and Zangezur, pending a final decision by the Paris Peace Conference.Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the ROA. Circular by colonel D. I. Shuttleworth of the British Command. Republic of Armenia Archives, File No. 9. Retrieved March 2, 2007.
Two months later however, the Soviet 11th Army invaded the Caucasus and within three years, the Caucasian republics were formed into the Transcaucasian SFSR of the Soviet Union. The Bolsheviks thereafter created a seven-member committee, the Caucasus Bureau (often shortened to Kavburo), which under the supervision of the future Soviet ruler Joseph Stalin, the People\'s Commissar for Nationalities, was tasked to head up matters in the Caucasus.Karagiannis, Emmanuel. (2002). Energy and Security in the Caucasus. London: RoutledgeCurzon, 36, 40. ISBN 0-7007-1481-2. Although the committee voted 4-3 in favor of allocating Karabakh to the newly created Soviet Socialist Republic of Armenia, protestations made by Azerbaijani leaders including the Communist Party leader of Azerbaijan Nariman Narimanov and an anti-Soviet rebellion in the Armenian capital Yerevan in 1921 embittered relations between Armenia and Russia. These factors led the committee to reverse its decision and award Karabakh to Soviet Azerbaijan in 1921, and later incorporated the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast (NKAO) within the Azerbaijan SSR in 1923, leaving it with a population that was 94% Armenian.Bradshaw, Michael J; George W. White (2004). Contemporary World Regional Geography: Global Connections, Local Voices. New York: Mcgraw-Hill, 164. ISBN 0-0725-4975-0. Yamskov, A. N. "Ethnic Conflict in the Transcausasus: The Case of Nagorno-Karabakh". Theory and Society, Vol. 20, No. 5, Special Issue on Ethnic Conflict in the Soviet Union October 1991, 659. Retrieved on February 13, 2007. The capital was moved from Shusha to Khankendi, which was later renamed as Stepanakert.
Armenian and Azeri scholars have speculated that the decision was an application by Russia of the principle of "divide and rule". This can be seen, for example, by the odd placement of the Nakhichevan exclave, which is separated by Armenia but is a part of Azerbaijan. Others have also postulated that the decision was a goodwill gesture by the Soviet government to help maintain "good relations with Atatürk\'s Turkey."Weisbrode, Kenneth (2001). Central Eurasia - Prize or Quicksand?: Contending Views of Instability in Karabakh, Ferghana, and Afghanistan. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 27. ISBN 0-1985-1070-5. Armenia had always refused to recognize this decision and continued to protest its legality in the ensuing decades under Soviet rule.
As the new general secretary of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev, came to power in 1985, he began implementing his plans to reform the Soviet Union. These were encapsulated in two policies, perestroika and glasnost. While perestroika had more to do with economic reform, glasnost or "openness" granted limited freedom to Soviet citizens to express grievances about the Soviet system itself and its leaders. Capitalizing on this, the leaders of the Regional Soviet of Karabakh decided to vote in favor of unifying the autonomous region with Armenia on February 20, 1988.Gilbert, Martin (2001). A History of the Twentieth Century: The Concise Edition of the Acclaimed World History. New York: Harper Collins, 594. ISBN 0-0605-0594-X. Karabakh Armenian leaders complained that the region had neither Armenian language textbooks in schools nor in television broadcasting,Brown, Archie (1996). The Gorbachev Factor. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 262. ISBN 0-1928-8052-7. and that Azerbaijan\'s Communist Party General Secretary Heidar Aliev had extensively attempted to "Azerify" the region and increase the influence and the number of Azeris living in Nagorno-Karabakh, while at the same time reducing its Armenian population (in 1987, Aliev would step down as General Secretary of Azerbaijan\'s Politbureau).(Russian) Regnum News Agency. "Кто на стыке интересов? США, Россия и новая реальность на границе с Ираном" (Who is at the turn of interests? US, Russia and new reality on the border with Iran) April 4, 2006. By 1988, the Armenian population of Karabakh had dwindled down to nearly three-quarters of the total population.Lobell, Steven E.; Philip Mauceri (2004). Ethnic Conflict and International Politics: Explaining Diffusion and Escalation. New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 58. ISBN 1-4039-6356-8.
The movement was spearheaded by popular Armenian figures and also members of the Russian intelligentsia, such as the dissident and Nobel Laureate Andrei Sakharov. Prior to the declaration, Armenians had begun to protest and stage workers\' strikes in Yerevan, demanding a unification with the enclave. This prompted Azeri counter-protests in Baku. In reaction to the protests, Gorbachev stated that the borders between the republics would not change, in accordance with Article 78 of the Soviet constitution.Rost, Yuri (1990). The Armenian Tragedy: An Eye-Witness Account of Human Conflict and Natural Disaster in Armenia and Azerbaijan. New York: St. Martin\'s Press, 17. ISBN 0-312-04611-1. Gorbachev also stated that several other regions in the Soviet Union were yearning for territorial changes and redrawing the boundaries in Karabakh would thus set a dangerous precedent. Armenians viewed the 1921 Kavburo decision with disdain and felt that in their efforts, they were correcting a historical error under the principle of self-determination, a right also granted in the constitution. Azeris, on the other hand, found such calls for relinquishing their territory by the Armenians unfathomable and aligned themselves with Gorbachev\'s position.Kaufman, Stuart (2001). Modern Hatreds: The Symbolic Politics of Ethnic War. New York: Cornell Studies in Security Affairs, 49–66. ISBN 0-8014-8736-6.
Ethnic infighting soon broke out between Armenians and Azerbaijanis living in Karabakh. On February 22, 1988, a direct confrontation between Azerbaijanis and Armenians, near the town of Askeran (located on the road between Stepanakert and Agdam) in Nagorno-Karabakh, degenerated into a skirmish. During the clashes, which left about 50 Armenians wounded, a local policeman, purportedly an Armenian, shot dead two Azerbaijani youths. On February 27, 1988, while speaking on Baku\'s central television, the Soviet Deputy Procurator Alexander Katusev mentioned the nationality of those killed.
The Askeran clash was the prelude to Sumgait pogroms, where emotions, already heightened by news about Karabakh crisis, turned even uglier in a series of protests starting February 27, 1988Kaufman, Stuart J. (2001). Modern Hatreds: The Symbolic Politics of Ethnic War. Cornell University Press, 63 chapterurl=http://books.google.com/books?id=2Plw98pTk5wC&pg=PA63&sig=JPP_bQXGl7c8kjQ-jk1_k6Mz3WE. ISBN 0801487366. . Speaking at the rallies, Azerbaijani refugees from the Armenian town of Ghapan accused Armenians of "murder and atrocities including raping women and cutting their breasts off". Within hours, a pogrom against Armenian residents began in Sumgait, a city some 25 kilometers north of Baku, where some 2000 Azerbaijani refugees from Armenia were settledRabo, Annika; Utas, Bo (2005). The Role of the State in West Asia. Swedish Research Institute in Istanbul, 169. ISBN 9186884131. . The pogroms resulted in the deaths of 32 people, according to official Soviet statistics, although many Armenians feel that the figures were understated by the Soviet media, as nearly all of Sumgait\'s Armenian population left the city after the pogrom. Armenians were beaten, raped and killed both on the streets of Sumgait and inside their apartments in three days of violence that was only put down when Soviet armed forces entered the city and quelled much of the rioting on March 1Shahmuratian, Samvel (1990). The Sumgait Tragedy: Pogroms Against Armenians in Soviet Azerbaijan. New York: Zoryan Institute. ISBN 0892414901. .
The manner of which many Armenians were killed reverberated amongst Armenians who felt the pogrom was backed by government officials to intimidate those involved in the Karabakh movement. Violence slowly began to escalate after Sumgait as Gorbachev finally decided to send in Soviet Interior troops to Armenia in September 1988. By October 1989, over 100 people were estimated to have been killed since the revived idea of unification with Karabakh in February 1988.Hofheinz, Paul. "On the Edge of Civil War", TIME Magazine, October 23, 1989. Retrieved on 2006-03-13. The issue temporarily absolved, when on December 7, 1988, a devastating earthquake hit Armenia, leveling the towns of Leninakan (now Gyumri) and Spitak, and killing an estimated 25,000 peopleBrune, Lester H. (2002). Chronological History of U.S. Foreign Relations. Routledge, 1133. ISBN 0415939143. So alarming was the deterioration of relations between Armenians and Azeris in the course of 1988 that when the earthquake hit, many of the residents living in Leninakan thought that an explosive or bomb been set off by the Azeris. There were also numerous reports of celebrations taking place in Azerbaijan, praising the earthquake over the damage it wrought against Armenians: op. cit. in Melkonian. My Brother\'s Road, p. 163..
Gorbachev\'s attempts to stabilize the region were to no avail, as both sides were equally intransigent. Armenians refused to allow the issue to subside despite concessions made by Gorbachev, including a promise of a 400 million rubles package to introduce Armenian language textbooks and television programming in Karabakh. At the same time, Azerbaijan was unwilling to cede any territory to Armenia. Furthermore, the newly formed Karabakh Committee, which comprised eleven members including the future president of Armenia Levon Ter-Petrossian, were jailed by Moscow officials in the ensuing chaos after the quake. Such actions polarized relations between Armenia and the Kremlin; Armenians lost faith in Gorbachev and despised him even more because of his mishandling of the earthquake and his uncompromising stance in regards to Nagorno-KarabakhChorbajian, Levon (2001). The Making of Nagorno-Karabagh: From Secession to Republic. New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 161, 213. ISBN 0333773403. . In January 2003, commenting about Nagorno-Karabakh conflict at the Diplomatic Academy of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, President of Armenia Robert Kocharian stated:
| “ | The Armenian pogroms in Sumgait and Baku, and the attempts at mass military deportation of Armenians from Karabakh in 1991-92 indicate the impossibility for Armenians to live in Azerbaijan in general. We are talking about some sort of ethnic incompatibility"President Robert Kocharian was hosted at the Diplomatic Academy of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs", President.AM News Server, January 16, 2003. Retrieved on 2008-01-12. . | ” |
Inter-ethnic strife began to take a toll on both countries\' populations, forcing most of the Armenians in Azerbaijan to flee back to Armenia and most of the Azeris in Armenia to Azerbaijan. The situation in Nagorno-Karabakh had grown so out of hand that in January 1989 the central government in Moscow temporarily took control of the region, a move welcomed by many Armenians. In the summer of 1989, Popular Front leaders and their ever-increasing supporters managed to pressure the Azerbaijan SSR to instigate a railway and air blockade against Armenia, effectively crippling Armenia\'s economy, as 85% of the cargo and goods arrived through rail traffic (this also cut off Nakhichevan from the rest of the Soviet Union). The disruption of rail service to Armenia was in part due to the attacks of Armenian militants on Azerbaijani train crews entering Armenia, who then began refusing to do so.
In January 1990, another pogrom against Armenians in Baku forced Gorbachev to declare a state of emergency and sent MVD troops to restore order. A curfew was established and violent clashes between the soldiers and the surging Azerbaijan Popular Front were common, in one instance over 120 Azeris and eight MVD soldiers were killed in Baku. Smolowe, Jill. "The Killing Zone", Time Magazine, January 29, 1990. Retrieved on 2006-02-25. During this time, however, Azerbaijan\'s Communist Party had fallen and the belated order to send the MVD forces had more to do with keeping the Party in power than to protect the city\'s Armenian population.Abu-Hamad, Aziz, et al. Playing the "Communal Card": Communal Violence and Human Rights Human Rights Watch. The events, referred to as "Black January," also delineated the relations between Azerbaijan and Russia.
Fighting spread through other cities in Azerbaijan, including, in December 1988, in Ganja and Nakhichevan, where seven people (four of them soldiers) were killed and hundreds injured when Soviet army units attempted to stop attacks directed at Armenians.Hofheinz, Paul. "Nationalities People Power, Soviet Style", Time Magazine, December 5, 1988. Retrieved on 2006-05-02.
In the spring of 1991, President Gorbachev held a special countrywide referendum called the Union Treaty which would decide if the Soviet republics would remain together. Newly elected, non-communist leaders had come to power in the Soviet republics, including Boris Yeltsin in Russia (Gorbachev remained the President of the Soviet Union), Levon Ter-Petrossian in Armenia and Ayaz Mutalibov in Azerbaijan. Armenia and five other republics boycotted the referendum (Armenia would hold its own referendum and declared its independence from the Soviet Union on September 21, 1991), whereas Azerbaijan voted in compliance to the Treaty.
As many Armenians and Azeris in Karabakh began an arms build up (by acquiring weaponry located in caches throughout Karabakh) in order to defend themselves, Mutalibov touted support from Gorbachev in launching a joint military operation (in this case, by the Azerbaijani OMON special squads of the militsiya) in order to disarm Armenian militants in the region. Known as Operation Ring, the operation forcibly deported Armenians living in villages in the region of Shahumyan. It was perceived by both Soviet officials from the Kremlin and from the Armenian government as a method of intimidating the Armenian populace to giving up their demands for unification.
The operation proved counter-productive to what it had originally sought to accomplish. The initial Armenian resistance inspired volunteers who flocked from Armenia, and only reinforced the belief among Armenians that the only solution to the Karabakh conflict was through outright armed conflict. Monte Melkonian, an Armenian-American who had served in revolutionary groups in the 1980s and would later rise to be perhaps the most famed commander of the war, argued that Karabakh be "liberated" and contended that if it remained in Azeri hands, the region of Syunik would then be annexed by the Azeris and the rest of Armenia would follow thereafter, concluding that "the loss of Artsakh could be the loss of Armenia."Melkonian, Markar (2005). My Brother\'s Road, An American\'s Fateful Journey to Armenia. New York: I. B. Tauris. ISBN 1-85043-635-5. Velayat Kuliev, a writer and the deputy director of Azerbaijan\'s Literary Institute disputed this, "Lately the Armenian nationalists, including some quite influential people, have started talking again about \'Greater Armenia\'. Its not just Azerbaijan. They want to annex parts of Georgia, Iran and Turkey."Malkasian, Mark (1996). Gha-Ra-Bagh!: The Emergence of the National Democratic Movement in Armenia. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 157. ISBN 0-8143-2605-6.
As the disintegration of the Soviet Union became a reality for Soviet citizens in the autumn of 1991, both sides sought to acquire weaponry from military caches located throughout Karabakh. The initial advantage tilted in Azerbaijan\'s favor. During the Cold War, the Soviet military doctrine for defending the Caucasus had outlined a strategy where Armenia would be a combat zone in the case NATO member Turkey invaded from the west. Thus, in the Armenian SSR only three divisions and no airfields had been established while the Azeri SSR had a total of five divisions and five military airfields. Furthermore, Armenia had approximately 500 railroad cars of ammunition in comparison to Azerbaijan\'s 10,000.Petrosian, David. "What Are the Reasons for Armenians\' Success in the Military Phase of the Karabakh Conflict?" Noyan Tapan Highlights. June 1, 2000
As MVD forces began pulling out, they bequeathed the Armenians and Azerbaijanis a vast arsenal of ammunition and stored armored vehicles. The government forces initially sent by Gorbachev three years earlier were from other republics of the Soviet Union and many had no wish to remain any longer. Most were poor, young conscripts and many simply sold their weapons for cash or even vodka to either side, some even trying to sell tanks and armored personnel carriers (APCs). The unsecured weapons caches led both sides to blame and mock Gorbachev\'s policies as the ultimate cause of the conflict. Carney, James. "Former Soviet Union Carnage in Karabakh", TIME Magazine, April 13, 1992. Retrieved on 2006-04-13. The Azeris purchased a large quantity of these vehicles, as reported by the Azeri Foreign Ministry in November 1993, which said it had acquired 286 tanks, 842 armored vehicles, and 386 artillery pieces from the power vacuum. Several black markets also sprang up which included weaponry from the West.Smith, Hedrick (1991). The New Russians. New York: Harper Perennial, 344–345. ISBN 0-380-71651-8.
Further evidence also showed that Azerbaijan received substantial military aid and provisions from Iran, Turkey and numerous Arab countries. Most weaponry was Russian-made or came from the former Eastern bloc countries however some improvisation was made by both sides. The Armenian Diaspora managed to donate a significant amount of money to be sent to Armenia and even managed to push for legislation in the United States Congress to pass a bill entitled Section 907 of the Freedom Support Act in response to Azerbaijan\'s blockade against Armenia; restricting a complete ban on military aid from the United States to Azerbaijan in 1992.Section 907 of the Freedom Support Act. Humanitarian aid was not explicitly banned but such supplies had to be routed through indirectly to aid organizations. On January 25 2002, President George W. Bush signed a waiver that effectively repealed Section 907; thereby removing any restrictions that were barring the United States from sending military aid to Azerbaijan; however, military parity is maintained towards both sides. For more information, see here [4]. Azerbaijan continues to maintain their road and air blockade against Armenia. While Azerbaijan charged that the Russians were initially helping the Armenians, it was said that "the Azeri fighters in the region [were] far better equipped with Soviet military weaponry than their opponents."
With Gorbachev resigning as Soviet General-Secretary on December 26, 1991, the remaining republics including the Ukraine, Belarus and Russia declared their independence and the Soviet Union ceased to exist on December 31, 1991. This dissolution gave way to any barriers that were keeping Armenia and Azerbaijan from waging a full scale war. One month prior, on November 21, the Azerbaijani Parliament rescinded Karabakh\'s status as an autonomous oblast and renamed its capital "Xankandi". In response, on December 10, a referendum was held in Karabakh by parliamentary leaders (with the local Azeri community boycotting it) where the Armenians voted overwhelmingly in favor of independence. On January 6 1992, the region declared its independence from Azerbaijan.
The withdrawal of the Soviet interior forces from Nagorno-Karabakh in the Caucasus region was only temporary. By February 1992, the former Soviet states consolidated as the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). While Azerbaijan abstained from joining, Armenia, fearing a possible invasion by Turkey in the escalating conflict, entered the CIS which would have protected it under a "collective security umbrella". In January 1992, the CIS forces then moved in and established a headquarters at Stepanakert and took up a slightly more active role in peacekeeping, incorporating old units including the 366th Motorized Rifle Regiment and 4th Army.
The sporadic battles between Armenians and Azeris had intensified after Operation Ring recruited thousands of volunteers into improvised armies from both Armenia and Azerbaijan. In Armenia, a recurrent and popular theme at the time compared and idolized the separatist fighters to historical Armenian guerrilla groups and revered individuals such as Andranik Ozanian and Garegin Njdeh, who fought against the Ottoman Empire during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. In addition to the government\'s conscription of males aged 18–45, many Armenians volunteered to fight and formed tchokats, or detachments, of about forty men, which combined with several others were under the command of a Lieutenant Colonel. Initially, many of these men chose when and where to serve and acted on their own behalf, rarely without any oversight, when attacking or defending areas. Direct insubordination was common as many of the men simply did not show up, looted the bodies of dead soldiers, and commodities such as diesel oil for armored vehicles disappeared only to be sold in black markets.
Many women enlisted in the Armenian military; however, they more often served in auxiliary roles such as providing first-aid and evacuating wounded men from the battlefields than taking part in the fighting. Azerbaijan\'s military functioned in much the same manner; however, it was better organized during the first years of the war. The Azeri government also carried out conscription and many Azeris enthusiastically enlisted for combat in the first months after the Soviet Union collapsed. Azerbaijan\'s National Army consisted of roughly 30,000 men, in addition to nearly 10,000 in its OMON paramilitary force and several thousand volunteers from the Popular Front. Suret Huseynov, a wealthy Azeri, also improvised by creating his own military brigade, the 709th of the Azerbaijani Army, and purchasing many weapons and vehicles from the 23rd Motor Rifle Division\'s arsenal. İsgandar Hamidov\'s bozkurt or Grey Wolves brigade also mobilized for action. The government of Azerbaijan also poured a great deal of money into hiring mercenaries from other countries through the revenue it was making from its oil field assets on and near the Caspian Sea. Gurdelik, Rasit. "Azerbaijanis Rebuild Army with Foreign Help", The Seattle Times, January 30, 1994, pp. A3. Retrieved on 2006-08-12.
Former troops of the Soviet Union also offered their services to either side. For example, one of the most prominent officers to serve on the Armenian side was former Soviet General Anatoly Zinevich, who remained in Nagorno-Karabakh for five years (1992 – 1997) and was involved in planning and implementation of many operations of the Armenian forces. By the end of war he held the position of Chief of Staff of the NKR armed forces.(Russian) Barkoudzaryan, Alvard. "К войне невозможно привыкнуть" (You cannot get used to war). in Газета «Новое время» (New Time) N. 797, November 21, 2006. Nagorno-Karabakh Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Retrieved February 20, 2007 The estimated amount of manpower and military vehicles each entity involved in the conflict had in the 1993–1994 time period was:Chorbajian, Levon; Patrick Donabedian, Claude Mutafian (1994). The Caucasian Knot: The History and Geopolitics of Nagorno-Karabagh. London: Zed Books, 13–18. ISBN 1-85649-288-5. The statistics cited by the authors is from data compiled by the International Institute for Strategic Studies based in London, Great Britain in a report entitled The Military Balance, 1993–1994 published in 1993. The 20,000 figure of the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh included 8,000 volunteers from Armenia itself; Armenia\'s military in the report was exclusively made up of members in the army; Azerbaijan\'s statistics referred to 38,000 members in its army and 1,600 in its air force. Reference to these statistics can be found on pp. 68–69 and 71–73 of the report.
| Entity | Military Personnel | Artillery | Tanks | Armored personnel carriers | Armored fighting vehicles | Fighter aircraft |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh | 20,000 | 16 | 13 | 120 | N/A | N/A |
| Republic of Armenia | 20,000 | 170 | 160 | 240 | 200 | N/A |
| Republic of Azerbaijan | 42,000 | 330 | 280 | 360 | 480 | 170 |
In an overall military comparison, the number of men eligible for military service in Armenia, in the age group of 17–32, totaled 550,000, while in Azerbaijan it was 1.3 million. Most men from both sides had served in the Soviet Army and so had some form of military experience prior to the conflict. Among Karabakh Armenians, about 60% had served in the Soviet Army. Most Azeris, however, were often subject to discrimination during their service in the Soviet military and relegated to work in construction battalions rather than fighting corps.Curtis, Glenn E. (1995). Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia Country Studies. Washington D.C.: Federal Research Division Library of Congress. ISBN 0-8444-0848-4. Despite the establishment of two officer academies including a naval school in Azerbaijan, the lack of such military experience was one factor that rendered Azerbaijan unprepared for the war.
Officially the newly created Republic of Armenia publicly denied any involvement in providing any weapons, fuel, food, or other logistics to the secessionists in Nagorno-Karabakh. However, Ter-Petrossian later did admit to supplying them with logistical supplies and paying the salaries of the separatists but denied sending any of its own men to combat. Armenia faced a debilitating blockade by the now Republic of Azerbaijan as well as pressure from neighboring Turkey, which decided to side with Azerbaijan and build a closer relationship with it.Gokay, Bulent (2003). The Politics of Caspian Oil. New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 189–190. ISBN 0-3337-3973-6. The only land connection Armenia had with Karabakh was through the narrow mountainous Lachin corridor which could only be reached by helicopters. The region\'s only airport was in the small town of Khojaly, which was seven kilometers north of Stepanakert with an estimated population of 6,000–10,000 people. Additionally, Khojaly had been serving as an artillery base and since February 23, was shelling Armenian and Russian units in the capital. By late February, Khojaly had largely been cut off. On February 26, Armenian forces, with the aid of armored vehicles in the 366th, mounted an offensive to capture Khojaly.
According to the Azeris and the affirmation of other sources including Human Rights Watch and the Moscow based human rights organization Memorial, after Armenian forces captured Khojaly, they proceeded to massacre several hundred civilians evacuating from the town. Armenian forces had previously stated they would attack the city and left a land corridor for them to escape through. However, when the attack began, the attacking Armenian force easily outnumbered and overwhelmed the defenders who along with the civilians attempted to retreat north to the Azeri held city of Agdam. The airport\'s runway was found to have been intentionally destroyed, rendering it temporarily useless. The attacking forces then went on to pursue those fleeing through the corridor and opened fire upon them, killing scores of civilians.As one survivor put it, Armenian forces, continued to "just [shoot] and [shoot] and [shoot]: Melkonian. My Brother\'s Road. p. 213. Facing charges of an intentional massacre of civilians by international groups, Armenian government officials denied the occurrence of a massacre and asserted an objective of silencing the artillery coming Khojaly.The Armenian government denies that a deliberate massacre took place in Khojaly and maintains most of the civilians were killed in a crossfire shooting between Armenian and Azeri troops. An exact body count was never ascertained but conservative estimates have placed the number to 485. The official death toll provided by Azerbaijani authorities for casualties suffered during the events of February 25–26 is 613 civilians, of them 106 women and 83 children.Letter from the Charge d\'affaires a.i. of the Permanent Mission of Azerbaijan to the United Nations Office On March 3, 1992, the Boston Globe reported over 1,000 people had been slain over four years of conflict. It quoted the Mayor of Khojaly, Elmar Mamedov, as also saying 200 more were missing, 300 were held hostage, and 200 injured in the fighting.Quinn-Judge, Paul. "Armenians killed 1000, Azeris charge.", Boston Globe, 1992-03-03. Retrieved on 2007-03-02.
A report published in 1992 by the human rights organization Helsinki Watch however stated that their inquiry found that the Azerbaijani OMON and "the militia, still in uniform, and some still carrying their guns, were interspersed with the masses of civilians" which may have been the reason why Armenian troops fired upon them.Denber R. Bloodshed in the Caucasus: Escalation of the Armed Conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh (New York: Helsinki Watch), September 1992, 19–21 ISBN 1-5643-2081-2
Armenian children standing next to the rubble of a building in Stepanakert after a shelling barrage.
The aftermath of the Khojaly attack erupted in Azerbaijan. Mutalibov was called to step down from his post by many who charged that he failed to protect the civilians in Khojaly and forced to resign amid the hail of criticism on March 6. In the ensuing months after the capture of Khojaly, Azeri commanders holding out in the region\'s last bastion of Shusha began a large scale artillery bombardment with GRAD rocket launchers against Stepanakert. By April, the shelling had forced many of the 50,000 people living in Stepanakert to seek refuge in underground bunkers and basements. Facing ground incursions near the city\'s outlying areas, military leaders in Nagorno-Karabakh organized an offensive to take the town.
On May 8, a force of several hundred Armenian troops accompanied by tanks and helicopters attacked the Shusha citadel. Fierce fighting took place in the town\'s streets and several hundred men were killed on both sides. Overwhelmed by the numerically superior fighting force, the Azeri commander in Shusha ordered a retreat and fighting ended on May 9.
The capture of Shusha resonated loudly in neighboring Turkey. Its relations with Armenia had grown better after it had declared its independence from the Soviet Union; however they gradually worsened as a result of Armenia\'s gains in the Nagorno-Karabakh region. A deep resentment towards Turkey by Armenia predated the Soviet era and this enmity stemmed in part from the Armenian Genocide. Many Armenians collectively referred to Azeris as "Turks" since they are considered ethnic cousins. Turkey\'s prime minister, Suleyman Demirel said that he was under intense pressure by his people to have his country intervene and aid Azerbaijan. Demirel however, was opposed to such an intervention, saying that Turkey\'s entrance into the war would trigger an even greater Muslim-Christian conflict (Turks are predominantly Muslims).Rubin, Barry; Kemal Kirisci (2001). Turkey in World Politics: An Emerging Multiregional Power. Boulder, Co: Lynne Rienner, 175. ISBN 1-55587-954-3.
Turkey never did actively contribute troops to Azerbaijan but did send a great deal of military aid and advisers. In May 1992, the military commander of the CIS forces, Marshal Yevgeny Shaposhnikov, issued a warning to Western nations, especially the United States, to not interfere with the conflict in the Caucasus; stating it would "place us [the Commonwealth] on the verge of a third world war, and that cannot be allowed."
A Chechen contingent, led by Shamil Basayev, was one of the units to participate in the conflict. According to Azeri Colonel Azer Rustamov, in 1992, "hundreds of Chechen volunteers rendered us invaluable help in these battles led by Shamil Basayev and Salman Raduev." Basayev was said to be one of the last fighters to leave Shusha. Basayev later said during his career, he and his battalion had only lost once, and that defeat came in Karabakh in fighting against the "Dashnak battalion". He later said he pulled his mujahideen out of the conflict when the war seemed to be more for nationalism than for jihad. During the conflict, Basayev was first introduced to Amir Ibn Khattab.Mouradian, Khatchig. "Terror in Karabakh: Chechen Warlord Shamil Basayev\'s Tenure in Azerbaijan", The Armenian Weekly On-Line (AWOL). Retrieved on 2007-02-15. Azerbaijani Ministry of Defence denies involvement of the latter.Khalilova, Konut. Eurasia insight. Chechen fighter’s death reveals conflicted feelings in Azerbaijan. EurasiaNet Eurasia Insight. May 10, 2002. Retrieved March 15, 2006.
Members of the Armenian "Dashnak battalion" celebrate the capture of Shusha in front of Ghazanchetsots Cathedral.
Azeri artillery shelling Armenian positions in the onset of the 1992 summer offensive.
The loss of Shusha led the Azeri parliament to lay the blame on Mamedov, which removed him from power and cleared Mutalibov of any responsibility after the loss of Khojaly; reinstating him as President on May 15 1992. Many Azeris saw this act as a coup in addition to the cancellation of the parliamentary elections slated in June of that year. The Azeri parliament at that time was made up of former leaders from the country\'s communist regime and the losses of Khojaly and Shusha only aggrandized their desires for free elections.
To contribute to the turmoil, an offensive was launched by Armenian forces on May 18 to take the city of Lachin in the narrow corridor separating Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh. The city itself was poorly guarded and, within the next day, Armenian forces took control of the town and cleared any remaining Azeris to open the road that linked the region to Armenia. The taking of the city then allowed an overland route to be connected with Armenia itself with supply convoys beginning to trek up the mountainous region of Lachin to Karabakh.Bertsch, Gary (1999). Crossroads and Conflict: Security and Foreign Policy in the Caucasus and Central Asia. London: Routledge, 167–171, 172–173, 297. ISBN 0-415-92273-9.
The loss of Lachin was the final blow to Mutalibov\'s regime. Demonstrations were held despite Mutalibov\'s ban and an armed coup was staged by Popular Front activists. Fighting between government forces and Popular Front supporters escalated as the political opposition seized the parliament building in Baku as well as the airport and presidential office. On June 16, 1992, Abulfaz Elchibey was elected leader of Azerbaijan with many political leaders from the Azerbaijan Popular Front Party were elected into the parliament. The instigators characterized Mutalibov as an undedicated and weak leader in the war in Karabakh. Elchibey was staunchly against receiving any help from the Russians, instead favoring closer ties to Turkey.Brown, Michael E. (1996). The International Dimensions of Internal Conflict. Cambridge: MIT Press, 125. ISBN 0-262-52209-8.
On June 12 1992, the Azeri military, along with Huseynov\'s own brigade, used a large amount of tanks, armored personnel carriers and attack helicopters to launch Operation Goranboy, a large three-day offensive from the relatively unguarded region of Shahumyan, north of Nagorno-Karabakh, in the process taking back several dozen villages in the Shahumyan region originally held by Armenian forces. Another reason the front collapsed so effortlessly was because it was manned by the volunteer detachments from Armenia which had abandoned the lines to go back to their country after the capture of Lachin. The offensive prompted the Armenian government to openly threaten Azerbaijan that it would overtly intervene and assist the separatists fighting in Karabakh.Goldberg, Carey. "Azerbaijan Troops Launch Karabakh Offensive Conflict", The Los Angeles Times, June 14, 1992. Retrieved on 2007-02-17.
The assault forced Armenian forces to retreat south towards Stepanakert where Karabakh commanders contemplated destroying a vital hydroelectric dam in the Martakert region if the offensive was not halted. An estimated 30,000 Armenian refugees were also forced to flee to the capital as the assaulting forces had taken back nearly half of Nagorno-Karabakh. However, the thrust made by the Azeris ground to a halt when their armor was driven off by helicopter gunships. It was claimed that many of the crew members of the armored units in the Azeri launched assault were Russians from the 104th Guards Airborne Division based out of Ganja and, ironically enough, so were the units who eventually stopped them. According to an Armenian government official, they were able to persuade Russian military units to bombard and effectively halt the advance within a few days. This allowed the Armenian government to recuperate for the losses and reorganize a counteroffensive to restore the original lines of the front.
In the summer of 1992, the CSCE (later to become the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe), created the Minsk Group in Helsinki which was comprised of eleven nations and was co-chaired by France, Russia, and the United States with the purpose of mediating a peace deal with Armenia and Azerbaijan. However, in their annual summit in 1992, the organization failed to address and solve the many new problems that had arisen since the Soviet Union collapsed, much less the Karabakh conflict. The war in Yugoslavia, Moldova\'s war with the breakaway republic of Transnistria, the growing desire for independence from Russia by Chechen separatists, and Georgia\'s renewed disputes with Russia, Abkhazia and Ossetia were all top agenda issues that involved various ethnic groups fighting each other.Freire, Maria Raquel (2003). Conflict and Security in the Former Soviet Union: The Role of the OSCE. Burlington, VT: Ashgate. ISBN 0-7546-3526-0.
The CSCE proposed the use of NATO and CIS peacekeepers to monitor cease-fires and protect shipments of humanitarian aid being sent to displaced refugees. Several cease fires were put into effect after the June offensive but the implementation of a European peacekeeping force, endorsed by Armenia, never came to fruition. The idea of sending 100 international observers to Karabakh was once raised but talks broke down completely between Armenian and Azeri leaders in July. Russia was especially opposed to allowing a multinational peacekeeping force from NATO to entering the Caucasus, seeing it as a move that encroached on its "backyard".
An Armenian fighter firing an NSV heavy machine gun, often found on ta
