Ukraine — Armenia — Russia — World War III?

The well-known and influential public figure Arbak Khachatryan gave this interview to our editorial team more than six years ago. The material attracted considerable attention. Yet even now, in light of events in Armenia, Nagorno-Karabakh and Ukraine, and in relations between Russia and the United States, the arguments set out in this article remain highly relevant. We invite our readers to read it again and reflect with our interviewee on the geopolitical prospects of the post-Soviet space.

At first glance, there seems to be no reason for concern. All the latest news from Armenia is thoroughly positive: accession to the EAEU, the Pope’s speech, and the EU resolution on the genocide of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire. But our interviewee is adamant: unless the dangerous direction of Russia’s relations with the countries of Southwest Asia changes now, an explosion will occur here that will make all earlier geopolitical crises look insignificant.

Arbak Shaumyanovich Khachatryan, a former adviser to the President of the Republic of Armenia, a former adviser to the Human Rights Commissioner of the Russian Federation, and an independent human rights defender, is a frequent guest at our editorial office. He has repeatedly offered sharp comments on the most pressing issues. Sharp and truthful: Arbak Khachatryan has never placed personal safety and comfort above state interests. He wrote his first open letters to Vladimir Putin back in 2003–04. He wrote them while held in Lefortovo on a fabricated charge initiated by the political leadership of the Republic of Armenia at the time:

‘Covering up one’s political ignorance by switching off electricity, closing the gas valve or refusing imports of mandarins and wine is unworthy of a civilized world power. Most decisions are made for public relations purposes and may bring temporary, local gains. There are evidently shortsighted actions concerning Adjara, Abkhazia and Transnistria, and arms supplies to Syria, which will only have negative consequences for Russia in the future. In strategic matters, the actual geopolitical problems that have emerged between other states—China and Japan, Iran and Azerbaijan, and so on—are not being used to Russia’s advantage.

I can have no complaints against the current figures, since by their very nature they are unlikely to be capable of solving such serious problems. Every political upstart, through his actions and entourage—guards, cars, mansions and foreign bank accounts—demonstrates his supremacy over ordinary people and the law. In political, judicial and party circles, decisions are made for appearances. A commissioned order becomes the basis of every decision. Legislators are not professionals but celebrities from sport and show business, doctors…

‘…The most dangerous thing for Russia is that most of those remaining around you are those “rich politicians” who are essentially doormats for those in power, while worthy people cannot speak openly; they are either isolated or destroyed…

‘…In January 2003, I wrote to you about the actions of certain officials whose activities could cause a crisis in Moscow’s relations with a number of CIS countries. The letter contained a forecast concerning relations with Georgia, Moldova, Kazakhstan and Ukraine and, most painfully for me, Armenia and the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. I placed all the blame on the local satraps and their guardians at the center. Still ahead are strategic problems such as the Caspian oil and gas pipelines. I think there will be similar problems with Ukraine, where anti-Russian sentiment is gradually growing…’

And now it is 2015. ISIS controls territory in three countries of Southwest Asia where eight million people live. Five million live in Novorossiya, while Georgia is a state partially hostile to Russia:

—In 2003, when I warned about Georgia, Syria and Ukraine, people laughed. They are no longer laughing. But the true causes of the local and global crises taking place are not being addressed either. Nor will they ever be addressed as long as the old libertarian economic model operates, as long as the so-called ‘golden billion’ runs the world while 70% of the Earth’s population goes hungry. Russia’s economy and banking sector all follow this model like diligent pupils. Unless we reorient the economy to serve society as a whole rather than the ‘chosen few’, we will continue to suffer defeat after defeat. It does not matter what the ideological component is—ISIS Salafism, Bandera-style nationalism in Ukraine, or the Houthis in Yemen. What matters is that a well-fed population will not overthrow its government.

Misguided directions of foreign policy influence lead to unsatisfactory, losing results. Russia is very concerned—at least that is what its diplomats keep saying—about NATO’s eastward expansion. But what do we have now? We have US armed forces exercises in Ukraine. And nobody wants to draw conclusions; nobody is in a hurry to take responsibility for a mistaken strategy toward a neighboring state that was initially friendly. Now Russian-Armenian relations are next in line for the same failure that occurred in Russian-Ukrainian relations.

Yet neither Russia nor Armenia, despite the warnings of a world in flames, intends to change its ‘state strategy’. And Khachatryan again writes an open letter to the head of state, stressing that this is the last chance:

‘Dear Vladimir Vladimirovich,

‘More than ten years ago I wrote to you, warning of approaching dangers. To my regret, those fears have come true. Since then the situation in the world and in the country has become much worse. I do not in any way question your personal competence or the fact that you are guided above all by state interests in your work. But many of those around you are precisely the swamp in which the best and most sound initiatives sink. They are interested exclusively in working for themselves, solely for personal enrichment. They are profoundly indifferent to the problems of the people of Russia and to Russia itself.

‘The performance of many of your officials is catastrophic. In recent years Russia has invested several hundred billion dollars in Ukraine’s economy and business. This went both to real projects and to ensuring that Ukrainian politicians remained loyal to Russia. By Barack Obama’s own admission, the United States allocated five billion to resolving the “Ukrainian question”—almost a hundred times less. The result was the “Maidan”, a coup d’état and bloody chaos in the country. It turns out that American officials, commonly called stupid, worked a hundred times more effectively than your “effective managers”.

‘It is no secret that from the moment Russia, under your leadership, began to grow stronger and cause problems for the West, American and European politicians serving their oligarchies set themselves the goal of weakening our country as much as possible. The best way to do this is to draw Russia into a military conflict and ignite a fire on its borders. Ten years ago I drew your attention to the fact that this fire might flare up in Ukraine. That is what happened. At the time, I also said that Armenia could become the next target.

‘The situations in Ukraine and Armenia are virtually carbon copies of one another. To a great extent, this is the result of Russian officials’ activities. Their only method is to grease the palms of the local authorities, hook them on a stream of money and thereby buy their loyalty. It is how a market trader bribes a corrupt policeman. That is the level of Russian diplomacy. They do not understand that a venal official is always ready to sell out and betray if the advantage changes.

‘Russia supplies “its” politicians with gas and other raw materials at low prices, and they sell them to their own people at three or four times the price. The difference ends up in their pockets and goes to their Western accounts. They are oriented toward the West, not Russia. And the West knows this: it has a firm grip on these people by their most sensitive part—their wallet. Therefore, at the slightest danger, they will switch sides and betray Russia.

‘But that is only half the trouble. The main point is that under these circumstances the people in these countries become poorer while the politicians grow fat. People are forced to live on the brink of hunger or seek work in other countries—in Russia, for example. But they are not welcome here; they are called guest workers and treated as second-class people. Russians think, “We supply you with everything at half price, so you owe us everything.” But they fail to understand that all the assistance ends up in the pockets of local petty rulers.

Meanwhile, people in Armenia and Ukraine see something different: Russia helps its puppet appointees, not the people. That is where anti-Russian sentiment comes from, and the desire to get away from Russia to anywhere, even Europe. Yes, they are not welcome in Europe either, but people do not yet know that. And this social tension only benefits the United States: Russia itself does its work for it, alienating the peoples of friendly countries by feeding their thieving rulers.

‘Why am I drawing your attention to Armenia so insistently? I fear that it is the immediate target for igniting another Maidan crisis. Armenia is very important to Russia as an outpost in the Caucasus and Transcaucasia. Russian troops are stationed here. Russians protect Armenia’s border. But Armenia is also extremely vulnerable because of its longstanding conflict with Azerbaijan and the constantly smoldering Nagorno-Karabakh issue, ready to flare up at any moment. To make Russia “fight” on two fronts, the overseas directors of color revolutions will do everything to fan this fire.

All the signs are already visible, and they are the same as in Ukraine: an utterly impoverished population seeking work abroad—more than 60 percent of Armenians have left their homeland in search of earnings; thoroughly corrupt authorities living off Moscow; and increasingly clear popular dissatisfaction with Russia and its policies. Meanwhile, Russian “diplomats”, if one can call them that, only add fuel with their clumsy steps.

‘It is clear that Russia cannot cast aside contacts with Azerbaijan. But it must understand that Baku’s orientation is not Moscow and never will be. Azerbaijan is oriented toward Turkey! “Turkish Stream”, presented to Russians as a tremendous victory, is actually a time bomb. Yes, it promises economic benefits. But the difference between a wheeler-dealer and a statesman is that the latter looks beyond the next financial receipts. Russia’s fraternization with Turkey has caused pain in Armenia. People there feel betrayed and sense a growing threat.

What use will Russia get from this pipeline—which still has to be built—if war begins in Armenia? And in that war Russia will not be regarded as a friend and ally, because it will be precisely its actions that spur the war. In that case, can Russia sustain a “war on two fronts”? Or will it have to leave Transcaucasia, handing this strategically important region entirely to its opponents?

‘Vladimir Vladimirovich,

‘The existing power system does not admit to high office the many people in Russia who truly think and act in the interests of the state. Instead, a number of key positions are occupied by untalented, unenterprising, self-serving and simply primitive-minded wheeler-dealers whose main and only merit is membership in the team. They cannot even boast of personal loyalty to you, because they are loyal only to their own interests and will betray you at the first sign of danger.

‘Russia faces enormous, monumental tasks. The fierce confrontation with the West has united Russians. In these circumstances, Vladimir Vladimirovich, you have a unique chance, with popular support, to break the exhausted underlying system and build a new one in which genuinely professional people oriented toward the state will have a worthy place. If this is not done, the opportunity will be lost forever.

‘History does not give a second attempt.’

While we were preparing this publication, significant events continued to occur around the world, confirming that Arbak Khachatryan was right. Failing to comment on them would be a crime against the peoples of Russia and Armenia.

The Direct Line with the President of Russia:

—I was once struck by a remark by Boris Gryzlov, who said, ‘We will support any candidate Putin puts forward.’ What a disgrace! He admitted that he was nobody, merely a function. If Putin had ‘introduced his horse into the Senate’, as Caligula once did to emphasize the Senate’s insignificance, Gryzlov and others like him would have gladly voted for that horse too.

What can Putin do with such people around him? Take these notorious ‘Direct Lines with the President’. Yes, he looks like a benevolent tsar who solves the water-supply problems of a small town, helps a schoolboy buy a bicycle, or helps a husband choose a breed of dog as a gift for his wife. If the president is resolving such issues, it means that the people he has in place locally are talentless incompetents who cannot or will not do anything themselves.

That is the problem with the current system in Russia. Nobody wants to do anything unless it benefits them personally: not a minister, not a governor, not the head of a village administration. They are not governing; they are feeding off their positions. They do not see their jobs as a way of serving the people and the country, but merely as a way to improve their own wealth. As long as such people are in power, nothing will change. And the money the state directs into the economy will settle in their bottomless pockets and go to Western banks. All these officials and businessmen feeding off the budget do not envisage their future in Russia. They have one goal: rake in as much as possible and leave for abroad. Do you really think they will build anything in this country? Why would they?

Returning to the ‘Direct Lines’: they fit neatly into the propaganda system, the system of information warfare that is now underway and in its hot phase. It is a system whose goal is to raise the level of hatred in society to unprecedented, gaping heights. But what will all these soldiers of information warfare do if common sense prevails and the world turns 180 degrees? The shoots of hatred they have sown cannot be uprooted quickly; these weeds have already entangled the entire planet.

‘Offshore amnesty’:

—The methods remain the same. The government continues to care about the wallets of big business rather than its citizens. A financial crisis occurs. And whom does the government start helping? The banks! Those who, to a great extent, provoked this crisis! Nobody intends to help the citizens who suffered most from it; they are left to their own devices. Manage however you can.

The capital amnesty is more of the same. We save and legalize criminally acquired castles on the French Riviera, while nothing is done for small businesses that are now dying because no loan can be obtained without a 50% ‘kickback’, even at today’s extortionate interest rate.

It is a disgraceful system. It repeats exactly what these authorities did in Ukraine and what they are doing now in Armenia. They buy loyalty from oligarchs while disregarding the needs of ordinary people. But a country is not its oligarchs. At the slightest danger, they will flee to the West, where they keep their savings. And the authorities will be left face to face with their people. Far from all of them will manage to escape.

I repeat: of course all these officials and oligarchs attached to power for their own benefit are guilty, but the system that produced them comes first. The system, not the people, sets the rules of the game. Adopt different, humane principles and these parasitic individuals will disappear, because fundamentally people are friends, comrades and brothers to one another, not wolves, as we are now told. There is fundamentally much more humanity in people; just give them a chance.

Weapons kill

On the eve of his farewell appearances in Moscow, Charles Aznavour, the best variety performer of the twentieth century according to a joint Time and CNN poll in 1998, reproaches ‘the great powers accustomed to subordinating morality to their own interests’ in his poignant Le Monde article ‘The Armenian Genocide: A Hundred Years of Solitude’. They bear responsibility for such catastrophes recurring again and again, Aznavour asserts: ‘Arms dealers have become the best friends of Azerbaijan’s oil dictatorship today. Not a single week has passed since the beginning of the year without some twenty-year-old young man dying on the line of contact between Karabakh and Azerbaijan. It breaks my heart.’

Arbak Khachatryan recalls that Russian weapons in Azerbaijan are already firing:

—I said four years ago that this would not end well. The intensity of exchanges of gunfire, including grenade launchers and mortars, on the line of contact between the armed forces of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic and Azerbaijan is no less than that seen in the hottest days of the confrontation between Ukraine’s armed forces and the Novorossiya militia. People die every day. It has already begun; these are the first sparks. But what is very bad for Russia is that the Armenian soldier standing on the border realizes that they are trying to kill him with Russian weapons. For Russian diplomacy and state corporations, this is once again ‘just business’. Immediate gain will lead to the loss of a strategic partner, as always. Partnership for profit rather than peace: is that the face of Russian diplomacy?

One has to look a little beyond the end of one’s nose! Even the latest lessons teach our diplomats nothing! Take the return of Crimea: when analyzing further actions, why overlook such an important historical detail as the perpetual confrontation between Russia and the Ottoman Empire on this bridgehead? Having chosen Turkey as a strategic partner for a new gas pipeline, we will repeatedly encounter difficulties that seem to arise from nowhere but have clear historical roots. We must remember this so we are not surprised afterward. Yes, Putin had no other course of action in the circumstances of the ‘Crimean spring’, but before it there had been twenty years of policy in Ukraine that, as we can now see, had failed. That is what I want to say: take a broader view, do not repeat your mistakes, place the welfare of peoples above immediate clan interests, and we will succeed.

That is precisely why I am certain that the question of repentance by the heirs of the Ottoman Empire for the Armenian genocide cannot be resolved through official diplomacy. Only the people of Turkey—the people, not their rulers—must themselves decide that the time has come to repent, that the people themselves have decided it is time to move forward so that nothing like this ever happens again. In doing so, they would show the strength to acknowledge the mistakes of the past. And only the people of Armenia must find the strength to accept and forgive. Nor will ‘gunboat diplomacy’ resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh issue: only restoring economic ties between peoples, only people’s diplomacy, can heal this wound.

From the editors.

What Arbak Khachatryan proposes is something we saw quite recently on the international stage in the actions of Sergey Lavrov and Hillary Clinton. It was called a ‘reset’, but it did not come together. It failed because it was an initiative ‘from above’. Now the time has come for people’s diplomacy rather than official diplomacy. Only the peoples, united, must decide their own fate. We call on proactive people who care, throughout the world, to join Arbak Khachatryan’s appeal. We must succeed—there is nobody else.