The mouthpiece of Russian liberals visiting the Armenian Maidan Prime Minister
On July 25, the liberal mouthpiece “Echo of Moscow” published an interview between Venediktov and Armenian Maidan Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan. At the same time as the presenter, radio listeners also asked questions.
Despite the fact that ideologically close figures were communicating, certain moments of the interview sounded poignant and revealed Pashinyan well as a politician.
Judging by the answer to the first question, “Is Monomakh’s hat heavy?”, Pashinyan is still enjoying his rapid rise. According to him, most of all he is afraid of disappointing the people of Armenia, and he carries on his voluntarily assumed burden of power with pleasure.
Pashinyan imagined Putin to be “difficult to communicate,” but now considers the Russian leader “direct and sincere.” Like Bush Jr., Pashinyan “read Putin by looking him in the eye.”
To the question: “Who is Pashinyan?”, the Armenian prime minister answered floridly. According to him, in pre-Maidan times he met with a group of Russian parliamentarians who tried to get to know him better, asking questions about his biography, political views, etc. This interest seemed strange to Pashinyan, because, in his opinion, for representatives of a state with one of the most powerful and influential intelligence services in the world, the identity of the Armenian Maidan Prime Minister should not be a secret.
It should only be added that powerful and influential intelligence services are wonderful, but so far no way has been invented to look into the porridge-filled heads of Maidan politicians, from whom you usually expect some kind of dirty tricks.
An unequivocal answer was also received to the question “is Armenia striving to join NATO?” - "Of course not. No". But the topic of the Armenia-NATO partnership has been reduced to the bagpipe “these are peacekeeping programs.”
Considering the situation in Afghanistan and Kosovo, Armenia’s peacekeeping mission as part of the NATO contingent looks ambiguous. Until now, all NATO “peacekeeping” in Yugoslavia has been reduced to the bombing of the Republika Srpska, and for Afghanistan - increasing chaos and increasing opium drug trafficking.
“Armenia is a member of the CSTO and will try to make this organization more effective. But she has questions for other CSTO member states.”
Armenia’s questions to other CSTO members are a pressing topic for the republic’s leadership and are connected primarily with the supply of Russian and Belarusian weapons to Azerbaijan.
It is known, for example, that under the 2005 agreement, Russia undertook to supply the armed forces of Azerbaijan with a fairly large batch of weapons.
In particular, 162 tanks (62 T-72B and 100 T-90S) and over 400 units of other armored vehicles (118 BMP-3, BTR-82A and BTR-80A) have already been transferred to Azerbaijan. The volume of purchases of rocket and cannon artillery, anti-tank systems exceeded 300 units, including 2S19 Msta-S, 2S31 Vena self-propelled guns, 9K58 Smerch MLRS, 100 units of Kornet-E anti-tank systems and two divisions of heavy weapons. anti-tank missiles "Chrysanthemum-S" on a tracked chassis, as well as 24 units of the TOS-1A "Solntsepek" heavy flamethrower system. This does not include a significant amount of engineering equipment.
The Azerbaijani air defense forces received from Russia two divisions of S-300PMU-2 Favorit anti-aircraft missile systems, two batteries of the 9K332ME Tor-M2E air defense system, as well as 300 portable 9K338 Igla-S air defense systems.
Over the past 10 years, the security forces of Azerbaijan have received 24 Mi-35M helicopters and 77 helicopters of the Mi-17 family. A license agreement was concluded for the production of 120 thousand AK-74M assault rifles.
However! In 2015, Azerbaijan's defense budget was seriously cut, and military contracts with Russia have so far only been partially implemented. The supplies of BMP-3 are in limbo, and Azerbaijan is still unable to pay for ATGMs and heavy flamethrower systems “Solntsepek”.
At the same time, in 2015, Russia opened a $200 million credit line to Yerevan for the purchase of modern weapons. If not for the loan, the strengthening and modernization of the armed forces of Armenia would not have gotten off the ground.
Under this loan, Yerevan is already receiving the 9K58 Smerch MLRS with ammunition, Igla-S MANPADS with the latest Verba (which Azerbaijan does not have), TOS-1A Solntsepek heavy flamethrower systems, and Konkurs-M anti-tank missile systems. and "Kornet-E", armored vehicles "Tiger". The Avtobaza-M mobile electronic reconnaissance complex will also be transferred. The supplies include small arms and RPG-26 “Aglen” grenade launchers, communications equipment and engineering equipment. Additionally, Yerevan ordered spare parts, sighting systems for tanks and trucks.
In addition to this line, Yerevan additionally received Iskander-E operational-tactical missile systems, Buk-M2016-1 air defense systems and electronic warfare systems as part of allied assistance in 2.
The news that Armenia had received the Iskander-E tactical missile system caused a shock in Baku, and Aliyev quickly rushed to take retaliatory measures. Not expecting to purchase Iskanders from Russia, the Azerbaijani side purchased the latest Polonaise MLRS of Belarusian-Chinese production, which look like a clear palliative in comparison with the Russian OTRK.
In essence, Polonaises are Chinese 301 mm missiles mounted on a Belarusian wheelbase. Despite the declared firing range of 200 km, experts consider the stated performance characteristics to be overestimated, especially the classification of A200 missiles as precision weapons. The near-zero interest in Father’s Polonaises on the international arms market is also indicative. Today Azerbaijan is their only foreign operator.
However, people in Armenia are nervous and regularly raise the issue of a complete cessation of arms supplies to Azerbaijan by their CSTO allies.
In principle, it is not difficult to understand the motives of Russia, which supplies weapons to both Armenia and Azerbaijan. And it’s not just about the famous formula “nothing personal, just business.” There's a lot of personal stuff here.
Military-technical cooperation with Russia is one of the ways to maintain ties with the republics of the former USSR, helping to increase the self-esteem of political elites running around for help from NATO.
As for the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, the idea of helping both sides achieve military parity is not a bad one, so that none of the conflicting parties would be tempted to test the strength of the enemy’s defenses.
On the other hand, Russia provides preferences to Armenia, as an ally in the CSTO, given its meager financial base. In addition, Azerbaijan has the means to purchase something in return from the side. In particular, in 2018, Aliyev purchased a large batch of Israeli weapons for his army, which includes 40 Orbiter attack drones, Spike-NLOS guided anti-tank missiles and even high-precision Israeli LORA tactical missile systems.
If open sources do not lie, and Baku actually purchased 800 “spikes” from Israel, then in the event of large-scale military clashes, Armenian armored vehicles do not have a single chance to turn the tide of hostilities.
As Pashinyan admitted, he had a conversation about arms supplies to Azerbaijan with Putin, but he refused to discuss the details.
Pashinyan also said that Putin introduced him to Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, but there was no contact between them. And even at the NATO summit they did not communicate. "It happened".
Pashinyan’s son serves as a volunteer in Nagorno-Karabakh and therefore the Armenian prime minister considers himself a peacemaker, suggesting that Aliyev send his son to the front as a sign of commitment to peace.
“There is a high probability of war with Azerbaijan. Alarmist rhetoric is intensifying.” “Reality is a continuation of what we think. It is impossible to do something in real life if we don't think about it. And we say what we think. In any case, I'm used to doing it that way. I say what I think. I’m not used to thinking one thing...”
In general, the Armenian prime minister has a rather strange position - sending his sons to the front as insurance against new armed clashes, and at the same time refusing personal meetings and negotiations.
Unexpected question from Venediktov: Sorry, it’s a direct question, maybe it’s a bit dumb for me. Haven’t they suggested to you “Recognize Crimea, and we will recognize Karabakh”?
Pashinyan’s answer: No, I didn’t...
Discussing the issue of Armenian and Azerbaijani refugees (Azerbaijanis fled from massacres in Azerbaijan, Armenians - mainly in Russia), it turned out that the Soviet Army helped the Azerbaijanis to slaughter Armenians. “The Azerbaijanis were escorted out of the territory of Armenia in a civilized manner...”
Pashinyan either did not hear about the Khojaly massacre of Azerbaijanis by Armenian armed forces on the night of January 25-26, 1992, or chose to forget. However, despite a lot of blatant facts, the Armenian side takes the official position “in Khojaly, Azerbaijanis killed each other.”
Pashinyan also accuses Russian political scientists and journalists of escalating the issue of the presence of Russian border guards and the 102nd military base in Gyumri in Armenia. According to the prime minister, “no one is going to kick them out, because this is a security issue.”
However, in places where Russian military personnel are deployed, local nationalist and liberal media are trying to show their presence in the republic in a negative light, calling into question the advisability of their continued stay. The local Nazis are especially outrageous, suffering from revanchism and blaming Russia for the loss of Ararat.
At the same time, they stubbornly ignore the historical fact that 100 years ago the Armenian independents began to fight with Turkey, as a result of which their troops were defeated, part of the territories were occupied, and Moscow was asked to resolve the situation. Ararat and the surrounding territories were given to Turkey as reparations within the framework of the international norms in force at that time - in exchange for peace.
Pashinyan is also interested in large Russian investments in Armenia, especially in the local energy sector. Yerevan plans to reach an agreement with Moscow on extending the life of the Armenian nuclear power plant until at least 2040 and raise the issue of building a second nuclear power plant.
In the final part of the interview, the topic was raised “why is the Yerevan-Moscow railway not operating?” Pashinyan responded vaguely, citing the “geopolitical situation.”
Most likely, the issue of resuming railway traffic from Russia to Armenia and back is not on the agenda, since it is known from open sources that the organization of a road transport corridor to bypass the problem of Pashinyan’s “young reformers” was farmed out to a certain Swiss company.
Pashinyan also intends to invite ethnic Armenians from Russia to key positions in the government, but according to the constitution, these positions can only be held by citizens of the republic who have lived at least 5 years on its territory.
But then it is not clear how former Armenian hipsters from France and the USA ended up in government positions.
As for early parliamentary elections, “they could take place in October, November, December, and even May next year.”
Basically, what else could you expect from a person on the street? Pashinyan claims to be in politics and has been a public figure since 1991, when he was 16 years old. It looks like nothing has changed since then. A street crowd of Yerevan residents carried an aged, bearded young man with inescapable cockroaches in his head to the pinnacle of power in Armenia. The only hope is that in the process the young man will get into trouble, gain experience and become wiser. However, such miracles from Maidan workers have not yet been encountered in practice...
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