Amid escalating repressions and police brutality in Armenia, the Biden Administration has taken a controversial position: it has unequivocally thrown its weight behind the country’s increasingly autocratic and embattled prime minister, Nikol Pashinyan, who has consolidated power to the greatest extent since Armenia’s independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, and who has overseen the continued deterioration of Armenia’s institutions, security, and sovereignty.
In a recent policy brief, I described the ‘smoke and mirrors’ game the Kremlin has had Pashinyan play since installing him in power in 2018. While doing Russia’s bidding has already caused Armenia much damage, the worst is yet to come, and the Biden Administration is willingly or unwillingly falling into a trap.
The new round of Armenia’s concessions—precursor to the bigger losses yet to come—started with Pashinyan’s unilateral transfer to Azerbaijan of four northern Armenian villages, which had formed Armenia’s only remaining fortified line of defense against its arch enemy. This was done on the pretext of gaining good will from Azeri leadership in the hope of reaching a peace agreement.
This move might seem reasonable and even welcome if we knew the terms of such a peace agreement and whether Azerbaijan would actually sign it. For now, transferring those fortified positions to Azerbaijan has opened Armenia’s second and third largest cities to an enemy advance. Nothing now stands in the way of the capture of Armenia’s north by the Azeris.
The roots of Pashinyan’s action and inaction have been outlined in an investigative report (to which I contributed), which was published on the first anniversary of Armenia’s capitulation in the second Artsakh war in 2020. What remains unclear is why the U.S. is positioning Armenia for a military defeat and more ethnic cleansing, both bound to happen within a year.
What’s at stake?
When an entire region (Artsakh or Nagorno-Karabakh) populated by Armenians was under blockade for over nine months, deprived of food and medication, I warned how this could become a problem for the Biden Administration. Yet, the U.S. did not lift a finger even when Azeri troops ethnically cleansed the region in a matter of days during a major offensive in September 2023. While a small Artsakh self-defense force fought bravely against the overwhelming Azeri force, the Armenian troops, the Russian ‘peacekeepers,’ and the rest of the world stood idle.
The loss of Nagorno-Karabakh and the subsequent territorial concessions to Azerbaijan—all on Pashinyan’s watch—have fueled public outrage and eroded trust in Pashinyan’s leadership. His government’s perceived subservience to Azerbaijani and Turkish interests, which ultimately pleases Russia, further undermines its credibility and legitimacy in the eyes of many Armenians.
Pashinyan has continued acquiescing to Azerbaijan’s demands, and he regularly threatens his own people with a new war if they do not comply with those demands. This strategy has worked well with a population weighed down by a humiliating defeat in 2020 and the constant Azeri aggressions since then, which have received little, if any, pushback from Pashinyan and his generals, leading to Armenian retreats from 31 villages along the southern border.
In declaring Artsakh part of Azerbaijan in April 2023, he gave Azerbaijan a formal justification to attack Artsakh and expel its Armenian population in September 2023 (in what they called an “anti-terrorist operation”). He has whitewashed the Armenian genocide, causing a pushback from international observers, and argued for a revision of Armenia’s Constitution and the removal of Mt. Ararat from Armenia’s coat of arms, all under open pressure from Azerbaijan and Turkey.
However, Azerbaijan is not likely to stop here: the Aliyev regime has ratcheted up its anti-Armenian rhetoric in recent months and has called for “liberation of Western Azerbaijan” in reference to much of Armenia. Given that Armenia has been severely weakened since 2020 and that its prime minister is unlikely to push back—and, if anything, is inviting new aggression—nothing is preventing Azerbaijan from attacking Armenia again. In fact, the Armenian Foreign Ministry warned of “a new aggression against the Republic of Armenia after the COP29 summit in Baku in November 2024.”
Biden knows that Pashinyan is a Russian asset
Vladimir Putin’s recent visit to North Korea and Vietnam, which unsettled policymakers both in Washington and Beijing, is yet another reminder that the Kremlin has never stopped acting strategically. But when it comes to Armenia—Russia’s ultimate vassal for the past 30 years—the State Department officials deny foul play and take everything at face value.
In a report published recently, I provided evidence of the State Department ignoring evidence regarding Pashinyan’s ties to Russia and the implications of this for Armenia. Criticism of Pashinyan within the State Department has been suppressed in favor of Russia’s narrative on Armenia.
However, in reality, U.S. diplomats are falling for a well-choreographed Russian game played both to benefit the Kremlin’s newly found ally, Azerbaijan, at the expense of Armenia, and to boost its own capabilities to evade Ukraine-related sanctions. With minor exceptions, the mainstream media outlets have missed these warning signs and have played into Putin’s narrative.
Despite Politico’s sensationalist claims of a document leak explaining Armenia’s recent diplomatic pushback against Belarus, the sale of Polonez missiles to Azerbaijan by Belarus in preparation for the 2020 war was public knowledge. So was Putin’s multi-billion-dollar sale of advanced Russian ammunition to Azerbaijan. And although Pashinyan recently said that he will no longer travel to Belarus while Lukashenko is in charge there, he continues to travel to Russia, and even chaired the Summit of a Russia-led military block, the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), in May 2024. It is all just smoke and mirrors.
As has been highlighted in a recent report by two veteran Armenia analysts, one would be hard-pressed to find any tangible and irreversible steps the Pashinyan administration has taken to distance itself from Russia. The reality is that Armenia remains a member of the Russia-led alliance and houses Russian military bases on its soil.
In fact, Armenia has gone the opposite way, including by facilitating a massive increase of re-exports in order for Russia to circumvent U.S.-led sanctions related to Ukraine. We have also recently learned that Armenia’s representative at the Global Peace Summit in Switzerland refused to sign the final declaration on Ukraine. Moreover, in a move that is likely to please Russia and upset the U.S. and many of its G20 allies, Armenia recognized the State of Palestine on June 21, 2024. Finally, Pashinyan has announced that he will be attending the BRICS summit in Kazan, Russia, in October.
The ‘saber-rattling’ by Pashinyan about leaving the CSTO, dramatized by Politico, is also part of the smoke and mirrors, concealing his obedience to Putin. Russia needs this seemingly belligerent posturing by Armenia in order to justify the CSTO’s remaining on the fence during Azerbaijan’s large-scale offensive against Armenia after COP29 is over and warmer weather sets in. Otherwise, CSTO members would be treaty-bound to come to Armenia’s aid.
In a recent public statement, the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs stated that “the change of our vector is about diversification of our [foreign] policy.” The bottom line is that they have no intention of leaving the CSTO.
Does anyone really think that Putin, who is going to such lengths to expand his grip on Ukraine (supported by some powerful allies), will allow Pushinyan—a college dropout, who has governed over a series of territorial losses—to liberate Armenia, which has no allies, from Russian control? Yet, some relevant people in Washington refuse to put two and two together and call Pashinyan’s bluff. This is despite his latest rant delivered in the parliament, mocking the U.S. for being a fickle ally, on which “the Armenian people should not rely.”
Propping up a wannabe dictator
It is unclear what could justify U.S. support of the destructive tendencies of the Pashinyan government toward its own country and people. The ruling party’s overall approval rating remains extremely low by any standards. A survey conducted by the International Republican Institute in March, before the recent controversial border demarcation moves by Pashinyan, showed that only 13% of voters trust him. More damaging was the ruling party candidate receiving just 8% of the vote during the September 2023 mayoral elections for Armenia’s capital, Yerevan, where voters are more educated and politically savvy.
This situation is confusing for my political opposition contacts in Armenia. Most no longer know what they are up against—the Kremlin, or the Kremlin plus those elements in the Biden Administration who want Armenia weakened. Strong pro-Turkish and pro-Azerbaijani sentiments at the State Department, and at some key think tanks in town, would justify such thinking.
While U.S. assistance currently falls short of putting boots on the ground or even providing capabilities to allow Armenia to defend itself, the Biden Administration is putting a finger on the scale to help Pashinyan, who is the weakest link in Armenia’s defense. Hence, the Biden Administration is leading Armenia, a friendly nation, to a new military failure and humanitarian disaster.
Democratic countries have one thing in common—they have strong armed forces (or have memberships in military alliances) capable of defending themselves against foreign aggression. American diplomats are aware that Armenia’s army has been all but destroyed since 2020: at the U.S. embassy in Yerevan, I spoke with a defense official who confirmed his knowledge that funding is being channeled by Pashinyan to police and internal security for the regime’s protection. For a small country with less than two million inhabitants, Armenia has amassed a force exceeding thirty thousand policemen, likely making Armenia the most highly policed state in the region in per capita terms, with salaries and bonus pay far exceeding those of teachers, scientists, and a whole array of private sector employees. This is economic suicide, and it cannot be sustained.
If the White House and the U.S. State Department are truly interested in helping Armenia strengthen its democracy, they should not undermine its ability to defend itself against outside enemies who continue making territorial and other demands on Armenia. Shockingly, while the State Department acknowledges the existence of such asymmetric demands, the response of the Assistant Secretary of State James O’Brien has been merely to state that “the pattern of new demands needs to stop.”
To see just how much credibility the State Department’s statements carry in the Armenian context, one should recall that days before the Azeri army expelled 120,000 Armenians from their millennia-old homes in September 2023, the then-Acting Assistant Secretary of State, Yuri Kim, declared, “The United States will not tolerate any action—short-term or long-term—to ethnically cleanse or commit any other atrocities against the Armenian people of Nagorno-Karabakh.”
However, wishful thinking does not end here. When confronted about the absurdity of Pashinyan’s “crossroads of peace” initiative (which opens up Armenia to traffic from Russia, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Iran, essentially without protection) from an economic development perspective, a senior USAID official asked me, “What’s wrong with the guy hoping that it will work?” The conversation came to an end after I reminded him that “hope is not a strategy, nor is it a policy prescription the U.S. should endorse.”
It gets worse: a source in Washington, who was recently debriefed by the U.S. Embassy in Yerevan, told me that “While PM Pashinyan has pitched himself as pro-Western to U.S. officials, they view him as too inept to carry out the systemic changes of decoupling Armenia from Russia and re-orienting the country to the West.” So why would the Biden administration put all its eggs in one (unreliable) basket and risk losing Armenia?
No matter what the reasons for doing so are, the hypocrisy on the U.S. side is apparent—handicapping Armenia (by supporting a weak and subservient leader) and making it vulnerable to the next Azeri offensive, while not offering any real protection. What is worse is that Biden’s team may not even be in the office when the new offensive begins next year. What may come next is anyone’s guess.
The State Department’s recent blunders
A nation-wide protest movement has, since May of 2024, called Pashinyan’s border demarcation along the Armenia-Azerbaijan border illegal and anti-constitutional, and has demanded his resignation. On 12 June 2024, Armenia’s riot police used stun grenades against unsuspecting peaceful protesters and journalists. As a result, nearly 80 protesters and journalists received injuries and sought medical help, while several dozen were detained. One of the leaders of the protest movement, journalist Abraham Gasparyan, was kidnapped by police and severely beaten while in custody.
A ruling party MP and oligarch, Khachatur Sukiasyan, threatened his opposition colleagues: “If you don’t behave … you will either end up in prison, die, or be dispossessed.” Private businesses that have voiced their support of the protest movement have been subjected to surprise tax inspections and other government scrutiny, involving confiscation of computers and other equipment making it difficult for them to function.
Human rights groups have been critical of the Pashinyan regime’s handling of the public protests. Referring to the well-documented episodes of police brutality and use of stun grenades on June 12, including against journalists, Amnesty International, the International Press Institute, Reporters Without Borders, Transparency International, and other international and local NGOs called on the Pashinyan government to investigate what happened and hold accountable those responsible for use of excessive force against demonstrators and journalists.
However, and shockingly, less than 24 hours prior to the tragic events, the U.S. State Department issued a statement on the outcome of the visit by Assistant Secretary James O’Brien, in which he praised police reform. His colleagues at the U.S. Embassy in Yerevan were even more off the mark: they issued a statement essentially blaming the protestors for what happened on June 12 and putting them on the same level as the perpetrators.
The clearest manifestation of a business-as-usual attitude was Deputy Secretary of State Richard R. Verma’s visit to Armenia on June 17. During his visit, he attended the U.S.-Armenia Local Democracy Forum, an event that “brings together U.S. and Armenian mayors and regional, state, and provincial leaders for a two-day exchange about what it means to be a local leader in a democracy.” Instead of providing useful assistance, mayors from across the U.S. took the time to lecture about democracy to their counterparts in a country under siege.
Adding insult to injury, the shifting policy of the Biden Administration on Artsakh again supports Pashinyan’s own position on the matter. American Diplomats are now sugarcoating the ethnic cleansing in Artsakh in September 2023 and dialing down support for the right of return for the refugees under international protection.
Related to this, Secretary Blinken’s recent reference to the “Alma-Ata declaration” as the basis for border delimitation and demarcation is shocking. This declaration cannot and should not be a basis for border delimitations for a simple reason—it was never meant to serve that purpose. Secretary Blinken and his colleagues should know better than to make such claims.
Having been subjected to Azeri propaganda for too long, successive U.S. State Department regional officials have lost track of why the Soviet administrative borders between Armenia and Azerbaijan cannot be considered a basis for legal border delimitation. While geopolitical realities unfortunately do sometimes override parties’ legal rights, the Biden Administration should at the very least stop pretending that it is a friend of Armenia if it chooses geopolitics over international law against Armenia’s interests.
Going forward
A dignified and lasting peace requires hard work—not just hope—and the presence of various preconditions. When dealing with Azerbaijan—a country which has just expelled the entire population of Artsakh, which continues to occupy several villages in Armenia proper, which holds dozens of Armenian POWs hostage, and which keeps talking about “Western Azerbaijan”—diplomats need to be prepared to do more than just wishing for peace to occur.
In the face of these developments, the Biden administration should reaffirm its April 2021 commitment to Armenia’s security and provide tangible support to the people of Armenia to help avert another genocide. This means engaging directly with opposition leaders and unequivocally condemning human rights abuses committed by the Pashinyan administration against protesters.
By continuing to support Pashinyan, the Biden Administration is perpetuating policies that have been disastrous for Armenia and which are viewed as defeatist by an overwhelming majority of Armenia’s population and the Armenian-American community (which have a sizable presence in some U.S. electoral battleground states). Doing so prepares Armenia for another defeat and ethnic cleansing and will likely result in the U.S. being thrown out of the region, which would also run counter to America’s interests.
A strong U.S. statement denouncing Pashinyan and supporting the protesters—just as was done in Georgia—would be enough to help the people of Armenia to remove their discredited prime minister from power and force new elections. That would allow the citizens of Armenia to elect a government that is willing and able to build a democracy and defend the country from its belligerent neighbors.
