V.H. Apelian's Blog: EMPERORS, TSARS, AND COMMISSARS: The Booklet (No. 1)

Tuesday, September 28, 2021

EMPERORS, TSARS, AND COMMISSARS: The Booklet (No. 1)

By Antranig Chalabian

“Emperors, Tzars and Commissars” is a 23 pages long booklet published by Antranig Chalabian in Michigan, in 1988, when the USSR was tittering on the brinks of a breakdown with slogans for glasnost (openness) and perestroika (re-structuring) as Comrade Gorbachev wanted to shape the USSR but not abandon the ship.

In an introductory note he wrote that “this treatise of Armenia’s relationship with its neighboring great powers (The Byzantine Emperors, Tsarist Russia and now Soviet Russia, was first published as an article in some English language Armenian papers about a year ago, and under a slightly different title. The present text is slightly modified with the addition of some new material and two maps.”

Recently I was able to locate a copy of the booklet thanks to the few copies his son, Jack Chelebian, MD, found out he had in his possession. In the book’s foreword, Ms. Elizabeth Aprahamian noted that the renowned British historian Christopher J. Walked has said: “Expatriate Armenians of all political hues have expressed pride in Soviet Armenia and the most capitalistic of them would be appalled by the thought of the collapse of the Soviet regime in Armenia.”

Ms. Aprahamian concluded his short foreword noting: “The fanatical movement within the Moslem religion makes the threat to Soviet Union an undeniable reality. The potential role of a powerful Soviet Armenia can play on the vulnerable southern border of the USSR is well worth contemplating.”

But indeed, the mighty USSR collapsed or imploded, and the people of Armenia voted in a referendum proclaiming independence from the Soviet Union on September 21, 1991. As of that date the free and independent Armenia became master of its own destiny. It had to shape its destiny on its own by cultivating new relationships with its powerful neighbors.

Reading the book Jack noted: “Very interesting article and in many ways prescient of what came to pass since the withdrawal of the Soviets from Afghanistan & rise of transnational Islamism/Jihadism.”

Some may argue that much water has flown under the bridge since the Byzantine Emperors let alone during the last thirty years and the treatise of the booklet is akin to the proverbial “Monday morning quarterback” contemplating the moves of the game he just lost or could have scored better.

Nonetheless, the book makes for an interesting reading.

I will be presenting it in segments.