“Artsakh is Armenia”, myth or reality?

Vahe H Apelian

Republic of Mountainous Karabakh in 2017,  Republic of Artsakh in 2018

The title of the blog pertains to the declaration the PM Nikol Pashinyan made in Stepanakert in 2019.

A few hours ago, Avo G Boghossian had made the following thought-provoking remark early morning on his Facebook page: “I was listening to Areg Kochinyan's Dilemma program, where the discussants were Tatul Hakobyan and Aghasi Tadevosyan. The link is below if you want to listen to it, which is very interesting. Aghasi cited the following interesting information of which I had not thought about or noticed despite the fact that I have been in Sweden twice and for months. He says that in Sweden the most important national value, or one of the most important, is Progress, that is, progress, in all areas. Can you imagine this when we compare it with the values we profess? Our past, myths, the Church, honor, pride, masculine virtues, etc. are part of our special national values... all of which come from the past, there is no future while the Swedes emphasize the future, improvement, and progress. It is the result of this national value that today, this cold, almost polar country, has reached a level that is among the top ten in the world in many areas, such as longevity, health, respect for human values, gender equality, scientific development, innovation, artificial intelligence, and many other things. They live for the future; we live for the past. Tatul made a good point. We give a lot of credence to our myths, one of which was the invincibility of our army, and he says, which army has not been defeated? Is there a single army in the world that has not been defeated in its history? Because of this myth, there have been many deserters from our army, and many quickly when they were faced with the reality that the enemy army was much better prepared, much better organized, and with much more modern weaponry.”

Prevalence of myth in nation’s psyche may be argued to be true, but not necessarily so. Roupen Der Minassian headed the First Republic’s Minister of the Army. On November 25, 1920, he resigned office to make room for  PM Simon Vratsian’s short-lived government to transition the first free and independcnt Republic of Armenia onto Soviet Socialist Republic of Armenia. In his farewell to arms address he said the following: “Witnessing the formation of the Armenian Army, its development and the victories it achieved, I firmly believed in the fulfillment of our beautiful age-old dream of a United and Independent Armenia, completely liberated. I followed with excitement our army’s advances on the borders of Eastern Armenia.

However, our newly established army did not prove to be strong enough to be a match against our enemy’s forces forged through centuries of warfare and unfortunately had to concede to the stronger and better organized adversary.” 

One of the reasons myth perpetuates is because people pick and choose in history.

Avo G Bogossian had suggested to watch the recording of the panel. I did. However, after a short while I stopped to jot this note when I heard Tatul Hakobyan cite for a myth PM Nikol Pashinyan’s declaration in Stepanakert in August 2019 that “Arstakh is Armenia and that’s it”. Tatul Hakobyan has repeatedly cited it as an example of myth becoming part of state mindset. Naturally as the PM, Nikol Pashinyan should have been more diplomatic for he knew too, all too well, like any us that Armenia did NOT incorporate Artsakh as part of Armenia or annex it. Armenia also did NOT recognize Artsakh as a state of its own.

But, for all practical purposes on the ground the self-declared Republic of the Mountainous Karabagh, later Republic of Artsakh was part of Armenia. Its citizens were Armenian nationals. Its monetary system was Tram, the Armenia currency. Its banking system was Armenia’s banking system. Its representatives travelled the world  as citizens of Armenia travelled the world, with Armenian passport and hence with all rights and privileges abroad of a citizens of Armenia.  Armenia was a signatory of the Bishkek Protocol  or agreement that ceased the first Artsakh war. To have ignored these realities on the ground and claim that Artsakh was not Armenia would have been a myth in itself. Myth may be perpetuated when a state does not know the implications of its actions. When the state pursues policies and takes actions and expects the third parties not to view them in real terms.

Now let me pose the following question. Was Artsakh part of Armenia or not?