The concept of external security of the Republic of Armenia proposed by the ruling party is structured according to a certain logic and has normative integrity. It is anchored on a combination of international legitimacy, economic interconnectedness, predictability, a peace agenda and defense reforms. However, the proposal’s vulnerability is caused by the largely doctrinal nature of this structure.

First of all, the overestimation of the importance of international legitimacy as a source of strength and a deterrent is noticeable. Undoubtedly, from the point of view of international law, the international recognition of the country’s territorial integrity contributes to the strengthening of the country’s subjectivity and its political and diplomatic resistance. But the practice of modern international relations proves that legitimacy itself does not eliminate the anarchic character of the international environment and, therefore, cannot replace either deterrence mechanisms, allied guarantees, or the state’s self-defense potential. In other words, legitimacy is a necessary but not sufficient condition for ensuring external security.

Against this background, the qualification of the army as a “reserve” tool in the published document, which, according to the authors, is required if the diplomatic and political “means” of containment “did not work” is more than worrying. From a normative point of view, such an approach is perhaps justified, as it emphasizes the defensive nature of military potential and, in general, is consistent with the logic of international law. However, in the theory of security and the practice of conflict resolution, the military potential performs not only the function of forced reaction, but also of strategic deterrence. The state’s effective defense capability itself affects the calculations of a potential opponent even at the stage when the political-diplomatic mechanisms have not been exhausted.

Considering the military component as a “reserve” rather than among the main components of Armenia’s security architecture also creates a logical contradiction.

On the one hand, the pre-election program describes the army as a tool that should act only when diplomatic, legal and political measures have failed.

On the other hand, state policy consistently emphasizes the importance of large-scale military reforms, development of defense infrastructure, modernization of armaments and introduction of a comprehensive security system. Such duality is difficult to consider consistent. if the power component really only has an auxiliary importance, then it is difficult to explain why it is given so much institutional and financial-material attention. On the contrary, if the state practically proceeds from the irreplaceability of the army as a basic factor of survival, then considering it as a “reserve” is a political-normative record and not a reflection of the real hierarchy of priorities in the field of security. Therefore, it can be concluded that fixing the “reserve” role of the army in the security policy program is primarily a political message addressed to the enemy and, in its essence, is a consequence of the pacification strategy adopted by the current government.

One of the shortcomings of the presented program from the point of view of international security and geo-economics is due to the fact that it is almost entirely built on the logic of cooperation, while Armenia’s external environment is clearly competitive. Thus, in the case of the TRIPP project, it is expressed in the fact that the project ignores the conflict of interests of the competing powers and, instead, proceeds from the assumption that the transport and logistics interconnection itself will form an interest in the stability of Armenia among external actors. However, in the conditions of the conflict of interests of foreign powers, such a route is unlikely to automatically act as a stabilizing factor, since it initially contains elements of not only economic interdependence, but also political influence, strategic competition and external pressures.

Also problematic is the ownership structure of the planned Armenian-American joint venture, which already limits Armenia’s ability to influence the formation of the strategic parameters of the project and effectively control the economic and political processes related to it.

The project relies more on the normative expectation of mutual benefit than on the ability to realistically perceive economic interdependence as a mechanism for leveraging influence. Therefore, it is not clear whether the optimism emphasized in the document towards TRIPP and its strategic role is due to external guarantees unknown to the public, or, on the contrary, to an underestimation of obvious risks.

The next problematic circumstance is related to the emphasis on internal discourse, as well as psychological and cultural transformations, as components of external security. In the long term, such an approach is quite justified, because sustainable peace does require changes in public consciousness, educational policy, and more broadly, political culture. However, here it is necessary to distinguish between the reduction of internal conflict and the external change of Azerbaijan’s strategic behavior. however important the first is, the second does not automatically follow from it.

Moreover, such a transformation implies reciprocity, since its stabilizing effect is possible only if similar processes – softening of hostile rhetoric, abandoning the mobilizing image of the enemy, revising educational and symbolic practices – also take place on the other side of the Armenian-Azerbaijani border. In the absence of this reciprocity, the unilateral transformation may not contribute to the reduction of tension, but, on the contrary, may create an additional asymmetry in the perception of threats and political readiness for resistance. Therefore, the effectiveness of this component depends not only on the changes taking place inside Armenia, but also on the extent to which it is combined with tougher deterrence institutions, crisis management tools, and a realistic assessment of the fact that there are no signs of adequate socio-psychological and cultural transformation in Azerbaijan today.

The next problem concerns the correlation between the program’s ideology and rationality, where the peace agenda, predictability, and de-escalation are given an axiomatic status rather than an important one. Meanwhile, in the logic of international security analysis, the state’s behavior is considered rational to the extent that it contributes to the maximum security of the country. Hence, an important warning. considering the normative position not as a means of ensuring security, but as an end in itself, the ideological component inevitably weakens the rationality of strategic behavior. In that case, the state can overestimate the stabilizing effect of its own moderation, underestimating the situations when external actors interpret that moderation not as constructiveness, but as a lack of will to resist. Therefore, the key question is not whether the peace agenda itself is desirable or not, but whether it maintains its instrumental nature, that is, whether it is subjected to the problems of maximum security, or whether it gradually acquires the characteristics of a self-sufficient political doctrine.

Summing up, let’s note that although the presented concept should be considered as a normative framework, its practical viability depends on the extent to which such an ideological structure can be turned into a policy of maximum provision of real security. The vulnerability of the ruling party’s program is, first of all, due to the deep gap between the normative integrity of the model and the reality characterized by power competition, conflict of interests, geo-economic dependencies and strategic uncertainties in the external environment.

The external and security provisions of the 2021 pre-election program of the “Civil Agreement” party were also based on such dreamlike hopes, which brought irreversible human, moral, material and territorial losses. Now the CP, sticking to the same mentality, makes an early claim in the pre-election program that “peace has been established between Armenia and Azerbaijan, and thus, the era of peaceful development has opened for Armenia”, while this is not a peace based on reconciliation, but a “peace” imposed through coercion.

Armen Martirosyan

Deputy of the RA Supreme Council (1990-95)

Deputy of the RA National Assembly (1995-99)

RA Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary

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