Contributor: The Trump administration succeeded in Armenia where others fell s

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2026-06-08/trump-administration-armenia-azerbaijan

June 8, 2026 1:22 PM PT

By Kristina A. Kvien

Guest contributor 

The U.S. and Europe tried unsuccessfully for 35 years to end the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan. Moscow also failed, sending “peacekeepers” after Azerbaijan’s attacks on Nagorno-Karabakh in 2020; these forces idly watched when Azerbaijan took the entire region and drove out 110,000 ethnic Armenians in 2023.

President Biden’s measured response to the exodus continued the stale “balanced” regional policy that could not overcome decades of hostility. But the dynamic changed under President Trump.

Shortly after taking office for the second time, Trump’s administration decided to quietly but directly engage the Armenian prime minister and the Azerbaijani president to see if a deal could be done in the South Caucasus — a move prompted in part by the powerful American evangelical community that supported Armenia as the world’s first Christian nation. At a summit at the White House last August, both parties committed to the inviolability of international borders, the inadmissibility of the use of force and the opening of regional transportation links.

The Trump administration’s admirably swift progress in a famously difficult part of the world can be credited to favorable conditions combined with innovative approaches not attempted by previous administrations. When Trump assumed office in January 2025, Armenia and Azerbaijan were both seeking to restrain Russian influence in the region. Both saw benefits to working with each other to resolve issues, which was itself a new and positive step. While the work of the Biden administration and European diplomacy set a foundation, their adherence to traditional approaches was not enough to overcome the power differential between the two countries and a peace deal was elusive.

The Trump administration’s frequent high-level engagement with the Armenian prime minister, starting with a White House meeting with Vice President JD Vance less than three weeks after the inauguration, have bolstered Armenia’s position in the talks and incentivized the Azerbaijani president’s more constructive approach.

The element that set the Trump administration’s diplomacy apart was its proposal to develop a U.S.-Armenia project called the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity, an east-west link between Central Asia and Western Europe that will benefit every country along its path by creating or restoring rail, fiber optic and gas pipeline connections.

Direct U.S. involvement in the proposal — branded with Trump’s name — provided each country enough assurance to reach agreement on an issue that had long been a point of contention. Because of U.S. commitments, Armenia expects to control the infrastructure and Azerbaijan expects to retain access.

Once construction is underway the route will provide Armenia with a de facto security guarantee in its most vulnerable region, increasing regional stability and ensuring sovereignty, territorial integrity and jurisdiction — something no other outside negotiator has managed to achieve.

While each conflict is unique, some lessons from Trump’s success in the Caucasus could apply elsewhere. Trump’s public support for the Armenian leader and on-the-ground presence reduced the power imbalance and incentivized Azerbaijan to come to the table.

In Ukraine, a larger and better armed autocrat also threatens a smaller, weaker democracy. Trump-branded projects there could help deter Russian attacks on key infrastructure; the Trump-initiated U.S.-Ukraine Reconstruction Investment Fund could be a mechanism to develop these joint ventures. Refocusing diplomatic attention from Moscow to Kyiv could better balance the power differential and show Russian leader Vladimir Putin that he stands to lose by obstructing peace.

Positive momentum in Armenia continues. Late last month, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio visited the Armenian capital to keep the commitments moving forward. Sunday’s parliamentary elections affirmed the Armenian public’s support of U.S. engagement and its government’s approach. It also demonstrated that Armenia, like other former Soviet states before it, have tired of toxic Russian “partnership.”

More needs to be done to secure lasting stability, including delimitation of the Armenia-Azerbaijan border, signing and ratification of the peace agreement, Turkish action to open its border with Armenia, Azerbaijani release of Armenian political prisoners and the actual construction of the promised route.

Despite the many other global challenges requiring the attention of the Trump administration, including the U.S.-Israeli-led conflict with neighboring Iran, we may now be seeing the best opportunity in decades for lasting peace in the South Caucasus. Sustained focus and adherence to the principles of last summer’s White House summit offer a promising path forward that should be replicated elsewhere.

Kristina A. Kvien, a career diplomat who was the U.S. ambassador to Armenia from 2023 to 2026, is the president and chief executive of the Pacific Council on International Policy.

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Ideas expressed in the piece

• The article argues that, after 35 years of failed efforts by the United States, Europe and Russia to end the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict, the dynamic shifted only under President Trump’s second term, particularly following Moscow’s ineffective “peacekeeping” role during the 2020 war and the 2023 exodus of Nagorno-Karabakh Armenians.

• It contends that President Biden’s more traditional and “balanced” regional policy, though contributing some groundwork, could not overcome deep hostility and the power imbalance between Azerbaijan and Armenia, whereas the Trump administration’s decision to engage both leaders quickly and directly produced tangible results.

• The piece maintains that high-level, early and frequent engagement by Trump officials — including meetings at the White House within weeks of the inauguration — strengthened Armenia’s bargaining position and encouraged a more constructive stance from Azerbaijan, creating conditions for a breakthrough.

• It highlights the August White House summit, where the Armenian prime minister and the Azerbaijani president committed to the inviolability of borders, the inadmissibility of force and the opening of transportation links, as a historic turning point that brought the parties closer to a sustainable peace than any previous initiative, aligning with descriptions of that declaration in outside analyses.^[1][2][3]

• The article credits the Trump administration’s “innovative” approach, especially the proposal for a U.S.–Armenia infrastructure initiative branded as the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity — a new east-west rail, fiber-optic and gas corridor — arguing that direct U.S. involvement, and Trump’s personal imprimatur, gave both sides the confidence needed to close long-standing gaps.^[1][2]

• It emphasizes that, under the deal, Armenia is expected to control the corridor’s infrastructure while Azerbaijan retains guaranteed access, and it presents this arrangement as a de facto security guarantee for Armenia’s most vulnerable region, enhancing its sovereignty, territorial integrity and jurisdiction in ways other outside mediators never achieved.^[1][2]

• The column suggests that the South Caucasus experience offers a template for other conflicts, asserting that Trump-branded projects and a U.S.-led reconstruction investment fund in Ukraine could help deter Russian attacks on key infrastructure and rebalance power in favor of Kyiv, much as U.S. backing rebalanced power for Yerevan.

• It interprets continuing U.S. engagement — including a visit to Armenia by the secretary of State and recent Armenian elections endorsing the government’s pro-Western course — as evidence that Trump’s policy has public legitimacy in Armenia and has accelerated the country’s drift away from reliance on Russia.

• Finally, the article concludes that, although key steps remain — such as border delimitation, a signed and ratified peace treaty, Turkish-Armenian border opening, the release of Armenian political prisoners and actual construction of the route — this moment represents the best opportunity in decades for lasting peace in the South Caucasus if the Trump administration sustains focus and replicates these principles elsewhere.

Different views on the topic

• In contrast to claims that the White House summit produced a definitive peace, some analysts emphasize that the August 8 joint declaration is a political framework rather than a legally binding peace treaty, noting that it does not itself end the 37-year conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh but instead sketches goals such as border delimitation, renunciation of force and the opening of transport links that still require arduous follow-through.^[2][3]

• Critics point out that Azerbaijan’s behavior since the declaration — including what human rights advocates describe as sham trials of Armenian detainees and demands that Armenia change its constitution as a precondition for signing a peace agreement — demonstrates that Baku continues to wield its military and political advantage to exert pressure on Yerevan, calling into question the notion that the power imbalance has been fully addressed.^[3]

• From this perspective, the current arrangement is seen as fragile precisely because it sidesteps unresolved justice issues: observers stress the need for clarity on the fate of missing persons, the return or fair treatment of prisoners of war and accountability for abuses against Armenians from Nagorno-Karabakh, arguing that without such measures the deal risks cementing an unequal status quo rather than delivering a durable, rights-based peace.^[1][2][3]

• Some peacebuilding organizations therefore describe the August framework not as a final settlement but as a “fragile framework” that requires sustained international engagement, warning that setbacks in border demarcation, security guarantees or political will in either capital could quickly undermine the progress made in Washington.^[3]

• In addition, several policy experts argue that focusing too narrowly on a single U.S.-branded corridor is insufficient to lock in long-term stability; they instead advocate a broader regional economic compact among Armenia, Azerbaijan and Turkey, backed by the United States, the European Union and Gulf partners, and call for a South Caucasus stability fund to coordinate multiple projects so that peace dividends are widely shared and not tied to one route.^[1]

• Regional specialists also note that key elements of a comprehensive peace — including a finalized and signed peace treaty, detailed border delimitation and robust confidence-building measures — remain incomplete, leading them to caution against portraying the Trump initiative as a finished success rather than a step in a longer, uncertain process.^[1][3]

• Conflict trackers add that the risk of renewed confrontation has not disappeared: outstanding disputes over the Armenia-Azerbaijan border and unresolved questions about the future or possible return of Armenians displaced from Nagorno-Karabakh are cited as potential flashpoints that could re-ignite tensions despite the Washington declaration.^[2][3]

• Finally, some observers emphasize continuity across administrations, noting that years of diplomacy by previous U.S. governments, European institutions and the OSCE Minsk Group, combined with battlefield outcomes in 2020 and war fatigue in both societies, steadily moved the parties toward compromise; in this reading, the 2025 breakthrough is better understood as the culmination of a protracted process rather than the singular achievement of one administration.^[1][2]