Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan

[Eddo211]

Re: Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan

I believe they still hold a few small positions within what is technically Nakhichevan or at least they did until even years after the combat ended.

I think Armenians still hold Nakhichivan’s exclave of Karki where the N-S highway runs.
As I understand Turkey and Russia are both the guarantors of Nakhichevan per Kars..........If Armenians ever have to go in again then I say the first target should be the bridge between Turkey and Nakhichivan.

[Catharsis]

Re: Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan

I think Armenians still hold Nakhichivan’s exclave of Karki where the N-S highway runs.
As I understand Turkey and Russia are both the guarantors of Nakhichevan per Kars..........If Armenians ever have to go in again then I say the first target should be the bridge between Turkey and Nakhichevan.

Roughly 10,000 sq. km. have been forcibly ceded from the Armenian Republic and Artsakh to Azerbaijan during the 1920s.


Also, in 1934 Ataturk purchased from Iran the 9 kilometer strip (wedge) that connected Turkey to Nakhichevan (cleansed of its last Armenian inhabitants in 1988, where the horrific cultural genocide of Armenian cross-stones took place in Jugha). Additionally the Armenian Republic during the 1930s ceded more than 1,000 sq. km. to Azerbaijan (this, after Armenia and Artsakh were already forced to cede some 5,000 sq. km. to Azerbaijan), prior to these cessions Armenian Syunik was directly connected to Artsakh proper.

Armenian Socialist Soviet Republic in 1927 - 30,948 sq. km. (by late 1980s the ASSR had shrunk to 29, 800 sq. km. Note the Iran-Turkey-Nakhichevan border (without the 9 km. Nakhichevan land link with Turkey).

Below is a map of 1920s land transfers from the Armenian Republic and NKAO to Azerbaijan. Notice that the Armenian Republic ceded about 3,000 square km. (this is before Armenia was forced to cede an additional 1,000 sq. km.) to Azerbaijan. At the same time NKAO was also forced to cede about 2,000 sq. km. to Azerbaijan. Also note, North Karabakh (North Artsakh) also known as Lowland or Valley Karabakh as opposed to Mountainous Karabakh, a toponym that was also gradually erased from use. The ethnic cleansing in Nakhichevan as in other parts of Azerbaijan at this time was going full speed as Turkey also purchased the 9 km. land strip from Iran, thus assuring direct land link to Nakhichevan. As you can see before the national liberation movement of late 1980s and the National Awakening Armenians kept losing and more ground to the pan-Turkists on all fronts.

[burjuin]

Re: Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan

http://www.president.am/events/news/eng/?id=761

President Sargsyan observed the final stage of the “Cooperation 2009” military exercises

...President of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan observed at the Maribulak military training field the final stage of the “Cooperation 2009” military exercises conducted by the collective Rapid Response Force of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO). Military exercised held in Kazakhstan on October 12-16 were first exercises conducted since after the establishment of Rapid Response Forces. At the maneuvers in Kazakhstan Armenia was represented by 110 servicemen - one military unit and line officers...

[bell-the-cat]

Re: Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan

Also, in 1934 Ataturk purchased from Iran the 9 kilometer strip (wedge) that connected Turkey to Nakhichevan (cleansed of its last Armenian inhabitants in 1988, where the horrific cultural genocide of Armenian cross-stones took place in Jugha).

I'm not sure if this is correct. I think the strip had been officially part of Turkish territory since the Treaty of Kars. On the 1913 "Eastern Turkey in Asia" sheet map for Bayazid, the border line (between Russian and Persian territory) runs from the top of Little Ararat but just stops several km from the Arax river, suggesting the actual border along the Arax was ill-defined during the Tsarist period. The "purchase" was the eastern side of Little Ararat, which is now all in Turkish territory. It was done to stop Kurdish fighters from entering Turkish territory from Iran - the Turkish army could not control the border if it ran up the sides of the mountain, but they could if it ran along its base.

What is the source and the date of the first map in your posting?

[Catharsis]

Re: Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan

I'm not sure if this is correct. I think the strip had been officially part of Turkish territory since the Treaty of Kars.

The "strip" was bought by Ataturk from Iran in the 1930s. The Treaties of Moscow and Kars (both from 1921) do not include a clause for Turkey to have a common border with Azerbaijan, but only stipulate that both Turkey and Russia "agree" (without Armenia) that Nakhichevan should be included within Azerbaijan as an autonomous republic.

On the 1913 "Eastern Turkey in Asia" sheet map for Bayazid, the border line (between Russian and Persian territory) runs from the top of Little Ararat but just stops several km from the Arax river, suggesting the actual border along the Arax was ill-defined during the Tsarist period. The "purchase" was the eastern side of Little Ararat, which is now all in Turkish territory. It was done to stop Kurdish fighters from entering Turkish territory from Iran - the Turkish army could not control the border if it ran up the sides of the mountain, but they could if it ran along its base.

These were the borders of Eastern Armenia (including Kars and Ardahan provinces) before the 1921 Treaty of Kars, which was never affirmed by independent Armenia.

What is the source and the date of the first map in your posting?

It is from Soviet Encyclopedia published in 1928. The map is dated to January 1, 1927.

[Icy]

Re: Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan

Does anyone know how much Turkey bought that 9km
amoutn of land from Iran for? Also imagine how things
would be different if turkey didnt purchase that amount
of land, maybe we would liberate Nakhcvan aslo.

[Hellektor]

Re: Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan

Does anyone know how much Turkey bought that 9km
amoutn of land from Iran for? Also imagine how things
would be different if turkey didnt purchase that amount
of land, maybe we would liberate Nakhcvan aslo.

Reza Shah went to Turkey in 1934, met Cacaturd and fell in love with his green eyes. Seems like the alcoholic, genocidal, doenmeh Jew bandit has whispered something against the Armenians in Reza Shah's ear, because he closed the Armenian schools soon afterwards. They opened several years later of course. This happened in the time of my parents' generation which caused many to miss school. As you see, this way the Armenian Genocide affected every Armenian however distant they were situated from the realm of the genocidal Turk parasite.

While Reza Shah is the greatest thing that happened to Iran since Nader Shah, he also made this grave mistake against the Armenians who had been, and still are, extremely beneficial for Iran in any imaginable field, despite the fact of Shah Abbas' forced migration of Armenians to Iran, not to speak of other historic events, happy or sad.

Oh, the border! It seems the way Reza Shah was mesmerized by that murderous devil, he would have given it to the monster anyway. What does it matter how much? You simply don't sell territory from your country. The question of the three islands in the Persian Gulf and the question of the name of the Persian Gulf raise passionate, patriotic debates among the Iranians. The Iranians still nag about the 200 year old Golestan/Turkmenchai treaties. The fact that they have lost the right to 50% of the Caspian, decided in the Soviet era, is also in daily discussions. They always blame the Russians for this, yet those parts of the lake are in “Azeri”, Turkmen and Kazakh territories and Russia cannot give them back to Iran, yet they wouldn't irritate their Turkic coreligionists so that it would make us a bit happy, right?

[Armanen]

Re: Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan

Hellektor, what do Iranians think of azeri's from fake azerbaijan?

[bell-the-cat]

Re: Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan

The "strip" was bought by Ataturk from Iran in the 1930s. The Treaties of Moscow and Kars (both from 1921) do not include a clause for Turkey to have a common border with Azerbaijan, but only stipulate that both Turkey and Russia "agree" (without Armenia) that Nakhichevan should be included within Azerbaijan as an autonomous republic.

Thanks for the map details.

However, I am still dubious about your claim that the strip was bought from Iran in the 1930s.

If you have access to a detailed (1:100,000 or better) map of the border during Tsarist times, that might settle the matter. The Turkish-Iranian border on 1930s maps runs along the Karasu river, a tributary of the Arax river - with the narrow strip between that river and the Arax constituting the "tongue zone". But on the pre-WW1 map I cited, the Russian-Persian border line running from Little Ararat stops at the Karasu, suggesting that the Karasu was also the border during Tsarist times. The Arax is a swampy marsh all along that zone, so the Karasu might have been a more easily defined border. On your Soviet Encyclopedia map the border is not shown touching the Arax river.

[bell-the-cat]

Re: Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan

Does anyone know how much Turkey bought that 9km
amoutn of land from Iran for? Also imagine how things
would be different if turkey didnt purchase that amount
of land, maybe we would liberate Nakhcvan aslo.

They didn't pay anything for it (it being the eastern side of little Ararat). Iran got some border territory from Turkey in return.