Nagorno-Karabagh: Military Balance Between Armenia & Azerbaijan

[Mher]

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

I was just about to post this...you did that before me

An interesting perspective...one more thing btw...the falling oil prices should be good news for us and hopefully bad new for the azeris! The the oil prices are down by almost half...IMF is predicting 3.5% growth for Azerbaijan in 2015...while the Azeris are increasing their military budget but 25%...! this is actually excellent...means more resources will be spent on a corrupt army instead of being directed towards economic development...which in my opinion would be a much bigger threat!

The Oil falling is more important than any military, political, economic development out there. It could be the biggest development for our nations well being. I think the IMF prediction was made before most recent, more extreme decline. In October, the Azeris had to adjust their 2015 budget from oil being based on $100/barrel to $90. Well now the price of Brent is $70/Barrel. Despite the various attempts at manipulating numbers such as saying "oil only account for 45% of economy", or "non-energy sector growing", the bottom undeniable fact is oil accounts for about 74% of all government revenue. http://www.academia.edu/8149729/Why_...an_in_English_
Given the fact that year-to-year oil prices are down roughly 33% and that oil account for 74% of the economy, Azerbaijan will be receiving 25% less revenue in the upcoming year. That's 9 billion dollars. They can't cut the budget because it will cause panic and mass civil unrest. So they'll have to tap into their SOCAR Oil Fund which officially stand under 30 billion dollars, but most likely significantly less. When this fund runs out is when real instability will start. But let's just say if prices stay where they are for the next 12 months (which most predictions says they will), Azerbaijan won't be talking as big.

[Ak105]

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

Are you trying to understand Forbes? Lol.
You are trying to understand propaganda??
If you are seeking actual truth, don't go to Forbes for an accurate understanding of world events.

Haha I don't really like Forbes. Like you said, they like talking bs

[Ak105]

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

http://www.armyrecognition.com/adex_2014_show_daily_news_coverage_report/azerbaijani_ministry_of_defense_industry_presents_zkdm_modernized_version_of_soviet-made_brdm-2_1109.html

Is azerbaijan using this?

[Chubs]

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

The Oil falling is more important than any military, political, economic development out there. It could be the biggest development for our nations well being. I think the IMF prediction was made before most recent, more extreme decline. In October, the Azeris had to adjust their 2015 budget from oil being based on $100/barrel to $90. Well now the price of Brent is $70/Barrel. Despite the various attempts at manipulating numbers such as saying "oil only account for 45% of economy", or "non-energy sector growing", the bottom undeniable fact is oil accounts for about 74% of all government revenue. http://www.academia.edu/8149729/Why_...an_in_English_
Given the fact that year-to-year oil prices are down roughly 33% and that oil account for 74% of the economy, Azerbaijan will be receiving 25% less revenue in the upcoming year. That's 9 billion dollars. They can't cut the budget because it will cause panic and mass civil unrest. So they'll have to tap into their SOCAR Oil Fund which officially stand under 30 billion dollars, but most likely significantly less. When this fund runs out is when real instability will start. But let's just say if prices stay where they are for the next 12 months (which most predictions says they will), Azerbaijan won't be talking as big.

While this is great news for Armenia, lets remember who this is affecting greatly: Russia. Russia is predicted to hit a recession in 2015, possibly slightly effecting states dependent on their economy. We might experience some migrant issues, along with currency issues.

This is a bit of a problem for Azerbaijan, considering they will have to dip into reserves for their insane spending

Fun fact: Azerbaijani exports, are dominated by crude petroleum, making up 87% of exports in 2012, thats 9% more than Saudi Arabia.

http://atlas.media.mit.edu/explore/tree_map/hs/export/aze/all/show/2012/

http://www.armyrecognition.com/adex_...dm-2_1109.html

Is azerbaijan using this?

Of course, but its basically an upgraded version of the BRDM-2. What they basically did in this vehicle, is fix it. They fixed all the armor and fire power issues that vehicle had, but as I explained a while ago, its not much of a problem. Armenian BTR-70s are basically its match firepower wise, thats if they had 80mm rockets. In the long run, they only have around a small number of these, and they probably wont see much combat. We barely know if this thing is fully operational and not a prototype or in testing. To be honest, they are attempting to fix a severly flawed Soviet design. Its better to abandon the project

[Ak105]

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

This has absaloutly nothing to do with this thread, but u guys should read this. I find it to very very interesting. Wish american tv would pay a little more attention to stuff like this

http://arevordi.blogspot.com/2010/08/mesopotamias-civilization-originated-in.html?m=1

[Mher]

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

While this is great news for Armenia, lets remember who this is affecting greatly: Russia. Russia is predicted to hit a recession in 2015, possibly slightly effecting states dependent on their economy. We might experience some migrant issues, along with currency issues.

This is a bit of a problem for Azerbaijan, considering they will have to dip into reserves for their insane spending

One other thing to note though, before this whole price decline, Azerbaijan reserves were expected to decrease significantly in the coming years. It's officially predicted at -2% a year, but a lot of other reports expect it to be much more critical than that.

But yeah it's a complex situation. But the light short term damage to Armenia is not nearly as bad as what Azerbaijan has coming
Putin has painted him into a corner and I don't see how he gets out of it. Based on $80/barrel they are projecting a 2015 recession and GDP shrinkage of -0.8%. And that's being generous. Their predicted worse case scenario of $60/barrel would lead to -3.5 to -4% GDP shrinkage. It's in a lot of trouble economically, and with oil prices expected to hover where they are for the immediate future, i don't see how he gets out of it on his own terms. The ideal situation would be for both sides to realize they need each other. Ukraine is a total mess verging on complete economic and political collapse, and simply can't get out of it without finding a middle ground with Russia. I feel like Putin would now love this option, but he has lost control over the rebels and can't reign them in.

I don't know how this bodes for the Armenian economy. It's very depressing that despite some positive economic steps by our government in recent years, a lot of it is going to wash away because of the fact that as a small landlocked country we're so vulnerable to up and downs in neighboring countries. Beyond geography, its a result of an economy that is significantly dependent of remittance and has a large trade deficit. Again though so much of this dependence on Russia is also based Armenia facing that military threat and needing Russian aid and not being able to have a more balanced foreign policy. With a decline to the baboons we can hope to see that change.

[Ak105]

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

One other thing to note though, before this whole price decline, Azerbaijan reserves were expected to decrease significantly in the coming years. It's officially predicted at -2% a year, but a lot of other reports expect it to be much more critical than that.

But yeah it's a complex situation. But the light short term damage to Armenia is not nearly as bad as what Azerbaijan has coming
Putin has painted him into a corner and I don't see how he gets out of it. Based on $80/barrel they are projecting a 2015 recession and GDP shrinkage of -0.8%. And that's being generous. Their predicted worse case scenario of $60/barrel would lead to -3.5 to -4% GDP shrinkage. It's in a lot of trouble economically, and with oil prices expected to hover where they are for the immediate future, i don't see how he gets out of it on his own terms. The ideal situation would be for both sides to realize they need each other. Ukraine is a total mess verging on complete economic and political collapse, and simply can't get out of it without finding a middle ground with Russia. I feel like Putin would now love this option, but he has lost control over the rebels and can't reign them in.

I don't know how this bodes for the Armenian economy. It's very depressing that despite some positive economic steps by our government in recent years, a lot of it is going to wash away because of the fact that as a small landlocked country we're so vulnerable to up and downs in neighboring countries. Beyond geography, its a result of an economy that is significantly dependent of remittance and has a large trade deficit. Again though so much of this dependence on Russia is also based Armenia facing that military threat and needing Russian aid and not being able to have a more balanced foreign policy. With a decline to the baboons we can hope to see that change.

What's the thing I hate about armenia. The economy sucks,
And so it doesn't attract any people.

[Chubs]

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

One other thing to note though, before this whole price decline, Azerbaijan reserves were expected to decrease significantly in the coming years. It's officially predicted at -2% a year, but a lot of other reports expect it to be much more critical than that.

But yeah it's a complex situation. But the light short term damage to Armenia is not nearly as bad as what Azerbaijan has coming
Putin has painted him into a corner and I don't see how he gets out of it. Based on $80/barrel they are projecting a 2015 recession and GDP shrinkage of -0.8%. And that's being generous. Their predicted worse case scenario of $60/barrel would lead to -3.5 to -4% GDP shrinkage. It's in a lot of trouble economically, and with oil prices expected to hover where they are for the immediate future, i don't see how he gets out of it on his own terms. The ideal situation would be for both sides to realize they need each other. Ukraine is a total mess verging on complete economic and political collapse, and simply can't get out of it without finding a middle ground with Russia. I feel like Putin would now love this option, but he has lost control over the rebels and can't reign them in.

I don't know how this bodes for the Armenian economy. It's very depressing that despite some positive economic steps by our government in recent years, a lot of it is going to wash away because of the fact that as a small landlocked country we're so vulnerable to up and downs in neighboring countries. Beyond geography, its a result of an economy that is significantly dependent of remittance and has a large trade deficit. Again though so much of this dependence on Russia is also based Armenia facing that military threat and needing Russian aid and not being able to have a more balanced foreign policy. With a decline to the baboons we can hope to see that change.

It seems as if sanctions have done nothing to the Russian economy, at least the ones imposed by Western sanctions. It really does seem as if oil price drop, is the main root cause of all this. Its insane, how dependent the world's nations are on oil...I mean, the US went to war, killing hundreds of thousands of people and occupied a country for it.

Hopefully Armenia might see at least one thing positive from this. The crude birth rates have increased slightly this year due to a better economic atmosphere compared to previous years, hopefully it will keep growing despite this setback.

I doubt this will effect defense spending and I doubt it will put much of a dent in GDP. I dont know what the average payment is for migrant workers in Russia. i would assume its anywhere between 5k-15k rubles, which translates to 40k-120k drams, which if people in Armenia are working at the very least slightly part time, than that would be still a plentiful bonus. Would this force migrants back to Armenia if the ruble keeps falling?

Anyways, Armenia seems to be on track with military modernization so far. It seems as if the budget is filled up with deals spanning the next year or so. If that PT72U deal went through (only one outlet said it wasn't, and MoD did not confirm nor deny it), Armenia should have 54 PT72U tanks by now. Considering Armenia has like 300-400, its not hard to conceal at all. Maybe we might see them in the parade, maybe we wont, but one thing is for sure, cooperation with Poland must continue, they just might be our ticket to defense if Tsar Putin decides to drop us.

[burjuin]

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

The Police Force of Armenia carried out professional and tactical exercises in Metsamor city, in the area of the nuclear power plant.

[Haykakan]

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

The decline of the azeris will not have as much of a positive effect on Armenia as you may think. It may even have a negative impact. A inevitable economic collapse of azerbadjan will lead to government change. Without a nest egg to protect and armed to the teeth this country will be more dangerous. The only power which can and probably will keep it under control is Russia.