Russia’s Military Weakness Fosters the Return of Conflicts in the Post-Soviet Space.

Moscow is overwhelmed by the clashes between Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan and between Armenia and Azerbaijan.

As a direct result of the Russian military fiasco in Ukraine, the clash of arms is once again rising in various parts of the former Soviet empire. In Central Asia, at least one hundred people have lost their lives in the last few days on the disputed border between Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. In the Caucasus, an Azerbaijani-led offensive on the Armenian border claimed even more lives last week.

The predictable return of violence reveals a Russia that is unable to realize its ambition to become the guarantor of stability in the former Soviet space.

Under Moscow's leadership, the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), of which the belligerent countries are members, except Azerbaijan, is conspicuous by its inability to carry weight in either conflict.

The border conflict between Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, two of the world's poorest countries, has been simmering for 30 years, with brief eruptions of violence. The one last week was unprecedented in its scale. Bishkek used Bayraktar attack drones (purchased from Turkey) for the first time, while dozens of armored vehicles faced each other in heavy artillery duels (including Grad rocket trucks).

The object of the conflict did not change: it was sovereignty over the Tajik enclave of Vorukh, located inside Kyrgyz territory; control of the road linking the enclave to Tajikistan, as well as the sharing of local water resources.

Weakened by corruption scandals and persistent political instability, the semi-democratic Kyrgyz regime accuses Tajikistan, a dictatorship led for thirty years by a now declining Emomali Rahmon, of having instigated an invasion of its territory. According to Bishkek, which says it has evacuated 142,000 civilians from the area, the Tajik army used “Afghan mercenaries” for the first time, who were said to have engaged in looting at the expense of civilians.

On the Tajik side, the deputy foreign minister, Imomi Sodik, is demanding a new borderline linking Vorukh to Tajik territory, arguing that “in the 1920s and 1930s the Soviet authorities transferred three Tajik territories to the Socialist Republic of Kyrgyzstan without following legal procedures.”

Remonstrances in Samarkand

Monday evening, September 19, 2022, the directors of the security services of the two countries announced, at 11:00 p.m. local time, in a joint statement, that they had “signed a protocol to stabilize the situation at the border.” No explanation was given on either side on the simultaneity of this outbreak of violence with the summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, held at the same time in their common neighbor, Uzbekistan, under the leadership of China.

Present at the summit, in Samarkand, Vladimir Putin was subjected to veiled remonstrances from the Indian Prime Minister and his Chinese counterpart, while the heads of state of Central Asia - a very unusual and vexing fact - made him wait in turn during their respective bilateral meetings, except Emomali Rahmon, with whom the Russian head of state seems to have a more cordial relationship.

In the South Caucasus, where the violence has left more than 200 people dead, Russia's influence is even more openly questioned. Once an unconditional ally of Moscow, Armenia is irritated by the blatant inaction of the CSTO. Several hundred people demonstrated on Sunday, September 18, 2022, in Yerevan to demand the withdrawal from this Russian-dominated alliance and a rapprochement with NATO. Armenia has officially requested the intervention of the CSTO in the face of the attacks perpetrated by Azerbaijan on 13 and 14 September on its territory, notably in Goris, Sotk, and Jermuk.

Baku blames Yerevan for these hostilities, the deadliest since the war between the two countries in the Nagorno-Karabakh enclave in the autumn of 2020, which ended in a ceasefire signed under the aegis of Moscow, sealing Armenia's humiliating defeat.

By requesting the CSTO, Yerevan asked, once again, in vain, for military and political assistance to restore its territorial integrity. “Our expectations have not been met,” said Armenian Security Council Secretary Armen Grigoryan on Friday, September 16, 2022.

Dummy organization

While the CSTO sent a delegation to Armenia on an assessment mission, it ruled out any military involvement. The alliance had already shown itself powerless in 2021 when Yerevan had requested it after multiple incursions by Azerbaijani soldiers on its territory. This time, military involvement seemed all the less likely as Russia is preoccupied with the war in Ukraine, where it is suffering military setbacks.

Weakened on this front, Moscow is now struggling to play the role of referee that it claims in the Caucasus. Visiting Yerevan on Sunday, September 18, 2022, the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, condemned “Azerbaijan's illegal and murderous attacks on Armenian territory.”

Azerbaijan is trying to take advantage of Armenia's defeat in the 2020 war and get maximum concessions in several areas. According to several experts, the country is also taking advantage of the fact that the international community is focused on the war in Ukraine to impose its position on the Armenian side, claiming that the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict has been resolved and that there is no more Nagorno-Karabakh.

Baku also demands a corridor connecting its territory to the Azerbaijani exclave of Nakhchivan, which Yerevan considers a “red line.”

On the ground, the last truce, negotiated by the United States, was respected for the moment, but the situation remains volatile. The foreign ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan, Ararat Mirzoyan and Djeyhoun Baeramov, were due to meet on Monday 19 September 2022, in New York, on the sidelines of the 77th session of the United Nations General Assembly.

The CSTO, which brings together Russia and five former Soviet republics loyal to Moscow (Kazakhstan, Belarus, Armenia, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan), is the eastern counterpart of NATO. Article 4 of its treaty is the equivalent of Article 5 of the Atlantic Alliance on collective defense: in the event of an act of aggression against one of the member states, all the others must provide the necessary assistance, including military assistance.

Perceived as a dummy organization that mimics NATO to put Russia on an equal footing with the United States, the alliance has only once in its 20 years of existence emerged from its torpor. It was in January 2022, when the Kazakh president, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, asked for its assistance to restore calm after deadly riots. His return to passivity, despite the resurgence of violence, shows that Moscow no longer has the resources, either military or diplomatic, to play referee in the former USSR.

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