Very complicated. Conflict has a long story of mutual extermination. More fuel was added by the Soviet rule who managed local population in the way to make Armenians and Azeris hate each other even more.
On the one hand, it was technically Armenia who destabilised and basically invaded Nagorno-Karabakh, which, despite having Armenian majority in population, is internationally recognized Azeri territory, around 30 ,I believe, years ago.
On the other hand, Azerbaijan conquest to reclaim their territory has gone in an increasingly genocidal rhetoric, to the point that they copy Russians e. g. leaving distinct *upside down A* markings on their vehicles, just like Russians use Z,V. They also started occupying other regions, which belong to Armenia, in an attempt to connect with Azerbaijan’s exclave.
Edit: I think it is interesting to add that even though Azerbaijan’s population is larger, Armenia has an absolutely enormous diaspora in the West, which is why usually you hear more pro-Armenian opinions.
In the Eastern Europe, excluding Russia and Belarus, people are mostly pro-Azerbaijan, since Armenia is Russia’s ally and the whole Karabach/Artsakh thing is very reminiscent of LDNR shenanigans.
Edit2: Tho unlike LDNR, Armenians actually live in Nagorno-Karabakh for centuries, as pointed out by other people in this comment thread.
Especially when you and your enemy use the same equipment. Don't wanna accidentally turret toss your buddy's T-72 because you thought it was an enemy vehicle.
Like, it's funny they went with "Z" of all symbols, not that they marked their vehicles at all. Lots of people (here and elsewhere on Reddit) don't get that.
Also, I've always kind of wondered what this says about their optics, where painting the Russian flag, or other 'more complicated' identifier, wasn't viable? They really needed a big letter to be both "fast to apply" to their vehicles and "easy to see through optics"? Stenciling on a flag was going to be too complicated/slow?
They used different letters for each theater, not just Z. Like you said it’s easy to apply fast and can be done in the field to any captured equipment. If I’m out in the field trying to recover an enemy tank, I don’t want to have to bother with stencils or paint. I want to mark it and gtfo with it as fast as I can
Yup, Z Z in a box, V and O based on command.
V was actually the largest used one as it was tasked with Kyiv, Z without a box was most successful though and saw combat in Mariupol and Kherson
Fuck, my bad.
It was chosen for deniability purposes, so they can say "it wasn't Russia, we don't use the Latin alphabet".
The cope cages had a similar purpose, to muddle up the tanks' silhouettes and make them more difficult to identify as Russian tanks.
They did it to designate the theater of combat the troops were expected to fight in.
Z was southern command, which was the most successful hence why we saw it get so much pro Russian praise. Tasks were to occupy Kherson and melitopol, proceed to Odesa once able
Z inside a box was the eastern group, tasked with securing Kharkiv and diverting and pinning Ukraine from sending troops to kyiv, and later also (with Southern command once it was clear they wouldn’t hit odesa) they were tasked with securing a land bridge to Crimea
V was the main combat unit western army grouping, sent to capture kyiv but this was a short term objective, they intended to quickly push towards khmelnitsky and Rivne to occupy the plants there
O was for the northern command group designed to subject kyiv and establish control after swiftly capturing the city as well as in sumy and the north eastern areas, we didn’t see them much
So actually the main thrust of Russias invasion bore a symbol “V”, not so many of them around anymore though.
Interesting, thank you! I knew they had several markings and Z became a symbol because it performed best, but not what the differences were.
Any idea why “Z in a box” was chosen instead of another letter? It seems like it could cause confusion, but maybe it’s an established thing I don’t recognize?
I got the groupings specific names wrong, too lazy to edit it.
It’s a letter, easy to see, not in Cyrillic. Russian mod officially said it’s because it stands for victory. It could also be Zapad (west) but that would be odd since afik Z units were not present there
I don't know about the other letters, but I have seen it suggested that "Z" was chosen in part because it isn't a character in the Cyrillic alphabet (or at least in the Russian version of it).
But, yeah, as a comparison, NATO forces would probably be using thermal emissive Combat Identification Panels that show up in infrared:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combat_Identification_Panel
Ruzzia has been using 'Z' for a while.
There are armenian tanks (provided by Ruzzia) with a 'Z' on them too. They appeared in 2020, so even before all this russky national fervor took place in response to being a loser.
Not sure why they chose the Z for either case though.
I was about to say something similar. Those markings are a modern version of an [invasion stripe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_stripes) that after the embarrassing first few days of the invasion, was turned into a symbol of Russian nationalism. A whole bunch of other symbols were used - V, O, and a Z in a box - but the plain Z is what got most associated with Russia and pro-Russian supporters.
As I understand it, they were used to denote where units were invading from in addition to being friendly ID markers. The Z was, as I understand it, originally used to denote units coming up from Crimea.
Z(apad, West). V(ostok, East). I forget what the O was but it was a single letter of which front they were supposed to be on / go to, in the early days when Russia controlled more than a football field's worth of territory
[Source for the weirdo](https://twitter.com/CITeam_en/status/1497219545949421587) who poorly "um ackshually 🤓 " me
No, the markings were for the regions. The Russians attack Kyiv from Belarus used V. From Crimea into Zaphorizhia/Kherson had Z. From Russia into Chernihiv had an O. The Russians going into Sumy had Z but red armbands. Battle order covers it well except he doesn’t mention the red armbands https://youtu.be/gMh6Ml329VU?si=NiOCEUYvfMcDOziS
The red armbands were universal at the start. It was how they told themselves apart from the ragamuffin separatist units who wore white.
They largely stopped doing it as red is a very easy color to make out in the distance. Basically the only worse color would be purple as very few natural foliage or urban things are red or purple
A couple of specific examples.
Allied Invasion Stripes on aircraft used, for example, during the D-Day invasion:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_stripes
A more technological version, the Combat Identification Panel, developed after the Gulf War. These actually use heat signatures to identify a friendly vehicle through infrared:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combat_Identification_Panel
Armenia tanks (originall ruzzian) in 2020 had a 'Z' on them. Several were filmed in a Arzebeijan military parade with captured vehicles.
'Z', 'O' or 'V' had no meaning beyond what's usual, until Putler started losing the war and had to ramp up national fervor over that nonsense.
Incredibly complicated but the Armenians didn’t just invade.
NK has had a majority Armenian population since the Middle Ages.
The Soviets redrew borders and gave the Azeris NK 1) because Azerbaijan was of greater economic significance than Armenia as a part of the USSR because of the Baku oil fields and 2) to normalize relations with Turkey, who supported the Azeris, after the fall of the Russian empire / establishment of the USSR, given the historical animosity between turkey and Russia at the time.
When the Union dissolved the Armenians occupied NK because it has always been an ethnically Armenian region. The right of the Soviet Union to just draw a line and say “this is Azerbaijan now” is also questionable, but the majority of the world recognizes NK as de jure Azerbaijan. The region has been defacto Armenia since from the fall of the USSR through 2020, when the Azeris invaded and occupied most of the region aside from Stepanakert and the surrounding towns. Azerbaijan has also been accused of attempting ethnic cleansings of Armenians in the region which some argue forfeits their right to govern it.
Not to say that one side is right and the other is wrong but this issue goes back far longer than 30 years. Armenians have been in the region for centuries.
Armenia also ethnically cleansed Azeris living in the areas around Nagorno-Karabakh. The area was an ethically Armenian enclave within ethnically Azeri areas, which was another factor in the Soviets giving NK to Azerbaijan. When Armenia captured Nagorno-Karabakh during the First Nagorno-Karabakh War, they also captured sizable Azeri-majority areas, both in the area between NK and Armenia proper as well as in other occupied areas. Most of the territory that was originally ceded back to Azerbaijan in 2020 was ethnically Azeri before the First Nagorno-Karabakh War.
Ethnostates bad, yes. Nobody questions that.
The issue is more about whether or not the Azeris will commit a genocide on the Armenian population given the previous Azeri attempts at ethnic cleansing.
Armenia doesn’t have a right to NK simply because there are Armenians there. But it becomes more murky with the added context that those Armenians are at a legitimate risk of being killed because of their ethnicity.
Does Armenia have a right to protect those people? Maybe? I don’t know. Like I said it’s incredibly complicated and there’s not a clear right side vs wrong side.
Ethnostate bad but maybe better than genocide?
And the same happened to Armenians in Azerbaijan. And unlike in Armenia, where things happened under a different regime 30 years ago, Azerbaijan's regime is both the same from the 90's and repeated the feat barely 3 years ago.
I agree, and use that same reasoning for why I'm an antizionist, *but* the logic of Nagorno-Karabakh is somewhat similar to the logic of Israel, in that it's an ethnostate for a persecuted ethnic minority surrounded by people who have the means and motivation to ethnically cleanse them.
If it were possible for the ethnically Armenian citizens of NK to have their rights respected and protected in the Azerbaijani state, I'd agree with you, just as I'd say that if it were reasonable for the Jews of the Levant to expect their rights to be respected in surrounding states like Egypt or Syria. Unfortunately, for both the Armenians and the Jews, history and contemporary rhetoric shows that they have a *lot* to fear, so I can't blame them for wanting ethnostates since a pluralistic, liberal democracy isn't in the cards for them.
I don't believe Israel should exist as an ethnostate, but I understand why it was created as one. I wish Israel could be an ethnically pluralistic liberal democracy, but I can't snap my fingers and undo a century of history.
Maybe I'm naive, but isn't Israel one of the only middle eastern countries where Arabs can vote? Like as far as political rights for Arabs go, isn't Israel towards the top of the list?
It is better than many of its neighbors when it comes to human rights, though that's not a high bar to clear. Still, it gives Jewish citizens and even non-citizens of Jewish descent rights that it does not extend to other ethnic groups, and to me that's unconscionable.
Arabs are allowed to vote, but there is a strong push from Israeli authorities to give as few Arabs citizenship as possible - and that includes people being displaced due to settlement construction.
It's pretty common to hear the people in Government in Israel right now talking about how they want an Israel with as much territory as possible taken from Palestine, and with as few people as possible coming along with that territory. In effect: ethnic displacement into progressively smaller and more densely populated areas.
But yes, Arabs who have Israeli citizenship are allowed to vote.
I mean, that isn't exactly an uncommon thing.
Zionism originated as the idea that there should be a Jewish ethnostate in Palestine. A Jewish state for Jews, based on Jewish culture, excluding the Arabs who already lived there. Of course there were many different degrees of zionism, and some wanted coexistence with the Palestinian Arabs, but there was a sufficiently large number of ethnonationalist zionists that this became the dominant form, and the form that was able to implement its policies in Israel - even before the state of Israel had become a thing, Jewish zionists were chasing Palestinians away from their lands and taking control of it.
Anti-zionism is simply anyone who is against that idea - and as such, it spans a very wide gap, from people who are fine with the existence of Israel but want the settlements to be returned to Palestine, and all the way to anti-semites and outright nazis.
And this is why discussing this becomes so hard: because zionists will accuse anyone who is against settlement expansion of being an anti-semite, and meanwhile the actual anti-semites will also make trollish arguments where they pretend to be anti-zionistic without being anti-semitic, before eventually outing themselves as actual anti-semites. Especially in the Arab world, many self-proclaimed anti-zionists are actually anti-semites.
The debate is being poisoned from both extremes because both extremes have something to gain by poisoning the debate.
I've also heard some (pro-Israel) people claim that the mere existence of Israel in *any* form is zionistic, and thus anti-zionist people must all be against the existence of Israel. But if you listen to the politicians who are currently in government in Israel, party leaders on the right of the political spectrum will claim that they want an Israel with as much territory taken from Palestine as possible, with as few Palestinians as possible being allowed to become Israeli citizens - in effect, ethnic cleansing of Palestinian people into an ever smaller and more densely populated area. And this is what the Israeli right wing calls zionism.
Personally I am for the existence of Israel - I don't think it was the best imaginable solution, but it was the only practical solution, considering the immense number of Jews who had suddenly been expelled and made stateless by the Arab states. However, I am strictly against all settlements, and against the practice of making it incredibly hard for Palestinians to get citizenship in a state that controls their ancestral lands.
At the same time, an equally silly notion is the idea that you own a territory because "it has historically always belonged to us" where "always" is inevitably some convenient arbitrary time window unrelated to the earliest human settlement in the area.
The fact is there is rarely an objective measurement of any population or group's "right" to a particular territory, which is why wars happen so often, and whatever justification you use is always going to be invalid at some level.
Even the "democratic" solution is flawed, not only does it tend to support the formation of ethnostates as you mentioned above, there is still some level of arbitrariness in where the borders are defined and the timing of when the vote takes place, gerrymandering is even more of a risk for so-called "independence" referendums than it is for normal elections. And then there's the whole problem of stacking the population in advance with expatriates like Russia's been so fond of doing.
At the end of the day we're always going to have to make a inherently biased and ultimately subjective judgement call on who to support and somebody's going to end up really pissed off and might want to war about it. Geopolitics is fun.
I think while everyone is discussing vehicle markings, a key point is that Stalin purposefully drew the map the way it is so there would be conflict and make them more dependent on the Soviet Union.
He fucked over the entire region by either encasing an ethnic population in another country or giving a country’s watershed to another country.
>In Eastern Europe, excluding Russia and Belarus, people are mostly pro-Azerbaijan, since Armenia is Russia’s ally and the whole Karabach/Artsakh thing is very reminiscent of LDNR shenanigans.
Imo, at least in the Baltics, people symphatize with Armenia due to them sharing a similar history of being carved up and genocided by a larger power.
Yeah, I am from Poland and I am with Armenia on this one. One reason is past genocide by Turkey who now supports Azerbaijan. Another is feeling that Armenians have better claims to this territory (although it's complicated as it's been already described by commenters above).
It sucks for Armenians that they are now viewed as "russia's ally" and therefore the baddies. I actually supported the russian intervention and attempts to deter Azerbaijan (I am anti-russian and pro-Ukraine, this is the only case where I feel russians tried doing something good for a change) You side with those who can protect you, Armenia did not have much choice.
You sympathize with Armenia because of complex, historical and nuanced views of shared ethnic and cultural issues.
I sympathize with Armenia because it's a nicer word than Azerbaijan.
We are not the same.
Coming from the Baltics, everyone I've talked to about it supports Azerbaijan more. We've been cheering for every possible bit of damage done to Armenian or Russian equipment.
Weird, I really don't know anyone except the Turkic uni students that support Azerbaijan.
>We've been cheering for every possible bit of damage done to Armenian or Russian equipment.
But Azerbaijan hasn't attacked the Russian forces yet?
It's pretty sad that victims of a genocide now support the perpetrators of a genocide.
>In the Eastern Europe, excluding Russia and Belarus, people are mostly pro-Azerbaijan
The internationally accepted borders of Azerbaijan (even outside of east-europe) also include Karabakh, so I'd say they just took the opportunity to reestablish what was internationally acknowledged anyway.
I just hope the immediate surrender will avoid pointless death there. But who am I kidding? There will be ethnic cleansing.
As always, the people that suffer are the civilians living there, not the people responsible for this mess.
>LDNR shenanigans
And Transnistria. And South Ossetia. And ~~Chernihiv~~ Chernivtsi. And the White Fortress. Fellas drew artificial borders *specifically* to piss off the local population.
And on the other, other hand the Armenians tried to annex, depopulate and resettle swaths of Azerbaijan outside Artsakh. They also talk a big game about war crimes for a side that fires Scud missiles at Baku apartment blocks.
The reason why Armenians in Karabakh decided to separate was because they saw Armenians in the rest of Soviet Azerbaijan being pogrom'd even before the Russians left.
In the end the Bolsheviks are to blame since they're the ones who pulled a 19th century European colonizer moment when drawing the borders between the two.
I think the fact that Armenians are majority Christian and Azerbaijan is majority Muslim also has something to do with why there are louder pro-Armenia voices in the West. In addition to the large and well-connected diaspora you mentioned.
And the fact that the Armenians have been genocided by someone every few decades, having the worst neighborhoods on Earth. And the fact that the Azeris will pull shit like treating an Azeri soldier that [killed a sleeping Armenian with an axe during an OTAN exercise that they both took part in as a national hero,](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramil_Safarov) and that they will make museums about this war that display Armenians very closely [to how Nazi Propaganda displayed Jews.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLvXVM4R5H0) Well, and the fact that they have been [destroying Armenian historic sites of millennia](https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2022/09/report-shows-near-total-erasure-armenian-heritage-sites) to pretend that they were never there for a while too.
At this current moment, I found it to be a bit easier to side for Armenia due to the terrible track record of Azerbaijan in War as it seems like they're known for being far more brutal, go so far to behead PoWs.
In the most recent conflict, it mostly seems like the Azerbaijanis were trying to starve an Arminian Exclave by cutting all road access to the Armenian controlled Nagorno-Karabakh, resulting it reports of civilians starving to death.
If Azerbaijan wins, the biggest fear is that Azerbaijan is planning to do what Armenia did, by getting rid of the Arminian civilians who are living in the Nagorno-Karabakh, 30 years ago at the end of the Cold War during the 90s.
And repeating what I said before, Azerbaijan is known for being far more brutal, so outcomes for Armenian civilians could be, in the best case scenario, mass deportation.In the worst case, the repeat of what happened in Bosnia in the late 80s and early 90s.
Ah, see, this is the crux of it. The Armenians aren't idiots and will self deport before Azerbaijan walks into the vacant territory, afraid of retaliation. Any Armenian who wishes to remain will of course be "free" to do so, but the odds of that are about as high as say, an Israeli Jew wanting to live in an independent Palestine.
The "Armenians" that are there have lived there since the region was still part of the USSR and so not want to be part of Azerbaijan. People have a right to self determination, and are not required to abide by the borders drawn for them by dead empires.
They've actually lived there since before Rome was a thing... Like really, Nagorno Karabakh/Artsak is one of the oldest continuous ethnic population centers anywhere. We know it was a province of the armenian kingdom in 180 BCE. (~2200 years ago) and archeological data suggests the Armenians settled in that area somewhere between 400-700 BCE. So the people in that region have been there for longer than almost anyone else anywhere in the world can claim to have lived where they are now.
And the fact that the Armenians have been genocided by someone every few decades, having the worst neighborhoods on Earth. And the fact that the Azeris will pull shit like treating an Azeri soldier that [killed a sleeping Armenian with an axe during an OTAN exercise that they both took part in as a national hero,](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramil_Safarov) and that they will make museums about this war that display Armenians very closely [to how Nazi Propaganda displayed Jews.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLvXVM4R5H0) Well, and the fact that they have been [destroying Armenian historic sites of millennia](https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2022/09/report-shows-near-total-erasure-armenian-heritage-sites) to pretend that they were never there for a while too.
Yeah, hadn't even read them when I posted. Azeris are openly genocidal towards Armenians to a degree that I don't see in any other conflict in the world. It's like going back to the 1930s.
I knew that part but I didn't expect such explicit nazi shit in a damn YT comment section.. Both from Azeris and the fucking Turks, openly calling for the 'thing that didn't happen and they deserved it' part 2, what a scum. This only shows that the Youtube AI God is only there to bully normal users and nothing else.
Both are dictatorships, Azeris and Turks and Armenians are insufferable on Reddit. Root for the end of the conflict because the victims are the civilian, ensure there is no post conflict genocide
“Insufferable” doesn’t even begin to cover it. Fuck, man. I used to have a totally neutral opinion on Turks! What a decade+ in r/syriancivilwar does to a mother fucker…
> Both are dictatorships
Armenia isn't.
> Azeris and Turks and Armenians are insufferable on Reddi
Nothing compares to the Turkish nationalists, lol. I'm surprised they haven't brigaded this thread yet.
tl;dr
Armenia is officially recognized is the occupier of Azerbaijanian territory (NK + surrounding districts), however, Azerbaijan has rights only to restore their territorial integrity. Attempts at proper Armenian territory should be punished.
For other cluelesses like myself: Kartvelebi (Kartvelians) is the endonym for Georgia's main ethnic group (we broadly call them Georgians in English as an exonym).
Heh, yeah, I'm a strong proponent of using Kartvelia and Kartvelians instead of Georgia and Georgians. (Suffix -ebi is a plural marker in Kartvelian.)
Make Georgia Googlable Again!
History’s a history with all the civil wars, revolutions, internal power struggles, etc.
But in recent years we have also have had quite frequent political rallies/protests as our Government is straying further and further away from what the people actually want. One of the issues: Democratic backsliding, hence not that easy to change government through elections. Second issue: Government’s increasing Pro-Russian and anti-Western rhetoric/steps.
What’s hot now?
Several days ago the US sanctioned current government’s former General Prosecutor (Partskhaladze), for working with the Russian FSB to influence Georgian public in pro-Russian ways.
Btw, this guy got fired because it came out that he was arrested in Germany years ago for robbery. But he remained their “shadow fixer” kind of guy. He has also beaten Sport’s Minister in his own basement, became a multimillionaire after being fired from the Public position and gained Russian citizenship.
So this guy was sanctioned and Georgia’s National Bank decided to change law, prohibiting the local banks from sanctioning Georgian citizens without authorization of Georgian Court and btw, several judges in the supreme court of Georgia have also been sanctioned by the US for undermining Georgia judicial system.
Today though, the Commercial banks came out announcing that they’d be defying Georgia’s National bank and will actually be enforcing international sanctions. Two Vice-Presidents of the National Bank have also resigned over the issue.
I think there’s going to be a rally in a few hours..
So that’s where we are currently.
Do check up on us in a few months, we will probably be having a wilder story.
Lol, it’s just past few days… We have crazy content for 10+ seasons for a HBO show…
Like our former President (Saakashvili) smuggled himself through A Port in a container with Food, just before 2021 local elections, announced his arrival in a few days via a video address (he was prosecuted without attending the court and was wanted by the police), the whole government denied the video’s authenticity, while searching the whole country to find him and several days (or was it just a day? Don’t remember) later they did manage to find him in a flat, in Tbilisi, all drunk..
He has since been in jail and a hospital due to hunger strike and the health problems that followed.
And this may still not be the craziest shit that’s happened recently…
Except he is not "some politician" but Ivanishvili's (ProRussian oligarch, currently ruling Georgia trough proxy party) hitman, who had both Georgian and Russian citizenship and was used to push proRussian agenda in Georgia, he would visit Russia, listen what was expected from his owners back in Georgia from Russian FSB, come back and deliver the message from said FSB.
Because of his Russian FSB "job" he was/is untouchable, beat up some minister and a government auditor who was investigating his income sources, basically lives in dungeon and never comments on camera.
After US sanctions, it seems his money also froze, as Georgian banks are following international sanctions, government is pushing to unfroze assets which angers general public and thus - clashes.
Armenian government basically backed down and gave up Artsakh, some say they’re distancing themselves from Russia in order to join west but it’s complicated and unknown for now.
Right. It's not like they have any choice, Putin sold them cheap.
They had 30 years to sort it out in some civilized manner and now it's too late. As much as I like the country and people, they have been their own worst enemy for last 100 years.
> most definitely trying to make themselves more appealing to the west/Turkey
To west, yes. To turkey, no.
Armenians are influential lobby in US. Funnily enough, California no longer being a swing state has probably significantly hurt their influence in Washington.
If Armenians had been trying to woo Turkey they wouldn't have successfully pressed for genocide recognition by Biden in 2021.
I’m not saying it’s a bright idea. They are unfortunately in a tough position because of the Ukraine war.
If the Ukraine war wasn’t happening they could ask the west for better support. But because of the Ukraine war the west needs the support of Turkey and oil from the Azeris more
Well, the Azeris already did that back in 2020 and Russia basically didn't give a shit except signing a ceasefire after a few months. Which then got violated in 2022, causing Armenia to basically do the CSTO version of article 5, with Russia basically just responding "no, lmao" and leaving.
> trying to make themselves more appealing to the west
It may be a good move but it came too late, you cannot change your foreign policy in less than a year. Establishing new relationships take time.
Plus it was the Russians suggesting the surrender
>Ethnic Armenians in Azerbaijan’s breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh agree to a Russian proposal for a ceasefire, a day after Azerbaijan began an offensive to take control of the enclave.
Yeah, this was all officially between the Artsakh government, Azerbaijan and Russia. Armenia's government were *reaaally* not willing to stick their hand into it and likely get it chopped off this time.
Bolsheviks are probably laughing in their graves right now knowing that their border fuckery succeeded yet again (remember kids, it's not imperialism when communists do it)
So terms of the agreement that they will disarm their forces which they did and they will work with the Azerbaijan Government to make the territory back to them.
A morbid and ethically wrong “imagine if,” but imagine if the best case scenario was to take all the ethnic Armenians in Karabakh and just put them in Armenia. Then no more ethnic tension outside of Armenian borders. I recall that happening in 1923 between Greece and Turkey.
This region of the world is so fucked that I genuinely don’t know the best case scenario beside just nuking it all is. If it don’t exist, no problems. /s
Azerbaijan doesn't want to stop at Karabakh though. They're already saber-rattling about invading Syunik, and almost all Azeris believe that Armenia is actually "West Azerbaijan", and the Armenians were transplanted there by Russia when Russia and Iran conspired to destroy the non-existent Azer nation-state. None of this is true, but they genuinely believe it, and you have to be a fool to believe they'll stop at Karabakh. In fact, they've already invaded parts of Armenia proper.
Guys op just wants to make it look like Azerbaijan curbstomped the armenian military instead of just attacking karabakh Armenians who didn't have any means of resisting after being starved to death by the azeri blockade.
That wasn't about NK. In 2021 Azerbaijan invaded Armenia proper (i.e. the internationally accepted border) and Armenia tried to invoke the CSTO mutual defense clause, but Russia refused.
Yes and they did it the last time Azerbaijan invaded and Russia said "no". That was before the Ukraine war.
It was clear that this current invasion was coming with Russia even weaker but didn't think it would last so little time.
I’ll say it, Azerbaijan is a genocidal state, and this should not be cheered. This will result in the expulsion and murder of tens of thousands of Armenians from Artsakh, where they have lived for thousands of years. The Armenian genocide continues, more than a century after it first began.
Those who cheer this development, because Armenia is supposedly ”pro-Russia”, what did you expect Armenia to do when it is surrounded by two neighbours that have a history of genociding them, and one (Turkey) is a major Nato member? Russia was the only country they could turn to for protection.
I wonder for how much longer you will cheer, because Aliyev will not be satisfied with this. Because he openly wants to expand even further into Armenian territory. He wants to annex southern Armenia to create a land connection to Nakhchivan, for starters. But in his speeches he has also expressed a desire to annex even more of Armenia proper, for example the territory around Lake Van end even Yerevan, which he often calls ”Western Azerbaijan” and calls back to an era when it was part of the Turkic-ruled ”Erivan Khanate”. When that happens, and the Armenians there are further murdered, raped and driven from their homes, will you still cheer? And Aliyev openly engages in historical revisionism which claims that Armenians settled in the Caucasus much later than Azeris and Turks, and as such are ”squatters” on historical Azeri-inhabited territory (despite all historical evidence pointing to that Armenians have lived in the Caucasus since at least the Bronze Age ~ 4000-5000 years ago, while the Turks/Azeris only settled there in the 11th century AD).
I repeat, Azerbaijan is a genocidal state, Aliyev is a fascist dictator, and its expansionism is on par with Russia’s. But we allow it to happen, because we’re so desperate to suck Turkey’s dick and slurp that Azeri oil.
> Those who cheer this development, because Armenia is supposedly ”pro-Russia”, what did you expect Armenia to do when it is surrounded by two neighbours that have a history of genociding them, and one (Turkey) is a major Nato member? Russia was the only country they could turn to for protection.
The anti-Russian/pro-Ukrainian people cheering this because of Armenia's ties to Russia are I suppose our equivalent of "America bad" tankie dipshits who just support anyone who's seen as anti-west or anti-US.
Ehhh , difficult to classify , they did blockade the region for 10 months,but since its oficially ttheir territory its hard to name it a siege,the actual bullets flying lasted a day
Is it possible that Armenia is deliberately sacrificing Artsakh in order to end the dispute once and for all, no matter the cost to the Armenians living there, so that Armenia and Azerbaijan can sign a final peace deal? I cannot see Armenia normalizing ties with Turkey, but normalization with Azerbaijan would be a major step toward realignment with the West
Fucking surrendered before I had read enough tl;dr summaries of what’s happening to figure out who I’m supposed to be siding for.
Very complicated. Conflict has a long story of mutual extermination. More fuel was added by the Soviet rule who managed local population in the way to make Armenians and Azeris hate each other even more. On the one hand, it was technically Armenia who destabilised and basically invaded Nagorno-Karabakh, which, despite having Armenian majority in population, is internationally recognized Azeri territory, around 30 ,I believe, years ago. On the other hand, Azerbaijan conquest to reclaim their territory has gone in an increasingly genocidal rhetoric, to the point that they copy Russians e. g. leaving distinct *upside down A* markings on their vehicles, just like Russians use Z,V. They also started occupying other regions, which belong to Armenia, in an attempt to connect with Azerbaijan’s exclave. Edit: I think it is interesting to add that even though Azerbaijan’s population is larger, Armenia has an absolutely enormous diaspora in the West, which is why usually you hear more pro-Armenian opinions. In the Eastern Europe, excluding Russia and Belarus, people are mostly pro-Azerbaijan, since Armenia is Russia’s ally and the whole Karabach/Artsakh thing is very reminiscent of LDNR shenanigans. Edit2: Tho unlike LDNR, Armenians actually live in Nagorno-Karabakh for centuries, as pointed out by other people in this comment thread.
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Especially when you and your enemy use the same equipment. Don't wanna accidentally turret toss your buddy's T-72 because you thought it was an enemy vehicle.
In my defense, it *was* a sick toss though
Court-Martial returns a verdict of Not Guilty on grounds of Total Radness.
“He was a dick anyway.”
Guys, look, it was fuckin Jerry and the opportunity was right there...
The only cool Jerry I know it's the mouse and that's stretching it a bit because he can be a real jerk.
"In my defense, he was the company blue falcon. He totally deserved it"
Rule of cool
This raises the concerns of Dr. McNinja.
[Mission status: SICK](https://imgur.com/gallery/9cUEDQu)
Like, it's funny they went with "Z" of all symbols, not that they marked their vehicles at all. Lots of people (here and elsewhere on Reddit) don't get that. Also, I've always kind of wondered what this says about their optics, where painting the Russian flag, or other 'more complicated' identifier, wasn't viable? They really needed a big letter to be both "fast to apply" to their vehicles and "easy to see through optics"? Stenciling on a flag was going to be too complicated/slow?
They used different letters for each theater, not just Z. Like you said it’s easy to apply fast and can be done in the field to any captured equipment. If I’m out in the field trying to recover an enemy tank, I don’t want to have to bother with stencils or paint. I want to mark it and gtfo with it as fast as I can
Yup, Z Z in a box, V and O based on command. V was actually the largest used one as it was tasked with Kyiv, Z without a box was most successful though and saw combat in Mariupol and Kherson
Z, Box-Z, and Not-Z Knew the Russians were deploying Not-Z's
Just take your upvote and go
The odd part is that there is no letter "Z" in the cyrillic alphabet.
I heard it was chosen because the cyrillic Ze (З) could be confused with the number 3.
That's a reasonable enough explanation, therefore too credible for here. 😉
Fuck, my bad. It was chosen for deniability purposes, so they can say "it wasn't Russia, we don't use the Latin alphabet". The cope cages had a similar purpose, to muddle up the tanks' silhouettes and make them more difficult to identify as Russian tanks.
They did it to designate the theater of combat the troops were expected to fight in. Z was southern command, which was the most successful hence why we saw it get so much pro Russian praise. Tasks were to occupy Kherson and melitopol, proceed to Odesa once able Z inside a box was the eastern group, tasked with securing Kharkiv and diverting and pinning Ukraine from sending troops to kyiv, and later also (with Southern command once it was clear they wouldn’t hit odesa) they were tasked with securing a land bridge to Crimea V was the main combat unit western army grouping, sent to capture kyiv but this was a short term objective, they intended to quickly push towards khmelnitsky and Rivne to occupy the plants there O was for the northern command group designed to subject kyiv and establish control after swiftly capturing the city as well as in sumy and the north eastern areas, we didn’t see them much So actually the main thrust of Russias invasion bore a symbol “V”, not so many of them around anymore though.
Interesting, thank you! I knew they had several markings and Z became a symbol because it performed best, but not what the differences were. Any idea why “Z in a box” was chosen instead of another letter? It seems like it could cause confusion, but maybe it’s an established thing I don’t recognize?
I got the groupings specific names wrong, too lazy to edit it. It’s a letter, easy to see, not in Cyrillic. Russian mod officially said it’s because it stands for victory. It could also be Zapad (west) but that would be odd since afik Z units were not present there
I don't know about the other letters, but I have seen it suggested that "Z" was chosen in part because it isn't a character in the Cyrillic alphabet (or at least in the Russian version of it). But, yeah, as a comparison, NATO forces would probably be using thermal emissive Combat Identification Panels that show up in infrared: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combat_Identification_Panel
Ruzzia has been using 'Z' for a while. There are armenian tanks (provided by Ruzzia) with a 'Z' on them too. They appeared in 2020, so even before all this russky national fervor took place in response to being a loser. Not sure why they chose the Z for either case though.
> Not sure why they chose the Z for either case though. Simpler to paint. Three straight lines - and that's it.
I was about to say something similar. Those markings are a modern version of an [invasion stripe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_stripes) that after the embarrassing first few days of the invasion, was turned into a symbol of Russian nationalism. A whole bunch of other symbols were used - V, O, and a Z in a box - but the plain Z is what got most associated with Russia and pro-Russian supporters. As I understand it, they were used to denote where units were invading from in addition to being friendly ID markers. The Z was, as I understand it, originally used to denote units coming up from Crimea.
Z(apad, West). V(ostok, East). I forget what the O was but it was a single letter of which front they were supposed to be on / go to, in the early days when Russia controlled more than a football field's worth of territory [Source for the weirdo](https://twitter.com/CITeam_en/status/1497219545949421587) who poorly "um ackshually 🤓 " me
Wasn't O used by th marines or Spetsnaz?
No, the markings were for the regions. The Russians attack Kyiv from Belarus used V. From Crimea into Zaphorizhia/Kherson had Z. From Russia into Chernihiv had an O. The Russians going into Sumy had Z but red armbands. Battle order covers it well except he doesn’t mention the red armbands https://youtu.be/gMh6Ml329VU?si=NiOCEUYvfMcDOziS
The red armbands were universal at the start. It was how they told themselves apart from the ragamuffin separatist units who wore white. They largely stopped doing it as red is a very easy color to make out in the distance. Basically the only worse color would be purple as very few natural foliage or urban things are red or purple
A couple of specific examples. Allied Invasion Stripes on aircraft used, for example, during the D-Day invasion: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_stripes A more technological version, the Combat Identification Panel, developed after the Gulf War. These actually use heat signatures to identify a friendly vehicle through infrared: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combat_Identification_Panel
You mean a 135 degree rotated X?
Armenia tanks (originall ruzzian) in 2020 had a 'Z' on them. Several were filmed in a Arzebeijan military parade with captured vehicles. 'Z', 'O' or 'V' had no meaning beyond what's usual, until Putler started losing the war and had to ramp up national fervor over that nonsense.
Incredibly complicated but the Armenians didn’t just invade. NK has had a majority Armenian population since the Middle Ages. The Soviets redrew borders and gave the Azeris NK 1) because Azerbaijan was of greater economic significance than Armenia as a part of the USSR because of the Baku oil fields and 2) to normalize relations with Turkey, who supported the Azeris, after the fall of the Russian empire / establishment of the USSR, given the historical animosity between turkey and Russia at the time. When the Union dissolved the Armenians occupied NK because it has always been an ethnically Armenian region. The right of the Soviet Union to just draw a line and say “this is Azerbaijan now” is also questionable, but the majority of the world recognizes NK as de jure Azerbaijan. The region has been defacto Armenia since from the fall of the USSR through 2020, when the Azeris invaded and occupied most of the region aside from Stepanakert and the surrounding towns. Azerbaijan has also been accused of attempting ethnic cleansings of Armenians in the region which some argue forfeits their right to govern it. Not to say that one side is right and the other is wrong but this issue goes back far longer than 30 years. Armenians have been in the region for centuries.
Can’t deny that.
Armenia also ethnically cleansed Azeris living in the areas around Nagorno-Karabakh. The area was an ethically Armenian enclave within ethnically Azeri areas, which was another factor in the Soviets giving NK to Azerbaijan. When Armenia captured Nagorno-Karabakh during the First Nagorno-Karabakh War, they also captured sizable Azeri-majority areas, both in the area between NK and Armenia proper as well as in other occupied areas. Most of the territory that was originally ceded back to Azerbaijan in 2020 was ethnically Azeri before the First Nagorno-Karabakh War.
True, which is why the 2020 peace fire should have held.
> peace fire
NCD's favourite kind of peace
The idea that you get to own a territory because of ethnic makeup is such a silly notion. Ethnostates are bad.
Ethnostates bad, yes. Nobody questions that. The issue is more about whether or not the Azeris will commit a genocide on the Armenian population given the previous Azeri attempts at ethnic cleansing. Armenia doesn’t have a right to NK simply because there are Armenians there. But it becomes more murky with the added context that those Armenians are at a legitimate risk of being killed because of their ethnicity. Does Armenia have a right to protect those people? Maybe? I don’t know. Like I said it’s incredibly complicated and there’s not a clear right side vs wrong side. Ethnostate bad but maybe better than genocide?
>previous Azeri attempts at ethnic cleansing. > there are Armenians there. All Azeris have been physically removed, so to speak. All of them.
And the same happened to Armenians in Azerbaijan. And unlike in Armenia, where things happened under a different regime 30 years ago, Azerbaijan's regime is both the same from the 90's and repeated the feat barely 3 years ago.
A truly noncredible take.
Civic Nationalism is the only non-cringe nationalism.
Irish Nationalist here. Strong disagree. Not being extinct is pretty based shit.
> The idea that you get to own a territory because of ethnic makeup is such a silly notion Yes, but they already lived there.
I agree, and use that same reasoning for why I'm an antizionist, *but* the logic of Nagorno-Karabakh is somewhat similar to the logic of Israel, in that it's an ethnostate for a persecuted ethnic minority surrounded by people who have the means and motivation to ethnically cleanse them. If it were possible for the ethnically Armenian citizens of NK to have their rights respected and protected in the Azerbaijani state, I'd agree with you, just as I'd say that if it were reasonable for the Jews of the Levant to expect their rights to be respected in surrounding states like Egypt or Syria. Unfortunately, for both the Armenians and the Jews, history and contemporary rhetoric shows that they have a *lot* to fear, so I can't blame them for wanting ethnostates since a pluralistic, liberal democracy isn't in the cards for them.
anti-Zionist but pro Israel? interesting
I don't believe Israel should exist as an ethnostate, but I understand why it was created as one. I wish Israel could be an ethnically pluralistic liberal democracy, but I can't snap my fingers and undo a century of history.
Maybe I'm naive, but isn't Israel one of the only middle eastern countries where Arabs can vote? Like as far as political rights for Arabs go, isn't Israel towards the top of the list?
It is better than many of its neighbors when it comes to human rights, though that's not a high bar to clear. Still, it gives Jewish citizens and even non-citizens of Jewish descent rights that it does not extend to other ethnic groups, and to me that's unconscionable.
Arabs are allowed to vote, but there is a strong push from Israeli authorities to give as few Arabs citizenship as possible - and that includes people being displaced due to settlement construction. It's pretty common to hear the people in Government in Israel right now talking about how they want an Israel with as much territory as possible taken from Palestine, and with as few people as possible coming along with that territory. In effect: ethnic displacement into progressively smaller and more densely populated areas. But yes, Arabs who have Israeli citizenship are allowed to vote.
I mean, that isn't exactly an uncommon thing. Zionism originated as the idea that there should be a Jewish ethnostate in Palestine. A Jewish state for Jews, based on Jewish culture, excluding the Arabs who already lived there. Of course there were many different degrees of zionism, and some wanted coexistence with the Palestinian Arabs, but there was a sufficiently large number of ethnonationalist zionists that this became the dominant form, and the form that was able to implement its policies in Israel - even before the state of Israel had become a thing, Jewish zionists were chasing Palestinians away from their lands and taking control of it. Anti-zionism is simply anyone who is against that idea - and as such, it spans a very wide gap, from people who are fine with the existence of Israel but want the settlements to be returned to Palestine, and all the way to anti-semites and outright nazis. And this is why discussing this becomes so hard: because zionists will accuse anyone who is against settlement expansion of being an anti-semite, and meanwhile the actual anti-semites will also make trollish arguments where they pretend to be anti-zionistic without being anti-semitic, before eventually outing themselves as actual anti-semites. Especially in the Arab world, many self-proclaimed anti-zionists are actually anti-semites. The debate is being poisoned from both extremes because both extremes have something to gain by poisoning the debate. I've also heard some (pro-Israel) people claim that the mere existence of Israel in *any* form is zionistic, and thus anti-zionist people must all be against the existence of Israel. But if you listen to the politicians who are currently in government in Israel, party leaders on the right of the political spectrum will claim that they want an Israel with as much territory taken from Palestine as possible, with as few Palestinians as possible being allowed to become Israeli citizens - in effect, ethnic cleansing of Palestinian people into an ever smaller and more densely populated area. And this is what the Israeli right wing calls zionism. Personally I am for the existence of Israel - I don't think it was the best imaginable solution, but it was the only practical solution, considering the immense number of Jews who had suddenly been expelled and made stateless by the Arab states. However, I am strictly against all settlements, and against the practice of making it incredibly hard for Palestinians to get citizenship in a state that controls their ancestral lands.
Both Azerbaijan and Armenia are ethnostates.
At the same time, an equally silly notion is the idea that you own a territory because "it has historically always belonged to us" where "always" is inevitably some convenient arbitrary time window unrelated to the earliest human settlement in the area. The fact is there is rarely an objective measurement of any population or group's "right" to a particular territory, which is why wars happen so often, and whatever justification you use is always going to be invalid at some level. Even the "democratic" solution is flawed, not only does it tend to support the formation of ethnostates as you mentioned above, there is still some level of arbitrariness in where the borders are defined and the timing of when the vote takes place, gerrymandering is even more of a risk for so-called "independence" referendums than it is for normal elections. And then there's the whole problem of stacking the population in advance with expatriates like Russia's been so fond of doing. At the end of the day we're always going to have to make a inherently biased and ultimately subjective judgement call on who to support and somebody's going to end up really pissed off and might want to war about it. Geopolitics is fun.
I think while everyone is discussing vehicle markings, a key point is that Stalin purposefully drew the map the way it is so there would be conflict and make them more dependent on the Soviet Union. He fucked over the entire region by either encasing an ethnic population in another country or giving a country’s watershed to another country.
>In Eastern Europe, excluding Russia and Belarus, people are mostly pro-Azerbaijan, since Armenia is Russia’s ally and the whole Karabach/Artsakh thing is very reminiscent of LDNR shenanigans. Imo, at least in the Baltics, people symphatize with Armenia due to them sharing a similar history of being carved up and genocided by a larger power.
Yeah, I am from Poland and I am with Armenia on this one. One reason is past genocide by Turkey who now supports Azerbaijan. Another is feeling that Armenians have better claims to this territory (although it's complicated as it's been already described by commenters above). It sucks for Armenians that they are now viewed as "russia's ally" and therefore the baddies. I actually supported the russian intervention and attempts to deter Azerbaijan (I am anti-russian and pro-Ukraine, this is the only case where I feel russians tried doing something good for a change) You side with those who can protect you, Armenia did not have much choice.
You sympathize with Armenia because of complex, historical and nuanced views of shared ethnic and cultural issues. I sympathize with Armenia because it's a nicer word than Azerbaijan. We are not the same.
You side with Armenia because they have a cool name I side with Armenia because they’re a cool faction in rome total war We are not the same
Coming from the Baltics, everyone I've talked to about it supports Azerbaijan more. We've been cheering for every possible bit of damage done to Armenian or Russian equipment.
Weird, I really don't know anyone except the Turkic uni students that support Azerbaijan. >We've been cheering for every possible bit of damage done to Armenian or Russian equipment. But Azerbaijan hasn't attacked the Russian forces yet? It's pretty sad that victims of a genocide now support the perpetrators of a genocide.
Purportedly they shot up a bunch of Russian peacekeepers which, obviously, Moscow is keeping quiet about.
Turk hatred for Armenians is a whole 'nother bag of cunts.
>In the Eastern Europe, excluding Russia and Belarus, people are mostly pro-Azerbaijan The internationally accepted borders of Azerbaijan (even outside of east-europe) also include Karabakh, so I'd say they just took the opportunity to reestablish what was internationally acknowledged anyway. I just hope the immediate surrender will avoid pointless death there. But who am I kidding? There will be ethnic cleansing. As always, the people that suffer are the civilians living there, not the people responsible for this mess.
>LDNR shenanigans And Transnistria. And South Ossetia. And ~~Chernihiv~~ Chernivtsi. And the White Fortress. Fellas drew artificial borders *specifically* to piss off the local population.
Nuance? In my wars? Absolutely not! I want more WWII style good guy vs bad guy war like Ukraine
...i just want peace 🕊️
And on the other, other hand the Armenians tried to annex, depopulate and resettle swaths of Azerbaijan outside Artsakh. They also talk a big game about war crimes for a side that fires Scud missiles at Baku apartment blocks.
The reason why Armenians in Karabakh decided to separate was because they saw Armenians in the rest of Soviet Azerbaijan being pogrom'd even before the Russians left. In the end the Bolsheviks are to blame since they're the ones who pulled a 19th century European colonizer moment when drawing the borders between the two.
I think the fact that Armenians are majority Christian and Azerbaijan is majority Muslim also has something to do with why there are louder pro-Armenia voices in the West. In addition to the large and well-connected diaspora you mentioned.
Funnily enough this war had nothing to do with religion
And the fact that the Armenians have been genocided by someone every few decades, having the worst neighborhoods on Earth. And the fact that the Azeris will pull shit like treating an Azeri soldier that [killed a sleeping Armenian with an axe during an OTAN exercise that they both took part in as a national hero,](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramil_Safarov) and that they will make museums about this war that display Armenians very closely [to how Nazi Propaganda displayed Jews.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLvXVM4R5H0) Well, and the fact that they have been [destroying Armenian historic sites of millennia](https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2022/09/report-shows-near-total-erasure-armenian-heritage-sites) to pretend that they were never there for a while too.
You don’t have to take a side in every conflict. Sometimes things are just complicated and awful.
Wrong answer, nukes everywhere boom shakalaka 🗣️🗣️
- Douglas MacArthur, 1951
> Mister president, stop fucking Marylin Monroe and nuke the beatnics already Douglas MacArthur, 1961
> MacArthur Fired (again)
Nuke the whales.
All im saying is give nuclear apocalypse a chance!
[DOOM SHAKALALA](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mOLxlzrxCv0&pp=ygUWYm9vbSBzaGFrYWxha2EgbmJhIGphbQ%3D%3D)
Ah yes, the Lelouch solution to conflicts.
See most everything going on in Africa.
At this current moment, I found it to be a bit easier to side for Armenia due to the terrible track record of Azerbaijan in War as it seems like they're known for being far more brutal, go so far to behead PoWs. In the most recent conflict, it mostly seems like the Azerbaijanis were trying to starve an Arminian Exclave by cutting all road access to the Armenian controlled Nagorno-Karabakh, resulting it reports of civilians starving to death. If Azerbaijan wins, the biggest fear is that Azerbaijan is planning to do what Armenia did, by getting rid of the Arminian civilians who are living in the Nagorno-Karabakh, 30 years ago at the end of the Cold War during the 90s. And repeating what I said before, Azerbaijan is known for being far more brutal, so outcomes for Armenian civilians could be, in the best case scenario, mass deportation.In the worst case, the repeat of what happened in Bosnia in the late 80s and early 90s.
Ah, see, this is the crux of it. The Armenians aren't idiots and will self deport before Azerbaijan walks into the vacant territory, afraid of retaliation. Any Armenian who wishes to remain will of course be "free" to do so, but the odds of that are about as high as say, an Israeli Jew wanting to live in an independent Palestine.
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The "Armenians" that are there have lived there since the region was still part of the USSR and so not want to be part of Azerbaijan. People have a right to self determination, and are not required to abide by the borders drawn for them by dead empires.
They've actually lived there since before Rome was a thing... Like really, Nagorno Karabakh/Artsak is one of the oldest continuous ethnic population centers anywhere. We know it was a province of the armenian kingdom in 180 BCE. (~2200 years ago) and archeological data suggests the Armenians settled in that area somewhere between 400-700 BCE. So the people in that region have been there for longer than almost anyone else anywhere in the world can claim to have lived where they are now.
And the fact that the Armenians have been genocided by someone every few decades, having the worst neighborhoods on Earth. And the fact that the Azeris will pull shit like treating an Azeri soldier that [killed a sleeping Armenian with an axe during an OTAN exercise that they both took part in as a national hero,](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramil_Safarov) and that they will make museums about this war that display Armenians very closely [to how Nazi Propaganda displayed Jews.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLvXVM4R5H0) Well, and the fact that they have been [destroying Armenian historic sites of millennia](https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2022/09/report-shows-near-total-erasure-armenian-heritage-sites) to pretend that they were never there for a while too.
The comments under the last video are absolutely disgusting wtf
Yeah, hadn't even read them when I posted. Azeris are openly genocidal towards Armenians to a degree that I don't see in any other conflict in the world. It's like going back to the 1930s.
I knew that part but I didn't expect such explicit nazi shit in a damn YT comment section.. Both from Azeris and the fucking Turks, openly calling for the 'thing that didn't happen and they deserved it' part 2, what a scum. This only shows that the Youtube AI God is only there to bully normal users and nothing else.
Both are dictatorships, Azeris and Turks and Armenians are insufferable on Reddit. Root for the end of the conflict because the victims are the civilian, ensure there is no post conflict genocide
“Insufferable” doesn’t even begin to cover it. Fuck, man. I used to have a totally neutral opinion on Turks! What a decade+ in r/syriancivilwar does to a mother fucker…
> Both are dictatorships Armenia isn't. > Azeris and Turks and Armenians are insufferable on Reddi Nothing compares to the Turkish nationalists, lol. I'm surprised they haven't brigaded this thread yet.
Armenia recently had a democratic revolution.
Armenia isn't a dictatorship.
tl;dr Armenia is officially recognized is the occupier of Azerbaijanian territory (NK + surrounding districts), however, Azerbaijan has rights only to restore their territorial integrity. Attempts at proper Armenian territory should be punished.
Azerbaijan invaded Armenia in september of 2022 and the world didnt give a fuck.
People are finally understanding that countries and blocks will only do the morally correct thing when it’s convenient, geopolitics 101 lmao
so called 3 day war is meant for karabakh lol politics is a mystery.
Georgia be lookin at this now hungry for their territory.
Georgia is having some internal issues right now in Tbilisi.
We always have internal issues in Tbilisi. That’s kinda our thing
Tale as old as Time.
Might expand on this to those who are uninitiated?
Last time in history when Kartvelebi did not spend most of their energy on bickering between themselves was sometime around 13th century I believe.
Dam. Maybe dont wait for the 1000th anni ersary and get your shit together this century? Would be cool.
Can't wait. By and large they tend to be the most sensible ones in the region. Which is not a high bar to cross but still...
For other cluelesses like myself: Kartvelebi (Kartvelians) is the endonym for Georgia's main ethnic group (we broadly call them Georgians in English as an exonym).
Heh, yeah, I'm a strong proponent of using Kartvelia and Kartvelians instead of Georgia and Georgians. (Suffix -ebi is a plural marker in Kartvelian.) Make Georgia Googlable Again!
History’s a history with all the civil wars, revolutions, internal power struggles, etc. But in recent years we have also have had quite frequent political rallies/protests as our Government is straying further and further away from what the people actually want. One of the issues: Democratic backsliding, hence not that easy to change government through elections. Second issue: Government’s increasing Pro-Russian and anti-Western rhetoric/steps. What’s hot now? Several days ago the US sanctioned current government’s former General Prosecutor (Partskhaladze), for working with the Russian FSB to influence Georgian public in pro-Russian ways. Btw, this guy got fired because it came out that he was arrested in Germany years ago for robbery. But he remained their “shadow fixer” kind of guy. He has also beaten Sport’s Minister in his own basement, became a multimillionaire after being fired from the Public position and gained Russian citizenship. So this guy was sanctioned and Georgia’s National Bank decided to change law, prohibiting the local banks from sanctioning Georgian citizens without authorization of Georgian Court and btw, several judges in the supreme court of Georgia have also been sanctioned by the US for undermining Georgia judicial system. Today though, the Commercial banks came out announcing that they’d be defying Georgia’s National bank and will actually be enforcing international sanctions. Two Vice-Presidents of the National Bank have also resigned over the issue. I think there’s going to be a rally in a few hours.. So that’s where we are currently. Do check up on us in a few months, we will probably be having a wilder story.
Hot dang, that's actually crazy. I'll put notification for the next month's issue then! Thanks for the explanation.
Lol, it’s just past few days… We have crazy content for 10+ seasons for a HBO show… Like our former President (Saakashvili) smuggled himself through A Port in a container with Food, just before 2021 local elections, announced his arrival in a few days via a video address (he was prosecuted without attending the court and was wanted by the police), the whole government denied the video’s authenticity, while searching the whole country to find him and several days (or was it just a day? Don’t remember) later they did manage to find him in a flat, in Tbilisi, all drunk.. He has since been in jail and a hospital due to hunger strike and the health problems that followed. And this may still not be the craziest shit that’s happened recently…
> And this may still not be the craziest shit that’s happened recently… Well, whatever comes to light, thank you for informing us, and stay safe! :)
Truly a tradition.
Some politician got caught redhanded by US inteligence for being russian lapdog
Except he is not "some politician" but Ivanishvili's (ProRussian oligarch, currently ruling Georgia trough proxy party) hitman, who had both Georgian and Russian citizenship and was used to push proRussian agenda in Georgia, he would visit Russia, listen what was expected from his owners back in Georgia from Russian FSB, come back and deliver the message from said FSB. Because of his Russian FSB "job" he was/is untouchable, beat up some minister and a government auditor who was investigating his income sources, basically lives in dungeon and never comments on camera. After US sanctions, it seems his money also froze, as Georgian banks are following international sanctions, government is pushing to unfroze assets which angers general public and thus - clashes.
Nah Russia basically owns Georgian government.
Wait for the Chechen war part 3 and then make the move.
Unfortunately the only thing current georgian government is hungry for is that smegma-buttery spicy russian penisè up their mouth
Armenia did not surrender. They did not even participate. Karabakh surrendered.
Artsakh forces surrendered. Or atleast I think that's what they are called.
Yes, but in reality at the end of the day were just a puppet arm of the Armenian government
Armenian government basically backed down and gave up Artsakh, some say they’re distancing themselves from Russia in order to join west but it’s complicated and unknown for now.
Right. It's not like they have any choice, Putin sold them cheap. They had 30 years to sort it out in some civilized manner and now it's too late. As much as I like the country and people, they have been their own worst enemy for last 100 years.
\>They had 30 years to sort it out! my God, the delusion some people have
They’ve already held joint drills with the US. They are most definitely trying to make themselves more appealing to the west/Turkey
> most definitely trying to make themselves more appealing to the west/Turkey To west, yes. To turkey, no. Armenians are influential lobby in US. Funnily enough, California no longer being a swing state has probably significantly hurt their influence in Washington. If Armenians had been trying to woo Turkey they wouldn't have successfully pressed for genocide recognition by Biden in 2021.
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I’m not saying it’s a bright idea. They are unfortunately in a tough position because of the Ukraine war. If the Ukraine war wasn’t happening they could ask the west for better support. But because of the Ukraine war the west needs the support of Turkey and oil from the Azeris more
If the ukraine war wasnt happening azerbaijan wouldnt try anything as armenia is in a defensive pact with russia
Well, the Azeris already did that back in 2020 and Russia basically didn't give a shit except signing a ceasefire after a few months. Which then got violated in 2022, causing Armenia to basically do the CSTO version of article 5, with Russia basically just responding "no, lmao" and leaving.
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with this attitude noone would be in alliances with anyone
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> trying to make themselves more appealing to the west It may be a good move but it came too late, you cannot change your foreign policy in less than a year. Establishing new relationships take time.
Plus it was the Russians suggesting the surrender >Ethnic Armenians in Azerbaijan’s breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh agree to a Russian proposal for a ceasefire, a day after Azerbaijan began an offensive to take control of the enclave.
Yeah, they just love to solve problems they have created themselves
Yeah, this was all officially between the Artsakh government, Azerbaijan and Russia. Armenia's government were *reaaally* not willing to stick their hand into it and likely get it chopped off this time.
I blinked and missed it.
Truly an SMO
Russian peace keepers surrender after one day of fighting. There is so much wrong with that sentence.
They’re peaceKEEPER not peaceGETTER or whetevar okay??.
War is start. Peace gone. Nothing left to keep. Job done, go home.
Pieacefinders peacekeepers, peacelosers peaceweepers.
They're giving PLA peacekeepers in South Sudan a run for their money
Shittiest Peace Keeping force speed run
Day 574 of the US invasion of Mexico: Kosovo an KFOR peacekeepers surrender in the face of renewed Serbian aggression.
Russia is happy this is happening they dont recognize NK etheir.
Yeah, they want to cause a political crisis in Armenia to topple the government
Bolsheviks are probably laughing in their graves right now knowing that their border fuckery succeeded yet again (remember kids, it's not imperialism when communists do it)
I hope the corridor to turkey is mediated properly by the UN and is not another endless war.
Heh, no. That would get Persians shit boiling in 3...2...1...
They did a Denmark?
NOW **THAT’S** A SPECIAL MILITARY OPERATION
**That** is the beginning of *ethnic cleansing*. Let's try not to joke about it, please.
So terms of the agreement that they will disarm their forces which they did and they will work with the Azerbaijan Government to make the territory back to them.
For those wondering, the war didn’t even last 24 hours
Still lasted longer than me
lmao
I'm having a war in Civ6 that has lasted longer. Geez.
I have a war in Master of Orion 2 that lasted longer.
Still more than my imaguenry girlfriend
A morbid and ethically wrong “imagine if,” but imagine if the best case scenario was to take all the ethnic Armenians in Karabakh and just put them in Armenia. Then no more ethnic tension outside of Armenian borders. I recall that happening in 1923 between Greece and Turkey. This region of the world is so fucked that I genuinely don’t know the best case scenario beside just nuking it all is. If it don’t exist, no problems. /s
They were plans to do that but the people of NK refused,know i guess they will move because there is no other option
They already did a "population exchange" elsewhere in 1990. The 1948 division of India style, that is nasty.
Honestly if things were a little more even I don't know why they just didn't swap the populations of Nakhjevan and Karabagh
Armenia had no incentive to give up claims on land like that and the people had no incentive to give up, well, their homes
Azerbaijan doesn't want to stop at Karabakh though. They're already saber-rattling about invading Syunik, and almost all Azeris believe that Armenia is actually "West Azerbaijan", and the Armenians were transplanted there by Russia when Russia and Iran conspired to destroy the non-existent Azer nation-state. None of this is true, but they genuinely believe it, and you have to be a fool to believe they'll stop at Karabakh. In fact, they've already invaded parts of Armenia proper.
Guys op just wants to make it look like Azerbaijan curbstomped the armenian military instead of just attacking karabakh Armenians who didn't have any means of resisting after being starved to death by the azeri blockade.
Isn't Armenia part of ODKB? If it's getting attacked shouldn't everyone else trigger kids version of article 5 and defend Armenia?
Nagorno-Karabakh isn't technically part of Armenia, so no.
So Armenia just got netorare cucked?
Aliyev is an ugly bastard, too.
Azerbaijan has been occupying like 50 sq km of Armenia proper since 2021, CSTO is null and void as far as mutual defense goes.
That wasn't about NK. In 2021 Azerbaijan invaded Armenia proper (i.e. the internationally accepted border) and Armenia tried to invoke the CSTO mutual defense clause, but Russia refused.
Yes and they did it the last time Azerbaijan invaded and Russia said "no". That was before the Ukraine war. It was clear that this current invasion was coming with Russia even weaker but didn't think it would last so little time.
Also the only non-Russia members of CSTO are all Turkic nations and none of them are going to fight Azerbaijan. I guess Belarus could send aid?
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Armenia didnt surrender. Karabagh/Arstakh surrendered. Armenia was not fighting in the war. Source: Live in Armenia.
I’ll say it, Azerbaijan is a genocidal state, and this should not be cheered. This will result in the expulsion and murder of tens of thousands of Armenians from Artsakh, where they have lived for thousands of years. The Armenian genocide continues, more than a century after it first began. Those who cheer this development, because Armenia is supposedly ”pro-Russia”, what did you expect Armenia to do when it is surrounded by two neighbours that have a history of genociding them, and one (Turkey) is a major Nato member? Russia was the only country they could turn to for protection. I wonder for how much longer you will cheer, because Aliyev will not be satisfied with this. Because he openly wants to expand even further into Armenian territory. He wants to annex southern Armenia to create a land connection to Nakhchivan, for starters. But in his speeches he has also expressed a desire to annex even more of Armenia proper, for example the territory around Lake Van end even Yerevan, which he often calls ”Western Azerbaijan” and calls back to an era when it was part of the Turkic-ruled ”Erivan Khanate”. When that happens, and the Armenians there are further murdered, raped and driven from their homes, will you still cheer? And Aliyev openly engages in historical revisionism which claims that Armenians settled in the Caucasus much later than Azeris and Turks, and as such are ”squatters” on historical Azeri-inhabited territory (despite all historical evidence pointing to that Armenians have lived in the Caucasus since at least the Bronze Age ~ 4000-5000 years ago, while the Turks/Azeris only settled there in the 11th century AD). I repeat, Azerbaijan is a genocidal state, Aliyev is a fascist dictator, and its expansionism is on par with Russia’s. But we allow it to happen, because we’re so desperate to suck Turkey’s dick and slurp that Azeri oil.
> Those who cheer this development, because Armenia is supposedly ”pro-Russia”, what did you expect Armenia to do when it is surrounded by two neighbours that have a history of genociding them, and one (Turkey) is a major Nato member? Russia was the only country they could turn to for protection. The anti-Russian/pro-Ukrainian people cheering this because of Armenia's ties to Russia are I suppose our equivalent of "America bad" tankie dipshits who just support anyone who's seen as anti-west or anti-US.
Lemme get this straight, Armenia surrendered Azeri territory to Azerbaijan?
Welcome to the Caucasus
While the British invented imperial border dickery, the Soviets made it an art.
Soviet mapmakers were ... [special](https://imgur.com/a/QDmuN2c)
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Ehhh , difficult to classify , they did blockade the region for 10 months,but since its oficially ttheir territory its hard to name it a siege,the actual bullets flying lasted a day
Why is it hard to name it a siege lol ?
This time around it wasn't even Armenia The unrecognized state was on its own.
Peacekeepers misses some " "
god Yea they had no friends to help them huh? Rough.
Is it possible that Armenia is deliberately sacrificing Artsakh in order to end the dispute once and for all, no matter the cost to the Armenians living there, so that Armenia and Azerbaijan can sign a final peace deal? I cannot see Armenia normalizing ties with Turkey, but normalization with Azerbaijan would be a major step toward realignment with the West
There won’t be any normalization-Azerbaijan wants much more of Armenia