Putin Just Sent Armenia MiG-29 Fighters and Military aid: Here Is Why

This was the first time any Syrian president had commented on this contentious issue — and this marked a radical shift in Syrian policy. Before the war, the Syrian regime censored books on the Armenian genocide and blocked foreign film crews from visiting the sites of Turkish war crimes.

3. Keep Armenia stable

Russia’s tighter relationship with Armenia is closely related to its interest in preventing regime change in Yerevan, a staunch Russian ally. Belarus and Kazakhstan, two other Russian allies in the region, are now increasing their trade with Western countries. Armenia’s largest trade partner remains Russia, the destination of 22.6 percent of its exports and source of 24.8 percent of its imports.

Armenia’s economic dependence on Russia meant that it followed Russia into recession in 2014. When protests broke out over electricity increases in the summer, the regime mitigated anti-Russian sentiments among the Electric Yerevan protesters by highlighting the domestic origins of the protests.

Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan’s loyalty to Russia reflects his skepticism of Western values. But his anti-Western stance has become increasingly unpopular in Armenia. Since the early 2000s, the near-universal consensus on the Russian alignment has broken down as pro-European civil society organizations have inspired young Armenians to push the country on an alternate trajectory.

As Sargsyan has positioned himself as unequivocally pro-Russian, his survival depends on Russian assistance counter-balancing Western aid to liberal groups. Unlike some of its neighbors, Armenia refused to consider the 2013 E.U. association agreement proposal, instead taking up Russia’s EEU counteroffer. This decision may make Sargsyan even more dependent on Russian assistance to survive politically.

So maintaining the status quo in Armenia keeps Moscow’s EEU alternative viable, as Armenia, along with Kyrgyzstan, is the strongest ally in the union. Moscow has increased its military assistance to Armenia to ensure that Sargsyan has the coercive capacity to repress future mass protests. The Kremlin regarded the Electric Yerevan movement and other “color revolutions” with deep suspicion, claiming that U.S.-backed NGOs inspired the protests, rather than actual popular discontent.

Regime change in Armenia would leave Russia standing solo in the South Caucasus — a major blow to Russians’ perceptions of their country’s great power status. As my research on Russian foreign policy illustrates, the perception that Russia’s sphere of influence is shrinking could potentially affect political stability at home. To keep his high approval ratings during a period of prolonged economic malaise, Putin needs the Russian public to believe that Moscow still holds power over the former Soviet territories.

A stronger Russia-Armenia partnership is a relatively underexplored geopolitical development that has profound implications for the stability and security of the Caucasus, the Middle East and the post-Soviet region. With the Syrian conflict unresolved and Russia’s relations with Turkey strained, the Armenian regime stands to benefit from an unprecedented degree of Russian economic and military assistance.

(Samuel Ramani is an MPhil student in Russian and East European Studies at St. Antony’s College, University of Oxford, specializing in post-1991 Russian foreign policy. This commentary appeared on April 14 in the Washington Post.)