The Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict Revisited

Melander

The Nagorno-Karabakh Conºict Revisited

Was the War Inevitable?

✣ Erik Melander

T
he escalation of the Nagorno-Karabakh conºict in 1988–1992
from a non-violent political struggle to a full-scale ethnic war was a momen-
tous development in the ªnal phase of the Cold War. Some analysts have sug-
gested that this local conºict gravely weakened the Soviet Union and thus di-
rectly contributed to the end of the Cold War. The Nagorno-Karabakh conºict
has also been depicted as part of a general wave of ethnic violence that arose
once the Cold War was largely over. Previous scholarly work has tended to por-
tray the escalation of the Nagorno-Karabakh conºict as the result of a surge of
nationalist sentiment unleashed under the more relaxed regime of Mikhail
Gorbachev. According to this interpretation, the path to war was largely un-
avoidable after deadly ethnic riots occurred in Sumgait in February 1988.1
A closer examination of new primary evidence, including interviews with
key participants, does not bear out these earlier views. Crucial developments
in the summer of 1991 indicate that there was a possibility to avert the war at
that time, more than three years after the events in Sumgait. In 1991 the po-
litical leadership of the Armenian separatist movement in Nagorno-Karabakh
offered the Azerbaijani authorities a virtual capitulation in exchange for a ces-
sation of hostilities. The war broke out because an alternative, more radical
Armenian leadership gained the upper hand in Nagorno-Karabakh during the
abortive August 1991 coup in Moscow, when the central authorities were
temporarily disengaged.

1. See for example Ronald Grigor Suny, “Nationalism and Democracy in Gorbachev’s Soviet Union:
The Case of Karabagh,” in Rachel Denber, ed., The Soviet Nationality Reader: The Disintegration in
Context (Boulder: Westview Press, 1992), p. 493; Suzanne Goldenberg, Pride of Small Nations: The
Caucasus and Post-Soviet Disorder (London: Zed Books, 1994), p. 162; Svante Cornell, “Undeclared
War: The Nagorno-Karabakh Conºict Reconsidered,” Journal of South Asian and Middle Eastern
Studies, Vol. 20, No. 4 (1997), p. 6; and Svante Cornell, Small Nations and Great Powers (Richmond:
Curzon Press, 1999).
Journal of Cold War Studies
Vol. 3, No. 2, Spring 2001, pp. 48–75
© 2001 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College and the Massachusetts Institute
of Technology

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 The Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict Revisited

This interpretation of events bears directly on our theoretical under-

standing of the causes of the Nagorno-Karabakh war. The two most theoreti-
cally elaborated studies of the subject claim that the war erupted because of
the willingness and opportunity (sometimes termed preferences and capabili-
ties or interest and power) of the parties to ªght over the disputed region. Stu-
art Kaufman focuses on willingness and opportunity of a particular kind: Eth-
nic prejudices and fears among the masses give rise to a willingness to provide
for their security by violent means if necessary, and the relaxation of state re-
pression affords them the opportunity to take such military action. The result
is a security dilemma in which each side is driven to enhance its security in
ways that threaten the other. Preemptive ethnic warfare is the outcome.2
Svante Cornell looks at willingness and opportunity in somewhat broader
terms, arguing that the Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh possessed the will-
ingness as well as the opportunity to go beyond preemptive self-defense (as
Kaufman portrays it) and to rebel against Azerbaijani rule.3
Kaufman and Cornell seem to argue that the conºict was inevitable and
that a negotiated outcome was an impossibility. But demonstrating that actors
are willing and able to do something is not the same as showing that this thing
must happen. Decision makers base their actions on uncertain and conºicting
expectations about the consequences of alternative courses of action.4
Kaufman’s and Cornell’s arguments are a useful starting point, but they take
us only part way toward an explanation.
The general theoretical puzzle with wars is that they are costly to all sides
and that a range of mutually preferable alternatives therefore ought to exist. A
key question for conºict theorists is what will prevent the parties to a dispute
from reaching a negotiated agreement. The Nagorno-Karabakh conºict could
2. Stuart J. Kaufman, “Ethnic Fears and Ethnic War in Karabagh,” paper presented at the Annual
Meeting of the International Studies Association, Minneapolis, MN, March 1998.
3. Svante Cornell, “Autonomy in the South Caucasus: A Catalyst of Conºict?” Paper presented at the
ªfth annual convention of the Association for the Study of Nationalities, New York, NY, April 2000.
4. Erik Gartzke, “War Is in the Error Term,” International Organization, Vol. 53, No. 3 (Summer
1999), p. 569. This body of arguments is also developed in James D. Fearon, “Threats to Use Force:
Costly Signals and Bargaining in International Crises” (Ph.D. diss., University of California, Berkeley,
1992); James D. Fearon, “Rationalist Explanations for War,” International Organization, Vol. 49, No. 3
(Summer 1995), pp. 379–414; James D. Fearon, “Commitment Problems and the Spread of Ethnic
Conºict,” in David A. Lake and Donald S. Rothchild, eds., The International Spread of Ethnic Conºict:
Fear, Diffusion, and Escalation (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1998), pp.; Robert H. Bates,
Rui J. P. Figueiredo, and Barry R. Weingast, “The Politics of Interpretation: Rationality, Culture, and
Transition,” Politics & Society, Vol. 26, No. 4 (December 1998), pp. 603–642; David A. Lake and
Donald Rothchild, “Containing Fear: The Management of Transnational Ethnic Conºict,” in Lake and
Rothchild, eds., Spread of Ethnic Conºict, pp. 203–226; David A. Lake and Donald Rothchild, “Ethnic
Fears and Global Engagement,” in Lake and Rothchild, eds., Spread of Ethnic Conºict, pp. 339–350.
David A. Lake and Donald Rothchild, eds., “Spreading Fear: The Genesis of Transnational Ethnic
Conºict,” in Lake and Rothchild, eds., Spread of Ethnic Conºict, pp. 3–32.; and David A. Lake and
Robert Powell, eds., Strategic Choice and International Relations (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press, 1999).

49
 Melander

have been resolved with much less bloodshed if the actors had been able to see
through the strategic uncertainties of the situation. Incomplete information
about capabilities and resolve are therefore an indispensable part of the expla-
nation for why this war began.
More speciªcally, if the successive regimes in Azerbaijan had been able to
foresee the ultimate dissolution of the Soviet Union and the catastrophic con-
sequences of Russia’s disengagement and its subsequent reorientation in favor
of Armenia, they would reasonably have preferred to cut their losses rather
than use force to resist Armenian separatism and irredentism. On the other
hand, if the political leadership of the Armenian separatist movement in
Nagorno-Karabakh had expected the kind of brutal response by the Soviet
Army that took place under “Operation Ring” in the spring of 1991, these
leaders would have had a strong incentive to retract their demands. Had they
done this, they would have spared themselves the pains of launching a failed
initiative in the summer of 1991 that cost them their leadership positions and
was the likely reason for the assassination of Valerii Grigoriyan by Armenian
hard-liners. If the abortive coup in Moscow in August 1991 had not diverted
the attention of the Soviet leadership at this critical juncture, the Armenian
initiative might ultimately have succeeded in averting a full-scale war. This ar-
ticle shows that Kaufman’s assessment of the escalation in Nagorno-Karabakh
as “mass-led” rather than “elite-led” must be qualiªed; the struggle for pri-
macy between competing elites played a decisive role.5
The ªrst section of this article provides background information on the
Nagorno-Karabakh conºict and the main actors involved. The second section
discusses previous theoretical analyses of the causes of the war and proposes a
complementary perspective that focuses on strategic uncertainty as the obsta-
cle to negotiated outcomes. The third and fourth sections describe how the
conºict escalated. The fourth section pays particular attention to the Arme-
nian capitulatory initiative in the summer of 1991. The account here is based
largely on new primary evidence in the form of interviews with participants,
as well as published sources in Russian that have been previously overlooked.
The conclusion lays out the theoretical ªndings of the article.

Background and Main Actors6

In 1987 Armenians made up 74 percent of the population of Nagorno-

Karabakh, an autonomous province (oblast) within the Soviet republic of

5. Kaufman, “Ethnic Fears,” p. 25.

6. For more comprehensive history and further sources on the conºict, see Cornell, Small Nations;

50
 The Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict Revisited

Azerbaijan.7 The Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast (NKAO) was

physically separated from the Soviet republic of Armenia by a strip of land be-
longing to Azerbaijan. The narrowest part of this strip is often referred to as
the “Lachin corridor.” It was almost exclusively inhabited by Azeris and
Kurds, and the NKAO can thus be characterized as an Armenian exclave.
Within the NKAO there was also a substantial Azeri community, though it
was considerably smaller than the Armenian population. This meant that the
Azeris in Nagorno-Karabakh were a local minority despite being part of the
larger Azeri majority in the Azerbaijan republic as a whole.
By the mid-to-late 1980s the Armenian population of Nagorno-Kara-
bakh was increasingly resentful that the province was part of Azerbaijan rather
than Armenia. The Armenians complained that the leaders of Azer- baijan
systematically neglected the province and that the Armenians who lived there
faced discrimination. The standard of living in the NKAO was relatively high
in comparison to other undeveloped mountainous regions in the Soviet Un-
ion and even in comparison to the Azerbaijan republic as a whole; but the
NKAO was still poor, and the standard of living was lower than in Armenia.
Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh also complained that the province was be-
ing drained of its resources by Baku and that it received few investments.8
It is difªcult to know whether these perceived injustices were caused by
discrimination against the province or by the incompetence, inefªciency, and
corruption that were endemic in the Soviet Union at the time, particularly in
the Transcaucasus republics. The difªculty of evaluating the claims of injus-
tice is compounded by the Soviet regime’s lack of transparency and the dearth
of reliable information. The actors in the conºict themselves faced a good
deal of uncertainty about these matters.

Michael P. Croissant, The Armenia-Azerbaijan Conºict: Causes and Implications (Westport: Praeger
Publishers, 1998); and Kaufman, “Ethnic Fears.”
7. The percentages are found in A. N. Yamskov, “Ethnic Conºict in the Transcaucasus: The Case of
Nagorno-Karabakh,” Theory and Society, Vol. 20, No. 5 (October 1991), pp. 631–660, esp. p. 645.
The background information provided here is based on the following works: Cornell, Small Nations;
Croissant, Armenia-Azerbaijan Conºict; Goldenberg, Pride of Small Nations; Kaufman, “Ethnic Fears”;
Mark Malkasian, “Gha-Ra-Bagh!” The Emergence of the National Democratic Movement in Armenia
(Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1996); V. G. Mityayev, “Karabakhskii konºikt v kontekste
mezhdunarodnykh otnoshenii,” in E. M. Kozhokina, ed., Armeniya: Problemy nezavisimogo razvitiya
(Moscow: Rossiiskii Institut Strategicheskikh Issledovanii, 1998), pp. 487–554; and Alexei Zverev,
“Ethnic Conºicts in the Caucasus 1988–1994,” in Bruno Coppieters, ed., Contested Borders in the
Caucasus (Brussels: VUBPRESS, 1996). As far as possible, controversial information has been checked
against several different sources. See Norman K. Denzin and Yvonna S. Lincoln, Handbook of Qualita-
tive Research (Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications, 1994), p. 373; and Robert K. Yin, Case Study Re-
search: Design and Methods, Vol. 5 of Applied Social Research Methods Series (Newbury Park: Sage
Publications, 1989).
8. Goldenberg, Pride of Small Nations, p. 161; Mityayev, “Karabakhskii konºikt”; Yamskov, “Ethnic
Conºict in the Transcaucasus”; Zverev, “Ethnic Conºicts in the Caucasus”; and Kaufman “Ethnic
Fears,” p. 15f.

51
 Melander

The dissatisªed Armenians in the NKAO were represented by two

main factions. The traditional Communist nomenklatura played a leading
role in the nationalist movement in the province, which might seem some-
what surprising given the ofªcial internationalism supposedly adhered to
by Communists.9 This faction initially operated through its representatives
in the ofªcial Soviet structures of local authority, and it also founded
the independent pressure group “Krunk.” A younger, more radical group
emerged during the open phase of the conºict and gained increasing inºuence
as the crisis progressed. The group’s power base was built mostly in the
Dashnak party, an illegal Armenian nationalist party secretly operating in
the Soviet Union after 1988.10 This radical group came to control the para-
military forces in Nagorno-Karabakh that were organized with support from
Armenia.
The uniªcation of Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia was an important
goal of the population of the Armenian Soviet Republic. A large nationalist
movement emerged in Armenia and gradually assumed political power. The
leaders of this movement, the so-called “Karabakh Committee,” did not come
from the traditional nomenklatura; instead, they were opposed to the Arme-
nian Communist regime. Because the Armenian nationalist movement was
widely popular, and perhaps because the Communists felt some genuine sym-
pathy with Armenian nationalist aims, the Armenian Communist leadership
mostly kept a low proªle or adapted its position to ªt the policies advocated
by the Karabakh Committee.11 The Karabakh Committee institutionalized its
activities in the Armenian National Movement (ANM), which successfully
contested the 1989 elections to the Armenian Supreme Soviet. In August
1990 the ANM became the government of Soviet Armenia.
Azerbaijan, for its part, was unwilling to relinquish Nagorno-Karabakh.
The government in Baku expected Soviet leaders to prevent any territorial
changes so long as the Azerbaijani republic remained loyal to Moscow. This
expectation was probably based on the assumption that Azerbaijan was more
important than Armenia to the Soviet Union because of its oil. The national-
ist movement in Azerbaijan did not become organized until rather late in the
conºict with the Armenians—partly because of government suppression, but
also because Azeri leaders supported popular opinion on the question of
Nagorno-Karabakh. Later on, frustration with the perceived weakness and
passivity of the Azerbaijani government spurred the formation of a strong na-

9. Kaufman, “Ethnic Fears”; and Malkasian, “Gha-Ra-Bagh!”

10. Goldenberg, Pride of Small Nations, p. 144.
11. Peter Rutland, “Democracy and Nationalism in Armenia,” Europe-Asia Studies, Vol. 46, No. 5
(July 1994), p. 845.

52
 The Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict Revisited

tionalist opposition, which became a serious threat to the Communist re-

gime’s control over the republic.
In addition to the Armenians and Azerbaijanis, there was a third actor in
the Nagorno-Karabakh conºict: the Soviet leadership in Moscow, headed by
Gorbachev. Soviet leaders opposed Armenian designs in Nagorno-Karabakh
because of the risk that similar demands could be made by various regions in
the Soviet Union, thus destabilizing the whole state.12 Moscow naturally sided
with the Azerbaijani regime in Baku.13 Gorbachev, however, was worried that
the large-scale use of force would jeopardize his reform program. He sus-
pected that his conservative opponents in the Soviet Communist Party
(CPSU) would seize upon any outbreak of serious civil unrest to argue that
the reforms were a threat to Soviet security. Gorbachev even feared that hard-
liners would provoke such disturbances to discredit him and the whole reform
program.14
The relationship among the three major actors in the conºict had a few
signiªcant characteristics that should be noted. First, Erevan, Baku, and Mos-
cow formed a triangular relationship as the three strongest powers in the
conºict. The Armenian separatist movement centered in Stepanakert was a
fourth power, but it was clearly dependent on outside support. Nevertheless,
the separatist movement could decisively inºuence the conºict through its ac-
tions, and it could be conªdent that Armenia would send help if necessary.
Second, each power had to contend with an alternative faction within its own
ranks. The ruling elites in Erevan, Baku, and Moscow had to worry not only
about one another but also about competition closer to home. To use the
metaphor coined by Robert D. Putnam, the actors had to play a two-level
game, which meant that shifting alliances and disunity within the camps were
a distinct possibility.15

Theoretical Perspectives

Conºict theory and theories of ethnic violence provide the best tools for un-
derstanding the warfare in Nagorno-Karabakh. Most theories of violent

12. Malkasian, “Gha-Ra-Bagh!” p. 120f; and Zverev, “Ethnic Conºicts in the Caucasus.”
13. Cornell, Small Nations, p. 353f; Malkasian, “Gha-Ra-Bagh!” p. 116ff; Rutland, “Democracy and
Nationalism”; and Zverev, “Ethnic Conºicts in the Caucasus.”
14. Malkasian, “Gha-Ra-Bagh!” p. 191; Georgiy Shakhnazarov, Tsena svobody: Reformatsiya
Gorbacheva glazami ego pomoshchnika (Moscow: Zevs, 1993), ch. 12; and Mikhail Gorbachev, Mem-
oirs (New York: Doubleday, 1995), ch. 15.
15. Robert D. Putnam, “Diplomacy and Domestic Politics: The Logic of Two-Level Games,” Interna-
tional Organization, Vol. 42, No. 3 (Summer 1988), pp. 427–460.

53
 Melander

conºict fall into three categories: those that look at the actors’ willingness to
resort to violence; those that focus on opportunities to pursue a strategy of vi-
olence; and those that look at a combination of willingness and opportunity.
In addition, a new approach to conºict theory argues that the willingness-
opportunity paradigm does not sufªciently explain costly wars. This new ap-
proach, sometimes referred to as “strategic choice,” emphasizes the impact of
uncertainty and incomplete information on decision making.16
Both Donald Horowitz and Walker Connor contend that willingness is
the most important factor in instigating ethnic conºict. Horowitz looks at the
effects of ethnic anxiety and ethnic entitlement on increasing tensions, and
Connor stresses the importance of the family bonds associated with ethnic
identity in arousing ethnic passions. In contrast, Charles Tilly focuses on the
role of shared and collectively controlled opportunities in the competition for
social niches.17 Most theorists of ethnic conºict, especially those afªliated
with the Majority at Risk project—perhaps the best-known body of system-
atic research on the causes of ethnic conºict—refer to both willingness and
opportunity.18
In a thorough study of the origins of the Nagorno-Karabakh war, Stuart
Kaufman looks at willingness and opportunity of a particular kind. He argues
that willingness to ªght is generated by ethnic prejudice that gives rise to fears
of extinction among an ethnic group. If members of the group perceive such a
threat, they will take the opportunity to mobilize militarily if they believe they
are in no danger of central state coercion. The result, according to Kaufman,
is an ethnic security dilemma. Both sides in the ethnic conºict are driven by
their perceived security needs to take measures that threaten their opponents.
Unless a strong state resorts to severe repression against one or both sides
(what Kaufman refers to as the Stalinist model), or undertakes a more modest
form of repression (what Kaufman refers to as the Northern Ireland model),
the ethnic security dilemma will result in ethnic war.19

16. Lake and Powell, Strategic Choice.

17. Donald L. Horowitz, Ethnic Groups in Conºict (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985);
Walker Connor, Ethnonationalism: The Quest for Understanding (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press, 1994); and Charles Tilly, “Ethnic Conºict in the Soviet Union,” Theory and Society, Vol. 20,
No. 5 (October 1991), pp. 569–580.
18. Ted Robert Gurr and Will H. Moore, “Ethnopolitical Rebellion: A Cross-Sectional Analysis of the
1980s with Risk Assessments for the 1990s,” American Journal of Political Science, Vol. 41, No. 4 (Oc-
tober 1997), pp. 1079–1103; and Ted Robert Gurr, Peoples Versus States: Minorities at Risk in the New
Century (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace Press, 2000).
19. Kaufman, “Ethnic Fears.” One potential problem with Kaufman’s theory is that prejudices “of a
type sufªcient to justify the emergence of ethnic fears” (p. 7) could be difªcult to identify empirically
without reference to the outcome. It would seem that prejudices are present in many ethnic conºicts
that nevertheless do not escalate to war. If only the prejudices that ended up in a violent outcome were
to count as “sufªcient,” Kaufman’s explanation would be circular.

54
 The Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict Revisited

With regard to the Nagorno-Karabakh conºict, Kaufman maintains that

there was widespread ethnic prejudice throughout the Soviet period and that
the political space afforded by Gorbachev’s reforms allowed the security di-
lemma to arise. Armenians feared that Azerbaijanis were oppressing and per-
haps planning genocidal actions against them, and these presentiments fueled
the demand for the uniªcation of Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia. The
Azerbaijanis, on the other hand, long regarded the Armenians as “trouble-
makers” and resented them for their economic success and social status.
Kaufman also notes that the Azerbaijanis who ºed Armenian areas before the
violence erupted “obviously had cause to fear [the Armenians] as well.”20
What is more, Kaufman holds that the Azerbaijani sense of nationhood was
fragile and tightly linked to the defense of territorial integrity, thus making
Armenian separatism seem especially threatening. These popular fears soon
triggered deadly ethnic riots in Askeran, Sumgait, and other locales. As Soviet
forces gradually disengaged from the conºict, the ªghting escalated from
guerrilla warfare to conventional warfare. Thus, in Kaufman’s account, the
underlying willingness to ªght was present at the outset of the conºict, and
the escalation of the war was mostly due to the opportunities resulting from
the easing of Soviet repression. Kaufman also maintains that escalation oc-
curred because Armenian leaders came under pressure to adopt increasingly
belligerent policies.
Svante Cornell has employed a more general willingness-opportunity
framework to explain why the Nagorno-Karabakh conºict led to war. Based
on a comparative study of nine ethnic conºicts in the South Caucasus, Cor-
nell claims that a number of factors, such as the intensity of past conºict and
the myths surrounding it, contributed to the willingness of minority groups
to rebel. He also suggests that a variety of factors, such as rough terrain,
helped create the opportunity for rebellious action. The propensity of
conºicts to erupt and escalate, he argues, can be explained largely by varia-
tions in these factors. Cornell characterizes two especially important phenom-
ena as catalysts: a radical leadership and external support for the rebellious mi-
nority.21
In the Nagorno-Karabakh case, Cornell maintains, deep cultural differ-
ences in language and religion, a history of intense conºict with accompany-
ing myths, and an exclusive ethnic conception of the nation combined to give
rise to a strong willingness among Azeris and Armenians to contest the consti-
tutional status of Nagorno-Karabakh by force if necessary. The opportunities
for the Armenian minority were enhanced by the mountainous terrain suit-

20. Ibid., p. 26.

21. Cornell, “Autonomy.”

55
 Melander

able for guerrilla warfare in Nagorno-Karabakh, the relatively unproblematic

access to arms, and the presence of ethnic kin in the neighboring Armenian
Soviet Republic. Cornell also points to the importance of political institutions
associated with the autonomous status of Nagorno-Karabakh:
From a very early stage in the conºict, the Nagorno-Karabakh Armenians—who
already had a strong willingness to act given the salience of cultural differences
and the remembrance of past conºict—were equipped with three crucial factors:
the autonomous status of the province, which had been helpful in sustaining Ar-
menian identity, but more importantly carried with it the political institutions
to channel secessionist sentiments; secondly, external support from the republic
of Armenia which effectively obliterated the problem of demographic weakness
(no more than 150,000 Armenians lived in Nagorno-Karabakh) and any possi-
ble problems of economic viability; and thirdly, radical leadership which en-
tailed an uncompromising course of action. In fact, faced with a refusal from
both the Azerbaijani SSR and the USSR leadership to acquiesce to its demands
and later Soviet military intervention in 1991, the Nagorno-Karabakh leader-
ship continued its uncompromising course of action. These three factors seem
to have had a decisive impact on the development of the conºict.22

Cornell’s assessment of the unwavering refusal by the Nagorno-Karabakh

leadership to compromise must be qualiªed in light of the evidence presented
below. At this point, however, the main thing to note is that Cornell attributes
the escalation of the Nagorno-Karabakh conºict to the combined presence of
factors related to willingness and opportunity, particularly to cultural differ-
ences, the remembrance of past conºict, autonomous institutions, external
support, and radical leadership.
The explanations advanced by Kaufman and Cornell are not necessarily
mutually exclusive. The willingness-opportunity framework can be integrated
with the security dilemma, and it is possible to see the security dilemma as a
special case of the willingness-opportunity framework. The main difference
between these two interpretations lies in their characterizations of the Arme-
nian separatists. Cornell implies that they were revisionists on the offensive,
whereas Kaufman suggests that they were motivated primarily by defensive se-
curity concerns. This difference aside, both authors believe that the willing-
ness and the opportunity to ªght over Nagorno-Karabakh were present by
1988.
Neither of these theories, however, addresses the question of why the
parties to the conºict did not conclude an agreement that would have avoided
mutually costly ªghting. Why did they not pursue a compromise that
would have stopped short of violence? If both sides knew that they and their

22. Ibid., p. 41.

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 The Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict Revisited

adversary were willing and able to wage war over Nagorno-Karabakh, why
did the conºict gradually escalate for almost four years before full-scale war-
fare erupted?23 This latter question seems especially puzzling if we bear in
mind the perceived advantages of striking ªrst in the Nagorno-Karabakh
conºict.24
A deceptively simple answer to these questions is that the parties pos-
sessed incomplete information about crucial aspects of the situation. For ex-
ample, neither side knew whether its opponent would succeed in imposing its
will through force. Neither side knew whether the Soviet authorities would
come down on one side or the other, or whether the central government
would merely withdraw from the conºict. In strategic choice theory these and
similar uncertainties will determine whether the outcome of a conºict is a
peaceful, negotiated settlement or war. To the extent that the parties hold
conºicting beliefs about the balance of resolve and the balance of power, the
search for a less costly negotiated solution may be impeded. For example, if
both sides in a conºict believe they will prevail relatively easily on the bat-
tleªeld, perhaps because they both expect support from a third party, then
neither will be willing to make any substantial concessions. If one side under-
estimates the resolve of its opponent, it is likely to demand more than the op-
ponent will concede. But if the parties overestimate each other’s resolve or
strength, they may be willing to seek a compromise.25
This relationship between the perceived balance of resolve and power on
the one hand, and the perceived range of acceptable divisions of the disputed
stakes on the other, implies that the parties in conºict face incentives to exag-
gerate their resolve and power. Through displays of force and other signals,
each side can try to intimidate the other into conceding more of the stakes.
(Sometimes, however, the parties have incentives to downplay their resolve
and power, perhaps to attract sympathy and support from third parties or
to prepare the ground for a surprise attack.) Since each side knows that the
other is inclined to conceal its true resolve, neither believes what the other
says. This uncertainty is likely to affect each side’s decision about whether to
escalate.

23. The length of the escalatory process could be attributed to the level of repression used by the cen-
tral government. But a more important factor was the uncertainty about how Moscow would respond
to a conºict. As will be shown in the empirical section, the uncertain and sometimes contradictory ex-
pectations about the reaction of the central authorities to different actions affected the behavior of all
parties involved.
24. Barry R. Posen, “The Security Dilemma and Ethnic Conºict,” Survival, Vol. 35, No. 1 (Spring
1993), pp. 27–47.
25. When all parties in a conºict correctly assess the balance of resolve and power, they should be able
to predict the outcome of a violent confrontation. If so, they should also be able to agree on conces-
sions mutually preferable to a costly and violent conºict.

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 Melander

When a party decides to escalate or offer concessions, it must convey its

intention to the adversary. Signals that are more costly to the sender are less
likely to be dismissed as cheap talk and are therefore inherently more credible
as tools of intimidation. The parties to a conºict can be expected to start out
by using less costly means and will then gradually increase the belligerence of
their acts. This may explain why so few conºicts escalate very quickly to all-
out war even if ªrst-strike advantages are present. During the early stages, the
parties are uncertain about the outcome and are still hopeful that a favorable
agreement can be reached through less costly means. The longer the exchange
of intimidating signals lasts without an agreement, the greater the risk at any
given moment that war will be initiated. The increasingly belligerent signals
tend to strengthen perceptions that the stakes are highly valued by all parties
and that the advantages of a ªrst strike are growing.
When explaining a war, we must do more than simply show that the ac-
tors were willing and able to ªght. We must also determine whether the ac-
tors’ manipulation of strategic uncertainty was successful. The Nagorno-
Karabakh war, as this article will demonstrate, was not inevitable; it could
have been avoided if the actors had seen through the uncertainties of the situ-
ation and had better anticipated the consequences of their actions.

Developments up to 1991

The status of Nagorno-Karabakh was in dispute both before and during the
Soviet era. The most recent Nagorno-Karabakh conºict began shortly after
Gorbachev announced his reform programs of perestroika and glasnost. In
1987 Armenians repeatedly petitioned the authorities in Moscow to transfer
Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia. Soviet leaders mostly ignored these appeals
until the Armenian petitioners and demonstrators grew bolder. The demon-
strations and strikes went beyond the level of behavior that was normally tol-
erated, but they did not necessarily guarantee that violence would occur. Until
the early 1990s most Armenians believed that a negotiated solution to the
Nagorno-Karabakh conºict was still possible.
In late 1987 and early 1988, however, a series of tragic events drastically
altered the situation. By the end of 1987 Azeri refugees began to ºee the
NKAO.26 On 22 February Azeri demonstrators marched on Stepanakert to
protest a resolution adopted by the Nagorno-Karabakh provincial council ap-
pealing a transfer of the NKAO to Armenia. Just inside the border of the
26. Audrey L. Altstadt, “O Patria Mia: National Conºict in Mountainous Karabagh,” in W. Raymond
Duncan and G. Paul Holman, eds., Ethnic Nationalism and Regional Conºict (Boulder: Westview
Press, 1994); Cornell, Small Nations; and Kaufman, “Ethnic Fears,” p. 16.

58
 The Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict Revisited

NKAO, near Askeran, Azeri demonstrators clashed with police and local Ar-
menians, and two Azeris were killed. When these casualties were announced
on Azerbaijani radio, violence against Armenians erupted in the town of
Sumgait (near Baku) on 27 February. Some of the 2,000 Azeri refugees who
had ºed to Sumgait were reported to have played a signiªcant role in this eth-
nic riot, which killed 26 Armenians and 6 Azeris, according to ofªcial
sources.27
The cause of the Sumgait riot continues to be a puzzle.28 It is clear, how-
ever, that the riot increased fears within the Armenian community.29 Al-
though these fears had an important long-term effect on the development of
the conºict, most Armenians during the early phase of the struggle for the
uniªcation of Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia still believed in the potential
of a nonviolent political campaign. They were convinced that Moscow, and
Gorbachev personally, would be won over to their side.
From early on, however, a few more militant Armenians began to prepare
for an armed struggle in response to the events in Sumgait.30 Among them
were Igor Muradyan, one of the original members of the Karabakh Commit-
tee in Armenia, who had been expelled from the Committee because of his

27. Armenian sources claim a much higher number of Armenian casualties. See Joseph R. Masih and
Robert O. Krikorian, Armenia: At the Crossroads (Amsterdam: Harwood Academic Publishers, 1999),
p. 8.
28. Several alternative explanations can be proposed for the Sumgait events. One is that the deadly
ethnic riot was a spontaneous or locally instigated outbreak of uncontrolled violence, which the re-
publican and central authorities failed to prevent because of incompetence and inefªciency rather
than malign intent. A variant of this explanation holds that local elements in the Azeri maªa wanted a
cover under which Armenian competition could be eliminated. See Richard Sakwa, Gorbachev and His
Reforms 1985–1990 (Hempel Hempstead: Philip Allan, 1990), p. 244. See also Kaufman, “Ethnic
Fears.” Another possible explanation is that the events were organized by the Azerbaijani republican
authorities, possibly even in conspiracy with the central authorities in Moscow, as a warning to the se-
cessionist Armenians in NKAO. Some claim that before the riots the authorities in Baku threatened
the Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh with violence unless the demands for uniªcation with Armenia
were withdrawn. See Vagan Bakhshiyevich Arutyunyan, Sobytiya v Nagornom Karabakhe. Khronika.
Chast’ 1. Fevral’ 1988 g.–Yanvar’ 1989 g. (Erevan: Izdatel’stvo AN Armyanskoi SSR, 1990). Yet an-
other possibility is that anti-perestroika forces organized the deadly ethnic riot to discredit Gorbachev
and his reforms. This was the explanation offered by Gorbachev himself. See Croissant, Armenia-
Azerbaijan Conºict, p. 29. Others suggest that Moscow or the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency sought
to destabilize the region for their own purposes, or that the riot was instigated by Armenian provoca-
teurs to justify Armenian nationalist policies. See Levon Chorbajian, Patrick Donabedian, and Claude
Mutaªan, The Caucasian Knot: The History and Geopolitics of Nagorno-Karabagh (London: Zed Books,
1994), p. 189. Finally, some Armenians believe there is a genetic predisposition among ethnic Turks to
murder Armenians. This view was encountered in several conversations during ªeldwork; see also Ida
Babayan, Armenia and Mountainous Karabakh on the Political Scene of the World (Erevan: Aghvank,
1995).
29. Goldenberg, Pride of Small Nations, p. 154; Edmund M. Herzig, “Armenia and the Armenians,” in
Graham Smith, ed., The Nationalities Question in the Post-Soviet States (London: Longman Group,
1996), p. 257; Malkasian, “Gha-Ra-Bagh!”; Masih and Krikorian, Armenia: At the Crossroads;
Mityayev, “Karabakhskii konºikt,” p. 490; and Zverev, “Ethnic Conºicts in the Caucasus.”
30. Masih and Krikorian, Armenia: At the Crossroads, p. 20f.

59
 Melander

radicalism and had formed his own Miatsum (Uniªcation) movement.31

Young Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh threatened to launch a guerrilla war
if the demand for uniªcation with Armenia was not met, and in May self-
defense troops appeared on the streets of Stepanakert. These militants would
later grow in strength and numbers, and eventually they dominated politics in
the Armenian enclave.
Armenian hopes for an easy political victory were dashed in March 1988
when the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR (the chief legislative
organ in the Soviet Union, though one with very little real power) rejected the
petition of the Nagorno-Karabakh council for uniªcation with Armenia and
denied the council’s right to appeal. During the spring and summer, sporadic
clashes and local incidents involving the forced removal of minority popula-
tions continued in both Armenia and Azerbaijan. Although Soviet leaders dis-
patched Internal Affairs Ministry (MVD) troops to Erevan, Armenian activ-
ists continued to organize new meetings and demonstrations.
On 13 June the Supreme Soviet (parliament) of Azerbaijan declared that
the Nagorno-Karabakh council’s petition of 20 February was unacceptable.
Two days later the Armenian Supreme Soviet ofªcially endorsed the request
for uniªcation, and on 17 June Azerbaijan rejected this request, spurring new
complaints by the Nagorno-Karabakh council. On 28 June, at the Nineteenth
Conference of the CPSU, Gorbachev ruled out any changes to republic bor-
ders. This came as a great disappointment to the Armenian nationalists.
That same month, at a meeting with the Communist Party ªrst secretar-
ies of Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Nagorno-Karabakh, Egor Ligachev, a leading
member of the CPSU Politburo, offered to upgrade the level of autonomy of
the NKAO to the status of an autonomous republic. The Armenians rejected
the plan, however, reportedly because it expanded the borders of Nagorno-
Karabakh to include more areas populated mainly by Azeris.32
The continued large-scale demonstrations and insistent appeals for
uniªcation despite the rejections by Moscow and Baku, and the highly visible
deployment of Soviet troops to Erevan, were risky. A concrete reminder of the
dangers involved came on 5 July 1988, when a demonstration blocking the
airport outside Erevan was brutally dispersed by Soviet MVD troops, killing
one Armenian demonstrator. Expectations of an imminent military crack-
down were widespread in Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh after the airport
incident. For a time the Armenian nationalist movement shifted to less pro-
vocative and less risky tactics. The strikes were largely called off, and national-

31. Malkasian, “Gha-Ra-Bagh!” p. 91.

32. Ibid., p. 102.

60
 The Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict Revisited

ist activists in Armenia began to emphasize democratization of the republic

and decentralization of the broader union.33
Nonetheless, a smaller, more radically minded part of the Armenian na-
tionalist movement drew the opposite conclusion. The radicals sought to in-
tensify the struggle for the uniªcation of Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia
and argued that Armenia should strive for outright independence from the
Soviet Union. Most of the radical nationalists in Armenia were politically
close to the Dashnaks in Nagorno-Karabakh.
Armenian nationalists in Nagorno-Karabakh were less tolerant of the sta-
tus quo than were nationalists in Armenia. The Nagorno-Karabakh council
was unwilling to back down on its earlier demands or to accept the current
stalemate. Instead, on 12 July the council declared that Nagorno-Karabakh
was seceding from Azerbaijan. The Azerbaijani Supreme Soviet immediately
responded by declaring the move “null and void.”
On 18 July the Presidium of the USSR Supreme Soviet devoted an entire
session to the Nagorno-Karabakh issue and again ruled that border changes
were out of the question. The Presidium also decided to send special represen-
tatives to Nagorno-Karabakh to oversee a program for large-scale economic
investment and cultural development, which had been initiated in March but
had failed to placate the Armenian nationalists. In addition, a special commis-
sion under the USSR Soviet of Nationalities (one of the two houses of the
USSR Supreme Soviet) was to examine the situation in the NKAO in greater
detail.
The Armenians were increasingly disappointed with the decisions in
Moscow, and they sensed that the uniªcation of Nagorno-Karabakh with Ar-
menia would be a more difªcult task than initially expected.34 Even the com-
paratively radical Armenian leadership in Stepanakert temporarily moderated
its position in response to the latest developments.35 Moreover, strikes ended
in Nagorno-Karabakh for the time being.
Armenians in both Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia had assumed that
Gorbachev would grant their request for uniªcation. These expectations in-
creased after Sumgait, since the violence in Sumgait seemed to make clear that
the residents of Nagorno-Karabakh could no longer live under Azerbaijani
rule. Many Armenians believed that Gorbachev was genuinely trying to cor-

33. Ibid., pp. 103–129. See also Goldenberg, Pride of Small Nations, p. 142f; and Herzig, “Armenia
and the Armenians,” p. 258f.
34. Christopher J. Walker, Armenia and Karabagh: The Struggle for Unity (London: Minority Rights
Publications, 1991), p. 126.
35. See the statement by NKAO First Secretary Poghosyan, quoted in Malkasian, “Gha-Ra-Bagh!”
p. 119.

61
 Melander

rect some of the mistakes committed by earlier Soviet leaders, especially by

Josif Stalin. They viewed the subordination of Nagorno-Karabakh to
Azerbaijan as an obvious case of a historical injustice in need of redress.36
The authorities in Moscow, for their part, underestimated the intensity of
the Armenians’ desire to reclaim Nagorno-Karabakh for Armenia. Soviet lead-
ers believed that proposals for major investment and cultural development in
the NKAO, announced on 24 March 1988, would sufªce to offset the Arme-
nian dissatisfaction.37 They also assumed that the dispatch of MVD troops to
Nagorno-Karabakh in February had signaled resolve not to change the border.
This, however, proved not to be the case. Initially, many Armenians viewed
the troops sent to Stepanakert more as protectors than as a deterrent against
further separatism.38
The Azerbaijani government was staunchly opposed to the separatist
movement. The authorities in Baku naturally could not foresee that the
conºict would ultimately lead to a catastrophic military defeat several years
down the road. For the time being, they trusted that Moscow would do what-
ever was needed to uphold the status quo. Based on that assumption,
Azerbaijani leaders repeatedly rejected the Armenian demands.
The escalation of tensions continued in Nagorno-Karabakh. In the
wake of Sumgait, fear had gradually increased in the province. Thefts of
sheep, one of the mainstays of the local economy, were increasingly common.
Rioting and small-scale ethnic cleansing took place during the spring in
Stepanakert and neighboring Shusha, a settlement with a predominantly
Azeri population, in the NKAO. The Azeri minority in Armenia and the Ar-
menian minority in Azerbaijan outside the NKAO were also subjected to vari-
ous forms of harassment, and numerous people were forced to ºee from their
homes. Most likely, the perpetrators of these deeds were loosely organized
bands of militants who began to coalesce on both sides. Azeri refugees testify
that Armenian hardcore nationalists, referred to as “the bearded ones”
(borodachi), played a prominent role in the violence.39 In Stepanakert Arme-
nian refugees from Sumgait were already present when Azeri refugees from
Armenia began to arrive in increasing numbers to Shusha. The appearance of
terriªed and mistreated refugees served to heighten fear on both sides. Many

36. Rutland, “Democracy and Nationalism”; Herzig, “Armenia and the Armenians,” p. 256; Crois-
sant, Armenia-Azerbaijan Conºict, p. 25f; Gerard J. Libaridian, The Challenge of Statehood: Armenian
Political Thinking since Independence (Watertown, MA: Blue Crane Books, 1999), p. 26; and Masih
and Krikorian, Armenia: At the Crossroads, p. 7.
37. Malkasian, “Gha-Ra-Bagh!” p. 62.
38. Grisha Hairapetyan, Dashnak leader and paramilitary commander in Nagorno-Karabakh, inter-
view, Stepanakert, June 1999.
39. See Rena Pashabekova, ed., Bezhentsy (Baku: Gzhadzhlik, 1992), p. 425.

62
 The Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict Revisited

Armenians suspected that Azeri refugees were being sent to Shusha by the
Azerbaijani authorities in a conscious effort to alter the demographic balance
in the province and thereby undermine the rationale for uniªcation with Ar-
menia. In protest, Armenians initiated strikes once again in Stepanakert in the
middle of September.40
One consequence of the intermingled ethnic settlement patterns in
Nagorno-Karabakh was that there were islands of Azeri settlements, such as
Shusha, within the predominantly Armenian-inhabited province. In some
places there were even small Armenian settlements within these Azeri en-
claves. The people living in the enclaves naturally began to worry about being
cut off from outside support during a conºict. Throughout the summer,
transports through the Lachin corridor had been hampered by civil distur-
bances, and the Armenian population in the NKAO began to fear an
Azerbaijani siege of the whole region, which would have been especially men-
acing given the harsh winters in the mountains.41 Similarly, a siege within a
siege threatened to develop around the Azeri village of Khojaly, slightly to the
north of Stepanakert. On 18 September 1988 a serious clash took place
among members of both ethnic groups, as well as Soviet MVD forces. One
Armenian was killed in a prolonged ªreªght. During the days that followed,
the ethnic cleansing of Stepanakert and Shusha was more or less completed.42
The clash in Khojaly was the most serious incident since the Sumgait ri-
ots. For the ªrst time, ªrearms were used on both sides. This meant that both
sides in Nagorno-Karabakh had the capacity and willingness to engage in a
semi-military confrontation. Moreover, the clash underscored the vulnerabil-
ity of the Armenian majority and the Azeri minority in the NKAO,
particulary to siege warfare. For the Armenians, Sumgait could no longer be
interpreted as an atypical, unintended consequence of hooliganism. Instead,
the Armenians concluded that the Azeris harbored hostility or even genocidal
intentions toward them.43
With the possible exception of Sumgait, the sporadic and relatively lim-
ited acts of violence described thus far did not necessarily indicate that any
central organization was directing the actions. Most of the clashes arose spon-
taneously and spread primarily because of the incompetence of local and cen-
tral authorities. But the subsequent waves of ethnic cleansing in both Arme-
nia and Azerbaijan would have been impossible without substantial planning
and centrally organized efforts. The entire Azerbaijani minority in Armenia

40. Malkasian, “Gha-Ra-Bagh!” p. 143. See also Croissant, Armenia-Azerbaijan Conºict, p. 31.
41. Malkasian, “Gha-Ra-Bagh!” p. 113.
42. Ibid., p. 146f; and Mityayev, “Karabakhskij Konºikt,” p. 490.
43. Rafael Kazaryan, member of the Karabakh Committee, interview, Erevan, June 1999.

63
 Melander

and most of the Armenian minority outside Nagorno-Karabakh in Azerbaijan

were forced to leave their homes in November and December 1988. The
cleansings were probably organized and executed by the various nationalist
groups. For example, Rafael Kazaryan, a member of the Karabakh Committee
claims that he helped organize the expulsion of the Azeris from Armenia.44 As
a result of these incidents the Azerbaijani authorities lost de facto control over
most of the NKAO by the end of 1988.45
It is unclear whether Soviet MVD troops took part in the cleansing or
whether they mainly tried to curb the worst excesses and alleviate the suffer-
ing of those displaced. It is clear, however, that the troops did not do every-
thing they could have done to prevent the cleansing, since they were consider-
ably better armed than the local nationalists and would have been able to stop
much of the violence if they had made the effort. It is possible that Gorbachev
was still hesitant to order the use of large-scale force. On 1 December he ac-
cused Armenian and Azerbaijani ofªcials of losing control, and he urged them
to act decisively to stop the violence.46
The incident around Khojaly in September 1988 marked the beginning
of a shift from low-cost, largely symbolic or declarative steps to more costly
actions with enormous, highly visible consequences. The incidents of ethnic
cleansing conªrmed each side’s fears about the other. The inability of the
MVD forces to prevent the conºict increased the likelihood of a semi-military
confrontation between Armenians and Azeris. The sieges within sieges that
developed made minorities acutely aware of their vulnerability. In ethnically
mixed areas, communication routes between the settlements of one ethnic
group often ran through the settlements of the other group. This feature,
which is commonly found in ethnically mixed mountainous areas with cana-
lizing terrain, had important political consequences in Nagorno-Karabakh.
Whereas one group perceived the securing of communication routes as an in-
dispensable precautionary measure in a situation of perceived threat, the other
group was apt to see this as a direct attack on its community. This is the logic
of the security dilemma. According to paramilitary commander Zhanna
Galstyan, the ªrst task of the local Armenian forces in Nagorno-Karabakh was
to secure the lines of communication within the enclave, a task that necessi-
tated the capture of Azeri-inhabited villages.47
The massive ethnic cleansing that followed the Khojaly incident was
spurred on by a number of other factors as well. The minority population

44. Ibid.
45. Croissant, Armenia-Azerbaijan Conºict, p. 34.
46. Masih and Krikorian, Armenia: At the Crossroads, p. 13.
47. Zhanna Galstyan, interview, Stepanakert, June 1999.

64
 The Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict Revisited

on both sides was increasingly perceived as a potential threat that could

be neutralized only through expulsion. Moreover, the ethnic cleansing could
send intimidating signals of resolve and overpowering strength, which could
convince the enemy that any further resistance would be crushed. Ethnic
cleansing also came to be favored by those who regarded ethnically pure
territories as valuable in and of themselves. This sentiment, which spread
as the scale and intensity of the conºict increased, was converted into a deadly
ideology by fears of preemption and memories of past bloodshed. Those
who favored an ethnically pure Greater Armenia were mindful of the ex-
tremely difªcult history of the Armenians, especially the enormous massacres
committed by the Ottoman Turks during World War I. Memories of this
tragic history, cultivated over the years, encouraged the Armenians to feel vul-
nerable and to see the Azeris as related to the Turks who perpetrated
the Armenian genocide. A similar form of extreme nationalist ideology moti-
vated sizable numbers of Azerbaijani nationalists, who feared that the sep-
aration of the NKAO would threaten the rather weak Azeri sense of nation-
hood.48
Ofªcials in Moscow responded to these developments by ousting local
ofªcials in both Armenia and Azerbaijan who had either participated in the
events or not done enough to prevent them. Leaders of nationalist organiza-
tions were arrested. On 12 January 1989 the NKAO was placed under direct
rule from Moscow, an attempt at compromise between Armenian demands
for secession and Azerbaijani insistence that the status quo be preserved. But
Moscow was only moderately successful in imposing order in the NKAO, and
no real progress was made in bringing the parties closer to a mutually accept-
able agreement.
In Nagorno-Karabakh, Armenians protested against the dismissal of local
leaders such as the Communist Party ªrst secretary, H. A. Poghosyan. In Au-
gust 1989 Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh formed a “National Council,”
which claimed to be the true representative of Armenians in the province un-
til the former local government was restored. In open deªance of Moscow this
council soon announced the secession of Nagorno-Karabakh from Azerbaijan
and the uniªcation of the breakaway province with Armenia. Predictably,
both Baku and Moscow immediately condemned the move.
Three months later, on 28 November 1989, the Supreme Soviet of the
USSR abruptly handed administration of the NKAO back to Baku. Although
the Supreme Soviet also adopted several measures to bolster the autonomy of
the province and to reestablish its provincial council, the abandonment of the
province’s special administrative status was widely seen as a victory for

48. Kaufman, “Ethnic Fears.”

65
 Melander

Azerbaijan. Soviet ofªcials most likely took this action because of growing dis-
satisfaction with the failed efforts to reconcile the hostile parties.49 Various
attempts at compromise had been met with hostility. Soviet MVD units
deployed in Nagorno-Karabakh encountered difªculty suppressing the guer-
rilla-style forces that were slowly developing with local support and that were
increasingly attacking the Soviet units to obtain weapons. These incidents had
caused the morale of the Soviet forces to decline. The situation ominously be-
gan to resemble the decade-long war in Afghanistan, from which the Soviet
military had only recently disentangled itself.50 (The last Soviet troops were
pulled out of Afghanistan in February 1989.) Moscow increasingly supported
Azerbaijan and took a stronger stance in favor of preserving the status quo and
the existing borders.
At ªrst, the 28 November decision did not have much effect on the situa-
tion. Armenians in the NKAO as well as in Armenia responded to the Su-
preme Soviet’s decision with another act of open deªance. On 1 December a
joint session of the Armenian Supreme Soviet and the national council of
Nagorno-Karabakh proclaimed a union of the Armenian republic and the
NKAO. In and around Nagorno-Karabakh Armenian guerrillas increased
their activities.51 On 9 January 1990 Armenian ofªcials completed a budget
for the Armenian republic that included funds for Nagorno-Karabakh for the
ªrst time. Azeri nationalists began to protest Moscow’s failure to enforce
Azerbaijani control over Nagorno-Karabakh.52 Rumors spread through
Azerbaijan that Armenian guerrillas were going to seize the province as well as
the strip of land separating it from the Armenian republic.53 On 11 January
Azeri militants, who reportedly were armed with military weaponry, attacked
three Armenian villages on the border with Nagorno-Karabakh and drove out
all the Armenians. Other militants purportedly representing the Azerbaijani
Popular Front declared that the Front had assumed power in the city of
Lenkoran and that the Communist party was dissolved.54 The ethnic violence
on the border of Nagorno-Karabakh soon spread to Baku, where rioters mur-
dered Armenians while the local police and the Soviet MVD troops in the city
stood idle. At least 74 people, most of them Armenians, were killed in Baku
during two days of chaotic riots.55

49. Croissant, Armenia-Azerbaijan Conºict, p. 35.

50. Sakwa, Gorbachev and His Reforms, p. 246.
51. Kaufman, “Ethnic Fears,” p. 25.
52. Croissant, Armenia-Azerbaijan Conºict, p. 36.
53. Tamara Dragadze, “Azerbaijan and the Azerbaijanis,” in Smith, ed., The Nationalities Question,
p. 285.
54. Kaufman, “Ethnic Fears,” p. 23.
55. Croissant, Armenia-Azerbaijan Conºict, p. 37.

66
 The Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict Revisited

On 19 January 1990, when the anti-Armenian riots in Baku had all but
ended, Moscow responded with a vehement military crackdown. Soviet
troops moved en masse into Baku and crushed the Azerbaijani Popular Front.
The Soviet Minister of Defense, General Dmitrii Yazov, openly admitted that
this was the primary goal of the operation.56 Outside the main towns, how-
ever, control was difªcult to reassert. Guerrilla warfare continued among na-
tionalist paramilitaries in the border regions between the NKAO and
Azerbaijan and between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
The central authorities in Moscow restored Soviet control over Baku and
installed a new Communist Party ªrst secretary in the Azerbaijani SSR, Ayaz
Mutalibov. Moscow then tried to quell the interethnic ªghting in the border
regions and to bolster the strength of the new Communist regime in
Azerbaijan, in part by providing military support to Mutalibov. Mutalibov, in
turn, steadfastly relied on Moscow and counted on the Soviet authorities to
resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh conºict favorably in exchange for Azerbaijan’s
loyalty.57 He attempted to disarm the paramilitaries of the Azerbaijani nation-
alist opposition and to reassert de facto control over Nagorno-Karabakh.58
Despite these efforts, the deadly riots in Baku had aggravated fears
among Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh, who continued to feel threatened
by Azerbaijani rule.59 The failure of the Soviet MVD troops to intervene dur-
ing the January riots reminded the Armenians of their vulnerability and con-
vinced them that they needed their own military forces.60 As a result, the guer-
rilla bands fortiªed their ranks and the ªghting continued.
The escalation of the interethnic conºict after the abolition of direct rule
from Moscow in November 1989 followed the classic pattern of a spiral. To
the Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh, the prospect that Baku would attempt
to enforce its rule over the province meant an increased danger, especially in
light of the widespread ethnic cleansings over the preceding year. By intensify-
ing the guerrilla campaign, the Armenian side could signal its resolve and abil-
ity to resist Azerbaijani rule with military means and thus try to deter the
leadership in Baku. The Azeri nationalist movement, on the other hand, was
increasingly dissatisªed with what it perceived as the government’s inaction
and lack of pressure on the breakaway province. By launching paramilitary

56. Dragadze, “Azerbaijan and the Azerbaijanis,” p. 281.

57. Ilham Mamed-zadeh, member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan,
interview, Baku, April 1999; and Rasim Musabekov, advisor on nationalities issues to President
Mutalibov, interview, Baku, April 1999.
58. Croissant, Armenia-Azerbaijan Conºict, p. 38; Herzig, “Armenia and the Armenians,” p. 260; and
Zverev, “Ethnic Conºicts in the Caucasus.”
59. Kaufman, “Ethnic Fears,” p. 24.
60. Croissant, Armenia-Azerbaijan Conºict, p. 39.

67
 Melander

raids on Armenian settlements, the Azeri nationalists could signal their resolve
and intimidate the Armenians. The Azeri nationalists also wanted to send a
warning to the Communist regime in Baku.

The 1991 Initiative

The next step in the escalation of the Nagorno-Karabakh conºict came after
Operation Ring was initiated by the Soviet Army in cooperation with the
Azerbaijani special police in the spring of 1991. New evidence, including in-
terviews with participants, sheds valuable light on this hitherto underexplored
phase of the conºict.61 The account provided here has important implications
for the theoretical understanding of the escalatory process.
In early 1991 Soviet MVD forces came under ªre during serious clashes
between Azerbaijani special police and Armenian guerrillas. In early April
units of the Soviet Army’s 23rd Motorized Riºe Division were deployed as a
buffer along the Armenia-Azerbaijan border. By the end of the month, these
units had joined the MVD troops and the Azerbaijani special police in a mas-
sive offensive against Armenian settlements in Azerbaijan to the north of the
NKAO. Ofªcially, the purpose was to neutralize illegal guerrilla formations in
the area; but, in practice, Operation Ring amounted to systematic ethnic
cleansing. In May joint Soviet and Azerbaijani forces moved into Armenia
proper and arrested more than twenty people in three towns. They also at-
tacked Armenian villages in Nagorno-Karabakh. The brutality and scope of
the operation, and the fact that Soviet Army units worked openly with the
Azerbaijani forces for the ªrst time, had a tremendous impact on the Arme-
nian community.
Moscow launched Operation Ring to send a forceful signal to the Arme-
nians that their demands were unacceptable and that the price for continued
deªance would be high. According to the Armenian nationalist Zori Balayan,
General Yazov responded to the Armenian protests against Operation Ring
with an oft-repeated remark: “Well, Mutalibov and Ter-Petrosyan will just
have to sit down at a negotiating table.”62
On the previous occasion when Moscow had used large-scale military
force—the bloody assault on Baku in January 1990—Soviet troops had been
operating against the Azerbaijani nationalist opposition that threatened to
overthrow the rule of the Communist Party in that republic. Operation Ring
was the ªrst time that military force was directed on a large scale against the

61. The author carried out the interviews in 1997 and 1999.
62. Zori Balayan, Between Hell and Heaven: The Struggle for Karabakh (Erevan: Amaras, 1997), p. 60.

68
 The Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict Revisited

Armenians. In earlier years Soviet leaders had wanted to avoid such a drastic
step. By the spring of 1991, however, Moscow had all but given up hope of
overcoming Armenian recalcitrance in the Nagorno-Karabakh conºict.
Weaker measures had repeatedly failed to convince Stepanakert to back down,
and the nationalist leadership in Erevan had signaled its unwillingness to sign
the new union treaty worked out by Gorbachev to prevent the break-up of the
Soviet Union.63
Operation Ring was also motivated by growing pressure from Azeri lead-
ers, who feared that the Armenian nationalist paramilitaries would create a
fait accompli by capturing the last Azeri-held settlements in Nagorno-
Karabakh and the strip of land separating the NKAO from Armenia. The au-
thorities in Baku sensed that they needed to strike at the Armenian guerrillas
and prevent additional Armenian forces and military supplies from entering
the enclave.64 The brutality with which the operation was carried out suggests
that the Azeris also wanted to intimidate the Armenians into submission or
ºight.
Although Operation Ring was not executed swiftly and decisively enough
to cripple the Armenian guerrillas, it did achieve some of its goals in the short
term.65 The massive damage inºicted on the Armenian population in the
summer of 1991 made the political leaders of Nagorno-Karabakh reconsider
the feasibility of their struggle. They signaled their willingness to retract most
of their demands once Operation Ring was halted. This move was not ini-
tially supported in Erevan, but after intense debate and the strong personal in-
tervention of the Armenian president, Levon Ter-Petrosyan (who even threat-
ened to resign), the parliament of the Armenian republic ofªcially endorsed
the initiative.66 Although a hardened and more militant Armenian leadership
eventually gained prominence in Stepanakert, the short-term effect of Opera-
tion Ring was to bring about concessions.
In late June a delegation was sent from Stepanakert via Erevan to Mos-
cow to seek assistance in launching negotiations with the Azerbaijani side.
The delegation met with several of the highest-ranking ofªcials of the Soviet
Union (but not with Gorbachev), and the initiative was generally welcomed.
Then, on 20 July, a delegation was sent from Stepanakert to Baku for direct
negotiations with Azerbaijani President Mutalibov.67 Political leaders in

63. Croissant, Armenia-Azerbaijan Conºict, p. 40f; and Herzig, “Armenia and the Armenians,” p. 261.
64. Musabekov, interview, Baku, June 1997.
65. Musabekov, interview 1997.
66. Souren Zolyan, member of the Karabakh Committee and the Armenian parliament, interview,
Erevan, June 1999.
67. Arutyunyan, Yanvar’ 1991 g.–Yanvar’ 1993 g.

69
 Melander

Stepanakert had prepared a letter to Mutalibov outlining the new position of

the NKAO. In essence the letter amounted to a capitulation.68 The leaders of
Nagorno-Karabakh declared that negotiations would be held “on the basis of
the constitution of the Soviet Union and the Republic of Azerbaijan and the
union acts on Nagorno-Karabakh” and that both sides would discuss “the reg-
ulation of time periods and mechanisms to hold elections for peoples’ repre-
sentatives at all levels, and the reinstatement of the local and regional city
committees of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan.” This meant that all de-
mands for alterations in the constitutional status of Nagorno-Karabakh had
been dropped. The Azerbaijani leadership and the leaders of the Armenian
militants in Nagorno-Karabakh both perceived the initiative as a willingness
to accept Baku’s authority over the NKAO.69 This important step and its im-
plications have been overlooked in the literature dealing with the Nagorno-
Karabakh conºict.
Despite the Armenians’ willingness to enter negotiations on terms favor-
able to Baku, the ascendance of an alternative, more radical Armenian leader-
ship in Stepanakert proved decisive in the subsequent escalation of the
conºict. The elite as well as the general population within the beleaguered en-
clave were actually deeply divided over how to respond to Operation Ring.
Armenian leaders told Mutalibov that the political course outlined in their
letter “corresponds to the sentiments of the majority of the population of the
autonomous province” (emphasis added).70 The younger, more militant lead-
ers, who were not members of the traditional nomenklatura and had risen to
prominence through paramilitary organizations, argued that the Armenians
in Nagorno-Karabakh now had no choice but to engage in an all-out military
struggle. The militants pointed to Operation Ring as evidence of Azerbaijan’s
alleged intent to remove Armenians from the province, and they demanded
that negotiations with Baku be halted.71
Because the militants had already taken up arms against the Soviet state,
they had much more to lose from backing down at this stage than the
nomenklatura leaders did.72 The militants had been ªghting Soviet Army

68. The content of this letter can be found in Arutyunyan, Yanvar’ 1991 g.–Yanvar’ 1993 g., p. 54.
69. Mamed-zadeh, interview; and Georgi Petrosyan, member of the “National Council” and of the
team sent to Moscow in June 1991, interview, Stepanakert, June 1999; and Manvel Sarkisyan,
coordinator of Dashnak paramilitary preparations, interview, Erevan, June 1999.
70. Arutyunyan, Yanvar’ 1991 g.–Yanvar’ 1993 g., p. 54.
71. Karen Ohanjanian, member of Krunk and coordinator of the Stepanakert branch of the Helsinki
Citizens Assembly, interview, Stepanakert, June 1999; Petrosyan, interview; and Sarkisyan, interview.
72. See David Laitin, “National Revivals and Violence: Threats and Bluffs in East European Transi-
tions,” Archives Européennes de Sociologie, Vol. 36, No. 1 (1995), pp. 3–43.

70
 The Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict Revisited

troops, and they no longer saw any reason to show restraint.73 Harsh criticism
of the meeting in Baku was broadcast over the radio on 29 July, stirring anger
and dismay among the more radical segments of the Armenian population of
Nagorno-Karabakh.74 That same day Armenian guerrillas from Nagorno-
Karabakh attacked and killed seven police ofªcers in a village previously cap-
tured by Azeri special police. The following day two more men were killed
and three taken hostage in another Armenian attack.75 These incidents may
well have been provocations aimed at undermining the prospects for further
negotiations. Then, on 10 August one of the Armenian participants in the
meeting in Baku, Valerii Grigoriyan, was murdered in a drive-by shooting in
the center of Stepanakert.76
This assassination of one of the old nomenklatura leaders in Stepanakert
was widely assumed to be a move by the radicals to silence the proponents of
negotiation with Baku. After this event the radicals became the dominant
force in Nagorno-Karabakh.77 According to ofªcials who were working for the
Azerbaijani government at the time, the leaders in Baku interpreted the inci-
dent in a similar manner.78 It is still unclear, however, who was in fact behind
the assassination. The Armenian militants did not admit responsibility, but a
statement by paramilitary commander Zhanna Galstyan indicates that, at the
least, there were militants who were willing to kill Grigoriyan. Asked about
the document that Grigoriyan and the others brought to Mutalibov, Galstyan
responded:
Anyone who signed such a document—a document that was invalid because
neither we nor the people could have abided by it—we would have threatened
his life; he would simply have been shot, even if this was a close friend of ours.79

The increased inºuence of this militant faction negated the prospects of a ne-
gotiated solution in the summer of 1991.
Another reason that the Armenians’ concessions in the summer of 1991
did not lead to full-ºedged peace was the abortive hardline coup in Moscow
in August 1991. The delegation sent by Stepanakert to Moscow in June did
not get very far, probably because most of the inºuential decision makers with

73. Galstyan, interview.

74. Arutyunyan, Yanvar’ 1991 g.–Yanvar’ 1993 g., p. 57.
75. Ibid., p. 60f.
76. Ibid., p. 63; and Sergej Samsonovich Chobanyan, Gosudarstvennaya i Natsional’naya Politika
Azerbajdzhana: Fal’siªkatsiya i Agressiia (Erevan: 1993), p. 119.
77. Ohanjanian, interview; and Petrosyan, interview.
78. Mamed-zadeh, interview; and Musabekov, interview 1999.
79. Translation from Russian by author, Galstyan, interview, Stepanakert, June 1999.

71
 Melander

whom the delegation met—Yanaev, Lukyanov, Pavlov, Yazov, Kryuchkov,

Pugo, and others –were preoccupied at the time by preparations for the
coup.80 The delegation never met Gorbachev, who went to the Crimea for va-
cation. Gorbachev’s adviser, Georgii Shakhnazarov, writes that the General
Secretary was focused on the new union treaty, which Gorbachev hoped
would create more favorable conditions for the resolution of issues such as the
Nagorno-Karabakh conºict.81
The coup made it difªcult for Moscow to deal with any situation, includ-
ing Nagorno-Karabakh, and the ªrst result was a temporary military disen-
gagement from the region.82 The abortive coup allowed the Armenian mili-
tants in Nagorno-Karabakh to consolidate their grip on power. Although
Russian President Boris Yeltsin, together with his counterpart in Kazakhstan,
Nursultan Nazarbaev, managed to obtain the signatures of both Mutalibov
and Ter-Petrosyan on an agreement in September 1991 to seek a peaceful res-
olution of the conºict, Moscow lacked the necessary resolve to assist in imple-
menting the agreement.83 The Soviet Union was mortally wounded, and
Yeltsin was preoccupied with ªnishing it off.
As a result of the dissolution of the Soviet Union, large quantities of
heavy weaponry ºowed into Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Nagorno-Karabakh.
The stage was thus set for the deadly escalation of the conºict. In January
1992 the Armenian forces in Stepanakert launched an offensive and captured
Khojaly, the Azeri village in which the fateful clashes of September 1988 had
occurred. Hundreds of Azeri civilians were massacred in the process. This in-
cident marked the ªnal step in Nagorno-Karabakh’s descent into full-scale
war.

Conclusion

The main theoretical claim of this study is that in spite of the high levels of
willingness and opportunity present during the early stages of the escalatory
process, the Nagorno-Karabakh conºict would not have resulted in full-scale
war if the strategic uncertainties facing the actors had been overcome. This
claim can be supported by concrete counterfactual evidence drawn from dif-
ferent stages of the conºict. Neither the more general willingness-opportunity
framework nor the security dilemma provides a complete explanation for the

80. Arutyunyan, Yanvar’ 1991 g.–Yanvar’ 1993 g., p. 40.

81. Georgiy Shakhnazarov, Tsena Svobody, p. 221.
82. Croissant, Armenia-Azerbaijan Conºict, p. 43f.
83. Mityayev, “Karabakhskii konºikt,” p. 502.

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 The Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict Revisited

war, since both theories offer an overly deterministic and pessimistic perspec-
tive on conºict. An analysis of the war must also recognize that decision mak-
ers based their actions on uncertain and conºicting expectations about the
consequences of alternative policies. Not all conºicts as intractable as
Nagorno-Karabakh necessarily result in all-out war; it should be possible to
ªnd other conºicts with similar levels of willingness and opportunity that
were resolved short of war.
In the case of Nagorno-Karabakh several courses of action could have
been pursued to avoid war. First, if the successive regimes in Azerbaijan and
their Azeri challengers had foreseen the ultimate dissolution of the Soviet
Union and the new Russian government’s shift in favor of Armenia, the Azeris
would reasonably have preferred to cut their losses. They could have pre-
vented the war by simply allowing Nagorno-Karabakh to secede. The regime
in Baku and the nationalist opposition chose to go to war against Armenia
over Nagorno-Karabakh because of their erroneous belief that Moscow (or
perhaps Ankara, in the minds of the nationalist opposition) would save the
day.
Second, if the relatively moderate Armenian leaders who were in power
in Nagorno-Karabakh until mid-1991 had been able to foresee the radicaliz-
ing effect that Operation Ring would have on the Armenian militants, they
would have had a strong incentive to retract their separatist demands before
the operation was initiated. The moderates would then have avoided the need
to present their failed capitulatory initiative, which cost them their leadership
positions (and in the case of Valerii Grigoriyan probably also his life). They
could have settled instead for the proposal advanced by Moscow in June 1988
to upgrade the status of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Province to an
autonomous republic within Azerbaijan.
Third, it is clear that the nomenklatura leaders of the Armenian separatist
movement in Nagorno-Karabakh were not willing to pursue their separatist
demands to the point of all-out war with the Soviet army. They stuck with
their program only so long as they believed that such a war was unlikely.
When Operation Ring in 1991 called this assumption into question, they
offered to retract their demands rather than ªght. It is reasonable to assume
that conºict could have been avoided if Moscow had sent stronger signals
earlier to the Armenians that their intransigence would be met with force.
Most likely, Gorbachev hesitated in using force until the last possible moment
because he feared that an open conºict would undermine his reform ambi-
tions. He probably also wanted the operation to appear as a response
to provocations by Armenian guerillas rather than as punishment for their
failure to abandon their demands for the uniªcation of the NKAO with Ar-
menia.

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 Melander

Fourth, if Moscow’s attention had not been diverted by the coup at-
tempt, the capitulatory initiative by the more moderate Armenian faction in
Nagorno-Karabakh might have resulted in an agreement between the Arme-
nians and Azerbaijanis to resolve the conºict short of war. The leadership in
Baku at this point was still very much under the inºuence of Moscow, as indi-
cated by Mutalibov’s close personal reliance on the second secretary of the
Communist Party of Azerbaijan, Viktor Polyanichko, who represented
Moscow’s interests in the republic.84 If Moscow had resolutely backed such an
agreement, the Azerbaijani government would have followed suit. The
Azerbaijani nationalist opposition would have had few reasons to undermine
such an agreement. Similarly, the government of Armenia supported the
capitulatory initiative. The militant Armenian faction in Nagorno-Karabakh
could not have pushed the conºict to full-scale warfare by itself if the other
main actors in the drama—the Armenian nomenklatura in Stepanakert, the
government of Armenia, the Soviet government, and the Azerbaijani govern-
ment, as well as its nationalist opposition—had all worked to prevent such an
escalation. According to an Armenian source in Stepanakert, the armed
groups in Nagorno-Karabakh had only 250 automatic riºes by mid-1991.85
This strongly suggests that as late as the summer of 1991 there was a very real
chance to avoid the escalation to full-scale war in Nagorno-Karabakh.
The pivotal importance of the militant faction in Stepanakert indicates
that Kaufman’s characterization of the Nagorno-Karabakh conºict as “mass-
led” rather than “elite-led” needs to be qualiªed. Although mass support for
the ªghting was strong, the moderates still might have been able to preserve
peace. The outcome of the struggle for primacy between the competing elites
at different levels made a crucial difference, and in this sense the conºict was
elite-led.
The fact that Operation Ring was successful in compelling the
nomenklatura leadership in Stepanakert to back down should not be taken to
mean that systematic ethnic cleansing is a legitimate or even very effective way
of dealing with ethnic separatism. It would have been preferable for both the
Armenians and the Azerbaijanis if the Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh
could have been persuaded to accept autonomy within Azerbaijan in return
for credible guarantees that Azerbaijan would become a tolerant democracy in
which the Armenian minority could prosper. Unfortunately, the combination
of a history of tensions, an undemocratic and corrupt Soviet system, and a se-
curity dilemma prevented a peaceful resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh
conºict.

84. Mamed-zadeh, interview.

85. Arutyunyan, Yanvar’ 1991 g.–Yanvar’ 1993 g., p. 32.

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 The Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict Revisited

Note

This research was supported by grants from the Swedish Council for Research
in the Humanities and Social Sciences and the Swedish Agency for Civil
Emergency Planning. The views expressed here do not necessarily represent
those of the funding agencies or the Swedish Government. The author would
like to thank Mats Hammarström, Magnus Öberg, Svante Cornell, Kjell-Åke
Nordquist, and the anonymous reviewers for helpful comments.

75