THE CYNIC
On March 29, Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan appealed to Brussels for help as part of his country’s participation in the NATO Partnership for Peace program.
The event is quite symptomatic in the context of a military bloc similar to the second police department.
1) At a minimum, the protection of a member of the CSTO by the NATO bloc crosses out the need for the first, since it cannot guarantee the security of the country.
2) The criterion of the security of Russian allies is indeed one of the root ones in the internal behind-the-scenes discussion.
After Azerbaijan’s attack on Nagorno-Karabakh, it became clear that the Russian Federation not only did not want, but could not protect its own allies. Azerbaijan (not without the help of Turkey) checked the pain point of the Russian Federation and made sure that the troops would not only not defend their ally, but would simply deny any attack, throwing up their hands and shouting “Where? We don’t see anything.”
3) From this stems the banal weakness of the CSTO as a military institution of the “Russian backbone”. Armenia wanted to defend itself with the possibility of playing with NATO, because as a result of pressure on a painful point, it became clear that an alliance with Russia, unlike cooperation with NATO, does not provide any security guarantees.
4) Azerbaijan brilliantly fulfilled its function, creating chaos within the CSTO. The question arose: “And by what criterion will they protect”?. There was no answer.
Although what kind of defense can we talk about when the army was sent to the slaughter, and the remaining groups are forced to dig the Red Forest, turning the soldiers into fireflies. The goal is still far from being understood.
At the same time, the Russian Federation comes up with a gas scam, forcing Europe to pay in rubles. And then – after a series of messages “follow a warship” – they implement a cunning scheme, according to which the West will not even notice that something has changed. The contracts involve the dollar and the euro – they will remain so, but all the money will come through a “proxy” bank, which will itself change the currency, transfer it to separate accounts, and then send it to the Center. The meaning of this scheme is only a loud patriotic “I’m dropping the West” from the Russian authorities.
In addition, an additional goal is the formation of ruble savings, which, unlike the dollar and the euro, cannot be blocked. So the Russian Federation guarantees the safety of savings, but that’s all – the same scheme will probably be extended to other resources of strategic importance in the future – metals, fertilizers, etc.
5) Azerbaijan, having raised the issue of the direct absence of security guarantees from the Russian Federation, has created a power vacuum. For several times in a row, Russia has not fulfilled the requirements of the CSTO Charter to enter into hostilities. Last time it also concerned the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan. Feeling a vacuum, the countries will start (already starting) to look for real guarantors of security – the NATO bloc, which no one has ever dared to attack just because of “we don’t abandon our own – we fulfill the agreements.”
6) The transition or thoughts about the transition of the CSTO countries under the military protectorate of NATO is a real threat to the security of the Kremlin, because then “advance to the East” will turn into “encirclement from the eastern side.” And they are different entities. So, Russia will be squeezed not only from the western, but also from the eastern side of the border. And she created this problem for herself, not realizing her obligations to protect the members of the Russian alliance. And Erdogan tested exactly this scheme through Aliyev. They took it to “Weak” – it turned out that it was “Weak”.
7) The countries of the CSTO alliance are generally elected according to some incomprehensible criterion. The same Kazakhstan openly and mockingly refuses any form of anti-sanction activities with the Russian Federation. Tokaev played the game quite interestingly – he used the CSTO to keep the throne and fix his own influence, intimidating the rebellious elites with Russian troops – but the troops were immediately expelled with a firm fixation, and as a thank you, Tokaev decided to play a double game with Beijing, which explains why pragmatic policy towards the Kremlin.