On June 14th, military expert and colonel of the Russian Armed Forces, Konstantin Sivkov, during the fourth meeting of the Russian-Armenian international Lazarev Club, said that any military conflict and war has its political, strategic, technical, and other sides. According to him, Aliyev’s goal was the entire capitulation of Karabakh, including the seven regions. The Armenian side’s main goal was to not allow Karabakh’s occupation. If one of the sides reached their goal, then they won, and if the other side did not allow that to happen, even with huge losses, then that side won. It is important to consider the sides in the conflict and the correlation between the sides. Turkey supported Azerbaijan with military technology and with controlling the army. In Karabakh’s case, Karabakh was fighting with Armenia’s support, and at the same time, Armenia was not formally participating in military operations. Sivkov said that the difference between the forces was huge.
Noting Azerbaijan’s weaknesses, Sivkov stressed that the Azerbaijani Armed Forces had a low level of moral and psychological training. The strong point was that the operative-strategic management was successful. Armenia had a number of strengths. For example, its anti-air defense was strong, and it did not allow Azerbaijan to use the aviation they had. According to the expert, the progress of the Azerbaijani army was very low. In the southwestern portion, in the mountainous regions, they were able to advance about 40 km in one month by advancing 1 km per day.
“Taking into account that during the first operation, in the main strikes in both the southeastern and northwestern directions, they were not even able to break through the Armenian Armed Forces’ defensive zone, to say that the Azerbaijani army won but the Armenian side suffered losses is unacceptable. We can say that this was at least a military draw. The Azerbaijani side was only able to capture 5 of the 7 arguable regions, which, according to data from open sources, were going to be handed over to the Azerbaijani side anyway. In other words, it is not necessary for Armenians to feel upset. “To say that the Armenian side suffered defeat in this war means to disrespect the memory of heroes.”
Hripsime Jebejyan
