Armenian analysts estimate probability of war in Nagorno-Karabakh

Azerbaijan will not initiate a large-scale war in Nagorno-Karabakh, but local confrontation in the conflict zone cannot be ruled out, believe Armenian political analysts and military experts interviewed by the "Caucasian Knot".

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that on September 11-13, 2018, Armenia held the "Shant-2018" military exercises, according to the scenario of which Armenia returned imaginary lost territories. The Azerbaijani Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) reacted sharply to the scenario of the military exercises and accused Armenia of disrupting the peace talks. Large-scale offensive exercises were announced in Azerbaijan starting from March 11.

Azerbaijani exercises cannot influence the position of Armenia in the negotiation process, believes military commentator Leonid Nersisyan, the editor-in-chief of the magazine "New Defence Order. Strategies". According to him, the scale of the military exercises is quite large, but Azerbaijan conducted even more large-scale military exercises earlier.

The military observer considers the risks of resumption of a large-scale war as low, while he believes the likelihood of local hostilities similar to the war in April 2016 is high.

Hayk Khachikyan, an analyst of the military-analytical portal "Razm.info", agrees that people can expect not a full-scale war, but a local escalation of the conflict. "Azerbaijan is consistently preparing for war, in particular, by purchasing weapons, strengthening its military infrastructure and positions, and conducting military exercises. The country will not be able to start a full-scale war because of military parity, but it will not miss an opportunity to escalate the local conflict," believes Hayk Khachikyan.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on March 12, 2019 at 10:04 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.