• ANDREW DEMIRDJIAN
• COLUMNISTS
• NEWS

Plant the Seeds Today For Regaining Artsakh Tomorrow

Posted on April. 12. 2024

“Seeking safety is a right and it 

needs to be upheld for every 

person. Protecting people 

forced to flee is a collective 

global responsibility.” 

— Ben Stiller 

BY Z. S. ANDREW DEMIRDJIAN 

If we do not act now, we would lose the golden opportunity to regain Artsakh in the future. The Armenian nation seems to be sitting on the horns of a dilemma. If the Armenians do nothing now, Azerbaijan would settle the enclave with Azeris. Emin Husynov, the special representative of President Aliyev, has recently announced that Azerbaijan plans to settle 140,000 Azeris in Artsakh by 2026,. 

Plans seem to be underway to deprive the indigenous people of Artsakh their homes and homeland. Instead President Ilham Aliyev should ask non-combatant citizens of Artsakh to return to their homes and farms through an amnesty to heal the wounds of the people of Artsakh. 

Additionally, if we fail to act now, most of the refugees will grow roots in the host country providing them with shelter thereby making it difficult to move back home. Either act now or face an impossible dream to regain Artsakh as part of historic Armenian land just like the regaining of Western Armenia, Cilicia, Nakhicchevan, Kars, Ardahan, Javakh, Northern Lori province, etc. are becoming impossible to regain as ancestral Armenian lands. 

Once Azeri settlers occupy Armenian properties, the international community would be recalcitrant against uprooting them so that some natives of Artsakh would decide to return. However, now the international community and the UN would be amenable to assist the refugees to go back to their homes in Artsakh. Suffice it to say, one day when the time comes, they can declare freedom if they so desire through self-determination with renewed power and determination. 

The extreme challenge facing the Armenian nation is how to make the Artsakh refugees look homeward. Ideas have changed the world; ideas old or new can also assist Armenia and Artsakh. 

According to the basic psychology of Carrot and Stick Motivation Theory, there are only two different approaches to control someone’s behavior: We can either encourage someone by providing a reward for favorable behavior. or we can also encourage someone by providing punishment for an unfavorable behavior, which is not needed in this situation to punish the refugees to go back to Artsakh. They already have had enough punishment by the Azerbaijani regime. 

Basic psychology tells us that humans and animals respond favorably to the “carrot approach”. The earliest empirical evidence comes from the circus operation. Most animals, such as dogs and elephants, can be trained through the reward motivation, while some other animals, such as lions and tigers, the whip will make them perform on the stage. 

Here are some carrot incentives to entice the Artsakh refugees to return home: 

Before any incentive is offered to the displaced Armenians of Artsakh, the issue of their safety and security should be resolved. It is imperative to enlist some of the Western powers such as the United States, Canada, France, Germany, etc., but forget about our loyal ally and partner Russia, to come up with a mechanism to ensure the safety and security of the returnees to their homeland. 

Russia has not recognized the exodus of the Armenians from Artsakh as ethnic cleansing; they require more information about the dislocation whether it was forced or volunteery. For example, Maria Zakharova, the Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, has stated that she would like “some facts to be provided regarding the alleged ethnic cleansing in Nagono-Karaabakh”. This statement is a patently pretext not to recognize the exodus of Armenians as ethnic cleansing. To add insult to injury, Mikhail Galuzin, the Deputy foreign Minister of Russia stated that unfortunately most Karabakh Armenians left the region by their own difficult, but voluntary choice, and that despite Russia’s readiness to facilitate their safe return to Nagorno-Karabakh. 

How can anybody respect those two Russian officials who sacrifice facts for realpolitik for the sake of ingratiation with Azerbaijan. 

Without any guarantees, such as mandates or protectorates, we cannot risk the lives of the people of Artsakh by encouraging them to return into the den of vicious predators. Here are some incentives to consider: 

1. Raise funds to establish an endowment for the refugees who decide to return home by providing them with financial assistance based on the endowment funds invested in a bank account to secure the flow of funds uninterrupted. Otherwise, there will always be shortage of funds once they are spent on necessities for resettlement. 

1. Incentives should be provided to those refugees who will return to Artsakh to live there and not just to return to sell property and then leave again to live in the Diaspora. Incentives to tach family to be given for new furniture for their houses, new kitchens, new farm equipment, etc. 

2. Provide social incentives. For example, include those who return into thw list of elite “Patriots Who Have Never Given Up Their Homeland”. According to research studies, social rewards are as important as material rewards to human beings. 

3. Offer scholarships to the children of those who choose to return to Artsakh including psychological therapy to adjust to a normal and safe life again in Artsakh. 

4. The Armenian Diaspora can adopt a family for resettlement by providing monthly stipend, a sum of money to make the Artsakhtsi family make ends meet in their ancestral lands. 

5. Even though the chances are slim, with the approval of the Azerbaijani government, give more property to returning natives to Artsakh by appealing to the magnanimity of President Ilham Aliyev who may succumb to praise of being a “great, compassionate leader”. Shrewd politics can open any window of opportunity if done creatively. 

6. Enlist some of the European powers to help the people of Artsakh in order to boost their agricultural production for export, 

7. Offer incentives for couples to have more than 2 children. 

8. Enlist the cooperation of some international organization for the preservation of cultural sites for assistance to stop Azerbaijan’s uncivilized destruction of the Armenian cultural heritage of Artsakh. 

9. Appeal to the patriotic spirit can also be used in this situation. of the three three kinds of Aristotle’s appeals Ethos, Pathos, and Logos (the three pillars of persuasive communication) used in influencing an audience. Masses of people respond favorably to Pathos. The word “motherland” (where one is born) pulls the strings of most natives’ heart into action. 

10. The coalition of the Republic of Armenia and its vast Diaspora should come up with more ideas to make the indigenous people willing to return to their homes. Naturally, a combination of the foegoing incentives can be used to encourage the natives of Artsakh to go back home. 

In terms of defense technology, Armenia/Artsakh should become the Israel of South Caucuses. The aim should center on drone technology, which would give the edge in military power. Regardless of the enemy’s army size and ground weapons, whoever has the drone superiority wins the war. 

Throughout history, the boundaries of countries have been fluid. When a country loses a war, usually its boundaries change. It divides a nation into pessimists who abandon any hope of regaining what they had lost to their enemy and optimists who never give up the hope of regaining the lost territory. This article is written from the perspective of an optimist. 

If the seeds of regaining is sown early, the challenge of the recovery of the stolen lands would be easier. For example, the United Nations (UN) and the international community would be willing to help with the return of the refugees now before their lands are settled by the people of Azerbaijan. 

However, after the Azeri settlement, any attempt at recovery would be looked upon as annexation through irredentism. In other words, any attempt at recovery later, neither the UN nor the international powers would be willing to uproot the Azeri settlers for the return of the Artsakh refugees. Besides, by then only a handful of refugees would remain in the world. 

It is apparent that presently Armenians cannot win any war with Azerbaijan in order to take Artsakh by force. They have to wait until they are militarily strong to put up a fight against Azerbaijan assisted by Turkey and Israel. 

Somewhere I read that Alfred Adler (an Austrian physician and psychotherapist) considered the dream as a problem-solving activity with a future orientation, while Freud viewed the dream as a means to attempting to solve an old problem. 

The dream is seen by Adlerians as a rehearsal of possible future courses of action. According to Adler, if we wish to postpone action, we forget the dream, but if we wish to dissuade ourselves from some action, we frighten ourselves with a nightmare. Let us not fear Azerbaijan; with the right armament, Armenians will silence their artilleries and clip the wings of their drones. 

It seems that the Armenian people has been “postponing action” to claim Armenian territories, and thus “we forget the dream” as we wake up every day to take care of our daily responsibilities and personal chores. The diasporan Armenians have been too busy listening to the chime of the cash r e g i s t e r i n s t e a d of pursuing also the recovery of lost Armenian Highlands or pursue even irredentist activities to regain our lost territories.

For any nation, to dream even blatantly implausible dream is healthy. It keeps them young, it keeps them energetic, it keeps them motivated, and tt brings them together –united to work on the realization of the collective dream. Let us all join forces and plant the seeds today as a shared mission in order to regain Artsakh tomorrow. 

An Armenian young father from Artsakh is warmly embracing his child as he arrives in Goris, Armenia, as a refugee. Given a safe passage to his home, these natives most likely will return to their homeland in Artsakh and one day, when the opportunity presents itself, raise the flag of the Republic of Artsakh in Stepanakert as its capital city. Unlike pessimism, optimism breeds men and women who keep on questing passionately for the freedom of the motherland. (Photo by Vasily Krestyaninov).