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July 2022: 101st anniversary of Gen. Njdeh’s Victorious Defence of Syunik, Armenia Against Soviet Russian, Azerbaijani and Turkish Invasion

Posted on June. 16. 2022

The Armenian Victory’s main architect is General Karekin Njdeh

Although the language is Armenian, it is still worth watching a few seconds to get a glimpse into the level of discipline that volunteer citizens of Armenia are exhibiting during such training.

Mr. Vova Vardanov, the founding Commander of The Arts of Staying Alive –ASA (“Vokhch Mnaloo Arvesteh-VOMA of Armenia) has earned a reputation in Armenia for being a proactive in training the Armenian citizenry to build maximum civilian/military readiness for any national emergency.

ASA-VOMA of Armenia is civilian initiative to train and empower Armenians to build Citizen Army to serve as bulwark of self-defense against potential Turkish, Azerbaijani or any other invasion of Armenia.

Watch the video: https://fb.watch/dD6IxU2EnL/ Although the language is Armenian, it is still worth watching a few seconds to get a glimpse into the level of discipline that volunteer citizens of Armenia are exhibiting during such training.

Mr. Vova Vardanov is of the same school of military thought and ideology as well as tactics mastered by General Karekin Njdeh (1 January 1886 – 21 December 1955) who has defeated two armies at once in fortress-like Syunik, a mountainous region in southern Armenia.

In 1920-21, with an Armenian Citizen Army of around 15,000 General Njdeh and his highly motivated soldiers inflicted heavy casualties upon the invading Kemalist Turkish Army of over 100,000 coming from the West (Ankara) and The Soviet Red Army with over 150,000 forces coming from the East (Baku).

General Njdeh positioned his units in such strategic places around the Northern, Western and Eastern borders of Syunik and succeeded in bugging down both armies for over seven months causing great international embarrassment for Moscow and Ankara.

An Armenian national hero who is known as the “Savior of Syunik,” Gen. Njdeh refused to surrender Syunik to invading Soviet authorities until he secured an international agreement according to which Soviet Russia would guarantee the inclusion of Syunik Region in the upcoming Soviet Socialist Republic of Armenia (or Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic — Armenian S.S.R.).

The indomitable spirit of General Njdeh and his soldiers averted for Syunik a fate similar to Artsakh/Nagorno Karabakh and Nakhichevan — of arbitrary carving and ‘gifting’ to the then newly created Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic (AzSSR). Soviet despot Josef Stalin had earlier dismembered the 1918-1921 First Republic of Armenia. As northern Armenia and the Armenian territories of Artsakh and Nakhichevan had already fallen under Soviet occupation, Soviet Armenia was arbitrarily dismembered.

Under Stain, Artsakh and Nakhichevan were carved out and ‘gifted’ to Azerbaijan. General Njdeh categorically refused to let Syunik Region (southern Armenia connecting to Iran) to face a similar fate. In defiance of Soviet occupiers of northern Armenia, General Njdeh declared the creation of Republic of Mountainous Armenia encompassing Syunik (Zankezur) and parts of Artsakh. The city of Goris became the capital of the unrecognized state, and Karekin Njdeh was chosen as prime minister and minister of defense. Later, in July, Simon Vratsian took the office as prime minister while Njdeh became the governor and the general commander.

In an August 2021 article on eurasianet.org, titled “Perspectives | Augmented Azerbaijan? The return of Azerbaijani irredentism” Laurence Broers, the Caucasus program director at Conciliation Resources wrote: “In January 1919 Britain, at that time holding a mandate over Azerbaijan, approved Azerbaijani jurisdiction over (Syunik-ed) Zangezur. But embedded Armenian resistance outlasted both Azerbaijani military pressure until Azerbaijan’s sovietization in April 1920, and then a Bolshevik military campaign later that year.”

Although Mr. Broers claims that “Armenian rebels in Syunik/Zangezur were finally pacified by the Bolsheviks in June-July 1921, and the region was allocated to Soviet Armenia” the facts remain that successful and protracted Armenian resistance forced the Soviet Kremlin to reconcile with the indigenous Armenians to keep the Syunik/Zangezur as part of newly declared Soviet Armenia.

To Mr. Broers’s credit, he finally acknowledges the region’s real name as “Syunik” stating that “’Zangezur’ disappeared from the map, lingering on as an informal placename … Syunik, the Armenian name for southern Armenia, is a far older term dating back to antiquity.”

Between April and July 1921, the Red Army conducted massive military operations in the region, attacking Syunik from the north and east. But to no avail. After months of fierce battles with the Red Army, the Republic of Mountainous Armenia forced the Soviet Kremlin in July 1921 to promise in a written and binding agreement “to keep the mountainous region of Syunik as a part of Soviet Armenia. After the agreement was signed in Switzerland, Gen. Njdeh, his soldiers, and many prominent Armenian intellectuals, including leaders of the First Republic of Armenia, crossed the Armenia-Iran border into the neighboring city of Tabriz, Iran.

To support organizations like ASA-VOMA of Armenia (“Vokhch Mnaloo Arvesteh” VOMA-The Arts of Staying Alive –ASA) is to venerate the undying legacy of General Karekin Njdeh.