How "correct" perception of Karabakh conflict being formed in Armenia

The formation of a stable "ideologically correct" perception of the Karabakh conflict in Armenia corresponds to two fundamental principles: first, "the war is won, it must be followed up by international recognition", and second, "any concessions are possible only if all the conditions of the Armenian side are met, ruling out the de-occupation of Azerbaijan's territory."

Any deviation from these principles is blocked, not brought up for general discussion. The recovery of lands issue is most often used as a manipulation of public opinion. The propagandists deliberately keep silent of the real agenda of the negotiation process, filling the republic's information space with information stuffing, as well as backstage relations of Armenian politicians.

The manipulation begins when the occupation of Nagorno-Karabakh and seven adjacent regions is declared as a fact that has happened and does not require any comprehension. They engraft an idea in the people's mind that the rejection, seizure and occupation of territory is not something unnatural in modern history, since the determining factor in international politics is still strength.

The National News Service, which meets the interests of Armenian politics, explicitly urges to ignore the position of the UN, which consolidates the internationally recognized borders of the South Caucasus republics. The average Armenian inhabitant (both within the republic and abroad) should not be interested in the legal aspects of the Karabakh occupation. It is enough for him to support its legitimization in the geopolitical game space. In order not to get lost in this space, an inhabitant should be guided by the opinion of the leaders and followers of Armenian separatism, since their "feat" is also sacralized and not subject to rethinking.

The glorification of the separatist leaders' policy is an important tool for forming a "correct" perception of the Karabakh tragedy. In modern Armenia it allows to gain political immortality. Former presidents of the republic Robert Kocharian and Serzh Sargsyan were rejected by the society for their corrupt, oligarchic policies. At the same time, they remain in Armenia's information space, since their names are inscribed in the history of "the triumph of Armenian military valor", but in essence the aggression in Karabakh.

This topic allows Defendant Kocharian to speak in the media on behalf of the Armenian people, and Sargsyan to break a two-year silence with strange statements. On August 19, the third president of Armenia based his speech on the thesis, according to which he defended the so-called Karabakh statehood until the very end, not allowing to discuss the issue of returning the occupied territories, even when Baku allegedly proposed new terms of an armistice.

Having created another point of instability on the international map, the Armenian separatists have formed a political platform for themselves, which now represents the main cultural and political paradigm. It is impossible to prohibit the glorification of separatism in Armenia; one can only try to cast a shadow on the "heroes". Therefore, the only reaction from Armenia's "revolutionary" information channels to Sargsyan's political rhetoric was that the third president is being cunning when he says that he did not discuss the return of territories. The reaction was so predictable that the public recalled similar "sensational" revelations of Sargsyan Tigran Barseghyan, a former general of the Armenian National Security Service, in an interview with "Zhoghovurd" last December. At the beginning of 2020, Nikol Pashinyan considered it necessary at a press conference in Kapan to announce that he has documents on Sargsyan's betrayal and his readiness to hand over seven occupied regions.

Unlike the "Karabakh presidents", Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan could not "boast" of participation in the war, his name is not equated with "military courage." Pashinyan is a revolutionary, but a hero of the revolution cannot be a real hero, because, according to Armenian ideological canons, real heroes in post-Soviet Armenia are participants in the Karabakh bloodshed. Therefore, unlike the comparatively laconic Sargsyan and the arrogant Kocharian, during the February conference in Munich this year, Pashinyan was forced to play along with an ideology he did not create, causing laughter from those present. Pashinyan cannot become a war hero and he doesn't even try. He can only try to tame the "heroism" of the Karabakh separatists leaders.

Now there is an active recruitment of contract soldiers in Armenia and on the territory of "NKR", mainly artillerymen and snipers. Thus, Yerevan demonstrates its readiness to dig even deeper in Karabakh, as well as shell the territory of Azerbaijan. Social benefits for family members of contractors should become an incentive to continue the indefinite occupation and, as a result, the preserve the unresolved conflict.