While Turkey has been attempting to carve out something of a larger role for itself, Ankara has only been able to do this because of its own up-grading and warming of relations with Moscow. Ankara’s relationship with Moscow is a careful balancing act -- particularly given that Turkey is a long-time NATO ally -- and Ankara is aware that it needs to be very careful to maintain this balance. Indeed, it would be quite unrealistic to believe that Turkey could even begin to compete with Russia.
As in other parts of the former Soviet Union, Russia is striving to reassert itself as the dominant power. While to a degree this process has been slightly frustrated by the consolidation of fully sovereign and independent national states, such as Azerbaijan and Georgia, pursuing independent foreign policies (backed by the West, particularly the US) which sometimes are not to the liking of the Kremlin -- both Azerbaijan and Georgia left the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) in 1999, clearly refusing to be part of any Russian sphere of influence -- Russia can live with this as long as the countries concerned do not “overstep” the mark as Georgia did in August 2008. Since then Russia has steadily pushed beyond its borders into the South Caucasus and Black Sea region, thanks to its increased presence in Abkhazia and the prolongation of the Black Sea Fleet in Sevastopol.
In Georgia, Russia has increased its military presence in South Ossetia and Abkhazia and continues to consolidate it, including the recent move to place S-300’s in Abkhazia. The West has pretty much accepted this new status quo and, for the most part, stays silent. Bigger issues such as Iran and Afghanistan are more important. When it comes to Armenia, they have little choice but to cooperate with Moscow given that two of their borders are closed. While Armenia is involved with NATO via the Partnership for Peace Programme and with the EU through the European Neighborhood Policy, neither of these processes are currently comparable to Armenia’s relations with Moscow. Whether Armenians like it or not, the country is dependent on Russia. There has been a security alliance for years including being part of the CSTO. Russia has almost full control over its border management. Both the Iran-Armenia border and the closed Turkey-Armenia border are manned by the Russian military. The new agreement strengthens the Russian-Armenian military alliance Five thousand Russian military personnel stationed in Gyumri have Mig-9 jet fighters and S-300 air defense batteries at their disposal. Under the new agreement they can be engaged in operations outside the former Soviet Union.
The agreement gives Armenians a feeling of confidence, particularly when the Russian’s talk the talk -- Russian President Dmitri Medvedev said that Russia would “meet its commitments” within the CSTO if Azerbaijan were to threaten Nagorno-Karabakh militarily. Five thousand heavily-armed Russian troops are viewed as a “bucket of cold water” on hot heads in Baku who Yerevan insists are preparing for war to regain control of their territory. However, given that legally Nagorno-Karabakh is part of Azerbaijan -- not Armenia -- Russia would have no such right. Only if Azerbaijan were to hit Armenia could Russia intervene, and the chances of Azerbaijan doing this are slight. Furthermore, it is unlikely that Russia has any intention of entering into a direct war with Azerbaijan -- or vice versa. However, if hostilities were ever to break out over Nagorno-Karabakh the position of Russia would be quite complicated.
As for the agreement between Azerbaijan and Turkey, there has been military cooperation between the two states for a long time. Since 1992 Azerbaijan and Turkey have signed more than 100 military protocols. While on his recent trip to Baku President Abdullah Gül reiterated his country’s solidarity with Azerbaijan one should bear in mind that Turkey is still trying to win back the complete trust of Baku following its reconciliation process with Armenia last year (which has now run aground), which raised serious concerns in Baku. There are also rumors that Turkey is planning to have a military base in the Azerbaijani Autonomous region of Nakhchivan, but so far nothing has been confirmed and, again, I would imagine Turkey would take into consideration its relationship with Moscow before entering into such an agreement.
In reality the chances of the Turkish military entering into a war against Armenia (and possibly Russia) are highly unlikely, not least because Turkey wants to be viewed by the international community as a reliable and cool-headed actor, but also because Turkish foreign policy has evolved moving away from hard power to a soft power approach. As for Azerbaijan, they maintain a relatively pragmatic relationship with the Kremlin, but the country is loath to let the Russian military back on to its soil. The only Russian presence is currently at the Gabala radar station. However, the Russians’ continue to push for more and have tried for years to get Russian border guards on the Azerbaijani-Iran border -- so far unsuccessfully. Azerbaijanis still harbor a deep resentment toward Russia for the considerable assistance given to Armenia (although denied by Moscow) during the Nagorno-Karabakh war.
There can be no doubt that Russia still rules the roost in this region and continues to want more influence, with the West having very little say. The consequences of this strategy remain to be seen. The future remains highly unpredictable and, because of this, we should hope nobody will “overstep” the mark.
