Historical Shadows from the Rwandan Genocide to Karabakh’s Ongoing Conflict

In the backdrop of the lightning military campaign by Azerbaijan against the remaining Armenian militias of Karabakh, reports of potential massacres have surfaced. Despite stating peaceful reintegration of Karabakh Armenians could ensue under Azerbaijani authority, Baku’s state-sanctioned policies and actions by their military show the complete opposite.

For several years, numerous beheadings, executions, and sexual assaults against Armenian POWs and civilians have been documented, with Azerbaijani leadership sponsoring such actions. The world is in its darkest hour, which has been repeated throughout history—where widespread massacres and cases of genocide have been identified, yet the international community fails to act.

Deteriorating Situation in Karabakh

Before 2023, Azerbaijan regained control over most of the Karabakh region in a war that redefined conventional drone warfare. After forcing Armenia to capitulate, Azerbaijan and Russia created a Trilateral Agreement to reintegrate the entire conflicted region.

Nevertheless, ”reintegration” has become anything but peaceful. Numerous ceasefire violations have been documented, including Azerbaijan’s condemned 2022 military campaign against Armenia Proper, and the Karabakh Armenians were put under a ten-month blockade since last December.

Numerous governmental bodies, from the European Union, United States, and United Nations, along with international NGOs, called for the blockade to be lifted in fear of extreme malnutrition for the Armenian population. The siege mirrored the Great Famine of Mount Lebanon, also exacerbated by a ruling autocracy that attempted to put the people of Mt Lebanon under submission by forcibly blockading their food supplies while blaming external factors.

Trading one Autocrat for Another

Vladimir Putin, who has ruled Russia with an iron fist filled with assassinations and perpetual military conflicts, made a miscalculated decision to invade Ukraine outright in 2022. The Russian invasion is the most condemned war since WWII, leading to Russia becoming Earth’s most sanctioned nation.

Moscow’s soft power is its lucrative gas connections to the European market, which has swelled its defense allocations for military conflicts in Chechnya, Georgia, Syria, and Ukraine. Wanting to stray from Russian gas, which has lobbied Europe in projects like Nordstream, the European Union made an energy deal with Azerbaijan.

The energy deal came with great controversy, as Ilham Aliyev is a highly authoritative leader with one of the worst human rights records on his citizens and a state-sponsored policy of hatred and cultural genocide against Armenians. The EU-Azerbaijani gas deal is a gift for Aliyev, who, like Putin and other energy autocrats in the Middle East, now feels untouchable to scrutiny due to natural resource reliance.

With Aliyev ignoring international calls for more productive and peaceful solutions and using energy wealth to lobby various countries and journalists to become complicit in his nefarious purposes, the West replaced one oil tyrant with another.

Appeasing Tyrants has Historically Backfired

Currently, policies by the international community spell their hallmarks of failure through appeasement from Mussolini’s invasion of Ethiopia in 1935, appeasing of Adolf Hitler pre-WWII, allowing Stalin to run rampant in mass purges, and looking the other way through various Latin American Asian, African, and Middle Eastern tyrants.

Peace through strength is the one constant that tyrants have only understood throughout history. Hesitations through bureaucratic practices have cost millions of lives throughout history and ultimately led to genocides such as the Greek Genocide (particularly in Smyrna), the Holocaust, the Khmer Rouge, the Bangladeshi Genocide, the Rwandan Genocide, and Yemen’s ongoing disastrous humanitarian situation.

In the Age of Social Media and Television, There is No Excuse

When the Hutu army and extremists slaughtered 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus, it was one of the most appalling displays of the international community, which allowed genocide to happen. Akin to the Karabakh conflict, the Rwandan Genocide was previously fueled by a foreign power (Belgium), which exacerbated already poor ethnic tensions.

The United Nations and world powers such as America, Britain, and France saw all the warning signs, yet, at most, the only “intervention” came to rescue foreign citizens while Rwandans were left to slaughter. The Rwandan Genocide ultimately ended when the Tutsi paramilitary, the Rwandan Patriotic Front, pushed out the Hutu army and extremists. Massacres and genocide incitement were heard on global media, yet the world failed the Rwandans.

Today, the Karabakh region’s conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan originates from foreign influence. Historically, Armenia has always been sandwiched between great powers who often fought for regional hegemony. Examples include the Romans and Persian Empires, Romans, and Seljuk Turks, Russians and Ottomans, Soviets, and Turkey, and now Russia and Turkey.

Karabakh was historically Armenian, with a 94% Armenian majority when the region came under Soviet rule. Josef Stalin, who would become the Soviet tyrant, exacerbated tensions by transferring the autonomous region to the Azerbaijani SSR—ultimately fueling the numerous wars, pogroms, and massacres that stemmed from Stalin’s decision.

Today, the Kremlin still has a tangible influence in the region, and Moscow is accused by Armenian activists and the government of fueling the wars post-2020. Putin historically takes a grudge at pro-Russian oligarchs being overthrown in his perceived “sphere of influence,” whether it’s Armenia, Ukraine, or Georgia.

One could argue Russia aims to place a pro-Russian government in Armenia by fueling hybrid warfare, even when there is a risk of genocide against the remaining Armenians in the region. Despite the warning signs of ethnic cleansing, the world has remained silent, even when Armenia’s government opened olive branches to countries such as America, France, and India.

Today, the world has failed to learn from its historical mistakes, and just as bureaucracy let down the Rwandans, the Armenians of Karabakh are facing similar suffering. As Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia said in a speech to the League of Nations after the Italian invasion: “It is us today. It will be you tomorrow.”