It is already known that on 25 August 2022 the Lachin corridor, with the town of Lachin and surrounding villages, will come under full Azerbaijani control. For the duration of the Russian peacekeeping mission in Karabakh, the Armenian inhabitants of this Azerbaijani region will be able to use the newly built road to travel to Armenia, which will be operated by the same Russian peacekeepers. However, there is no doubt that the full restoration of Azerbaijani jurisdiction over the entire territory of the former Nagorny Karabakh Autonomous Oblast will take place within the next three years.

We can therefore predict a new "wave of hysteria" by Armenian nationalists, who falsely claim that the allegedly "native Armenian" Karabakh was "handed over" to Azerbaijan by the Bolsheviks. It is impossible to transfer something that from the beginning did not belong to Armenia.

Here is a verbatim quote from the historical decision that determined the fate of the mountainous regions of Karabakh after some (but not all!) Armenian Soviet figures made absolutely unfounded claims to them.

From the minutes of the meeting of the Plenum of the Caucasian Bureau of the Central Committee of the RCP(b)

"5 July 1921.

Present: member of the Central Committee of the RCP, Com. Stalin; members of the Caucasus Bureau: comrades Ordzhonikidze, Makharadze, Kirov, Nazaretyan, Orakhelashvili, Figatner, Narimanov and Myasnikov; and the national commissar of the ASSR, Huseynov.

Listened to .

Comrades Ordzhonikidze and Nakhichevan. Ordzhonikidze and Nazaretyan put forward the question about reconsideration of the decision of the previous plenum on Karabakh.

Resolved

a) Taking into account the necessity of national peace between Muslims and Armenians and economic connection of Upper and Lower Karabakh with Azerbaijan, to keep Nagorno-Karabakh within Azerbaijan SSR, giving it wide regional autonomy with an administrative centre in Shusha city being a part of autonomous region.

b) To instruct the Central Committee of Azerbaijan to determine the boundaries of the autonomous oblast and submit it for approval to the Caucasian Bureau of the Central Committee of the Russian Communist Party.

c) Instruct the Presidium of the Caucasian Bureau of the Central Committee to negotiate with the Central Committee of Armenia and the Central Committee of Azerbaijan about a candidate for the Nagorno-Karabakh emergency committee.

d) The scope of Nagorno-Karabakh autonomy is to be determined by the Azerbaijani Central Committee and submitted for approval to the Central Committee's Caubureau.

Secretary of the Caucasian Bureau of the Central Committee of the Russian Communist Party Figatner".

The need for such a decision by the Caucasian Bureau of the Central Committee of the RCP(b) arose after ardent Armenian nationalists who had infiltrated the ranks of the Bolsheviks took advantage of the significant number of Armenians and raised the issue of the transfer of Karabakh from Azerbaijan to Armenia. We will consider how and why this issue was raised below.

Karabakh has never belonged and could never belong to any state called 'Armenia'. The maps of "ancient great Armenia" drawn by Armenian historical falsifiers with the inclusion of Azerbaijani territories to the Caspian Sea and most of Georgia into this mythical "great Armenia" are not considered by serious historians at all. But even when the first Armenian state was formed in the Azerbaijani lands in 1918 with the consent of the founders of the First Republic of Azerbaijan and Turkey, the territory of Armenia did not include Karabakh. This question of the inclusion of Karabakh in Armenia was not even close to being raised.

Nor was the question even raised when Turkey and Germany lost World War I and had to withdraw their troops from the South Caucasus. At that time, recall, Armenian nationalists made claims primarily in Southern Georgia, in the regions of Lori and Borchalo, due to which Armenia committed aggression against Georgia and the Georgian-Armenian war broke out in 1918.

It was only after their defeat in this war that the Armenian nationalist Dashnaks began to think about expansion in other directions. Even here, however, they did not always meet with understanding from their own former Dashnaks, who had defected to the Bolsheviks.

So, Anastas Mikoyan wrote directly to Lenin on 22 May, 1919 in a letter to Lenin: "The Dashnaks, agents of the Armenian government, are seeking annexation of Karabakh to Armenia. But for the people of Karabakh this would mean losing their source of life in Baku and linking up with Erivan, with which they have never been linked in any way.  The Armenian peasantry at the Fifth Congress decided to join Azerbaijan". (Central Party Archives of Marxism-Leninism Institute of CPSU Central Committee - CPA IML, f.461, op.1, f.cr.4525, fol. 1).

The question of the transfer of Karabakh to Armenia after the occupation and "sovietization" of Azerbaijan by Soviet Russia in 1920 was not raised. At that time, no one in Moscow doubted that Karabakh belonged to Azerbaijan, including the Armenian Bolsheviks.

However, everything changed after the Sovietisation of Armenia, which, as you know, was preceded by a resounding defeat of the Armenian aggressors by the Turkish army. Yerevan then decided to take early advantage of Turkey's weakness and "seize" its eastern territories (which Armenia had also been promised by the Entente under the bonded Treaty of Sevres imposed on the Sultan's government in Istanbul). The Grand National Assembly in Ankara and the leader of Turkey's independence struggle, Kemal Pasha, did not recognise the treaty. The Turkish army not only repelled the aggression of the Dashnaks, who rushed to seize the territories "promised" by the Treaty of Sevres, but defeated the Armenian army and reached Alexandropol (now Gyumri) and occupied it. Had it not been for the Bolsheviks and the Sovietisation of the remnants of Armenia, the Dashnaks concluded on December 2, 1920. Had it not been for the Bolsheviks and the Sovietization of the remnants of Armenia, the Dashnaks would not have had Gyumri on December 2, 1920.

Having been essentially rescued by Soviet Russia, the Armenian nationalists, having received a small territory instead of 'great Armenia', with Aleksandopol returned only thanks to the Bolsheviks' agreement with Kemal Pasha. Most of the Dashnaks were quickly "repainted" and began serving their new "masters", the saviour Bolsheviks. Serving in their "oldest" repertoire.

In February 1921 the Armenian population of Georgia's returned Lori zone and the Armenian-populated Borchali district centre of the Shulavera district launched a pro-Bolshevik uprising, calling on the Red Army for help. In fact, this betrayal dealt a death blow to Georgian statehood and predetermined the fall of the Democratic Republic of Georgia under the blows of the Red Army and its occupation in March 1921. More on this in the article "95 years of Armenian betrayal that led to the loss of independence of Georgia" (http://kavkazplus.com/news.php?id=3721).

It was then that the Armenian nationalists demanded an "increase" of the territory of Soviet Armenia at the expense of Georgia and Azerbaijan for their betrayal. At that time, in the spring of 1921, Armenian nationalists began insistently demanding not only the Georgian Lori zone but also the Georgian regions of Akhalkalaki and Akhaltsikhe (Samtskhe-Javakheti) as "payment" for their mass defeat against Turkey and betrayal of Georgia, as well as Azerbaijani Nakhichevan, Zangezur and Karabakh.

In the end, the Bolsheviks paid off Georgia's traitors at the expense of Georgian and Azerbaijani lands. However, it was not as "generous" as they had hoped, based on the interests of the same Bolsheviks. Zangezur was given to Armenia in order to "cut up" Azerbaijan and the Turkic world in general, but the Armenian claims to Nakhichevan and Karabakh were not met. Claims on Georgian lands were met in a similar way. Armenia was given the Lori zone, where the Armenian provocateurs organized the fatal uprising that led to the occupation of Georgia, but in relation to Akhalkalaki they decided that "it would be too much". 

After 2 days plenum of Caubureau decided to leave Garabagh in Azerbaijan on July 7, 1921 another plenum of Caubureau, also with participation of Joseph Stalin, raised an issue about ceding the Georgian zone of Lori and also Akhalkalaki district (Javakheti) to Armenia.  And it was this plenum that decided to transfer the former neutral zone of Lori to the SSR of Armenia. In fact, as payment for the betrayal of Georgia by the Armenian population of Lori and Shulaver in early 1921, the issue of the annexation of the Akhalkalaki district to the SSR of Armenia was decided to be referred to the Central Committee of the CP (b) of Georgia, whose conclusion was then to be submitted to the plenum of the Caucasian Bureau.

On 16 July, the Presidium of the CC CP (b) of Georgia confirmed the decision of the Caucasian Bureau to cede the Lori "neutral zone" to the SSR of Armenia ("for" F. Makharadze, M. Orakhelashvili; B. Mdivani noted that the issue was predetermined, but it would be better to arrange a plebiscite). On the issue of the cession of the Akhalkalaki district to Soviet Armenia, the Presidium of the CP (b) of Georgia, based on political as well as economic ties between the Akhalkalaki district and Tiflis, recognised this proposal as unacceptable. 

Thus the current borders in the South Caucasus were formed. And if you pull up historical documents, you can see that both Azerbaijani Zangezur and Georgian Lori are mostly "gifts" of the Bolsheviks. Therefore, Armenian nationalists should thank them for this and not make ungrounded pretensions on the lands of others.

But the Armenian nationalists did not forget about their claims raised in 1921 on Karabakh ("Artsakh") and Samtskhe-Javakheti ("Djavakhk"). It is no coincidence that on the eve of the collapse of the USSR, the Dashnak congress considered both options of expansion. The "Javakhk" direction of aggression lost only by 1 vote to the "Artsakh" one, i.e. in the direction of Azerbaijani Karabakh. This should not be forgotten today, as having lost the separatist 'Artsakh' (which was inevitable) Armenian nationalists may once again 'recall' their claims to 'Javakhk'.

Alexander Gedevanov (Gedevanishvili)