The Duran Podcast - Armenia capitulates to Azerbaijan and Trump corridor

Episode Date: August 13, 2025

Armenia capitulates to Azerbaijan and Trump corridor

All right, Alexander, let's talk about the peace deal, the agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan. Let's talk about the corridor, which is now named the Trump route of peace and prosperity. It used to be called the Zangazor, a corridor, I believe, was the name of this corridor, which is important because it's a corridor, it's Armenian territory, so it's a corridor in Armenia, but it will now bridge Azerbaijan to an enclave, an Azerbaijan enclave, which will then take Azerbaijan to Turkey. So that's the importance of this corridor, and it's a 99-year lease to the United States. Armenia, in essence,

Pashinyan, at least to me, it's Pashinyan giving up territories what it seems like. And, of course, this territory is located right on the border with Iran. And of course, we're talking about the Caucasus as well. So the U.S. now has a presence in the Caucasus. Trump has a corridor named after him in the Caucasus. Anyway, your thoughts on this deal and your thoughts on Armenia and Azerbaijan drifting towards the collective west actually moving deliberately towards the collective west. I mean, the first thing to say is that this isn't a deal or this is a capitulation.

I mean, Armenia has got, Paschignan has completely capitulated to Azerbaijan. Every single demand that Azerbaijan has made over the last couple of years, Parciniyan eventually and ultimately, Surrey concedes to. And this is another massive concession. So the Azerbaijan has managed to get the Zanzigur corridor. Azerbaijan has wanted that a long time. The Azerbaijanians are expecting to get more territory from Armenia itself. In fact, this is now looking an absolute certainty.

Armenia is rapidly devolving into a kind of satellite state of the United States, dependent on its protection, because of course it's now got Turkey and Azerbaijan, which are both allies, ultimately in control of all of this vast block of territory around it. And it has alienated its historic ally and Garantle, which is Russia. So, I mean, from an Armenian point of view, it is difficult to imagine a worse outcome than this. It is inevitable, given the line of policies that Parsinian has been following ever since he became leader of Armenia as a result of what was essentially now. I think it's quite clear a color revolution. I mean, he's consistently worked to take Armenia out off.

He would have the Russian orbit and into the EU, American orbit. He's prepared to, he's sacrificed Nagorno-Karabakh. He's looked the other way as all those people were expelled from Nagorno-Karabakh. It's important to say that he never fought, he never committed the Armenian army to defend Nagorno-Karabakh. He recognized Nagorno-Karabakh as part of Azerbaijan before the war in 2019 even started. he's gone out of his way to damage his relations with the Russians. He's brought us to this point.

It's very like, to me, the stance that Sikashvili took when he was president of Georgia. He too antagonized Russia. He eventually fought a war with Russia, just as Georgia lost terror. as a result and became, in the end, very disillusioned by the relationship it had struck with Europe and the United States. So Armenia is going to exactly the same process. And of course, there's a massive price to pay, and they will continue to pay that price. Now, Azerbaijan is doing very well out of this, though there is a risk that they run that eventually they will they will find that by playing the game in the way that they have done,

they could also find themselves in longer-term problems. Because in order to get Parshinyan to make all of these concessions, they too have tilted towards the Americans. And they've realized that Pashinian is with the Americans. It's the Americans of the Europeans, but ultimately the Americans who have all of this leverage. So, Azerbaijan, which is at various times tilted sometimes towards America, sometimes towards Russia, has now gone all out and committed itself to the US.

The problem it has is the same problem that all countries in the region have. It is that America is far away. Russia is nearby. And you can see that the Russians are already starting to take reprise. They're starting to attack energy facilities, Azerbaijan energy facilities in Ukraine. I've been looking at the performance of the Azerbaijani economy. Its growth levels are falling. Its inflation levels are rising.

It may be that if the Russians put on an ever-tighter squeeze, that could have long-term effects for Azerbaijan. John, and it's very difficult to see how they wrote this back now. Lastly, the United States. Now, it may be that the United States thinks it's come out well from this, and in a sense, it has. If you want to argue that this is consistent with the RAND Corporation study of, what was it, 20 years ago, 10 years ago, about, you know, creating all these points of friction

around Russia's borders in order to destabilize Russia. Well, if you think this is consistent with that strategy, it is completely consistent with that strategy. But I come back to this point. What does the United States objectively gain from this? I mean, this corridor is important to Azerbaijan. How is it important for the United States? Especially if the political situation in Armenia and Azerbaijan starts to crumble,

which at some point in the future it will, the United States cannot defend this investment. It doesn't really get anything back in return from it. It's ultimately a geopolitical play. which in the long term is going to fail because Russia remains the dominant power in the region for geographical reasons, if no others. So I think that the Americans, for the moment, have played their cards effectively because they managed to bring down Armenia's government.

And we've seen what the effect of that has been and that they've got Paschina, to make all of these concessions. But in the long term, they've just bought themselves another long-term commitment, which is not going to play well for them in the end. There's one other important country, which is, of course, Iran. They are furious about this. They made it clear that they're prepared to take military action to prevent the Americans establishing bases along the Zanzigur corridor. I don't know whether that will happen, to be honest. Iran now has another reason, by the way, to ally itself closer to Russia. Of course, Iran is a very big country,

much bigger and more important you would say than Azerbaijan and Armenia ultimately are. Anyway, I think that a game is being set up to play in the Southern Caucasus, a long-term game. And I can't see Armenia doing well from it. I mean, it's very badly from it. Azerbaijan, it's shown intelligence in the past, but it's a precarious regime, apparently, and it might have overcommitted.

The United States, I think, is overcommitted as well. And Russia watches and waits and consolidates its positions. And the Iranian defense minister and Harmonais' national security. Security Advisor recently visited Moscow. They spoke to Putin, almost certainly this military aid now flowing from Russia to Iran. I have details about this, and I know a little bit about what's going on there. And obviously this is mainly about Israel and the 12th day war and all of that, but the Zanzigur corridor will obviously be a topic for discussion. Yeah, Armenia's giving up territory.

It's hard to explain what Pashinyan is doing what he's thinking. I mean, okay, he wants to get into NATO and the European Union, but what's going to be left of Armenia? When you look at a map, eventually this court, or the way I look at it, eventually Azerbaijan and Turkey with the United States, they're just going to take this territory. I mean, they've already effectively taken it, but eventually they are going to take it. That's exactly what you're going to happen. You look at a map and you see Armenia's just kind of whittled away into Yerevan

and a little bit outside of Yerevan. Yeah, it's becoming an enclave. You're completely right. This is exactly what is going to happen. Let's say the United States withdrawals, as it might do, There is every possibility that Azerbaijan, assuming there hasn't been, as I said, a major change in the political system in Azerbaijan. But there were sent troops there. They will take steps to secure the Zanzigur corridor, and they will have Turkey to back them.

So, I mean, Armenia is going to lose this territory. Yeah, it's really tragic what's happening to Armenia. Yes. And like I said, it's Paschignan giving it, giving it all the way. Azerbaijan, though, is also making a lot of enemies. Yeah, it's taking risks. It's taking very big risks. Well, it's taking risks and it's pissing a lot of people off, Iran and Russia, most notably.

But the United States, I mean, I just want to kind of address your your point about what does the United States get out of it. The United States gets nothing out of it, if you look at it from a U.S. America first standpoint. But I think if you look at it from a neocon grand chessboard geopolitics of you, then yeah, the United States is coming away with a piece of territory in the caucuses. So if you look at a chessboard, the neocons will argue, okay, now we've put our pawn here. So that's a win for us. And we didn't have to fight a war.

We didn't have to do anything. It was just given to us by Paschania. It was given to us. So now we have a pawn right here. And that's for the neocons, the way they look at everything, that's a good thing for them. But also from the standpoint, I just want to say from the standpoint of what Israel wants and what Turkey wants, then for the United States. United States, it's almost as if they're doing what Israel and Turkey are telling them to do,

which is, look, we want to secure this corridor. We want to secure this area for Iran. Israel is saying because we want to put pressure on Iran, Turkey is saying because we want to build the corridor that connects Azerbaijan to Turkey. And eventually we're going to take this territory for Turkey. And if you're Adelan, that's what you're thinking. So, I mean, if you look at things from a cooperation, a partnership between these three countries, Israel, Turkey, and the United States, then, yeah, they're dividing up the area, the caucuses now. Well, absolutely. I mean, the major winner, by the way, here is not, in my opinion, in Azerbaijan, it's Turkey. I mean, the Zanzigur corridor connects Turkey, in effect, also with Azerbaijan. And it's going to play one. well for them. And, you know, Turkish troops could, as I talked about Azerbaijanian troops,

perhaps I should have said more properly, Turkish troops could enter. And they will say they're going there, they're not challenging Armenia's sovereignty, but they're securing the interests of Turkey and Azerbaijan by going in there. And you could see that that can very easily play out now. Now, my point is this. Absolutely, you're completely correct. From a near con point of view, this is a big win. My point, which is an America first point, is that the American strategy, the Neocon strategy has always been

this grand stretch chessboard strategy, exhaust Russia and make the Russians worry about what's going on all around their various borders, get them to tie down, depleting their resources, trying to put out all these fires that America is lighting all around their various borders. The question I ask is who actually is getting their resources depleted as a result?

We've seen in Ukraine that the war in Ukraine has resulted in Russia coming out stronger than the United States weaker. I mean, objectively, militarily speaking, the Russian army is much bigger, much better equipped, far more professionally organized now than it was three years ago. The United States has seen its resources massively deplete and it's got all kinds of other problems, economic problems as well. It's seen oil prices rise and all of that kind of thing. So the Ukraine war has not exhausted Russia. It has weakened the United States.

Now you are taking on a piece of real estate in the South Caucasus. which you're going to have to defend in a region where there are all sorts of very complicated players and you don't understand the politics extremely well. And you're going to have to be increasingly dependent on Erdogan and his success is in Ankara in order to be able to pull this off. This doesn't look to me ultimately like a good deal. Again, you're going to be using up resources, burning up resources to control. this Zanzigur corridor, which, as I said, has no economic value to you at all. It's part of a grand

strategic game in which you are depleting your resources faster than the other side is. I notice that the Russians have not fallen for the Rand Corporation study plan. They're not running around the South Caucasus trying to block or prevent this. They're not involving themselves in the events of Armenia and Azerbaijan and all of that, not directly in any way. They're just, they're putting the squeeze on Azerbaijan, as they absolutely can. But other than that, they're waiting. And it's the US, by contrast, that it has to expend resources here. Now, not perhaps huge resources. resources. It's not going to by itself exhaust the United States. But all of these little cumulative things that the United States is doing in various places, they all ultimately add up and they do create

a significant burden from the United States. I'm going to just finish by saying that in many respects, this all reminds me of a play that the United States tried in Central Asia back in the early 2000s. After the United States occupied Afghanistan, they established bases, military bases, into Central Asian states, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. And there was a lot of talk at that time that the United States was going to establish a predominant role in this region and that it was going to push out Russia and that it was going to push out China and that it was going to push out Iran and it was working at that time closely with Turkey to do all of that. And in the end, it failed. It was the Americans you got pushed out. It was their basis that got closed.

Because, of course, the surrounding powers, Russia, China and Iran were in a much, much stronger position in that particular region than the United States was. So again, the US used up, resources, not enormous resources, but as I said, significant resources to try to maintain these bases. And in the end, you couldn't, and I suspect we're going to see the same thing play out over time in the South Caucasus as well. Yeah, I agree with you. But if you zoom out and look at the Caucasus, the Middle East, the Mediterranean, the Aegean,

maybe even the Balkans, you get the sense. that there is a play that's unfolding to create these spheres of influence in these areas. I'll go back to the caucuses. Israel now has the United States on Iran's border. You can make that argument via Azerbaijan, of which they are allied. So Azerbaijan is a close ally of Israel. Azerbaijan is a puppet client state of Turkey. Turkey and Israel are working together or fighting or whatever you want to call it to decide

who's going to control what in Syria. And then you can even move westwards to include the Mediterranean, the Aegean, and maybe even the Balkans and what Erdogan might be thinking there as well. You know, this could drag the United States into a deeper crisis and a deeper commitment if they continue to go along with this cooperation that seems to be unfolding between these countries in the Middle East and the caucuses and elsewhere. You're absolutely right. That's exactly, well, that is the plan.

It's absolutely the plan. The problem is, as I said, it may look like the United States is winning positions, but what is actually obtaining or what is actually gaining, it seems to me, a long-term commitments which far from strengthening the United States will ultimately weaken the United States because it's doing so in a neighborhood where the other side will always be stronger. That was the lesson of Ukraine. That was the lesson of what was previously played out in Central Asia. That, by the way, was also the lesson of Afghanistan, which quickly evolved into a geopolitical play. And I predict it's going to be the lesson here too.

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