This is your 16-minute Monday report in 3965 words.
##1990s war hero and 2020 Artsakh Security Council chief Samvel Babayan about the 2020 and 1990s wars, military & political leadership, army reforms:
A myth was spread for 30 years that our generals were the saviors, that we had the strongest army in the region. The generals received so many undeserved medals that they were forced to hang them from their pants. Even Zhukov did not have as many.
Question: why do you only blame the military leadership for the failures?
We never blamed or credited the political leadership in the 1990s war after losing or capturing lands. It was the problem of military leadership. ; it was our problem. The political leadership is at fault only when it does not deliver the armament it's asked to. The only other thing politicians do is approve/deny an already-developed operation.
President Levon Ter-Petorysan did not even know that we liberated Aghdam. The same is true about Pashinyan. The latter finally realized recently that the military was lying to him. The entire general staff lied to him. Everyone. Losing positions but not reporting it, etc.
We wouldn't have difficulty with lying to president Levon. Levon learned about the liberation of Aghdam from Baku. They called Levon and informed him about it.
Armenia's politicians were against liberating Fizulin and Jabrayil in the 90s. I have an intercepted radio communication in which they urge General Manvel Grigoryan for the 5th brigade not to take part in the operation.
Levon was informed about the Shushi and Kelbajar operations, but not about Aghdam. We told them that we were just silencing the Azeri firing points because we knew that the political leadership did not want to carry such responsibility at that time.
Now all the losses are blamed on Nikol. Would you credit all the victories to Nikol if we won the war? Of course not.
Question: I remember a similar talk during July 2020 battles that it was all organized and done by the military, and not the politicians.
Exactly. But we lost today. Army leadership should accept the responsibility so we can learn what happened and prevent dilettantes from holding positions again. You can pick up anyone from the street, give them a uniform, and they will agree to hold a position.
Question: Kocharyan says when he came to power in Artsakh, they began liberating lands. What's your opinion?
Kocharyan's role was organizing troop mobilization and repairs, and
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there's no way they're going to do that again after so many of us already spent tons of money on flight tickets, PCR tests, cancellations/rebooking, etc, only for them to decide against reopening the borders on such short notice? And to make up for it, reassuring us that they'll open from the 15th onwards. Edit: (https://covid19.homeaffairs.gov.au/travel-arrangements-vaccinated-international-students)
