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Foreign Policy Journal
Aug 29 2014
The Strategic Culture of Authoritarian Regimes: Mountainous Karabakh
Conflict in the Limelight
by Grigor Boyakhchyan
In the 21st-century security environment, both week and fairly capable
authoritarian states will constitute the major sources of instability
and conflict the world over. Their instability may stem from internal
problems triggered by a lack of legitimacy, weakness in basic
governance, and the suppression of domestic opposition movements by
force. But these states also project power in their geographic
regions, sometimes as a ploy of distracting attention away from
internal issues, often as an expansion of their revisionist motives.
Their weakness is provocative.
The strategic culture of authoritarian regimes permits drawing several
generalizations: the violence orchestrated to cause destruction and
suffering are permanent conditions and not anomalies; the threat of
military force and its limited deployment is everyday business, used
as a routine tool, not as a last resort; the issuance of warnings
propagating war and uncompromising enmity is used to aid diplomacy in
communicating power, resolve, and will.
Unlike democratic states, where peace is viewed as the norm, and
instability and violence as the anomaly, the strategic culture of
authoritarian regimes perceives conflict and war much more as an
enduring state of affairs - even as an advantageous condition to
secure the continuity and prosperity of the ruling regime. Recourse to
such means is tempting for any authoritarian regime. They may well
prolong a regime's life, but at the same time they impede progress
toward sustainable peace and security.
These strategic cultures, along with security perceptions embedded in
them, also provide the framework through which political and military
instruments are selected, organized and employed. At base, they are
guided by strategic cultures that are willing to employ unrestrained
means for achieving their political objectives. That makes their
assaults harder to predict and prevent, while their confrontational
rhetoric renders negotiations or compromise almost impossible.
Now two decades into the cease-fire agreement, we are able to see that
these regular low-level yet intensely deadly confrontations along the
Mountainous Karabakh and Azerbaijani front line and Armenian and
Azerbaijani border are here to stay. These are not isolated incidents
or disparate attacks but rather examples of what is becoming the norm
for confrontation on the ground. Rather, events such as destruction of
cultural and historical artifacts, zealous talks about wiping Armenia
off the map, threats to civilian aviation, glorification of
axe-murderers, and a propensity not only to disregard the distinction
between military and civilian targets but often to deliberately focus
on the latter - something one would think belonged to a bygone era -
are constant conditions. This new environment poses dangerous and
evolving threats.
Understanding these trends and patterns for the OSCE Minsk Group
Co-Chairs and the European foreign and security policy architects at
large is critical, since these new challenges are likely to continue
in a low-level yet deadly warfare. Staying on the periphery and
supporting the efforts of the Co-Chairs are not sufficient to quell
the outgoing breaches of peace on its doorstep. These events are not
short-term disruptions of ordinary state of affairs and order. Rather,
they are the harbingers of a new security environment that will likely
present instability and gathering danger.
There comes a time in most mediation initiatives when the events on
the ground force the custodians of the peace process to face the
disparity between their favored strategies and techniques and the
necessity of action and change. When the assessment of the political
landscape exposes the ugly reality that strong incentives for
continued instability and conflict exist, no cherished diplomatic
dogmas of neutral pronouncements and expressions of concern can help
defuse tension.
Against the backdrop of recent intensified attacks along the
Mountainous Karabakh and Azerbaijani line of contact and at the
Armenian and Azerbaijani border, the mediators should come to a
belated acknowledgement that many of their assumptions and approaches,
often held as iron-clad tenets, are not valid. The deadly fighting,
together with heavy toll of casualties and human death, highlights the
many assumptions that the mediators have to jettison as they confront
the disparity between the standardized public statements to uphold the
peace and the increasing utility of use of force on the ground. These
diplomatic messages are not construed on the part of a spoiling side;
the audience is obscure, their home address is ill defined.
The mediation efforts under the auspices of the OSCE Minsk Group
Co-Chairmanship have floundered, since those who assume the custody of
conflict resolution process - or peaceful management for that matter -
must first of all seek to nurture peaceful conditions on the ground.
"Ambiguity is the diplomat's friend," - the oft-repeated cliché of
many mediation textbooks - no longer befriends the Karabakh context.
While international mediators may be impartial to the parties to
conflict and the solutions they craft, they should not be impartial
about bad behavior that obstructs the peace process. The shackles and
formalities of diplomatic parlance that constrain thinking and
practice should be broken.
Effective conflict resolution efforts proceed not in isolation but
amidst different interplay of interests and forces that often seek to
derail the peace process. A proposal to establish an "incident
investigation mechanism" is still on waiting list for implementation,
along with ad hoc arrangements that should be designed to manage and
control the local operating environment through a theater-wide
monitoring architecture for preventing the obstructionist forces to
thwart the peace process. More importantly, this should not be viewed
as outside the peacemaking remit; but an important part and parcel of
the overall conflict resolution effort. To provide demonstrable
legitimacy in support of a peace process, the motivations for
conducting a destabilizing activity must be recognized, confronted and
overcome.
The case of Mountainous Karabakh is indeed unique, but the quest for
viable peace is not. While the proposed Madrid principles are long
shots, practical near-term priorities should be set to establish a
predictable security environment with the potential to manage down the
violence on the ground and dislodge those who seek to obstruct the
road to a viable peace.
http://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2014/08/29/the-strategic-culture-of-authoritarian-regimes-mountainous-karabakh-conflict-in-the-limelight/
Aug 29 2014
The Strategic Culture of Authoritarian Regimes: Mountainous Karabakh
Conflict in the Limelight
by Grigor Boyakhchyan
In the 21st-century security environment, both week and fairly capable
authoritarian states will constitute the major sources of instability
and conflict the world over. Their instability may stem from internal
problems triggered by a lack of legitimacy, weakness in basic
governance, and the suppression of domestic opposition movements by
force. But these states also project power in their geographic
regions, sometimes as a ploy of distracting attention away from
internal issues, often as an expansion of their revisionist motives.
Their weakness is provocative.
The strategic culture of authoritarian regimes permits drawing several
generalizations: the violence orchestrated to cause destruction and
suffering are permanent conditions and not anomalies; the threat of
military force and its limited deployment is everyday business, used
as a routine tool, not as a last resort; the issuance of warnings
propagating war and uncompromising enmity is used to aid diplomacy in
communicating power, resolve, and will.
Unlike democratic states, where peace is viewed as the norm, and
instability and violence as the anomaly, the strategic culture of
authoritarian regimes perceives conflict and war much more as an
enduring state of affairs - even as an advantageous condition to
secure the continuity and prosperity of the ruling regime. Recourse to
such means is tempting for any authoritarian regime. They may well
prolong a regime's life, but at the same time they impede progress
toward sustainable peace and security.
These strategic cultures, along with security perceptions embedded in
them, also provide the framework through which political and military
instruments are selected, organized and employed. At base, they are
guided by strategic cultures that are willing to employ unrestrained
means for achieving their political objectives. That makes their
assaults harder to predict and prevent, while their confrontational
rhetoric renders negotiations or compromise almost impossible.
Now two decades into the cease-fire agreement, we are able to see that
these regular low-level yet intensely deadly confrontations along the
Mountainous Karabakh and Azerbaijani front line and Armenian and
Azerbaijani border are here to stay. These are not isolated incidents
or disparate attacks but rather examples of what is becoming the norm
for confrontation on the ground. Rather, events such as destruction of
cultural and historical artifacts, zealous talks about wiping Armenia
off the map, threats to civilian aviation, glorification of
axe-murderers, and a propensity not only to disregard the distinction
between military and civilian targets but often to deliberately focus
on the latter - something one would think belonged to a bygone era -
are constant conditions. This new environment poses dangerous and
evolving threats.
Understanding these trends and patterns for the OSCE Minsk Group
Co-Chairs and the European foreign and security policy architects at
large is critical, since these new challenges are likely to continue
in a low-level yet deadly warfare. Staying on the periphery and
supporting the efforts of the Co-Chairs are not sufficient to quell
the outgoing breaches of peace on its doorstep. These events are not
short-term disruptions of ordinary state of affairs and order. Rather,
they are the harbingers of a new security environment that will likely
present instability and gathering danger.
There comes a time in most mediation initiatives when the events on
the ground force the custodians of the peace process to face the
disparity between their favored strategies and techniques and the
necessity of action and change. When the assessment of the political
landscape exposes the ugly reality that strong incentives for
continued instability and conflict exist, no cherished diplomatic
dogmas of neutral pronouncements and expressions of concern can help
defuse tension.
Against the backdrop of recent intensified attacks along the
Mountainous Karabakh and Azerbaijani line of contact and at the
Armenian and Azerbaijani border, the mediators should come to a
belated acknowledgement that many of their assumptions and approaches,
often held as iron-clad tenets, are not valid. The deadly fighting,
together with heavy toll of casualties and human death, highlights the
many assumptions that the mediators have to jettison as they confront
the disparity between the standardized public statements to uphold the
peace and the increasing utility of use of force on the ground. These
diplomatic messages are not construed on the part of a spoiling side;
the audience is obscure, their home address is ill defined.
The mediation efforts under the auspices of the OSCE Minsk Group
Co-Chairmanship have floundered, since those who assume the custody of
conflict resolution process - or peaceful management for that matter -
must first of all seek to nurture peaceful conditions on the ground.
"Ambiguity is the diplomat's friend," - the oft-repeated cliché of
many mediation textbooks - no longer befriends the Karabakh context.
While international mediators may be impartial to the parties to
conflict and the solutions they craft, they should not be impartial
about bad behavior that obstructs the peace process. The shackles and
formalities of diplomatic parlance that constrain thinking and
practice should be broken.
Effective conflict resolution efforts proceed not in isolation but
amidst different interplay of interests and forces that often seek to
derail the peace process. A proposal to establish an "incident
investigation mechanism" is still on waiting list for implementation,
along with ad hoc arrangements that should be designed to manage and
control the local operating environment through a theater-wide
monitoring architecture for preventing the obstructionist forces to
thwart the peace process. More importantly, this should not be viewed
as outside the peacemaking remit; but an important part and parcel of
the overall conflict resolution effort. To provide demonstrable
legitimacy in support of a peace process, the motivations for
conducting a destabilizing activity must be recognized, confronted and
overcome.
The case of Mountainous Karabakh is indeed unique, but the quest for
viable peace is not. While the proposed Madrid principles are long
shots, practical near-term priorities should be set to establish a
predictable security environment with the potential to manage down the
violence on the ground and dislodge those who seek to obstruct the
road to a viable peace.
http://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2014/08/29/the-strategic-culture-of-authoritarian-regimes-mountainous-karabakh-conflict-in-the-limelight/