The South Caucasus at a Crossroads

On Georgian NGOs and the Armenian Archbishop

“It is in minds of middling vigour and middling capacity that are born erroneous opinions, for they follow the apparent truth of their first impressions and do have a case for interpreting as simplicity and animal-stupidity the sight of people like us who stick to the old ways, fixing on us who are not instructed in such matters by study.”
- Michel de Montaigne [I.54]

“The beginnings of religions, republics, and kingdoms must always contain in themselves some goodness through which they may regain their early prestige and their early expansion. And because in the course of time that goodness is corrupted, if something does not come about to bring it back to its proper limits, it will, of necessity, kill that body.”
- Machiavelli [Discourses, III.1]

Above: The foreign ministers of four foreign countries march in Tbilisi, Georgia in favor of allowing unlimited foreign influence without financial transparency or oversight. [Photo: Georgia Today] Below: Armenian Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan leads “Tavush for the Homeland” protesters demanding the resignation of PM Pashinyan and the end of capitulations to Azerbaijan. [Photo: Rupen Janbazian]

Which Way, Caucasian Man?

Western media has been filled with fawning coverage of pro-foreign influence protesters in Tbilisi, Georgia. It may not have been an overall top news story, but if you are the sort of person who reads the “International News” section, you could not have missed it. At issue is what has been billed the “Russian law” approved in Parliament by the ruling Georgian Dream Party which would make non-governmental organizations [NGOs] receiving more than 20% of their funding from abroad provide some basic financial information, which they usually publish on their website and admit to unprompted in interviews. The “non-governmental organizations” such as Transparency International [which gets the majority of its funding from governments] are losing their minds at the premise that they should be subject to transparency requirements. This all looks like a very unsubtle “Color Revolution.” However, it is hard to say if the protesters are centrally directed foreign agents- well, besides the President of Georgia who is literally a career French diplomat- or if the foreign funded “civil society” groups just know what is wanted of them because this is what they are for. The foreign powers are certainly being brazen, with the EU attempting to suspend Georgia’s membership process if the law is passed and multiple foreign ministers showing up to march with the protesters and speak in favor of allowing unfettered foreign interference. Georgia is at a pivotal moment, where it may be decided if its future will be determined by the general public or by the same narrow class of Western “educated” midwits who have ruined Ukraine; these people are tenacious as they have no marketable skills which would get them paid on a Friday besides as agents of governments and oligarchs.

To the south of Georgia, in Yerevan, Armenia, there have been different protests, almost completely ignored in Western media. You can find stories if you know what you are looking for, but it is tepid and circumspect coverage, worlds apart from the media’s praise on Georgia’s Western stooges. However, Armenia’s story is even more important- and compelling. This once great Kingdom has been continuously betrayed by its Prime Minister Pashinyan, who has alienated every important ally and repeatedly sold out the country to their implacable enemies in Azerbaijan. For a time, whether he was malicious or just incompetent was an open question, but now much of the public has settled solidly on the former. The Armenians are already reduced, victims of the Turkish genocide which devastated their population, and, all but alone, it seems as if there is little left for Pashinyan to do but leave the corpse of the nation of the neighboring Turkic peoples to pick over. While there is a lot of sense in getting what peace they can while they build up their military to fight another day, Pashinyan and his supporters among the same Western educated stooge class we see in Georgia are determined to move towards a Europe and NATO that can’t and won’t protect them.

Relations with Russia and the CSTO alliance of which Armenia is an erstwhile member seem beyond repair. The Armenians, however, are an ancient, proud, and brave people, ready to fight for what remains of their homeland. A genuine popular movement called “Tavush for the Homeland,” named after border region threatened by Azerbaijan, has arisen behind an Archbishop named Bagrat Galstanyan. In this time of crisis many Armenians, the first nation to officially adopt Christianity, seek protection and unity in the power of their faith, and wish to avoid any more capitulations such as that which recently saw over 100,000 of them ethnically cleansed from their ancestral homes in Artsakh [Nagorno-Karabakh on most international maps.]

While the situation in Georgia is important- mostly because the deranged response to having to post a few financial documents shows just how powerful foreign actors are- the Armenians are fighting for their lives. The Georgian Dream Party must tread carefully and try to resolve this situation while avoiding a Maidan, whereas Armenians must mobilize their whole society against Pashinyan and his cronies, place new leadership, dig in, and orient their whole society around defense. Armenia is in a fight to survive right now, whereas Georgia is fighting against the dreadful rule of Westernized “patriotic” internationalists who would probably seek to antagonize Russia into destroying the country in the future should they take power [it needs to be noted that while the Azeris have deep seated hatred for Armenians, Russians have no such sentiment towards the Georgian people in general, despite what Ukraine supporters may tell you.] In both instances, the Western powers are trying to lead these countries towards the situation which is most likely to see them victimized and destroyed. Hence, the enthusiasm about protests in Tbilisi and the silence about Yerevan.

Georgia: The Swarms of Foreign Minions

I wrote about the Georgian protests regarding this same matter last year. At the time, my view was that the best move for the government was to delay dealing with the problem and hope the situation would change and they might find themselves in a better spot to proceed. They did drop the bill for a time and let the country calm down, but their enemies remained determined. With the War in Ukraine dragging on and Georgian elections approaching, it was time to again try to deal with the problem of widespread foreign influence in Georgia. For anyone needing to catch up, my article from last March provides the rest of the necessary background:

Unfortunately, the United States and Western Europe have extremely deep pockets compared to Georgia’s size and relative poverty, and this is a long-term project on Russia’s border that they will not soon bore of. Further, this NGO class has been ruined by “education” and have no skills that that are marketable to anyone but governments and oligarchs buying influence. They certainly consider themselves too good to learn a trade or become one of these riot police they are trained to stare down. What seems to have changed since last time is that the foreign powers and organizations seeking to influence Georgia have become yet more brazen. We live in increasingly unsubtle times.

I do want to take a moment to talk about these “Non-Governmental Organizations.” In the United States, I think that the influence of George Soros is often overplayed, though it has been pronounced in key instances, such as pumping money into local District Attorney races to elect namby-pamby prosecutors who let criminals terrorize the public. The thing is that for its problems, the United States has thoroughly mature institutions and is an enormous country. Despite the Russiagate nonsense, and besides AIPAC [which is nominally an American organization anyhow,] it is very hard for foreign organizations to seriously impact the United States and its politics. The smaller, weaker states of the former Soviet Union are another matter entirely. One man such as George Soros can have extreme influence, and he is far from the only one. The “Western” powers dump vast amounts of money into this and have created a true multitude of such organizations. Nikoloz Samkharadze, the Chair of the Foreign Relations Committee in Georgia’s Parliament recently gave an interview to the BBC on this matter which you have to see to believe:

He is obviously hostile to Russia for occupying 20% of their internationally recognized territory and concerned about the many dangers in the region, but pay attention to the facts he mentions. Georgia has almost 25,000 NGOs, or roughly 1 per 148 citizens! 90% are believed to be foreign funded, but they do not have a formal method for tracking them. No country can function like this. If you do not believe me, I suggest you listen to a Radio War Nerd episode from last year on another former Soviet state called, “Kyrgyzstan: Death by a Thousand NGOs.” On an international level, for their faults, many NGOs do important work, especially when it comes to providing humanitarian aid, useful international data, or legal assistance. However, no country should suffer from a vast class of foreign funded, miseducated, useless people mucking up the works all the time and obsessively trying to draw the country to a decaying “West” which seems to want to destroy their culture and cares about little besides legal sodomy, sex changes, and opening their economy to the depredation of financial interests powerful enough to rapidly overpower it. This can be fought, but one must be willing to be as demonized as Hungary’s Viktor Orban.

The most absurd part about this which I cannot get over is that these organizations do not deny being foreign funded. I wrote a thread about doing research on this sort of thing last year, with a few key examples from Georgia [one of the most NGO-flooded countries in the world] to show how easy it is to find this information. What makes this even more ridiculous is that according to the above video the law also doesn’t use the word “agent,” it is simply creating a mostly toothless reporting process common to any industry in any country. And this is an industry. I don’t think such statistics are available due to the current lack of tracking, but we can do some basic speculative math here. The CIA Factbook reports that Georgia’s 2022 labor force was 1.84 million people. Samkharadze claims there are 25,000 NGOs in Georgia. If we assume each NGO has one full time employee, which is probably substantially low, that would mean roughly 1.36% of Georgia’s workforce is employed by an NGO, 90% of those foreign funded. By contrast, roughly 1% of the American workforce are classified as “Associates” by Walmart, which includes anyone directly employed by Walmart, not just full time workers. When you start to look at other ways in which people might be funded by NGOs, such as scholarships, training programs, student clubs, and hangers on who want a [literal] free lunch, we can be sure this is an enormous number of people. That, of course, is simply the ones directly affiliated, not all of those in the general public whom this well-fed propaganda machine has worked on.

One of my friends lives by the rule that if any protest goes on sufficiently long you can be sure it is foreign funded [particularly in the case of small countries.] I don’t think this is necessarily true, at least not with his degree of certainty, but there is something to that. People have jobs and lives to get back to if they are not being paid. At the same time, claims of being foreign funded are thrown around so much that they lose their sting and are often ridiculous. However, in some ways what is happening in Georgia is practically an organized labor protest by the foreign influence industry. Some of these people are directly telling us that they fear they will lose their foreign funded jobs if they are subjected to these reporting requirements and the stigma they claim will be attached to it. Let me share some notes from this incredible interview at euronews with one Nino Dolidze who is the director of “International Society for Fair Elections and Democracy,” which would perhaps be rejected by an AI bot as a fictional name for an NGO on account of the fact that it is too generic. This organization purports to monitor the electoral process in Georgia, which we can assume means their primary purpose is to blame Russia if the NGO side should under perform and to take various steps to undermine faith in the fairness of Georgia’s elections.

Here are the highlights from the euronews interview:

When asked why her organization would need to be among the first to register, she explains that they have already been called out and targeted, saying,

“Since we receive funds from the EU and the US, we will have to register. And we said we would never register in this public record because this is against our dignity. We only represent our country’s interests and are not willing to register to be labelled as some kind of foreign agent.”

So ignoring that apparently the bill doesn’t call them foreign agents anyway, this women who is a professional “election integrity” campaigner takes money from the EU and the US but it is below her dignity to fill out a form saying that she does so, though not below her dignity to freely admit to doing so in an interview. She is selflessly working for Georgia, and not for the foreign governments who pay her salary out of the goodness of their own hearts with no relevant ulterior motives.

She then proceeds to explain that she has been “smeared” as a foreign agent, sharing this photo which she purports to be of the hallway of her apartment building:

Photo: Nino Dolidze [of course]

I don’t doubt that people have gone on TV and shared the factual information that she is paid by foreign powers which she herself admits in this very interview, but I would bet the rent that her foreign sponsors paid to print and hang these posters so she could claim to be targeted.

Asked if she will either register or pay the €8,000 fine for not registering, she says that they will “have” to shut down due to her unwillingness to follow laws passed by the legally elected parliament of the sovereign state of Georgia, whose elections she herself claims to have spent years and God knows how much foreign money ensuring the fairness of. She can’t operate in a situation where she is called a foreign agent, but also no one in the entire country of Georgia would possibly give her a paycheck to do what she currently does for a living, unless of course her faction takes power and she then has access to what largess the government of Georgia has.

Then, euronews goes in for the kill, asking her why it matters, pointing out that the law doesn’t require NGOs to stop operating, it just requires them to register. Bear in mind, these are organizations, they don’t have human rights; this is not somehow equivalent to making Jews wear gold stars. Dolidze explains her stance:

“The risk is our stigmatisation. We cannot operate if we are called foreign agents because the beneficiaries of our activities will no longer work with us.

We are already feeling some distance. We are used to working with different (state) services. We will have this label of "enemies of the country" because we work for foreign countries.

In Georgia, it means being a spy. An enemy because we have a Soviet past, and we know what it means to be called a “foreign agent”. That’s what happened in Russia: the NGOs registered, and then they closed and left the country or were detained.”

Her direct quote is “we work for foreign countries.” Who, though, besides the foreign governments which pay her, are the beneficiaries of her activities? If it is for election integrity, wouldn’t that be the general public and the state itself? Is she sure these state services are making the decision because of the “accusation” and not because she is in active conflict with the government over this matter? Do the Georgian people understand this issue well enough to hold mass demonstrations and vote Georgian Dream out of power but not well enough to simply continue to work with organizations who have been made to register? Who is labeling them “enemies of the country?” She herself is the one making that up. That certainly isn’t what filling out the paper work implicitly or explicitly expresses. Further, all she is saying about Russia is that the NGOs refused to follow the laws which were passed by the government and ultimately refused to function if they were made to.

And don’t kid yourself, regardless of what this woman says, she is absolutely a foreign agent. Just look at her biography at the McCain Institute, of that famous defender of the concept of national sovereignty, US Senator John McCain. She is considered to be some sort of featured leader associated with their organization:

This “freedom fighter” has worked with USAID and at the International Republican Institute [IRI,] which was itself ran by John McCain for 25 years. The IRI is basically the US Republican Party’s own private National Endowment for Democracy [NED] whereas the NDI is the Democrat Party’s version of the same thing. She is a career foreign agent. I didn’t do any deep research to find this, I read that interview, Googled her name, and clicked the most relevant result. She freely admits to all of this.

It isn’t just this woman though, they are all this way. Here is another I noticed from an article in Al Jazeera. Transparency International has, of course, been one of the top anti-transparency groups fighting against democracy and the rule of law in Georgia. Here is but one quote:

Enterprising researcher that I am, I decided to type this name into the Google machine. What do you know:

SIDA, by the way, is basically just Sweden’s version of USAID. Also who is this “Open Government Partnerships” for whom she works? Well, would you look at that:

And, look who is among the various oligarchs funding it:

Open Society Foundations is, of course, George Soros. This is a whole class of people, they all receive foreign funding, admit to it, and cannot provide a compelling reason why, then, it is a problem if they provide the government with some basic financial information. Never mentioned in this is that under the current situation their hated enemy the Russians could pump vast money into the country entirely legally and it wouldn’t have to be registered. The fact that they don’t want this monitored demonstrates if Russia does such a thing it is in trivial quantities.

Though there is a certain type of man who gets involved in this industry, it does happen to be the case that it is generally women. They usually at least start at this career young, though of course no one stays young forever. Even Victoria Nuland was once hot, apparently. Regardless, there is a remarkably relevant quote from Orwell’s 1984 which I must share here, showing deep insight into aspects of human organization:

“It was always the women, and above all the young ones, who were the most bigoted adherents of the Party, the swallowers of slogans, the amateur spies and nosers-out of unorthodoxy.”

‘Twas ever thus, I suppose. Anyway, I must stop this line of inquiry here, because looking into NGO’s in Georgia will have you like this in no time, and all of it based on publicly available facts:

Onto the international reactions to this whole affair, which leave little room for interpretation. First, the regime change queen herself, Ms. Power:

That’s you, Samantha. You are yourself threatening the US-Georgia relationship in this very Tweet. It is not as if some sequence of events will cause problems, you will torpedo it if USAID funded organizations are made to acknowledge what they already admit. It would be easy enough to say,

“We think this is unnecessary, but we respect democracy and the sovereignty and laws of the countries in which we operate, strengthening those things has always been our goal. Further, we are proud of our work and have never concealed the aid money we have provided our partners in order to help Georgia develop into a strong, independent, liberal democracy.”

Instead, she openly threatens them and seeks to interfere in their internal politics to prevent transparency in the NGO sector. Almost the entire EU is in on this, saying that Georgia’s membership process will be suspended if they pass a “Russian-style law.” Fortunately, this was blocked by Hungary led by Orban and Slovakia led by Fico- who of course just suffered an assassination attempt by a man who seems to have been radicalized by anti-Russia conspiracy theories on public television and which the media tried to justify on the grounds that they dislike Fico’s leadership. Orban’s government, in a long-running death struggle with the NGO class, has said that instead of refusing Georgia membership on these grounds, they should themselves emulate this law:

This is Hungary PM Viktor Orban’s political director. As far as I know they have the same last name by coincidence.

Of course no one has been shy about trying to influence these proceedings. It is remarkable that the foreign ministers of 4 EU states would come and join a protest on a domestic matter. Granted, it was the foreign ministers of Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Iceland, so not exactly heavy hitters; I was going to joke that perhaps between the four countries they could fill a mid-sized sports stadium, but it is literally true that between the four of them they have the population of a mid-sized US state. The law has now been vetoed by the most important foreign agent of all: Georgia’s President Salome Zourabichvili. I need to clarify that this is not some sort of smear or conspiracy theory. This woman’s family were Georgian bourgeoisie who fled the Bolsheviks. They have been living in Paris since the 1920s. She was a career agent of the French state until she was inexplicably allowed to switch from being France’s Ambassador to Georgia to Georgia’s Minister of Foreign Affairs following the last “Color Revolution” in 2004. Clearly she was “Our Woman in Tbilisi.” She only learned Georgian as an adult and is known for not speaking it well. Perhaps even worse, if that is possible, she studied at Columbia’s SIPA school under famed empire strategist Zbignew Brzezinski- SIPA, of course, recently being in the news as the temporary resting place of Victoria Nuland. Zourabichvili is without a doubt the queen of this dreadful class of people within Georgia, though unlike many of them, she was at least able to spend much of her career in conventional employment in the French diplomatic service.

Where does this leave Georgia? Well, it is widely expected that Parliament will override the President’s veto, which it is able to do given the strong support for the bill within Parliament. The main talking point of the Western powers and their minions it that “80% of Georgians support joining the EU.” Joining the EU is also the official position of the Georgian Dream Party, though some doubt their sincerity, and it isn’t unheard of that ruling parties give up an ambition while keeping it their policy. However, while we can be sure roughly 100% of pro-foreign influence protesters want to join the EU, there is no reason to believe that fully cuts the other direction. The EU and its supporters certainly have some trouble articulating the purpose of the EU and what “European values” are, but I can assure you that allowing unlimited foreign funding [from the “right” foreign powers of course] for NGOs into your country with no oversight or regulation is emphatically not a primary stated purpose of the EU. It’s noteworthy that being as many countries have laws about foreign funding of political activism, they mostly avoid attacking the law on its merits, simply saying passing any law similar to one in Russia is bad; they can’t argue that monitoring foreign influence is against European values when Europe keeps running roughshod over civil liberties to crack down on anything which might generate sympathy for Russia. I don’t want to speak for the Georgian people, but I imagine quite a few of them want to be a member of that large trade, travel, and labor bloc and their motivation for wanting to join is not specifically to be ruled by an NGO class of useless tax-eaters.

Now, we just wait to see what happens between the government and the foreign funded mob if the veto is overridden. They have made clear that they have no intention of accepting the premise that Georgia’s legislature can make them submit basic financial documents affirming what they already freely admit. One way or another, like Ukraine, this class wants to lead Georgia towards the abyss. There is not an option but to try and reign them in.

Armenia: Following a Light in the Darkness

The situation in Armenia is quite different than that in Georgia. In Georgia, the real problems may be yet to come if that faction should take power, but their narrative about the gravity of the bill is nonsense. Armenia is in a different and much more dire position than Georgia and has been since its horrible defeat in 2020’s Second Nagorno-Karabakh War. On top of the ethnic Armenian Artsakh Republic within Azerbaijan’s internationally recognized borders, Armenian forces had been controlling quite a lot of land surrounding the old Soviet province of Nagorno-Karabakh, the great majority of which was given back to Azerbaijan in a cease fire, and Artsakh was left cut off but for one passage to Armenia, which then turned into a full blockade. The Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, who must be more malicious than incompetent, had a need to get whatever lasting deal from Azerbaijan he could while Armenia built up its strength. However, he persistently alienated and insulted Armenia’s military ally Russia whose CSTO alliance Armenia had been a member, sold the country out to the Azeris, and sought closer relations with Western powers that can’t and won’t choose Armenia over Azerbaijan [though admittedly Paris is a somewhat reliable friend of Armenia, but still not in a position to access the country and help them in any meaningful way.] The last time I wrote about Armenia, Pashinyan and Azerbaijan’s President Aliyev had came to an agreement on the status of the Artsakh Republic, which would clearly result in Armenia abandoning their kinsmen.

On September 15th, 2023 I wrote,

“If Pashinyan says that Artsakh is Azerbaijan and Aliyev claims they will have full rights, there is little left to negotiate but their surrender. One suspects that Aliyev will then move on to trying to pick apart Armenia itself.”

Mere days after those words were written, Azerbaijan invaded and almost to a man the public of Artsakh fled their ancient homeland. Though some of the leaders of Artsakh were arrested and there was isolated violence, for the most part it was never tested if Azerbaijan would give them equal rights because no one stuck around to find out. Even looking back now after we are numbed from over half a year of Israel’s brutal war on Gaza, the imagery of people fleeing is heartbreaking:

The truth is, however, with no one’s support, 120,000 citizens of Artsakh, with their young children and aged parents to worry about, simply couldn’t defend their homes against the Azeris. It needs to be further noted that no one living here had paid taxes to Azerbaijan for 30 years, which was but one of a million ways the Aliyev regime could have persecuted them while saying they were being treated equally under the law. Pashinyan didn’t get them an amnesty deal or even arrange their evacuation, he left them at the mercy of Aliyev.

From there, Pashinyan has only continued to increase Armenia’s danger and suffering. Armenia has formally suspended its involvement in the CSTO and stopped contributing financially to the organization. He had already brought them onto such terrible terms with Russia that this is not a big change, but they are now not even nominally under anyone’s protection. In April, Russian peacekeepers, in place since the 2020 truce, withdrew from Nagorno-Karabakh, their presence no longer being needed, given that they let Azerbaijan invade once Pashinyan had agreed to not protect the region, though that didn’t stop him from blaming Russia for failure to act. Further, Russia has just agreed to withdraw most of its troops from Armenia’s borders with Azerbaijan, though they will remain on the border with Iran and Turkiye. This would all be fine if it was part of a different security plan but Pashinyan seems to not have one at all, as he continues to capitulate to Aliyev.

It needs to be stated again that there are clear reasons the United States or NATO can never defend Armenia. The most important of which is that Turkiye is a quite significant member of NATO and controls all of NATO’s land access to Armenia and the Turks will never let NATO use their territory to reinforce Armenia against Turkiye’s [and Israel’s] close ally Azerbaijan. It is also a struggle to make the United States care at all, though Azerbaijan’s waiver to be a dictatorship which receives security assistance was recently denied due to lobbying from Armenians and Greeks in the United States. However, Azerbaijan had no genuine need of the weapons shipment. It is also the case that Representative Cueller of Texas and his wife were indicted on federal bribery charges relating to Azerbaijani oil money, which is a good sign that Azerbaijan is not immune in the United States, but it also shows a broader problem. To put it simply, lobbying in favor of Armenia is in the form of American voters of Armenian and Greek heritage, whereas lobbying for Azerbaijan is in the form of oil money; readers of this newsletter will be sufficiently cynical to know which one of those things is more likely to be effective.

The situation in Georgia presents a major threat to Armenia. It is not that either faction in Georgia is hostile to Armenia, but due to Armenia’s isolated position it is heavily reliant on both Russia and Iran for trade, and trade through Iran goes through a narrow strip between two parts of Azerbaijan, which is thus highly vulnerable, especially due to losses in the 2020 war. Of course, the United States is incredibly hostile to both of these countries. As it stands, the ruling Georgian Dream Party has tried to walk a fine line regarding condemning Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and being realistic about their position, and this has included continuing to trade with Russia. If a regime more hostile to Russia takes power in Georgia, not only could it stop trading with Russia, it could stop Armenia’s trade with Russia leaving Armenia in an extremely difficult position acquiring the basic supplies on which a population survives. Though many have been quick to criticize countries that won’t stop trading with Russia, they’re imagining being a large, wealthy country with other options. Armenia simply cannot afford to buy more expensive goods from Europe and the United States that are imported through Georgia, especially when they need to focus on defense. This would leave them with functionally only the 27 mile border with Iran from which to get goods they can afford, and of course the United States demands hostility towards Iran out of anyone from whom it has the leverage to get that behavior.

Armenian villagers from the Tavush region, who are likely to be displaced if Pashinyan has his way.

Faced with these many problems, Pashinyan continues to try to “delimit” the border, which means agreeing to the Soviet Era borders which do not reflect where Armenians actually live. More villages are to be surrendered to the Azeris, specifically in the Tavush region, and more Armenians displaced, based on the fantasy that Aliyev will ultimately respect the international borders. Perhaps worse, the deal involves removing Armenian troops from positions guarding the country. Note the difference in rhetoric from the sides about this deal, from RFE/RL:

“Having a delimited border cannot become a threat to the security of the country or any settlement,” claimed Pashinian’s press office.

Speaking in Nagorno-Karabakh on May 10, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev described the land handover as “yet another victory” for Azerbaijan. “We showed the enemy its place, and today the enemy is powerless against us,” he said.”

It is no wonder that the people of Armenia don’t believe this will all turn out fine when Aliyev is saying, “today the enemy is powerless against us.” Aliyev could have easily said something like, “We have been at war with our neighbors for too long, but this favorable settlement will open the door for lasting peace for both of our nations,” but he did not even bother to deceive. Pashinyan has clearly accepted that it is the place of Armenia to be victims at the hands of Azerbaijan and hopes that somehow being in a club of “liberal democracies” with the West will stop the Azeris from destroying them.

Giving away the villages was taking it too far for many Armenians, especially the residents of that region. In the midst of this seemingly unending bad news, the Armenians were blessed with a leader that many of them find they can believe in: the Tavush Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan, who is leading the “Tavush for the Homeland” movement. The AFP describes him as a “charismatic cleric” who has turned into a “protest firebrand.” Though their article is relatively positive, both of those are complex prejudicial terms when used by the media. Charisma is a key feature in a popular leader, but it generally means “manipulative” in this context, while being a “firebrand” commonly means “electrifying,” but in media-speak it means “irresponsible.” You can watch some of this video from the Armenian independent news organization 301 and decide for yourself if this man is a “firebrand” or a deeply concerned religious leader who is not willing to let his people be victims:

This video is from a 100 mile walk from the Tavush region to Yerevan. There are a few things to note here, on top of what he has to say. One is that according to AFP this man suffers from varicose veins and had to stop to wipe blood off of his legs periodically, so he was likely in immense pain as this video was filmed. The second is the composition of people around him: these are clearly “Salt of the Earth” Armenians who love their country and not losers with useless degrees who live off of foreign largess. Thirdly is that though of course there is diversity of thought like any society, Armenians are a deeply pious people; you would never see an American reporter besides at a specialty religious publication address a senior cleric with such formal terms of respect. Having been elevated to Archbishop in 2023 makes Galstanyan a powerful figure in such a society. Al Mayadeen describes his role as follows,

“The archbishop is not only a clergyman opposing Pashinyan's decision over the Tavush hand-over, but rather a social and spiritual figure representing the interests of the people of Tavush and various Armenians who believe that the hand-over will not bring peace, but more subjugation and that they must defend their existence.”

Upon reaching Yerevan there was a huge rally against the land handover deal, including the arrest of many protesters, which of course we haven’t heard pearl-clutching about, as in Georgia. Some sources report that the protests reached the size of more than 30,000 people, the same size as some of the Georgia protests by which our media class are so much more impressed. The protesters are not just against the deal, but want Pashinyan removed from office. Galstanyan has called him a “liar” and has further said,

“We need a new government, a government of the people, a caring, suffering government, a government of reconciliation…I am out fighting today because we live at a time of stolen joy and infamy...when all the borders of our homeland are in danger.”

He has encouraged peaceful acts of civil disobedience to stop the land handover.

The anti-Pashinyan rally in Yerevan. Notice that the attendants are clearly the common man and not an NGO class. Also notice the lack of foreign flags [the man in front is carrying a flag representing the Yazidi religious minority.]

Demanding Pashinyan’s resignation has thus far been unsuccessful, but this is all still just getting started. For his part, Galstanyan has expressed willingness to himself become the Prime Minister, with the permission of the Patriarch and “if God wills.” I don’t think this is a cynical play for power, as it seems to me he would clearly prefer Armenians were already safe and he did not have to enter into temporal matters. The Patriarch, Karekin II, known as the Catholicos of All Armenians, has expressed clear opposition to Pashinyan’s capitulations, saying,

“We consider the actions taken under the pretext of demarcation and delimitation of the border in the Tavush border area extremely dangerous. These actions, taken without comprehensive and guaranteed solutions, create new threats to our people…In the face of existential challenges, spiritual leaders, specifically the clerics of the Tavush diocese led by the head of the diocese, faithful to their spiritual mission and calling, cannot remain indifferent to the cares and needs of the people entrusted to their care…Our national dignity, zeal, and loyalty to the homeland and sacred values should not give way to hopelessness, intolerance, timidity, enmity, or hatred.”

He does go on to say that they should not “seek power” but that is vague and further it would be one man taking a secular office at the will of the people, and in their view, God.

To Americans, of course, with a country founded on Enlightenment values, the idea of a cleric leading a country seems as if it would always be wrong- Americans are not even comfortable with a ceremonial Head of State being a ceremonial Head of Church [as in much of northwest Europe.] However, in religious countries in crisis with a great deal of uniformity of religious practice, many high level religious figures have made important contributions as political leaders. 95% of Armenians are members of the Armenian Apostolic Church, which has been the official state religion of Armenia since 301 AD [with some interruptions, such as under the Soviets, but regardless it is the national church of the Armenian people.] A paper from The Jamestown Foundation expressed concern about “Separation of Church and State” in Armenia; I dislike the implication that this is some sort of universal value that Armenia is obligated to follow, but it contains some important information. It notes that the Constitution of Armenia says that the Church has an “exclusive mission…in the spiritual life of the Armenian people,” which is to say it is the legally recognized national Church, but even so it has previously stayed out of politics. One member of Pashinyan’s Civil Contract party said, “A process is being generated to carry out a coup in Armenia in an undemocratic way…The church is fully engaged in this” while others made the usual claims about how Russia is behind this [as my readers will know, anyone Western-aligned will make this claim anywhere in the world if the public notices bad governance.] It also notes that in 2023, Pashinyan, seemingly dismissing their influence, said, “If the church wants to carry out political activities, Armenia is a democratic country, [and] it is possible…Nothing prevents…creating a party and developing political activities.” It notes that there is long term hostility between the church and Pashinyan, who came into office hostile to Karekin as he is seen as a holdover from the USSR, and further accuses him of supporting the former President. It needs to be added that the Archbishop himself is apparently a dual Canadian citizen, making him currently ineligible for the position of Prime Minister, which is the one aspect of these protests which could signify foreign influence.

For now, the protests in Armenia have calmed down, but an ancient people like Armenians do not forget the times they have been betrayed, and their victimization under Pashinyan is not through. The Armenian people are brave and strong, even if their leader is not. It remains a volatile situation that is sure to see the public continuously return to the streets.

The Paths Forward

A summer photograph of a mountain valley in Georgia.

The protests in Georgia and Armenia are nearly opposite. In Georgia the protesters are overwhelmingly hostile to Russia and would die, or at least have other people die, to be Europe, which is of course a geographic impossibility. They are undeniably foreign funded, though presumably over 30 years of intense NGO penetration has built up a solid class of dupes as well as those getting paid. In Armenia the protests are wholly homegrown, and the demonstrators want little more but to protect themselves from a neighboring country that is also small but much more populous and powerful. It is no surprise that in both cases the Western media and influence classes are on the side that puts the people of these small countries in more danger by making them pawns in much bigger matters. Georgia is truly threatened by this NGO machine, and it is not clear if registering them will do much to get them under control. Though Russia and Georgia have significant disputes with each other, anyone in Georgia with half a brain should see that monsters like Samantha Power are trying to use them to antagonize Russia into opening a “second front” to distract Russia from Ukraine.

It is insane to let one’s homeland be used in this way, for more than one reason. Of course, the narrative is that Russia hates the freedom of all around it and must always expand or die. They want you to ignore the fact that that is Ukraine’s location makes its hostility a serious threat to Russia and that the two peoples are so closely historically linked that the distinction between them only arose over time. However, for Russia, Georgia is little more than a fly to swat at, and would hardly prove a serious distraction from Ukraine, even if Georgia got destroyed in the process. Further, Russia is usually more disciplined, for example not getting heavily involved in Georgia’s breakaway regions until Saakashvili’s invasion in 2008. In fact, Georgia was mostly important to Russia for the access it provided to Armenia, and that matters ever less. Armenia itself is not that strategically important to Russia, it is more accurately a brotherly people that the Russians have a sense of wanting to protect as threatened coreligionists.

The Georgian Dream government’s best move is to simply push this legislation through and manage the protests as best as they can. From there, it will still be a long and arduous struggle against the minions of foreign governments and finance, but since they have fought it would be a key victory. We can be sure that the NGO class, and more importantly, their sponsors, want revolution. They would presumably prefer a mostly non-violent “Color Revolution,” but will also accept or create blood if it is necessary to get their way. The government of Georgia should show restraint at all costs and try to avoid escalation, but this class doesn’t run out of funding and will not stop until it is defeated or Georgia is a dystopic vassal with its culture and society destroyed by these freaks and its economy enslaved to Western capital. We’ve seen this all before. Unfortunately, a spark could come at any time.

Armenia is in an even more challenging position. It is possible that Aliyev will stop at the internationally recognized border, but more likely that the Turkic nations the Armenians are sandwiched between will find pretenses to fight until Armenia is at best their vassal. I can appreciate their desire to be close to Europe, whose culture they helped the Greeks to birth. However, for now, it isn’t realistic, and certainly isn’t worth the destruction of their people. If Pashinyan can be thrown out of office, that would only be the beginning. Armenia is already a poor country with little to spare, heavily reliant on remittances from a large diaspora. Still, it needs to put itself on siege footing and send the able bodied population out with shovels to prepare fortifications and shelters as the men train for war. This is an existential moment, and through incompetence, cowardice, or malice, Pashinyan has let it go too far for there to be another solution. They also need to seek a security guarantee from Iran, and accept the international consequences which come with it. No only do Armenians share the same regional enemies, the Armenians and Persians are historic friends: the only ones which Armenians have left who are able to help them. It is commonly said that states do not have permanent friends, only permanent interests, but this is more true of world powers than ancient peoples in their homelands. Regardless, this wouldn’t be true if not for Pashinyan’s misrule, but Iran is the only country to whom Armenia can currently turn. It is that or go it alone.

Two Old Men of History

The Armenians and Georgians are some of the world’s most ancient recorded peoples, with Armenians playing a major part in Xenophon’s The Education of Cyrus, whereas it was from the Georgians in Colchis that Jason attained the Golden Fleece. The Armenians were once a great kingdom, the power in between Rome and Parthia which could sway the balance of the ancient world. Georgia never attained such heights, but has itself had many periods of glory. The Armenians, by following their traditions, can take strength from their past. Alternately, Georgia’s class of Westernizing NGO will rip them asunder from their history until there is little reason a Georgian is different from anyone else. It’s sad, but it’s incredible what a large class of people of middling intelligence and education can do to a country if whatever you call the job of an NGO worker is the only way they know how to make a living.

It is a mistake for small nations to get caught up in empire games if it can be avoided. It often can be avoided- there is a great security in being tough but benign, a friendly nation which no one is threatened by but also which no one wishes to fight. At other times it cannot be. The Georgian Dream Party knows to avoid getting between Russia and the United States. However the NGO class will do anything to throw the nation head first into the fire. Armenia, on the other hand, is already there, and needs a leader worthy of the name to follow as they walk through the fire. The one thing we can be sure of is that the man for the job is not Nikol Pashinyan.

Thank you for reading! The Wayward Rabbler is written by Brad Pearce. If you enjoyed this content please subscribe and share. My main articles will always be free but paid subscriptions help me a huge amount. I also have a tip jar at Ko-Fi. I am now writing regularly for The Libertarian Institute. My Facebook page is The Wayward Rabbler. You can see my shitposting and serious commentary on Twitter @WaywardRabbler.