CIA releases 1998 forecasts and warnings over Nagorno-Karabakh

The declassified documents released recently by the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) reveal interesting facts also on Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh.  

A document dated 21 April 1988, contains a monthly report by Robert Blackwell, providing warnings and forecasts based on the outcomes of an earlier meeting.  It says particularly that intelligence community members met on April 19 to “discuss the exchange of polemics between party conservatives and reformers and the implications of this confrontation for Gorbachev’s agenda.”

Addressing the revolts erupting in different parts of the USSR, it focuses also on Nagorno-Karabakh.

“Moscow’s use of carrots and sticks – refusing to review the territorial status of Nagorno-Karabakh, offering concessions in the cultural and educational sphere (for instance, improved access to Armenian television for the predominantly Armenian population of the region) and a show of military force – appear to have worked to defuse the short-term crisis. The streets have been relatively quiet and the work stoppages in the capital city of Nagorno-Karabakh effectively ended on 5 April. Over the long run, the community believes that the cultural concessions Moscow has made so far will not be sufficient to satisfy the Armenians and Soviet authorities will come under growing pressure to take some more substantial steps,” reads the document.

The report also contains a warning over a procession scheduled for April 24, the Armenian Genocide Remembrance day, which the authors believed might disturb the “fragile peace”. “The regime will probably allow the Armenian activists to march to the memorial commemorating the victims of the massacre. They will attempt to use moderate leaders to control the participants but there is still a risk of serious trouble.”