Resolution of Karabakh row
Since September 27, Armenia's and Azerbaijan's forces have slugged it out over the contested territory of Nagorno-Karabakh, the de facto independent region that remains de jure a part of Azerbaijan. The losses inflicted have been heavy. Winter, too, is on its way. And it is particularly the latter that may offer a glimpse at Azerbaijan's reason for starting the war, with help and perhaps prompting by Turkey. But it could also present an opportunity for a long-term solution to this dispute.
First, the casualties. Armenia and its ethnic compatriots in Karabakh have announced more than 500 combat deaths so far, a staggering number given their combined population of barely 3 million. Azerbaijan has refused to release statistics, although videos of Azeri soldiers' bodies piled together after various battles suggest they are also high. Most significant are the Armenian/Karabakhti armored losses from the deadly Turkish Bayraktar TB2 drones: Independent analysis of video evidence shows Yerevan and Stepanakert have lost no fewer than 80 tanks, 50 conventional and rocket artillery pieces and 170 trucks and transports. But while these losses are devastating, the military reality on the ground does not match them. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has repeatedly declared that this will be the final battle for Karabakh, intoning that "the time has finally come to liberate all of our occupied territories."
His October 3 announcement that Azerbaijani forces had captured their first village of the war, the settlement of Madaghis in Karabakh's extreme northeast, was met with unrestrained jubilation on the streets of Baku. Since then, Azerbaijani forces have taken the village of Talish (also in the northeast) and a number of abandoned villages in the southeast. And that is it. Despite complete domination of the skies and severe degradation of the Armenian and Karabakhti armies' equipment, the Azerbaijani advance has stalled. A recent analysis of the amount of Karabakh territory captured by Azeris since the start of the war estimated it to be a paltry 2.8% of the total. Were it earlier in the year, this would not seem to be a discouraging prognosis. Given time, Azerbaijani forces could likely continue to claw forward into the settled areas of Karabakh, taking advantage of their drones' ability to degrade enemy formations and materiel. Late September, however, is an inauspicious time to have begun an offensive in the Caucasus. Now, in midOctober Karabakh, winter is coming.
Within the next two weeks, snow will fall. In a month, the land will be covered. Offensive operations will bog down, movement of troops and vehicles will become difficult. Logistics and supply lines will experience additional strain. Severe storms will impact the operation of drones, periodically removing the greatest advantage on the Azerbaijani side.
This is to say nothing of the terrain. To date, Azeri forces have advanced through the lowlands, taking advantage of the few areas where the difference in elevation between their positions and those of their enemies being only a few meters. Now, they will have to go up. Up into the mountains, toward the positions from which Armenian troops will be able to pick their targets. It is not for nothing that the Russians named this land "Mountainous Karabakh."
Azerbaijan's soldiers have also just begun to fight their first urban battles. To date, they have largely seized just empty ground or long-abandoned settlements; even Talish and Madaghis consisted only of a few dozen houses. Now, Azeri troops have encountered their first real settlement, the town of Hadrut with its peacetime population of 4,000. Fighting has been ongoing there since Azeri special forces managed to enter the town, eventually being pushed out in fierce house-to-house combat. Drones can intercept reinforcements, but they can't enter a building and kill enemy soldiers entrenched inside.
Winter offensives are difficult enough for welltrained armies fighting on even ground. Azerbaijan's armed forces enjoy neither of these advantages. While the infantry's performance has been acceptable, military experts have not judged it to be exemplary, as it would likely need to be to advance uphill, through snowdrifts, into enemy-held urban towns.