Conflict, Crisis, Flashpoints, Military, Risks February 24, 2012

Caucasus Cataclysm: World War 3 Begins in Spring Says Russian Presidential Candidate

S ource: Lragir

See Also: Armenia’s Accession To NATO Is Not Ruled Out
The Russian presidential candidate, the LDPR leader Vladimir Zhirinovski stated that in summer World War III will start. “As soon as they crush Syria, Iran will be the next. Azerbaijan will take advantage and try to recapture Karabakh. Armenia will counteract. Turkey will support Azerbaijan. Here’s how our country can be drawn into a war in the summer of 2012,” he said.

Besides, there are already opinions of experts, mainly from Armenia and Russia, stating that the U.S. “agreed” with Azerbaijan to “give” it Karabakh in return for support to action on Iraq.

Despite a really great possibility of a blow in the region, it is evident that the situation is under control and there are at least two factors which indicate that war in Karabakh is not inevitable.

The first factor is that so far no conflict or war where the U.S. was involved or controlled it, spilt on to the neighbor countries. The feeling is that special mechanisms were used to localize the military actions in the given country –be it Serbia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya or else. They said that the war in Libya (or Iraq) would detonate World War III involving the entire Middle East but the war started and ended within one country.

Certainly, the point is not the U.S. being right or wrong in its decisions to intervene in different countries but the mechanism which keeps neighbor countries intact in the period of hostilities. The ongoing events in Syria are also a proof to this. Despite forecasts, the conflict has not spilt on the neighboring countries.

The only exception so far has been the Russian-Georgian war when the actions went on in two countries but this is a different story with different purposes.

In this regard, it seems that even if a conflict between Iran and the West or Israel starts, it will hardly spill on the neighboring countries. Although experts hope it will be possible to avoid the conflict.

The second factor is the U.S. position on Karabakh. If the ownership of territories by the Armenian side and the presence of the Karabakhi military and political entity are a bargaining chip between the U.S. with Azerbaijan, why didn’t it happen in the past 20 years? Why should the U.S. which has done much to preserve the status quo in Nagorno-Karabakh change its attitude to Azerbaijan for which it has a lot of other levers of influence reserved?

Nevertheless, the play of muscles continues in the region. The CSTO Secretary General Nikolay Bordyuzha said in case of escalation of the conflict in Karabakh, Armenia will receive all the necessary support. The third field army of Turkey the headquarters of which is situated in Erzrum is holding mass maneuvers near the Armenian border in the province of Kars. The president and the prime minister of Turkey are following the exercises.

The Azerbaijani military forces has also launched large-scale maneuvers along the Nagorno-Karabakh border on February 22. In Yerevan, on February 21-23, Armenian-Georgian joint command-staff exercises were held on the “detection and prevention of the spread of weapons of mass destruction”.