Материал: Payaslian S., The History of Armenia From the Origins to the Present

Communist leadership in Erevan criticize openly to the Kremlin’s Karabagh policy.80 Gorbachev insisted that the Soviet government could not permit conflicts in the republics to jeopardize the Soviet system. The inability of the central government to remedy the situation, however, further intensified hostility towards the authorities at all levels of government, contributing to the erosion of the political legitimacy of the Communist leadership.81 By the end of 1988, Armenians in both Armenia and Karabagh were convinced that national independence represented the only option to address the various political, economic, social, and environmental crises.82

Yet, the diasporan political organizations initially opposed the independence movement led by the Armenian National Movement. It was indeed ironic that the Dashnaktsutiun—the political party that since the Bolshevik takeover of the first republic had for seven decades advocated Armenian independence and unification of historic Armenian lands— together with the Hnchakian and Ramkavar parties issued a joint declaration in October 1988 urging compatriots in Armenia not to secede from the Soviet Union. The Dashnaktsutiun, maintained that secession from the Soviet Union at this point would jeopardize the security of Armenia and that the potential threat posed by Turkey and its ideology of pan-Turkism necessitated Russian protection. The Dashnaktsutiun believed that under Gorbachev’s leadership the Kremlin would facilitate a negotiated resolution of the crises enveloping both Armenia and Karabagh, and the party insisted on cooperation with Suren Harutyunyan (who succeeded Demirchyan in 1988 as the Communist party leader in Erevan) and Gorbachev.83 The Dashnakist party leadership, whose political activities for decades had been excluded from Soviet society, clearly failed to appreciate the power of the pro-democ- racy and pro-independence movement.84

In reaction to the rising challenge against their rule, the Communist leaders in Moscow and Erevan in December 1988 declared martial law and arrested members of the Karabagh Committee. In January 1989 the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union placed Karabagh under the direct administration of Moscow but left the region within Azerbaijan. The Kremlin appointed Arkady Volsky as the “regional governor” directly accountable to Moscow.85 This policy neither redefined the status of Karabagh nor granted Armenians authority in the region’s administrative affairs. It merely promised greater attention to the protection of the Armenians against official and unofficial discrimination and against persecution and oppression by Azerbaijanis. Armenians complained to Gorbachev that the implementation of the new system failed to meet their demands as the familiar process of the Azerbaijanization of Karabagh accelerated. “The sounder and more just solution,” the Armenians argued, would have been to reunify Karabagh with Armenia.86 These demands

grew into mass demonstrations in May 1989 for the release of the Karabagh Committee members from prison and for the lifting of the martial law. To pacify the Armenians, the Communist government made some concessions: it released the Karabagh Committee members from prison, granted authority for celebration of May 28 as a holiday, and permitted the use of the tricolor flag of the 1918 republic. Mass demonstrations continued in Karabagh, and in August 1989 Karabagh Armenians elected the Armenian National Council, which declared the secession of Karabagh from Azerbaijan and its reunification with Armenia.87

On November 28, 1989, Moscow removed Volsky and installed a military administration under the control of General Vladislav Safonov, whose patently favorable attitude toward Baku met intense Armenian opposition.88 Armenians greeted this policy with another wave of demonstrations in Erevan and Stepanakert, the capital of Karabagh, and on December 1, the Armenian Supreme Soviet in Erevan declared the reunification of Karabagh. This act was followed by the nullification of Article VI of the Soviet Constitution and the renaming of Armenia as the Republic of Armenia.89 Images of the Karabagh conflict and Armenian soldiers on military armored tanks victoriously waving the tricolor flashed on television screens worldwide, captivating the hearts and imagination of the diasporan Armenians.

THE DIASPORAN COMMUNITIES

Two traditional views on Soviet Armenia prevailed in the diasporan communities before the 1980s. The Dashnaktsutiun continued its opposition to the Soviet regime and viewed itself as the principal legitimate leader for the revival of an independent and united Armenia (encompassing historic and Soviet Armenia). The Ramkavar Liberal Democratic Party and the Hnchakian Socialist Democratic Party, on the other hand, embraced Soviet Armenia as the only viable “homeland”; under the existing circumstances, their sympathizers maintained, the preservation of culture and identity required close ties with Armenia even if within the Soviet system. Yet, as noted above, the three parties issued a joint declaration in 1988 urging their compatriots in Armenia not to abandon the Soviet Union. Since 1921, when the Red Army crushed the February rebellion, the Dashnaktsutiun had viewed itself as the lone fulcrum among the Armenian political parties sustaining the vision of an independent Armenia. It would not therefore accept a secondary role in a movement that sought to accomplish the very same objective that the party believed it was destined to accomplish. In the end, the diasporan communities, including the Dashnaktsutiun, Hnchakian, and Ramkavar parties, failed to gauge accurately the internal dynamics propelling Soviet Armenia toward independence. Although

Soviet Armenians had held the parties in great esteem, the joint declaration undermined the party’s legitimacy in the eyes of their compatriots in the homeland.

Such debates among parties hundreds and in some cases thousands of miles away from Armenia gained political and economic significance because of the growing size and wealth of the diasporan communities. In the mid-1980s, there were about 3 million Armenians in Soviet Armenia and an estimated 1.61 million resided in the other Soviet republics, Russia being home to 360,000. The Armenian communities in the United States and Canada totaled between 800,000 and 1 million, of which more than 600,000 lived in the state of California, and 45,000 in Canada. In Europe, that figure was about 300,000, of which 200,000 lived in France and 10,000 in Great Britain. In the Middle East, the Armenian communities totaled about 550,000, of which about 100,000 were in Syria, 200,000 in Lebanon, and 200,000 in Iran. In Latin America, the Armenian community totaled about 120,000, the largest being in Argentina (80,000).90

The diasporan communities, after an initial shock, responded with enormous energy to the political shifts in Armenia and Karabagh beginning in February 1988 and the earthquake in December later that year. Armenian organizations across the diasporan communities collected humanitarian assistance for earthquake survivors in the affected cities of Spitak, Gumri (Leninakan), Vanadzor (Kirovakan), and Gugard.91 Non-Armenian and diasporan experts in various fields traveled to Armenia to offer their services. Armenian organizations of different ideological leanings in diasporan communities that, with the exception of commemorating the genocide, seldom agreed on other issues, cooperated in matters pertaining to humanitarian assistance. The three principal diasporan political organizations, the Dashnaktsutiun, the Ramkavars, and the Hnchakians, along with their affiliates mobilized to assist the survivors. Soon the parties also, albeit belatedly, changed their position and supported independence. In 1991 construction companies from other parts of the Soviet Union constructed new buildings using “prefabricated concrete—much like the ones that collapsed so disastrously in the quake.”92 Soviet Armenia literally and metaphorically had become a “disaster zone.”

THE END OF SOVIET ARMENIA

Gorbachev and his close economic advisers sought to decentralize the Soviet system to render it more conducive to reforms and market economy. They failed to ameliorate the economic situation, particularly the shortages in basic consumer goods, low wages, and miserable working conditions. Labor strikes, especially in the coal industry, protested hazardous

working conditions, poor and unsafe housing, and deteriorating general social infrastructure.93 By 1990 the results of Gorbachev’s glasnost and perestroika policies had not been impressive, and the political situation clearly demanded close attention by the Kremlin. An effort in 1988 to introduce private enterprises had failed largely because local government and party apparatchiks had refused to relinquish their privileges and patronage in local economies. Nonetheless, on March 6, 1990, the Soviet parliament voted in favor (350 to 3) of privatizing small businesses to encourage new entrepreneurship while protecting the right to own private properties without fear of intrusion by local officials. A week later, on March 13, by a vote of 1,771 to 264 (with 74 abstentions) the parliament decided to amend the constitution in order to permit private ownership; by a vote of 1,817 to 133 (with 61 abstentions) it ratified the creation of a new presidency; and on March 14, by a vote of 1,542 to 368 (with 76 abstentions) it elected Gorbachev as president of the Soviet Union for a five-year term. A few days later, on March 18, local elections were held throughout the Soviet Union. The Communist Party lost in a number of cities throughout the country, including Moscow, Leningrad, and Kiev.94

The fact remained that by any standards perestroika failed to improve the living standards of the ordinary citizens. Experts such as Vladimir A. Tikhonov, president of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics cooperatives, warned that failure to rectify the situation would have catastrophic consequences for the economy. Real GNP dropped by 4 to 5 percent in 1989 and by about 9 percent by early 1991. The economy appeared to be on the verge of financial meltdown as the government’s finances spiraled out of control, the budget deficit (approximately 165 billion rubles in 1990) grew rapidly, and its credit rating reached its lowest levels. In order to improve the nation’s credit rating, Gorbachev belatedly introduced a new economic package inaugurating liberalization of prices and trade.95

Gorbachev’s experimentation with economic liberalization and joint ventures with western companies to stimulate wider trade relations for hard currency failed to improve the economy and merely amplified the structural deficiencies of the economic system. They drove home the point that the inferior quality of Soviet consumer goods could not compete with western products in international markets. Clearly, the Soviet economy could no longer be governed according to the principles of MarxismLeninism; but what would replace them? Gorbachev’s economic adviser, Nikolai Petrakov, encouraged him to press forward for full market economy in order to avert financial instability. Yet such advice and initiatives proved insufficient to reinvigorate the economy. The Soviet finances could not improve so long as the ruble was not convertible and the Soviet Union remained excluded from western international economic activities. Equally important, strategies proposed by Petrakov necessitated immediate measures

by fiat rather than by relying on the party organization and bureaucracies. Gorbachev found himself in the unenviable position of attempting to balance economic liberalization with political stability. He could implement Petrakov’s plan, but the conservatives would resist its implementation. Although for a while in 1990 Gorbachev seemed to win the political support of some members of the Soviet parliament, such alliances did not enhance his standing in economic matters, least of all among the administrative bureaucracies that proved inimical to liberalization.96

Beginning in early 1990, systemic paralysis, combined with the resurgence of nationalism across the Soviet Union, appeared too intractable to be remedied through normal channels of bureaucracy and legislation. In January 1990 the Supreme Soviet of Armenia had declared the supremacy of Armenian law to laws imposed by Moscow and claimed its own right to veto laws instituted by the Soviet regime.97 The Baltic states in 1989 had declared Latvian, Estonian, and Lithuanian the official languages of their respective societies.98 On March 11, 1990, the Lithuanian parliament declared its independence from Moscow and elected Vytautus Landsbergis, a music professor and leader of a grassroots movement, as president. The Kremlin condemned the declaration as “illegitimate and invalid,” and although tensions between Moscow and Vilnius remained high for some time, the fact that Gorbachev demanded protection for national industries in Lithuania revealed his unwillingness to employ military force to halt secession—a fundamental shift from the brutal measures exercised under Khrushchev in Hungary in 1956 and Brezhnev in Czechoslovakia in 1968. Conservatives interpreted Gorbachev’s failure to force an end to the secessionist process in Lithuania as an indication that his policies were doomed to fail. On March 30, 1990, the Estonian parliament declared independence from Moscow, but Estonians planned the disengagement to take place in phases of negotiations during the following three to five years. Other republics also began to discuss independence from the Soviet Union. In June 1990 Russia, the center of Soviet political power, declared its own sovereignty from the Soviet state.99 By the end of the year, more than one in four among the Soviet population considered the disintegration of the Soviet Union inevitable.100 By 1991 “the parade of sovereignties,” as political scientist Mark Beissinger has noted, “universalized a situation of dual power (dvoevlastie) in which relations between lower-level and higher-level institutions of territorial governance throughout the ethnofederal hierarchy grew ambiguous and contested.”101

In Erevan, Suren Harutyunyan, Communist Party chief in Armenia from 1988 to 1990, promised to take immediate steps to eradicate corruption, to address the environmental crisis by halting the operation of the nuclear plant in Armenia, and to convert the party’s vacation homes into health and service centers. Unable to accommodate demands for