Category Archives: EDITORIAL

“THE IDEOLOGY OF REAL ARMENIA”. A SCHOLARLY EVALUATION

The publication is devoted to a substantive analysis of the project entitled “The Ideology of Real Armenia.”

The study examines the semiotic systems and semantic content of the concepts “real Armenia” and “historical Armenia” as they appear in the document. It is demonstrated that, following the restoration of Armenian independent statehood, the concept of “real Armenia” has become a mere tautology in Armenian discourse. Moreover, due to the physical non-existence of historical Armenia, these two notions cannot be compared on a synchronic level, while from a diachronic perspective, scholarly understandings of the past and the present do not oppose one another but rather complement each other.

Therefore, attempts to construct an opposition between these concepts lack any scientific foundation and, politically, recall only the faint “rustling” of the ANM-era (Armenian National Movement) “innovations” of the 1990s. Whereas in the 1990s such devices could, to some extent, be understood as attempts to draw comparisons with the Soviet period, today they are transformed into epistemological nihilism. This is because, without even grasping the meaning of the concepts they themselves employ, the authors of the tautological notion of “real Armenia” have resorted to a commonplace populist maneuver—namely, the artificial separation of the Armenian nation’s past from its present.

Accordingly, with the aim of providing Armenian society and political forces with elementary knowledge concerning the history of Armenian statehood, the editorial board of Vem has undertaken a brief examination of the historical experience of the first Armenian statesmen of the modern era—not in order to analyze Armenia itself, but to overcome the cognitive dead ends inherent in the project “The Ideology of Real Armenia.”

Furthermore, taking into account the acceleration of regional developments, the Vem editorial expresses the conviction that the superficial experiments carried out through the concept of “real Armenia,” which emerged under conditions of the absence of statehood in Armenia, will soon lose their strategic prospects. In the context of the current disintegrating world order, the formation of yet another Armenian reservation reminiscent of Soviet Armenia—this time in service of the Greater Turan—is excluded. This is because the political objective of servicing a rotation of reservations through the “Ideology of Real Armenia” contradicts the medium-term plans of global actors.

The strengthening of U.S. positions that preclude a new “Lenin–Atatürk” deal, together with signs of Russia’s retreat, has outwardly created the impression of a Turkish–American consensus. However, at the core of the global game unfolding
around us lies not an American–Russian confrontation, but the objective of containing China’s growing power. Consequently, the threat of activating the Greater Turan project deprives Russia of the ability to maneuver between the United States and China. The clearly emerging existential threat of losing the entire post-Soviet South and subsequently being drawn into a war with the “internal Turks” can now be prevented only through the restoration of political dialogue with the entire West.

Thus, the overt objective of turning Armenia into a testing ground for a rotation of reservations through the ill-conceived project “The Ideology of Real Armenia” will operate only within a short temporal horizon.

WHY IS ARARAT BEING TARGETED?

The article shows that the current fact of Mount Ararat being located within the territory of Turkey, and the fact of “touching/violating” the concept of “Ararat”, which symbolizes national memory and the Christian value system, is an attempt to transfer the ongoing cultural genocide against the Armenian people inside the borders of the Republic of Armenia.

Since through this the Turkish-Azerbaijani tandem is automatically involved in Armenia’s internal political discourse, the examination of such a challenge is possible only on two planes: synchronic and diachronic. The first requires carrying out a scientific analysis of Turkish-Azerbaijani perceptions regarding place names of the Armenian Highland and, through comparative examination, revealing the fundamental differences between the linguistic thinking of nomads and indigenous peoples. The second requires illuminating Armenia’s pivotal role in combining, reinterpreting, and transmitting the mythological ideas of the Ancient Near East concerning Mount Ararat and the Land of Ararat to the entire Christian civilization.

THE FUNDAMENTAL COMPONENTS OF OUR IDENTITY

The article examines the interrelation of language, history, and culture as essential components of collective identity. These domains do not function in isolation but form an integrated system of memory, symbolism, and values that ensures the continuity of community existence.

From a phenomenological perspective, history reveals the temporal depths of collective experience, language organizes and mediates processes of thought and communication, while culture embodies traditions and simultaneously generates new meanings. The Armenian experience illustrates that the vitality of historical memory, the symbolic power of language, and the continuity of cultural values serve as crucial sources of resistance against oblivion, fragmentation, and assimilation. In the context of current situation, the distortion of history, the commodification of languages, and the marginalization of culture threaten the foundations of identity, reducing it to superficial diversity.

The article argues that scholarship must counter these processes by adopting integrative methodologies that unite linguistic, historical, and cultural perspectives. This approach is not only epistemological but also ethical, becoming a form of resistance to oblivion, standardization, and distortion. Thus, the humanities acquire existential significance, serving as a preventive and constructive force for the preservation of identity and the possibility of future coexistence.

THE NEW WORLD ORDER AND THE OLD TURKEY

The current publication reveals the political blackmail techniques employed by R. Erdoğan nearly a decade ago toward the leadership of China, and later Russia, and compares them with Ankara’s recent attempts to exploit the contradictions among global superpowers.

Let us recall that for years, R. Erdoğan had accused China of committing genocide in Xinjiang. However, in 2017, he managed to reach an understanding with Beijing—sacrificing his “Uyghur brothers” in the process. Prior to that, after downing a Russian military aircraft near the Syrian border, Erdoğan secured profitable gas deals with Russia while simultaneously reinforcing “Brother Ilham’s” position in the South Caucasus.

Now, after years of strained relations with the United States, Erdoğan is moving toward legitimizing the genocidal regime of “Brother al-Sharaa” in Syria. At the same time, he is attempting to bargain for a “Zangezur corridor” in exchange for accepting the Russian status of Crimea.

The publication demonstrates that Erdoğan, who has long played on the weaknesses of global powers, is now trying to skillfully take advantage of the clear utilitarianism of the new U.S. administration—something directly related to efforts to contain U.S. national debt and prevent dollar depreciation.

In early 2025, before the Trump administration had clarified its position on U.S.-China relations, Turkey’s president used Ilham Aliyev’s April 22 visit to China to remind official Beijing—on Azerbaijan’s behalf—of the mutual obligations outlined in the 2017 Turkish-Chinese agreement, thereby making Azerbaijan a party to them as well.

Taking into account the inevitable improvement in Russian-American relations and the potential formation of a “Entente-2”, Turkey has sought certain security guarantees from China concerning its territorial integrity. It is now clear that, by drawing Azerbaijan into the game, these guarantees will be used to transform China into a trench-digging instrument in the South Caucasus.

In conclusion, the publication suggests that Turkey’s hopes for a restoration of a bipolar world order currently lack serious foundations, as today’s global competition revolves not around quantity, but around qualitative resources—the majority of which remain under U.S. control. Moreover, Turkey’s multi-vector games have already begun to raise concerns among its patron, the United Kingdom. Hence, having been informed in advance about the upcoming resignation of his old friend—the head of British intelligence Richard Moore—Erdoğan began taking steps toward resolving the Kurdish issue as early as the end of last year.

WHO IS THE ARMENIAN? – 2017-4

Summary

Key words – Armenia, identity, coherent vision, identity crisis, the principle of justice, bourgeoisization, social ideology.

The main tragedy of modern Armenian society, which turned out to be a whirlpool of internal and external complex and contradictory processes, is the lack of a vision of coexistence together with universal human content. In order to turn the national goals into a political plane, Armenia must become a tempting social environment that will attract Armenians as a magnet. This is hampered by the fact that in Armenia today there are no minimum conditions for the formation of a national environment of coexistence, that is, the formation of common interests and aspirations of an individual, society and state based on the principle of justice, which gives each of them a clear clear vision of a common future. On the contrary, a hedonistic society was formed in modern Armenia. And the younger generation, brought up by such a society, is infected with the same diseases. Overcoming the crisis of self-identification in modern Armenian society by creating a vision of a common future means the formation of the new ideal of Armenia that will fight against the general bourgeoisization of the country. This vision presupposes the existence of a social ideology. Only in the process of formation of internal equilibrium, a new perception of one’s own identity arises, in which the national memory turns into a totality of trembling modern biorhythms.

ARMENIA AND KURDISTAN: NEIGHBORHOOD IN CUSTODY – 2017-3

Summary

Key words – Iraqi Kurdistan, Eastern Question, Armenian Question, Kurdish Question, Treaty of Sèvres, Alliance between Lenin and Ataturk, Khoyboun, Treaty of Saadabad, Abdullah Ocalan, Kurdistan Workers’ Party.

The geopolitical processes that began after the referendum of the Iraqi Kurdistan on September 25, 2017 come from both the current political calculations of separate states and the strategic goals of transforming the entire region. In order to neutralize the influence of the Russian «hammer» in the north of our region, the United States has already secured its presence in Georgia, therefore, while when forming the Iraqi Kurdistan, which casts doubt on the integrity of the Turkish «anvil», geopolitical pressure on the two geopolitical «locks» of our region begins. The first of these is based on the agreements signed by Lenin and Ataturk in 1920s. Relatively speaking, this is the «lock» put on the Armenian question, and the second one is the «lock» put on the Kurdish question, i. e. the Saadabad pact in 1930s. The first «lock» closes the future geopolitical changes in the vertical, and the second one – horizontally. And this means that, as in the past, so today, the fate of Armenians and Kurds intersect with each other, but this time not in the form of a head-on collision of mutual interests, but in the form of intersections of two neighboring geopolitical «prisons cells».

The program of fragmentation of the region is impossible without Armenia’s active participation. And in this case we do not pretend to the territory of «Great Armenia», as Wilson’s Armenia and the Republic of Armenia together with Artsakh and Nakhijevan make up one third of the historical lands of Armenia. On November 22, 1920, with his wise arbitration award, the President of the United States, the greatest Democrat of the time, W. Wilson clearly divided the historical territories of Armenia into three parts, so that none of the three parties – Kurds, Turks and Armenians, would be unhappy. This was the verdict of a civilized world, the implementation of which was postponed due to the formation of the alliance between Lenin and Ataturk, but not removed from the strategic agenda of the superpowers.