By Edgar Vardanyan

It's obvious that Armenia is becoming increasingly more dependent on Russia.

Not yet having entered the Customs Union, the Republic of Armenia has become the only country in the post-Soviet space (and one of the rare countries in the world) that supports the Russian Federation unconditionally.

Current relations between Armenia and Russia are such as, for example, relations between Bulgaria and the USSR were at one time, which is best defined by the following Soviet adage: "A chicken is not a bird and Bulgaria is not abroad".

One of the latest arguments proving Armenia's increasing dependence on Russia is Armenia's vote at the United Nations General Assembly against the UN resolution affirming Ukraine's territorial integrity. Not counting Russia and apart from Armenia, Belarus was the only other post-Soviet country that voted against the resolution. But prior to the vote, Belarus had stated that it doesn't recognize Yanukovitch as president, and Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko recently met with acting Ukrainian President Oleksandr Turchynov and basically, with this move, recognized Ukraine's current authorities at an official level. While Yerevan made no official statements or took any actions during the crisis in Ukraine that would be different from Moscow's official position. 

It is very often noted in Armenia that Armenia's being "super-pro-Russian" is due to the fact that Russia is the only country that ensures Armenia's security. According to the views of many, if Armenia opposes Russia, it might make the latter angry and lead to Russia reviewing its attitude toward Armenia, which, considering that Armenia is in a state of war with Azerbaijan, might mean that Russia will attack Armenia. That is to say, it is implied that, roughly speaking, it's better to be in a state of complete dependence on Russia than not exist at all.

But this hypothesis leads to several questions. First, it turns out that we have to accept that that which is advantageous for Russia is compulsively advantageous also for Armenia and only Russia decides what is and isn't advantageous for us.

And this means that it's not ruled out that Russia, based on its interests, might oblige us something that is disadvantageous and undesirable, and we have to accept it because we think that Moscow might no longer guarantee our security, as a result of which we will be subject to attack by our enemies and we will perish. But if we are going to be forced to adopt policy that doesn't arise from our interests, then we might likewise perish in this case. Thus, if today, Azerbaijan is our main foreign threat to security, then tomorrow Russia might also become that country.

It is my conviction that it is not Russia but the balance of forces that ensure Armenia's security. Completely "surrendering" to Russia, Armenia loses the opportunity to "play" with the similarities and differences of the interests of Russia and the West, their contradictions, and the competition between them, and to effectively pursue its own interests. 

Note, as well, that observations show that for many in Armenia the phrase "our security" means not "the security of our state," but "the security of our community, our ethnicity," which suggests that this can be ensured also within the scope of other states. This is an unconstitutional, anti-state approach that jeopardizes the security of the people.