Here we are again, watching a nation go through the motions of democracy while the Kremlin’s hand is firmly up the electoral puppet. Armenia, a country that once dared to dream of European integration, now finds itself voting under the shadow of Moscow’s looming silhouette. And what does the United Kingdom do? It issues a statement. A stern, disapproving statement. How very British: to condemn Russian interference with the same theatrical gravity one might reserve for a poorly brewed cup of tea.
Let us not delude ourselves. This is not a new phenomenon. The fall of the Soviet Union did not eradicate the Russian appetite for hegemony; it merely recalibrated it. We have seen this playbook before: in Georgia, in Ukraine, in Belarus. The Kremlin does not need to send tanks to rig an election. It suffices to control the media, to funnel money to sympathetic oligarchs, to dangle the threat of energy cuts. Armenia, landlocked and dependent on Russian gas, is a perfect specimen of vassalage in the modern era.
And what of the Armenian government? They play their part with weary resignation, like actors in a Chekhov play who know the ending is tragic but must deliver their lines regardless. The opposition cries foul, the international community tuts, and the Kremlin shrugs. It is a ritual as old as empire itself. The tragedy is that Armenia’s citizens, many of whom bravely protested against corruption and Russian influence in 2018, now see their hopes dashed against the rocks of realpolitik.
Britain’s condemnation is particularly rich. This is a nation that has spent centuries interfering in the affairs of others, from India to Iraq, and now it wraps itself in the mantle of outraged sovereignty. To be fair, the UK’s current position is less about moral clarity and more about geopolitical rivalry. The West wants Armenia in its orbit; Russia wants it in its sphere. And the Armenian people are the chess pieces. The game continues.
But let us not pretend that this is solely about Russia. The intellectual decadence of the West has left us unable to offer a credible alternative. We preach democracy but support autocrats when it suits our interests. We champion sovereignty but impose sanctions at will. The Armenians are not fools; they see the hypocrisy. They know that Britain’s condemnation is as much about posturing as it is about principle. The difference is that the Kremlin’s interference is effective, while the West’s is merely performative.
The real question is whether Armenia can ever escape this gravitational pull. History suggests not. The small states of the Caucasus have always been caught between empires. Rome, Persia, Russia, the Ottomans, and now the Russian Federation again. The cycle repeats because geography is a cruel master. And as long as Russia sees its near abroad as a buffer zone, as long as the West treats the region as a secondary theatre, Armenia will remain a pawn.
So what is to be done? I have no easy answers. But perhaps a start would be to stop pretending. Let us call this what it is: a managed democracy under Russian auspices. Let us stop the moralising and acknowledge that the fall of the Soviet Union never truly ended. It simply evolved into something more insidious. The ghost of the Kremlin still haunts Yerevan, and no amount of British condemnation will exorcise it.
