“The armed forces must report to the defense minister and the commander-in-chief,” Defense Minister Suren Papikian told pro-government lawmakers before they passed corresponding amendments to an Armenian law on national defense.
Under those amendments, the chief of the Armenian army’s General Staff will also automatically hold the post of first deputy defense minister. But he will not perform ministerial duties if the minister is absent from the country.
Papikian said that this will make the military’s command and control structure “smoother” and more “vertical.” He said the country’s leadership wants to “learn lessons” from unspecified “bitter experience.”
The last chief of the General Staff, Artak Davtian, and six other senior generals were sacked in February through presidential decrees initiated by Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian. The latter has still not handpicked a new army chief, prompting serious concern from the Armenian opposition.
The generals’ sackings came one year after Davtian’s predecessor, Onik Gasparian, and four dozen other high-ranking officers accused Pashinian’s government of incompetence and misrule and demanded its resignation. The unprecedented demand was welcomed by the opposition but condemned as a coup attempt by Pashinian.
Armenia -- Colonel-General Onik Gasparian (C), the chief of the Armenian army's General Staff, meets with senior Russian military officials, Yerevan, January 25, 2021.
Armen Khachatrian, a senior parliamentarian representing the ruling Civil Contract party, acknowledged that the authorities hope the structural change will prevent the army top brass from challenging them in the future.
Opposition lawmakers believe that this is the main purpose of the government bill approved by the parliament in the first reading.
“They are solving a purely internal political issue,” said Tigran Abrahamian of the opposition Pativ Unem bloc. “They think that they will thereby ensure tight control over the military which will preclude any political statements or actions by generals.”
“But they are not really solving the issue because the chief of the General Staff was already subordinate to the defense minister, not to mention his subordination to the prime minister,” he told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service.
Abrahamian accused Pashinian’s government of “politicizing” the top military post.
Pashinian promised a major reform of the military shortly after Armenia’s defeat in the 2020 war with Azerbaijan. He has replaced three defense ministers since a Russian-brokered ceasefire stopped the six-week hostilities in November 2020.
Opposition forces blame Pashinian for the disastrous war that left at least 3,800 Armenian soldiers dead. They also say that his administration is doing little to rebuild the armed forces.