Book Review – Ashes of Our Fathers: Inside the Fall of Nagorno-Karabakh
Reviewed by Maria Lipman
Foreignaffairs.com
Gavin chronicles the final chapter of the tragedy of Nagorno-Karabakh—an enclave in Azerbaijan—that culminated in 2023, when Azerbaijan seized the territory and sparked the mass exodus of roughly 100,000 Armenians.
The enmity between the Armenians and the Azerbaijanis predates their forced incorporation into the Soviet Union, but as the Soviet grip on power weakened in the 1980s, an ethnic and territorial feud between the two nations erupted again.
Armenians, a people with a much stronger sense of ethnic identity and cohesion, seized the opportunity of crippled Soviet authority to attack Azerbaijan.
By 1994, Armenian forces had wrested control of Nagorno-Karabakh and some of the adjacent Azerbaijani territories, driving out locals. Three decades later, Azerbaijan—now an oil-rich autocracy with a powerful army—struck back. In a decisive military campaign, Azerbaijan reasserted full control over Nagorno-Karabakh and drove out its Armenian inhabitants.
While highlighting the vicious cycle of ethnic hatred, Gavin strives for impartiality. But he does not hide his bitterness at the incompetence and callousness of the European diplomats who were tasked with resolving the crisis in its final days.
