Suren Sargsyan - Central Asia, TRIPP, Iran, and Armenia in the New Great Game | Ep 583, Sep 5, 2026

This whole story, this divorce story between Armenia and Russia so far is missing a large and powerful neighbor in the neighborhood.

who has interests of his own.

Of course, I'm talking about Iran.

In early 2025, Russia signed a strategic, comprehensive partnership with Iran.

And many analysts are putting a lot of emphasis on that as the cornerstone of Russian and Iranian relations.

I know you said that the Russian base is strategic for, I mean, the base in Gyumri is strategic for Russia.

But if it is true that for Russia, having dominance in the South Caucasus is no longer like the top priority in a list of strategic objectives, some analysts I've heard speculate that Russia could essentially outsource its interests in the region to Iran, its partner.

Now, of course, that flies in the face of everything that's going on right now with all the EU, US, Turkey, Azerbaijani activity and control in Armenia.

But do you think that there is a credence to this story that Maybe Russia is saying, okay, I don't have time or resources to deal with Armenia right now, but I'm going to allow Iran to dictate and be the dominant player in the South Caucasus.

What do you think about that?

Well, this is a realistic scenario, but at the same time, we have to understand that Iran is not...

He's not the player that can be very successful in the South Caucasus without Russia's support.

Because Iran itself is in a very difficult situation.

It has to balance Turkey not only in the South Caucasus, but around the whole Central Asian region, the whole Middle Eastern region.

It's very hard for Iran to deal with all these problems because it's...

It's half of the world.

They're dealing with half of the world.

We're the toughest half of the world.

We're the most dangerous half of the world.

And there are a lot of challengers.

A lot of challengers like Turkey, like Azerbaijan.

Why not? Azerbaijan is also a challenger too.

And China is a challenger in Central Asia.

and China is somehow trying to be involved in the Middle East.

So Russia is not able to go ahead and protect own interests in the territory of the South.