If there were no good commanders, they didn't fight, they ran away, are we to blame? You were the one who appointed and dismissed them too. Abrahamyan

Let us assume that the authorities have successfully shifted the responsibility for the state's collapse onto the army and its command, by conditionally imprisoning one person, executing another, and humiliating a third to the end. This was stated by former advisor to the President of Artsakh, Tigran Abrahamyan, on his Facebook page.

He specifically noted: “Will they succeed in escaping from responsibility and guilt through this? To answer this question, we need to go back three years and see who were the commanders of the army, and who replaced them. In short, by whose decision were the commanders of the armed forces, the Minister of Defense and his deputies, and the Secretary of the Security Council appointed?”

“The same goes for Artsakh. Was David Tonoyan appointed Minister of Defense in 2018 at the request of the former authorities? Were Artak Davtyan, and then Onik Gasparyan, the commander of the Artsakh Defense Army Karen Abrahamyan, and later Jalal Harutyunyan appointed under the pressure of the ‘former’ authorities? I am not even talking about the Secretary of the Security Council.”

I do not wish to list the numerous changes in the commanders of military units and divisions in Artsakh and Armenia over the past three years. There are units that have seen 2-3 changes in their commanders between 2018-2021.

What I am saying is that it is your appointed command structure, your appointed leaders in the defense sector, and your political approach in the field—why are you shifting the blame, trying to hold someone responsible? I am not saying that the commanders appointed in the last three years are good or bad; I recognize many deserving officers among them. But the question is, why do you attribute the failures to the leaders of the defense system, sending them to bear the blame for losses? Don't you understand that people are not foolish and they do not have memory loss?”

You were the one who appointed them, you were the one who dismissed them, so who is supposed to be accountable for that? If they were not good commanders, if they did not follow orders, if they ran away… think well, are we responsible for your appointments, for your created atmosphere, or for the unfulfilled combat missions? Otherwise, they are going from region to region, from one venue to another, trying to persuade people that it was the ‘evil, bad’ commanders sitting in their offices who lost the fight. And everyone is to blame except themselves. One way or another, you will leave power—by whatever means—and sooner or later, you will have to be accountable for all of this.