By Azerbaijan.US Editorial Board
For years, Russia viewed the South Caucasus as a familiar geopolitical neighborhood – a space shaped by frozen conflicts, unilateral security guarantees, and economic dependence. Today, that landscape looks remarkably different, and Moscow is struggling to acknowledge the extent of its strategic loss.
The shift did not occur overnight. Nor did it begin with the 2020 war, the 2023 anti-terror operation, or Armenia’s more recent political reorientation. The foundations were laid much earlier, through a deliberate and incremental strategy pursued by Azerbaijan.
Unlike many states in Russia’s near abroad, Azerbaijan invested heavily in a foreign policy built on diversification rather than dependence.
Three decisions proved decisive:
Redesigning the regional energy map
The Southern Gas Corridor, TANAP, TAP, and expanded links through Türkiye created an energy architecture that connects the Caspian to Europe without passing through Russian territory. Baku emerged not only as an energy exporter, but as a logistical hub capable of stabilizing markets shaken by the war in Ukraine.
Building security partnerships outside Moscow’s orbit
Deepening defense cooperation with Türkiye, alongside selective partnerships with Israel, Pakistan, and NATO members, reduced reliance on Russia as a security guarantor. The rapid reintegration of Karabakh in 2023 – under conditions effectively set by Baku – underscored a new balance of power in which Russian peacekeepers held diminishing relevance.
Integrating into wider Eurasian trade and connectivity routes
The Middle Corridor, accelerated cross-Caspian logistics, and new port infrastructure linked Azerbaijan more firmly to Europe and Central Asia. As regional trade flows reoriented, Russia’s once-dominant transit position became increasingly peripheral.
Amid these structural shifts, Moscow’s traditional leverage tools – economic pressure, political patronage, and control over regional conflicts – have lost much of their effectiveness. Even Armenia’s ongoing distancing from Moscow must be understood within this broader transformation: the old model of Russian-led regional order had already eroded long before Yerevan recalibrated its alliances.
Azerbaijan’s trajectory demonstrates something essential:
the decline of Russian influence in the South Caucasus is not the product of great-power competition alone. It is the outcome of a long-term process in which regional actors – especially Baku – asserted greater agency and built alternative networks of security, energy, and commerce.
Moscow may continue to speak the language of spheres of influence, but the South Caucasus increasingly speaks the language of connectivity, sovereignty, and strategic diversification. That divergence, rather than any single event, explains why Russia no longer shapes the region the way it once did.
And it is Azerbaijan’s steady, methodical strategy – not dramatic geopolitical shocks – that made this new reality possible.
