This is popular front, a podcast focused on the niche details of modern warfare and

underreported conflict with me Jake Hanrahan.

Today we're speaking to Richard Girogoshan.

He's a director of the Regional Studies Center in Armenia

and he's going to be talking to us about the recent border clashes

between Armenia and Azerbaijan now these are different because they didn't take

place where they usually do in Nagorno-Karabakh a contested area between

Azerbaijan and Armenia. They took place along the country's

border properly, so it's a very interesting situation.

If you like what we're doing at Popular Front, please do consider supporting us at

Patreon.com slash Popular Front or you can go to Popular Front. or you can go to

Popular Front.

co slash support. So before we get into like what's happening now and this kind of stalemate again I just want to go over what actually happened last month

when the clashes took place on the border because it wasn't Nagorno-Karabakh

right? This was Armenia versus Azerbaijan proper. Well basically on Sunday, July 12th, the Azerbaijani's

launched a very limited campaign designed to take control of a hilltop that is fairly strategic in terms of

overlooking roads on the Azerbaijani side.

Basically, it caught us all off guard in terms of those observing the situation

because what happened was the initial assault was a little bit half-hearted,

but quickly escalated and it was more based on misperception and

miscalculation than any professional military logic and then it lasted for a good

four to five days where they attempted two more assaults trying to at least take control of this hilltop.

...