Slipping Out of ‘Old Geopolitics’ Through TRIPP
For much of the post‑Cold War period, the South Caucasus was shaped by a distinct geopolitical logic in which unresolved conflicts functioned as instruments of external influence, connectivity was constrained, and stability was underpinned by interim security mechanisms and contested political arrangements, not by durable peace agreements. This old geopolitics did not seek resolution; it sought control. Frozen or semi‑frozen conflicts allowed external actors—above all Russia—to arbitrate outcomes, limit regional autonomy, and preserve leverage by keeping borders politically charged and economically inert. Order was produced not through integration or enforcement, but through managed ambiguity.
The erosion of the old geopolitical order did not occur suddenly, nor has it unfolded uniformly across the region. It began in earnest in 2020, when Azerbaijan fundamentally altered the regional balance of power by liberating its internationally recognized territories that had been under Armenian occupation for nearly three decades. For the first time since the early 1990s, one of the central pillars of the South Caucasus’s old geopolitical order—territorial conflicts sustained by external oversight—was dismantled through local agency rather than external arbitration.
This shift deepened in September 2023, when Azerbaijan brought an end to the Russia‑backed separatist entity in Karabakh, eliminating the last institutional remnant of the unresolved‑conflict paradigm in Armenia‑Azerbaijan relations. The withdrawal of Russian peacekeepers from Karabakh in May 2024 confirmed the strategic significance of this moment. This marked a turning point not only in the Armenia‑Azerbaijan conflict but in the wider regional balance of influence. Old geopolitics, however, has not disappeared entirely from the South Caucasus. The Georgia‑Russia conflict remains governed by old rules (i.e., military occupation, external veto power, and frozen political arrangements) and stands as one of the last strongholds of the former order in the region.
It is against this backdrop that the qualitatively new character of the normalization process between Armenia and Azerbaijan must be understood. Freed from the constraints of frozen conflict management, the two states have increasingly prioritized peacebuilding, connectivity, and economic cooperation. This transformation reached a further milestone at the August 2025 White House summit of the Armenian and Azerbaijani leaders, when the two countries reached an agreement on one of the most contested issues of the post‑war period: the Zangezur Corridor, a transport route intended to connect mainland Azerbaijan with its Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic through Armenia’s Syunik region. The corridor’s establishment was formalized under the framework of the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity (TRIPP), with the United States assuming a direct role in its infrastructural arrangements. By embedding regional connectivity within a U.S.‑backed infrastructural framework, the TRIPP agreement effectively shifted the role of external guarantor along the corridor through Armenian territory from Russia to the United States.
By embedding regional connectivity within a U.S.‑backed infrastructural framework, the TRIPP agreement effectively shifted the role of external guarantor along the corridor through Armenian territory from Russia to the United States.
The reactions of Russia and Iran to the TRIPP agreement demonstrated that the South Caucasus is not entering a post‑geopolitical era. However, developments between Armenia and Azerbaijan, together with the altered geopolitical context, indicate that the region is steadily, though slowly, moving away from the older order. The most consequential conflict in the region has been resolved, and the post‑war normalization process is increasingly managed through infrastructure, legal frameworks, and reciprocal commitments that reshape incentives on the ground. While old geopolitics persists in one part of the region (e.g., the Russia‑Georgia conflict), it no longer defines the dominant trajectory of regional order.
From Transit Corridor to Strategic Framework
The origins of TRIPP can be traced back to the immediate aftermath of the Second Karabakh War. Article 9 of the 10 November 2020 trilateral statement signed by the leaders of Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Russia envisaged the establishment of transport links between mainland Azerbaijan and its Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic. Under this arrangement, control over the passage was to be exercised by Russia’s Federal Security Service border guards. While the provision marked a formal acknowledgment of the need for regional connectivity, its implementation remained stalled for more than four years due to unresolved disagreements over sovereignty, security modalities, and the role of external actors. The deadlock persisted until the White House summit, where U.S. President Donald Trump succeeded in brokering a mutually acceptable framework, breaking the impasse and transforming a long‑dormant clause of the post‑war settlement into an operational agreement.
Today, TRIPP represents a qualitative departure from earlier approaches to regional connectivity in the South Caucasus. Rather than functioning as a narrowly defined transit passage or a symbolic confidence‑building measure, it constitutes a comprehensive strategic framework designed to lock political normalization into infrastructure, legal commitments, and long‑term external guarantees. Its significance lies not only in reconnecting mainland Azerbaijan with its Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic through sovereign Armenian territory, but in how this reconnection is governed, secured, and embedded in a broader post‑conflict order.
The operationalization of TRIPP was formalized on 14 January 2026, when U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan signed the TRIPP Implementation Framework (TIF) in Washington. This document transformed the political commitments reached at the August 2025 Washington Summit into a detailed, enforceable arrangement. In contrast to previous connectivity provisions—most notably those outlined in the November 2020 trilateral statement brokered by Russia—the TRIPP framework replaces ambiguity with institutional clarity and substitutes security‑by‑presence with security‑by‑design.
The TRIPP framework replaces ambiguity with institutional clarity and substitutes security‑by‑presence with security‑by‑design.
Under the framework, a dedicated TRIPP Development Company will be established with responsibility for the planning, construction, operation, and upkeep of the designated infrastructure. The ownership model grants the United States a controlling stake of 74 percent, while Armenia holds the remaining 26 percent, with a provision allowing Armenia’s share to rise to 49 percent should the arrangement be extended beyond the initial 49‑year lease. The lease itself may be renewed for a further 50‑year term by mutual agreement. Although the framework does not exclude the involvement of third parties, such participation is conditional upon the consent of both the Armenian and U.S. governments, and any modification to ownership, share distribution, or beneficial control requires advance approval from both sides.
The transit regime established under TRIPP further reflects this balance between efficiency and sovereignty. The introduction of a “front‑office / back‑office” model allows for streamlined movement without diluting state authority. Private operators contracted by the to‑be‑established TRIPP Development Company will handle auxiliary functions such as document collection, user assistance, and payment processing, while all sovereign decisions—document verification, security clearance, inspections, and authorization of transit—will remain exclusively with Armenian institutions. Armenian customs and border officials will maintain a physical presence, and no delegation of decisionmaking power is envisaged. This arrangement satisfies Azerbaijan’s longstanding demand for unimpeded connectivity while preserving Armenia’s control over its borders and legal space.
Some analysts were expecting additional specificity regarding TRIPP modalities to be revealed during U.S. Vice President JD Vance’s visit to Yerevan (and Baku) in February 2026. This did not end up happening. Instead, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan announced that his country would soon be submitting additional documentation to the United States in this regard, which suggests that at least some details still need to be worked out in the time ahead. It is likely that all will be agreed before the country’s parliamentary election, scheduled to take place in June 2026.
From a strategic perspective, the TRIPP model does more than facilitate transit. It raises the political and economic costs of disruption by embedding connectivity into a dense web of contracts, digital systems, and international oversight. Any attempt to suspend or politicize the route would generate immediate financial and diplomatic consequences, not only for the directly involved states but also for the United States as the principal external stakeholder.
TRIPP’s strategic character is further reinforced by its timing and context. It builds directly on the August 2025 Washington Summit, where Armenia and Azerbaijan initialed a peace treaty and agreed to dismantle obsolete mediation structures such as the OSCE Minsk Group. In this sense, TRIPP is not an add‑on to normalization but its infrastructural backbone. It translates abstract commitments to sovereignty and territorial integrity into daily practices of cooperation, thereby narrowing the space for revisionism and spoiler behavior.
The post‑summit period has already demonstrated how this logic operates in practice. Azerbaijan’s decision in October 2025 to lift all restrictions on transit to Armenia, followed by the resumption of wheat shipments via Azerbaijani territory and the initiation of Azerbaijani fuel exports to Armenia, illustrates a shift from symbolic reconciliation to functional interdependence.
Seen in this light, TRIPP should be understood less as a corridor and more as a governance mechanism for post‑conflict coexistence. It operationalizes the erosion of the old geopolitics described above by replacing conflict management with economic cooperation, external arbitration with legally bound guarantees, and strategic ambiguity with enforceable clarity. While it does not eliminate geopolitical competition from the South Caucasus, it redefines the terms on which that competition unfolds.
TRIPP should be understood less as a corridor and more as a governance mechanism for post‑conflict coexistence.
Recalibrating Great Power Dynamics
The South Caucasus has long been a theater in which great powers assert influence, with extra‑regional rivalries shaping the region’s political, economic, and security landscape. This was consistent with the longstanding view, implicitly shared by all great powers since the implosion of the Soviet Union, that the South Caucasus was an object of rivalry and not a subject of international order.
In the aftermath of the Second Karabakh War, the old dynamics entered a period of unprecedented recalibration, particularly as the liberation of Azerbaijan’s territories between 2020 and 2023 fundamentally altered the balance of power on the ground. Russia, which had long cast itself as the indispensable arbiter in the region, found its influence increasingly contested. The traditional mechanisms Moscow relied upon to assert control suddenly appeared insufficient in the face of new developments. The emergence of TRIPP has accelerated this shift, creating a conduit not only for trade and infrastructure but also for a broader realignment of geopolitical loyalties and power dependencies.
This recalibration was further consolidated during Vance’s recent visit to Yerevan and Baku. In Azerbaijan, Vance and President Ilham Aliyev signed a Charter on Strategic Partnership, formally elevating bilateral relations into a structured, long‑term framework. The agreement institutionalizes cooperation across connectivity, energy transit, digital infrastructure, and security dialogue, marking a shift from transactional engagement toward sustained strategic coordination.
The significance of this development extends beyond symbolism. For the first time, Washington and Baku codified their cooperation in a comprehensive document that aligns Azerbaijan’s growing role in east‑west transport corridors with U.S. strategic interests. In doing so, the Charter anchors Azerbaijan more firmly within a Western‑supported regional architecture that is simultaneously economic and geopolitical in nature.
This move also places Azerbaijan within a broader regional pattern. Armenia signed its own strategic partnership document with the United States slightly over a year earlier, just days before the Biden Administration left office. Georgia, too, possesses a similar framework with Washington, although it is currently largely dormant amid political tensions. The result is that all three South Caucasus states now maintain formalized strategic partnership arrangements with the United States, even if their depth and operational status vary.
Taken together with TRIPP, the U.S.‑Azerbaijan Strategic Partnership Charter signals that American engagement in the South Caucasus has entered a structurally embedded phase. Washington is no longer acting merely as a mediator or episodic crisis manager; it is institutionalizing its presence through long‑term economic, infrastructural, and security commitments. This significantly alters the geometry of influence in a region historically dominated by Russian leverage.
Taken together with TRIPP, the U.S.‑Azerbaijan Strategic Partnership Charter signals that American engagement in the South Caucasus has entered a structurally embedded phase.
Historically, Russia’s dominance in the South Caucasus rested on a combination of military leverage, institutional integration, and economic penetration. Armenia’s membership in the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) and the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) provided Moscow with formal instruments to influence Yerevan’s policy choices. The occupation of Azerbaijan’s territories intensified Armenia’s dependency on Russia, as this illegal occupation put Armenia in a de facto blockade following the closure of its borders with Azerbaijan and Türkiye.
Russia’s dominance in the region started to shatter when Azerbaijan began to liberate its occupied territories during the Second Karabakh War. Yet, the 10 November 2020 trilateral statement that ended active hostilities reinforced Russia’s claim as the primary security manager. Russia was granted the right to deploy a peacekeeping mission in the Karabakh region, and its role as the security provider over the Zangezur Corridor was recognized by both Baku and Yerevan. Once considered unassailable, this recognition has faded from the scene, in part due to the departure of Russia’s peacekeeping forces from Karabakh in May 2024, as discussed above.
The TRIPP project has further cemented this new reality. By placing the corridor linking mainland Azerbaijan to Nakhchivan under U.S. oversight, the project circumvented traditional Russian control mechanisms. Moscow’s initial reaction reflected both recognition of the project’s inevitability and an attempt to maintain leverage where possible. On 16 December 2025, Mikhail Kalugin, Director of the Fourth CIS Department at Russia’s Foreign Ministry, indicated that Moscow was open to consulting with Armenia on potential participation in the TRIPP project.
While noting that the Armenian‑American initiative still required detailed analysis, Kalugin emphasized that “there are sufficient grounds for Russian participation,” citing Russia’s existing management of Armenia’s railways through South Caucasus Railways, Armenia’s membership in the EAEU, and the existing deployment of Russian border guards along portions of the proposed route. His remark that “it is clear that our partners cannot do without Russia” underscored Moscow’s recognition that, although it cannot halt TRIPP, it seeks to maintain influence in a regional landscape reshaped by the conflict over Ukraine, diminishing Russian leverage in the South Caucasus, and Trump’s active personal involvement in the project.
Armenia has acted swiftly to prevent direct Russian involvement in TRIPP. On 14 January 2026, Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan stressed that “the framework of TRIPP is already quite clear,” indicating that the project’s terms leave little room for conceptual renegotiation, including the addition of new participants. While affirming that Armenia does not intend to politically exclude Russia and recognizing Moscow’s existing role in Armenian infrastructure, Mirzoyan made it clear that Russia would not serve as a managing or operational partner. Armenian officials have suggested that any future cooperation with Russia could be limited to parallel or adjacent projects, outside the U.S.‑Armenian TRIPP framework.
Russia has pushed back by citing its control over Armenia’s railway system. Russian authorities argue that, under the 2008 concession agreement with South Caucasus Railways, its participation in TRIPP would be both logical and necessary. Yerevan, however, has responded strategically. Pashinyan has publicly urged Russia to meet its existing obligations, including restoring key railway lines such as Ijevan‑Gazakh, Yeraskh‑Nakhchivan, and Gyumri‑Kars (the first two would connect with Azerbaijan, the third with Türkiye). Armenian officials have noted that Russian Railways lacks the financial capacity for these investments. As of early 2026, Russian Railways faced a severe crisis, with debts exceeding 4 trillion rubles (over $50 billion), steep budget cuts, declining freight volumes due to Western sanctions, and mounting losses in Armenia.
Against this backdrop, Pashinyan has increasingly emphasized the legal dimension, signaling that Armenia could reclaim control of its railways if Russia fails to fulfill its contractual obligations. Since the 2008 agreement transferred management—but not ownership—to Russia, Armenia has a legal path to terminate or renegotiate the arrangement, effectively leveraging Moscow’s financial weakness to regain sovereign control over critical infrastructure. Merely the possibility of moving in this direction illustrates the geopolitical and geoeconomic implications of TRIPP.
Armenia’s recalibration extends beyond infrastructure and security matters. Emerging economic interdependence, fostered by the opening of regional transportation channels and the upcoming opening of Armenia’s borders with Azerbaijan and Türkiye (upon the signing of peace treaties), has created new incentives for Armenia to pursue autonomy from Russian dominance. Fuel deliveries from Baku, the potential for Armenian exports to Azerbaijani markets, and bilateral management of the Armenia‑Azerbaijan border delimitation are already reducing Yerevan’s dependence on Moscow. In turn, TRIPP consolidates these gains by embedding U.S. participation, signaling a broader shift toward multipolar engagement in which Armenian sovereignty and agency are actively reinforced.
Yerevan’s growing assertiveness vis‑à‑vis Moscow has been clearly reflected in the Armenian government’s rhetoric. Pashinyan has increasingly shifted from implicit criticism to explicit public condemnation of Russia’s role in undermining Armenia’s state sovereignty. In his address marking Army Day on 28 January 2026, he stated that, as of September 2022, Armenia’s CSTO allies had failed to fulfill their treaty obligations to guarantee the country’s security and territorial integrity. He added that Moscow has refused to deliver hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of military equipment already paid for by Yerevan. Pashinyan characterized these failures as constituting an existential threat to the Armenian state, arguing that such actions reflected a deliberate erosion of Armenia’s sovereignty and statehood.
These statements are significant not only as an indictment of Russia’s current security role in Armenia, but also as an indicator of a broader shift in Yerevan’s external orientation. As U.S. involvement becomes more deeply embedded in the region through TRIPP, Moscow is not the only actor unsettled by the growing American footprint in the South Caucasus. In similar vein, Iran has viewed the rise of U.S. influence along its northern borders as a strategic challenge with direct security and economic implications.
Iran’s role in this evolving landscape presents a complementary set of challenges. Tehran’s strategic interests have historically revolved around maintaining influence along its northern borders, leveraging Armenia and Azerbaijan as transit and security buffers while limiting Western encroachment. From the outset, TRIPP has been viewed by Iranian officials not as a commercial or connectivity initiative, but as a potential vector for a NATO‑aligned presence near its frontier. On 17 December 2025, Ali Akbar Velayati, a senior adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader, publicly voiced Tehran’s objections to TRIPP during talks with Armenia’s ambassador to his country, drawing parallels between the initiative and the previously disputed “Zangezur Corridor” proposal, stating that Iran was categorically opposed to it. He warned that TRIPP could enable a NATO‑linked presence near Iran’s northern frontier, creating security concerns for both Iran and southern Russia. Despite repeated assurances from Armenian officials that TRIPP remains fully under Armenian sovereignty and entails no extraterritorial arrangements, Iranian doubts have endured, notwithstanding Tehran’s choice to dampen the volume of its rhetorical opposition.
Amid these pressures from Russia and Iran, other actors have emerged as stabilizing or supportive forces in the region. Türkiye has been a consistent backer of TRIPP and the broader Armenia‑Azerbaijan normalization process, providing both diplomatic reinforcement and economic signaling. Ankara’s support is rooted in its historical and strategic relationship with Baku, its interest in facilitating East‑West transport links, and its broader agenda of regional influence. Turkish engagement, aligned with U.S. oversight, enhances the credibility of TRIPP while offering Armenia a counterweight to Russian and Iranian pressures.
On 15 January 2026—i.e., one day after Armenia and the United States announced TIF—Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan publicly expressed Ankara’s support for TRIPP, highlighting its importance for the Middle Corridor and broader regional connectivity. He noted that the framework had been discussed in depth with Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov and confirmed that President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan had been fully informed. Fidan further reaffirmed Türkiye’s support for the conclusion of a comprehensive peace agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan, underscoring that sufficient political will now exists in Baku, Ankara, and Yerevan to advance normalization.
Similarly, the European Union has taken a cautious but constructive role, supporting the outcomes of the White House summit through mediation efforts, the announcement of various forms of technical assistance, and statements of plans to integrate Armenia and Azerbaijan into broader transregional economic networks.
China, while less directly involved, also benefits from the emergence of a stable, U.S.‑backed corridor that aligns with broader connectivity ambitions, including the Belt and Road Initiative and the Middle Corridor project, both of which link Central Asia to Europe via the South Caucasus and Anatolia. The TRIPP project, by reducing the potential for conflict and enabling predictable trade flows, indirectly complements Chinese interests in transport infrastructure across the Silk Road region without entangling Beijing in overt geopolitical contestation. This highlights the increasingly multipolar nature of influence in the South Caucasus, in which the strategic calculations of Moscow and Tehran are counterbalanced by a constellation of external stakeholders with diverse economic and political incentives.
Taken together, these developments illustrate a profound shift in the architecture of great‑power dynamics in the South Caucasus. Russia, once the uncontested arbiter, now confronts structural limitations to its influence. Iran, though geographically proximate and strategically attentive, faces a corridor that embeds American involvement, reducing Tehran’s capacity to assert dominance. Concurrently, Türkiye, the EU, and other global actors like China are increasingly integrated into regional processes, promoting stability, connectivity, and multipolar engagement rather than zero‑sum competition.
Neither Automatic, nor Irreversible
The emergence of TRIPP represents more than a technical advance in regional connectivity; it signals a structural shift in how power, sovereignty, and stability are negotiated in the South Caucasus. The region is not moving beyond geopolitics, but it is increasingly departing from an older geopolitical model in which unresolved conflicts, military deployments, and external vetoes served as the primary instruments of order. In its place, a new logic is taking shape, grounded in cooperation among the three regional states, and anchored in mutual respect for territorial integrity, internationally recognized borders, and shared economic gains.
This strategic transition has been driven above all by local agency. Azerbaijan’s restoration of its territorial integrity dismantled the longstanding assumption that conflict stasis was inevitable, while Armenia’s recalibration of its foreign and security policies reflects a growing determination to reclaim sovereignty over strategic decisions and infrastructure. TRIPP crystallizes this shift by translating political normalization into a durable governance framework that constrains revisionism and limits the effectiveness of spoiler strategies. Connectivity is no longer a promise deferred to an uncertain future; it has become an operational reality structured by law, contracts, and independent oversight.
At the regional level, TRIPP accelerates the redistribution of influence. Russia’s role has been reduced from indispensable arbiter to constrained stakeholder, its leverage weakened by the erosion of security credibility. Iran, while attentive and vocal, faces similar structural limits as U.S.‑backed arrangements reshape transit routes and security perceptions along its northern frontier. By contrast, the growing involvement of the United States, Türkiye, and, to a lesser extent, the European Union, reflects a shift toward a more plural and conditional form of external engagement—one that reinforces local sovereignty rather than substituting for it.
The broader implication is that the South Caucasus is entering a transitional phase in which infrastructure has become a key site of geopolitical competition and stabilization simultaneously. Hereby, TRIPP stands more than just a connectivity project, it serves as an instrument of conflict transformation and regional reordering. Yet this trajectory is neither automatic nor irreversible. Its durability will depend on sustained political commitment, effective implementation, and the ability of regional actors to manage external pressures.
The South Caucasus is entering a transitional phase in which infrastructure has become a key site of geopolitical competition and stabilization simultaneously.
