In Others’ Faith in God We Trust

The tragic events of Armenian history replace each other, but the American pre-election tradition of trying to thereafter sweeten the Armenians’ pill is eternal. The other day, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump paid tribute to that tradition too to change his mind a little later. He voiced allegations against the Democratic nominee for U.S., the acting vice president Kamala Harris. According to Trump, this administration (Joe Biden and Harris’) has already permited the ethnic cleansing of 120,000 Christian Armenians in Artsakh, and therefore Trump, the defender of Christians around the world, ought to win the election.

We have seen quite a few such ‘defenders’ in our lifetime. First came the same Trump, who was a US president engrossed in the election race during the 44-day war. Back then, he promised to deploy ‘Scandinavian peacekeepers’ to Artsakh, a mythical unit never heard of in the Nordic countries to begin with. Subsequently, when instead of Scandinavian peacekeepers Russian-Turkish peacekeepers eventually appeared, Armenians naively placed their hopes in another ‘Christian leader’ and guardian of traditional values – Vladimir Putin, who ‘asked’ Ilham Aliyev to preserve the key monuments of Artsakh and ‘took under his personal protection’ Dadivank – an Armenian monastery on the territory of the temporarily occupied Karvatchar region of Artsakh, founded as early as the 1st century. Following this, the Russian peacekeepers evaporated rather quickly from the grounds of the monastery, albeit at first promising to take Armenian pilgrims there every Sunday. In short, we have seen the promises of the guardians of the Christian faith in action both during and after the 44-day war.

Finally, fearless straight shooter Trump deleted this publication on his own Truth Social network in less than 24 hours, although he did not even directly name the culprits of the patriacide (deprivation of homeland) of Artsakh Armenians. That’s how much the role of the Armenian aspect has been devalued for the Republican Party (whereas we had something to lose). Optimists would say that at least with the Democratic Party there is room to fall – ‘Donkeys’ don’t erase their promises to prevent a reoccurrence of the Armenian Genocide, explicitly made every April 24th since 2021.

As we wrote earlier, alas, there is no Armenia nor Armenian dimension in the American elections. Nor is there any reason to be resentful of the cynical world – we missed the chance to become that Promised Land for American evangelicals ourselves. Though what are we talking about, if Armenia has not even become one for the Armenian world proper, which still has not recognised its own Jerusalem – Shushi.