VIDEO. No Predictions Were Made About Turkey's Level of Involvement, Tonoyan

During today’s meeting of the parliamentary investigative committee examining the circumstances of the 44-day war, former Minister of Defense Davit Tonoyan reacted to statements made by the then Chief of the General Staff Onik Gasparyan. Gasparyan had reported during a meeting of the Security Council on the third day of the war that the country’s armed forces were unable to stop the enemy's aggression and insisted that the war should be halted through political means.

Davit Tonoyan confirmed that such discussions did take place in the Security Council and that they also occurred in other formats. He noted, “I received the first report regarding this issue. We were obliged to present our approach to both the Prime Minister and the Security Council, as the main reason was also the direct involvement of a third party.”

According to Davit Tonoyan, the primary reason was the direct visible involvement of Turkey. “This involvement was not occurring along the borders with Nakhichevan and Armenia but, so to speak, through a horse’s stride on the Artsakh stage, which had not been calculated by us in any way. We did not anticipate that the Turkish Armed Forces could appear just 25-45 kilometers away from the Artsakh stage and carry out flights,” Tonoyan said.

The former Minister of Defense also addressed the assessments of Turkey’s potential involvement in military operations prior to the 44-day war. He mentioned that during the threat assessments, they discussed both allied relationships and the likelihood of Turkey’s participation. According to him, a precise assessment process was carried out during the periods of 2008-2010 and 2016-2018. “During the last phase of threat assessment, there were no geopolitical processes taking place. But let me elaborate on this issue in detail during a closed session. In the open part of the meeting, I can only say that we took into account the participation of our ally and the country with which we were allied,” he concluded.