Azərbaycan respublikasinin təHSİl naziRLİYİ GƏNCƏ DÖVLƏt universiteti Fakültə

The Shusha operation, unprecedented in modern military history

Details of the patriotic war have not yet been fully clarified, but it is safe to say that the operation to liberate Shusha from occupation will be forever in the annals of history. The crown, the beating heart of Karabakh - Shusha is a natural fortification, so it was impossible to enter the city with tanks or other heavy weaponry. There were two options to take it. Firstly, to defeat the enemy’s forces in the city by air strikes and artillery fire. Azerbaijan’s military command did not choose that way, due to the inevitably extensive destruction of the city that would result. The alternative was hand-to-hand combat, and this was the strategy adopted. Our heroic soldiers and officers traversed thick forests and deep ravines with light weapons, climbed rocks and mountains and defeated the enemy in face-to-face battle. A foreign journalist in Khankendi during the Shusha operation described the deplorable situation of the Armenians as follows: the defenders of Shusha were scattered. Dozens of wounded were taken in military ambulances to Khankendi hospital, covered in blood. The rest of the fighters, exhausted and throwing off their military uniforms, went down the mountain. Ambulances came and went non-stop. Wounded soldiers were piled on top of each other inside. Their injuries were evidence of hand-to-hand combat. Another report, published by Le Monde at the time, said that the defeated soldiers of the Armenian army left Shusha wounded and fled to Khankendi. On 8 November, the victorious Supreme Commander-in-Chief Ilham Aliyev gave our people the good news of Shusha’s liberation. The winning of Shusha, in fact, decided the fate of the war. The next day came news that more than 70 villages had been liberated, and one day later Prime Minister Pashinyan was forced to sign an act of capitulation, accepting the terms of the President of Azerbaijan.

On 10 November, the President of Azerbaijan, the Prime Minister of Armenia and the President of Russia signed a statement declaring a complete ceasefire and end to all military operations in the conflict zone. According to the terms of the statement, Aghdam was liberated on 20 November, Kelbajar on 25 November, and Lachin on 1 December without a single shot being fired or single casualty. The statement also announced the planned construction of new transport communications connecting the Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic with the western regions of the rest of Azerbaijan. Thus, Azerbaijan's military victory had forced Armenia to capitulate. The ceasefire was violated on 11 December - the first time since the end of military operations in Nagorno-Karabakh and the start of peacekeeping operations by the Russian Federation. The violation of the ceasefire was registered in Hadrut, where one Azerbaijani soldier was wounded.