dChan - Q Origins Project Archive

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11/23/2025

Corridors of Peace: How U.S. Strategy in the South Caucasus Can Rewire Eurasia

The peace agreement initialed at the White House between Armenia and Azerbaijan earlier this year represents more than the end of a long war. It opens a window of possibility that can transform decades of hostility into an era of cooperation, where shared infrastructure, trade, and technology can do what diplomacy alone cannot. If there is vision, it can translate peace on paper into peace in practice.

As seen in Gaza, turning signatures into stability requires oversight and mentoring. The United States can play a critical, follow-on role to transform political normalization in the South Caucasus into a framework of connectivity, commerce, and confidence. In so doing, Washington can ground this new-found cooperation into the larger trans-Caspian space that links energy- and mineral-rich Central Asia to Europe and global markets.

For more than three decades, the frozen conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan largely defined South Caucasus geopolitics as a zone of closed borders and missed opportunities. The protracted and bitter dispute demonstrated that external powers, whether Russian peacekeepers or Western mediators, were limited in what they could accomplish. However, now with the White House agreement, both sides have a chance to break that cycle and the United States has a unique opportunity to shape not only the peace settlement between the two states, but a deeper transformation of the region's geopolitical architecture.

To capitalize on this important step forward, Washington can help lock in the dividends of peace by focusing on one unifying theme: confidence-building through connectivity. At its core, this means focusing on connectivity as strategy–a principle that underpins every durable peace process. Infrastructure, when designed for shared benefit, becomes more than a transport system; it becomes a structure of trust. Roads, railways, and pipelines are difficult to weaponize once both sides depend on them. Data cables and trade routes can be conduits for both transparency and common understanding. The United States can help both Yerevan and Baku convert planned regional corridors into pathways for stability.

To this end, a first priority should be to ensure that the so-called Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity (TRIPP), linking Azerbaijan's mainland with its Nakhchivan exclave through southern Armenia, becomes an engine of shared prosperity rather than renewed rivalry. The new South Caucasus transport corridor is the foundation of the Armenia-Azerbaijan peace agreement brokered by the White House.

Managed well and with transparency, the corridor would connect Armenia to the Caspian basin for the first time in decades and integrate Armenia into east-west trade. The U.S.-backed TRIPP corridor would implement the peace process by creating a viable land bridge from Central Asia to Europe, opening direct access for Armenia to Azerbaijani and Central Asian markets to the east and Türkiye and Europe to the west. …

https://www.caspianpolicy.org/research/security/corridors-of-peace-how-us-strategy-in-the-south-caucasus-can-rewire-eurasia