US Cements Political Capture of Armenia as it Advances “Extending Russia” Strategy

June 15, 2026 (NEO - Brian Berletic) - The United States continues pursuing its decades-spanning policy of maintaining global primacy by encircling and containing rivals as described in the 1992 New York Times article, “U.S. Strategy Plan Call for Insuring No Rivals Develop.”

As part of this long-standing strategy the US has developed specific plans to encircle and contain key nations including China, Iran, and of course Russia. These plans often overlap - as degrading the power and influence of one targeted nation reduces the combined power and influence of all three as well as the multipolar world order they seek to construct. 

For Russia specifically, the RAND Corporation’s 2019 paper, “Extending Russia: Competing from Advantageous Ground” lays out policy options the US has clearly pursued for years leading up to its publication and ever since. 

These options targeting Russia include those of an economic dimension such as, “hinder petroleum exports,” “reduce natural gas exports and hinder pipeline expansions,” “impose sanctions,” as well as geopolitical measures like “provide lethal aid to Ukraine,” “increase support to the Syrian rebels,” “promote regime change in Belarus,” “exploit tensions in the south Caucasus,” “reduce Russian influence in Central Asia,” and “challenge Russian presence in Moldova.” 

Virtually all of these options have been implemented in one way or another - from the US sending lethal aid to Ukraine the same year this paper was published under the first Trump administration, to the continued arming of terrorists in Syria by the US culminating in the collapse of the Syrian government in 2024, to the physical destruction of the Nord Stream pipelines as well as constantly expanding US-led sanctions and maritime interdiction operations targeting Russian energy exports. 

Exploit Tensions in the South Caucasus: Politically Capturing Armenia 

In light of the recent elections in Armenia (in the south Caucasus region) and the President of the European Commission Ursula Van Der Leyan congratulating Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan by exclaiming, “the spirit of the Velvet Revolution you led in 2018 is alive and well,” it appears that once again the US objective of “extending Russia” has been further advanced. 

While many have been tempted to assign Armenia’s pivot away from its traditional Russian partnership to the European Union and NATO to European influence - the US government itself engineered the protests in 2018 Van Der Leyan referenced, with the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) itself admitting in its 2018 annual report that: 

NED’s many grantees in Armenia were in the forefront of the “Velvet Revolution” last spring that swept from office a corrupt and autocratic president who wanted to manipulate the constitution to retain power. In subsequent elections held in December, the party alliance of the new Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan won 70 percent of the vote, setting the stage for building accountable and effective government ministries, reforming the judicial system, and strengthening the media as a critical watchdog over government performance.

By “corrupt and autocratic” the NED means a government that does not answer to Washington at the expense of its own national interests, and by “accountable and effective ministries,” the NED means accountable to and effective at serving Washington - even at the cost of Armenia’s own interests. 

Organizations involved in the US-engineered “Velvet Revolution” in Armenia and the subsequent cementing of US political capture over the nation include the “Union of Informed Citizens” whose 2021 annual report admitted extensive US government backing and direction continued well after the 2018 protests - as well as Boon TV which is admittedly funded by the NED’s European counterpart, the unimaginatively named “European Endowment for Democracy.”   

Just like with other nations the US has politically captured, Armenia’s “color revolution” and “regime change” were just the beginning. With a client regime in place, the floodgates of foreign interference by the US are opened. 

The NED reported the following year in its 2019 annual report that US government interference shifted from producing desired outcomes during elections to consolidating political control in their aftermath, noting, “since the 2018 revolution in Armenia, NED grantees have shifted their focus from holding a corrupt regime accountable to supporting governance reform.” 

Again - language like “corrupt regime” and “reform” translate into a government unwilling to subordinate itself to US interests and consolidating US control. 

The same 2019 NED annual report notes how “several NED grantees have entered government,” demonstrating how US-engineered protests not only seek to overturn a targeted government, but replace it with a US-prepared and selected client regime. 

NED subsidiaries like the National Democratic Institute (NDI) announced in their own 2020 report regarding Armenia the launching of two programs, “the Intern Program of the National Assembly of Armenia and the Katarine Women’s Political Leadership Program.”

The same report mentioned, “a graduation ceremony for the Institute’s Young Political Leadership Strategy Program.”  

New Armenia Protests, Same US-Backed Mobs

April 27, 2016 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - Another day, another protest in Armenia. And if we were to simply believe the Western media regarding this 'other protest,' we might get the impression that the Armenian people are upset with Russian policy and "Putinism." In reality, the protests are led by the same verified US-proxies exposed at the height of the "Electric Yerevan" protests mid-2015 which sought to undermine and overthrow the current government of Armenia in favor of a pro-Western political front more to Wall Street, London, and Brussels' liking.

Image: Davit Sanasaryan (sometimes spelled "David" and "Sanasarian") hasn't found a US-engineered protest he hasn't felt compelled to join. He eagerly takes US cash to undermine the stability of his native Armenia, just like US proxies do worldwide. 

The International Business Times in their article, "Armenia-Russia Ties Under Question Amid Fighting, Anti-Moscow Protests," would report regarding the recent protests that:

At a recent thousand-strong demonstration in the capital of Armenia, Davit Sanasaryan took out a couple of eggs and threw them at the Russian Embassy. 

The gesture provoked both ridicule and approval in this small landlocked country that traditionally values very close ties with its large northern neighbor. “Our protests are not against Russia but against Russian policy and Putinism,” activist and politician Sanasaryan said in an interview with International Business Times last week.

Davit Sanasaryan (also spelled "David Sanasaryan"), among other things, is an opposition politician with the Heritage Party who helped lead the previous US-backed "Electric Yerevan protests in mid-2015. He is also an associate of the Armenian-based National Citizens' Initiative (NCI), revealed in the NCI's own news bulletin titled, "NCI Focuses on Armenia’s Mining Sector," which reports (emphasis added):

NCI associate Davit Sanasarian welcomed the audience with opening remarks. “The exploitation of the Teghut mine is an actual matter and it calls for serious discussions and proper suggestions prior to the undertaking of this project,” he said.

This bulletin alone seems innocuous enough, however, another NCI bulletin would reveal itself to be coordinating with and receiving aid from the US National Endowment for Democracy (NED). The bulletin titled, "NCI Partakes in a Civil Society Meeting," states (emphasis added):

The National Citizens’ Initiative (NCI) representatives attended, between 14 and 15 April 2011, the conference entitled “Assisting Armenia’s Civil Society Organizations.” This event was an initiative of the European Partnership for Democracy (EPD) organization and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) Yerevan Office, and it was organized with the assistance of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED). 

The objective of the conference was to contribute in developing the capacity of Armenia’s civil society organizations by way of cooperation and exchange of know-how with Central and Eastern European civil society associations.

Of course, considering that the US NED is chaired by pro-war corporate-financier representatives, "developing the capacity of civil society organizations" in Armenia was not actually on the agenda. Instead, creating a proxy front with which to control Armenia on behalf of foreign interests was, merely couched behind "civil society." Sanasarian's "association" with the NCI in this context, is troubling to say the least.

Russia Shoots Down US Stealth Coup

July 31, 2015 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - Times are tough for America's "color revolution" industry. Perfected in Eastern Europe after the fall of the Soviet Union, and honed during the so-called "Arab Spring," the process of backing subversion in a targeted country and overthrowing a sitting government under the cover of staged mass protests appears to be finally at the end of running its course.

Image: "No to Plunder's" core leaders are US-trained lawyers and activists. Because they are not overtly members of any specific US-funded group, the US believes it can maintain sufficient plausible deniability during the initial phases of political destabilization. Unfortunately for the US, Armenians suspected the US' role from the beginning, and America's more overt assets never had time to move into place before the protests fizzled out.  

That is because the United States can no longer hide the fact that it is behind these protests and often, even hide their role in the armed elements that are brought in covertly to give targeted governments their final push out the door. Nations have learned to identify, expose, and resist this tactic, and like Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime's tactic of Blitzkrieg or "lighting war," once appropriate countermeasures are found, the effectiveness of lighting fast, overwhelming force be it military or political, is rendered impotent.

This was most recently observed in Armenia during the so-called "Electric Yerevan" protests - Yerevan being the capital of Armenia, and "electric" in reference to the alleged motivation of protesters - rising electric prices.

American-backed "color revolutions" always start out with a seemingly legitimate motivation, but soon quickly become political in nature, sidestepping many of the legitimate, practical demands first made, and focusing almost entirely on "regime change." For the Armenian agitators leading the "Electric Yerevan," they didn't even make it that far and spent most of their initial momentum attempting to convince the world they were not just another US-backed mob.

The Stealth Coup 

Nikol Pashinyan and his "Civic Contract" party are transparently US-backed. So many found it suspicious that he was the most prominent voice insisting that the "Electric Yerevan" was not political and by no means a US-backed movement.

Verelq, an Armenian-based news website which inexplicably links to the US State Department's Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Armenian site, would report in their article, "Nikol Pashinyan: Protest actions in Yerevan are of exclusively social nature," that: 

“Even if you look at the ongoing processes through the microscope, you cannot see any foreign political or domestic political components in the demonstrations. People do not want electricity to grow in price. That’s all,” said Pashinyan. He said electric power is first of all a product: the Electric Networks sells it and the citizens buy it. “The protest actions should be considered as protection of consumers’ rights. Politics is nowhere near,” he said.

But politics were very near, including politicians like Pashinyan himself, who made it a point to visit jailed protesters throughout the failed uprising and even at one point called for the construction of a "human wall" of prominent Armenian personalities between protesters and police. US State Department-funded Armenia Now (of the New Times Journalist Training Center) reported in their article, "Politics in the Middle: Lawmakers, public figures form “human wall” between police, protesters," that:

The appeal to create a human wall was made by opposition lawmaker Nikol Pashinyan late on Tuesday as he urged all former and current MPs, scholars, show-biz representatives, lawyers, reporters, religious representatives and other public figures to visit the standoff site in order to ensure no force is applied against the protesters.

Other obvious ties between the protests, Pashinyan, and US-backed NGOs have been laid out by geopolitical analyst Andrew Korybko in his article, "'Electric Yerevan' is Sliding Out of Control."

Despite these links, some have attempted to claim Pashinyan was merely an opportunist and that his US-backing, and attempts by US NGOs to manipulate the protests had little to do with the protests themselves. But nothing could be further from the truth.