Once one of the Kremlin’s closest allies, Armenia is now conducting joint drills with US soldiers.

Russia’s catastrophic invasion of Ukraine means Armenia can no longer rely on Moscow as a guarantor of its security, even as fears grow of a return to open conflict with Azerbaijan, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan told POLITICO in an interview.

Pashinyan’s unusually pointed criticism of Russia’s inability to act as a policeman in the Caucasus only compounds a sense the Kremlin is losing its influence — and once much-vaunted superpower status — across former Soviet republics that Moscow once saw as its stamping ground.

Disillusion in Yerevan could represent a major turning point for the country of 2.8 million people as it has delegated much of the control of its railways, its energy sector and even its borders to Russia after the collapse of the USSR. When Armenia fought a 44-day war against the stronger, Turkish-backed forces of Azerbaijan in 2020 — a conflict that killed thousands on each side — it was Russian peacekeepers that were deployed to maintain a ceasefire.