Azerbaijan called it an “anti-terrorist operation.” For the ethnic Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh, it was the final chapter of a 30-year struggle. On September 19, 2023, Azerbaijani forces used artillery, drones, and infantry to break through the defensive lines of the self-declared Republic of Artsakh. The assault lasted less than a day. Outgunned and under a total blockade, the Karabakh Armenian leadership agreed to a Russian-brokered ceasefire that included the disarmament and dissolution of their defense forces.
The offensive was not a spontaneous eruption but the logical conclusion of a war Azerbaijan had already won in 2020. Since December 2022, a single road linking the region to Armenia, the Lachin Corridor, had been blocked by Azerbaijani activists and then by state troops. The 120,000 people in Nagorno-Karabakh were starved of food, medicine, and fuel. The September attack shattered any remaining hope of security or autonomy.
Within a week, over 100,000 people—virtually the entire Armenian population—crossed into Armenia. They left behind homes, churches, and graves dating back centuries. The exodus fulfilled a long-stated fear of ethnic cleansing. It redrew the demographic map of the South Caucasus in a matter of days.
The event closed a post-Soviet conflict but opened a new era of displacement. It demonstrated the limited power of international peacekeepers, as Russian troops stationed there did not intervene. The empty towns of Stepanakert and Shushi now stand as monuments to a vanished polity, their future dictated entirely by Baku.