The political dimension of drone warfare:The use of Turkish drones in Nagorno-Karabakh.

Abstract

After a cease fire of 25 years, new clashes occurred between Armenia and Azerbaijan during the Second Karabakh War in September 2020. These clashes proved to be more violent and intense compared with earlier battles, due to the increased military support that Turkey provided to Azerbaijan in the form of Turkish manufactured drones. This development came as a surprise, as Turkey had refrained itself from intervening in this conflict for the past 25 years. It leads to questions about why Turkey decided to intervene after those 25 years. A comparative analysis between earlier cases of Turkey’s drone warfare indicate that Turkey’s foreign policy has changed from being cautious and western oriented, to assertive and focused on hard power projection. By the use of the multiple hierarchy model in combination with regional security complex theory, this thesis tries to explain the motivations behind this change in foreign policy by the Turkish government. In doing so, Turkey’s relationship with both Western organisations as the Russian Federation will be examined in relation to Nagorno-Karabakh. This form of historical analysis combined with primary source analysis, will illustrate how Turkey’s intervention using drones can be explained through security dynamics in the region and power relations with Russia. Consequently. Turkey’s new foreign policy indicates why it is perceived as a growing drone power and how its strategic use of these drones demonstrates the new future of drone warfare.