A LIGHTNING ROUND IN HISTORY
The
Battle of Avarayr
May 26, 451A.D.
The battle
of Avarayr took
place near the
village of Avarayr
between the Armenian
forces and the regular Persian
army, at the peak
of the national liberation
movement of Armenians
against Sassanid Persia.
The Armenian
army, consisting of the regular forces
and the people’s volunteer
corps, was headed
by Marshal Vardan
Mamikonian, who fell
as a hero in the
battle glorifying his name
for centuries.
An eyewitness
of the battle, the
historian Yeghise, wrote
that the Armenian army
had 66 thousand
warriors, whereas the Persian
military counted more
than 200thousand. Although
the Armenian forces,
outnumbered by the Persians,
actually lost the legendary
battle of Avarayr, the
battle portended the end
of the Armenian’s struggle. Yezdegerd
I was compelled
to call back
his army, abandon
efforts to convert
and assimilate the
Armenians, and to consent
to a much higher
level of autonomy for
Armenia.
The battle
of Avarayr thus became
the first warfare
in the history of
mankind for the Christian
faith. The struggle of
Vardan and his adherents
was a “ war for the
faith and for the
fatherland”.
The
Heroice Battle of Sardarapat
may21-29, 1918
This heroice battle
against the Turks, in the fields
of Sardarapat, on the
mountain slopes of
Bash-Aparan, and in the
valleys of Karakilisse,
proved the resolve
and the unberding will
to live of the Armenian
people. Thanks to this
victory, obtained at
the price of
blood, a new leaf was
turned in Armenian history. The
Armenian National Council
declared the independence
of the Democratic Republic
of Armenia, through
which the Armenian
people reclaimed the
statehood that they
had lost 600 years
prior, with the fall
of the Cilician Armenian Kingdom
in 1375.
The
Great Patriotic War May9,
1945
On May 8 1945
in Carlhorst, a Berlin
suburb, at 22:43 p.m. local time (in
Moscow it was already May 9 ),
World War II was
ended when representatives of the
allied Supreme Commands
signed the declaration
of unconditional capitulation of Fascist
Germany, which was at war
with 54 countries.
As assessed by the global community, the soviet Union (to which Armenia belonged) played a major role in the anti-Hitler alliance.
Six divisions
were formed by Armenians
during World War II
and more
than 60thousand Armenian
commanders directly participated
in the management of
military operations on all fronts.
Among them were
Marshals Hovhannes (Ivan ) Baghramian (1897-1982), Sergey
Khudyakov (Armenak
Khemferiants, 1902-1950), and
Hamazasp Babajanian (1906-1977),
and Admiral Ivan
Isakov (Hovhannes Isakian,
1894-1967). Thousands and
thousands of Armenian soldiers
were rewarded with medals
and orders.
Liberation of
Shoushi May8-9,1992
Liberation of the
town of Shoushi in Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) was a
historical inevitability aimed
at the restoration
of the Armenian’s right to
live on their ancient land,
which signified a new phase
in the heroic liberation
movement in Artsakh.
The military
campaign for the liberation of
this old Armenian fort was
launched from ssout
impeccably under the
name of “Nuptial in the
Mountains”, was headed by commander
Arkady Ter-Tadevosian, with
major-general Gourgen Dalibaltyan,
Serzh Sargsyan, the
chairman of the Defense
Committee of Karabakh
and the present-day
president of Armenia,
and Felix Gzoghlian,
the commander of the
Defense Headquarters of
Karabakh.
The night
of May8 was highlighted
by a simultaneous assault
carried out by four 1200-man self-defense
squads and one reserve
group. The opponents
were provided the opportunity
to leave the
fort through an assigned
corridor. On the
evening of the same
day, the operation of freeing
Shoushi was completed. The ancient Armenian
stronghold was liberated
on May 9, 1992.
