Operation Ring

Overview

Operation Ring, known in Azerbaijan as Operation Chaykand was the codename for the May 1991 military operation conducted by the Soviet Army, Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) of the USSR and OMON units of the Azerbaijan SSR in the Khanlar and Shahumyan districts of the Azerbaijani SSR, the Shusha, Martakert and Hadrut districts of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast, and along the eastern border of the Armenian SSR in the districts of Goris, Noyemberyan, Ijevan and Shamshadin. Officially dubbed a "passport checking operation," the ostensible goal of the operation was to disarm "illegal armed formations" in and around Nagorno-Karabakh, referring to irregular Armenian military detachments that had been operating in the area. The operation involved the use of ground troops accompanied by a complement of military vehicles, artillery and helicopter gunships to be used to root out the self-described Armenian fedayeen.

Overview adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Significance

Operation Ring was a Soviet-led military operation conducted in May 1991 across multiple districts of the Azerbaijani SSR and the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast, as well as along the eastern border of the Armenian SSR. Officially framed as a passport-checking and disarmament exercise targeting irregular Armenian armed formations, the operation involved ground troops, armored vehicles, artillery, and helicopter gunships deployed by the Soviet Army, MVD Internal Troops, and Azerbaijani OMON units. With Armenian Revolutionary Federation casualties recorded at 5,000, the operation represented one of the most significant uses of Soviet state force against Armenian fedayeen during the pre-independence phase of the First Nagorno-Karabakh War. The breadth of the operational theater — spanning Khanlar, Shahumyan, Shusha, Martakert, Hadrut, and multiple Armenian border districts — indicates the extent to which the conflict had spread beyond Nagorno-Karabakh proper by mid-1991. The operation underscored the Soviet Union's attempt to suppress Armenian irregular forces under a legal pretext of arms control, while the involvement of Azerbaijani OMON alongside Soviet units reflected the increasingly entangled relationship between Soviet military authority and one side of the ethnic conflict as the USSR moved toward dissolution.

Forces & casualties

Commanders (5)