How America Became a Pillar of Armenia’s Security

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On May 26, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio stopped in Armenia to sign three documents that culminated several years of negotiations, marking, from Washington’s perspective, the consolidation of Armenia’s Western pivot. From Yerevan’s perspective, the signing of the three documents reinforces the paradigmatic shift in its security thinking, as deepening ties with the  United States has become one of the main pillars of the country’s growing security architecture. The general discourse on the signing of the TRIPP Framework Agreement, Charter on Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, and the Framework on Mining and Critical Minerals, have revolved around the economic, technological, and commercial/interconnectivity components of the agreements. But at the deeper doctrinal level, it is the security component that is defining thinking at the policy-making level within official Yerevan. 

In this context, this article addresses the security configurations of the agreements signed during Secretary Rubio’s visit, qualified through three analytical frameworks: 1) the TRIPP Framework Agreement consolidating the operationalization of the TRIPP project, an endeavor that was designed, from the outset, as a fundamental part to Armenia’s layered soft deterrence model; 2) the elevation of U.S.-Armenia relations from a Strategic Partnership to Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, which includes crucial defense and security elements that Armenia has never before had access to; and 3) the implementation of Armenia’s “mining-for-security” strategy through the signing of the agreement on mines, critical minerals and rare earths. 

On August 8, 2025, three documents were formalized at the Washington Peace Summit: advancing the full normalization of relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan, initialing the draft peace agreement, and launching TRIPP. The normalization process that defined the Washington Accords was predicated on TRIPP. For Armenia, TRIPP was first and foremost a nascent security arrangement that curtailed Baku’s aggressive posturing while mitigating the threat of war or militarized engagements. The TRIPP Framework Agreement signed between Secretary Rubio and Foreign Minister Mirzoyan institutionalized the contours of this emerging security arrangement, as it substantiated a numerous set of factors that have become crucial to Armenia’s security. 

First, the Agreement confirms that TRIPP is strictly a U.S.-Armenia project, thus negating much of the conspiracy theories and disinformation, spread by Kremlin-linked proxies in Armenia and the Diaspora, that the project has some “hidden Turkish hand” or is being dictated by Baku’s interests. This solidifies the bilateral structure of the project, reinforces Armenia’s role and agency, and confirms the scope and depth of U.S. investments, both diplomatically and economically. Second, the Agreement categorically and unequivocally confirms Armenia’s sovereignty over “all TRIPP project areas within sovereign Armenian territory,” thus codifying Armenia’s full control over the route, the legal framework of its management, and the enforcement of the laws, rules and regulations as commensurate with Armenia’s constitution. Third, it directly stipulates that Armenia has “primacy and full authority” in all emergency situations that may develop, will exercise full sovereignty and jurisdiction over borders and customs operations, and will have “physical presence in all border control facilities.” 

In essence, what the TRIPP Framework Agreement confirms is the successful “de-corridorization” of TRIPP by the U.S. and Armenia, thus outright negating all and every misinformation on extra-territoriality, “Zangezur-ization,” “unimpeded” Azerbaijani access, or the abdication of Armenia’s sovereignty. More so, the Agreement reinforces Armenia’s sovereignty while giving Yerevan the tools, geopolitical support, and technical capacity to improve and strengthen its border security.     

On January 14, 2025, Armenia and the United States signed the Strategic Partnership Charter in Washington, which included a robust array of agreements on economic, energy, commercial, institutional reforms, and enhancement of democratic governance. Its security dimension, however, remained relatively limited, focusing largely on military reforms and cybersecurity assistance. The Comprehensive Strategic Partnership Charter signed during Secretary Rubio’s visit marked a significant departure from that framework. For the first time the United States will allow for the “sale of U.S.-made defense articles and auxiliary equipment to Armenia through Foreign Military Sales (FMS),” with “defense articles” defined in U.S. legislation as tangible equipment or hardware designed, developed, or modified for military, missile, satellite, or other controlled purposes. 

In both geopolitical as well as geostrategic terms, Armenia’s access to the U.S. arms industry, its ability to purchase American weapons systems and the technology that comes with it, and its inclusion (as a non-NATO partner) into streamlined FMS processes, is an extraordinary enhancement of Armenia’s deterrence and power projection potential. While this important component is supplemented by the growing role of the U.S. military within Armenia’s security architecture, such as “professional military education and training courses,” as well as expanding cooperation to “increase Armenian interoperability and to strengthen Armenia’s defense capabilities,” Armenia’s access to hard power capabilities remains the defining aspect of the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership. 

America’s growing role in Armenia’s security system is further supplemented by three important aspects of the Comprehensive Charter. First, the U.S. will support Armenia in “strengthening and enhancing effective and independent security agencies of Armenia, with the aim of those agencies taking full responsibility for Armenia’s borders.” This enhancement capacity is specifically directed at one important factor: Armenia’s ability to exercise full sovereignty by removing Russian border guards and having the toolkit and capacity to fulfill such responsibilities. In practical terms, the U.S. is investing in border security, institutional capacity-building and the development of agencies responsible for safeguarding Armenia’s frontiers. Second, whereas in the initial Strategic Partnership the agenda spoke of assisting Armenia in the domain of cybersecurity, the Comprehensive Charter will address “hybrid threats.” Considering the breadth and scope of hybrid activities that Armenia is consistently subjected to, this expands the cooperation-and-support model from cyber security support to a more expansive framework. And third, the U.S. will support “Armenia’s efforts to develop domestic defense industrial capabilities,” while initiating “cooperation between the U.S. and Armenian defense industries.” 

When coupled with U.S. approval for arms sales to Armenia through FMS, Washington’s support for the development of Armenia’s defense industry takes on far greater significance. The development of any country’s domestic defense industry is predicated on one major factor: access to technology. In essence, it is military technology and science that determines the scope and quality of military defense production. America’s decision to not only support Armenia in this endeavor but to also establish cooperation between America’s defense firms and Armenia’s is a profoundly important development. At the structural level, this offers Armenia the foundational basis to build and develop strategic autonomy. 

And finally, the Comprehensive Charter includes a section that is just as crucial, yet may escape the eye of most observers: “The United States and Armenia intend to devise secure and practical mechanisms of sharing sensitive information.” An open secret to most, Armenia has never had nor developed robust intelligence capabilities, and since independence, it has only relied on Russia for any and all intelligence. In more simple terms, Armenia’s security capabilities, its scope and depth of risk-mitigation, and its access to actionable intelligence, have historically been limited at best, with much of the security apparatus being blind to the machinations of its neighbors. The formation of the Foreign Intelligence Service (FIS) has been a game-changer for Armenia in this domain, but intelligence services are only able to enhance capacity by cultivating multiplicity of partners. In this context, and noting the breadth of intelligence capabilities that the U.S. has, “sharing of sensitive information” is going to be instrumental for Armenia’s security and risk-mitigation capabilities.     

The third framework of our analysis examines the “Framework for Securing the Supply and Processing of Critical Minerals and Rare Earths,” an agreement that, while still in its formative stages, is designed to integrate Armenia into American critical-minerals supply chain infrastructure. While most qualify such arrangements as being generally economic, with constituent geopolitical components, for Armenia, however, this arrangement is part of its “mining-for-security” strategy that was developed in 2023. 

At its core, the concept of mining-for-security entails the conceptualization of mines and critical minerals as more than economic resources, positioning them as strategic assets integral to the country’s security architecture. The overarching research on the subject matter, and the range of case studies available on countries that utilize similar policies, produce four underlying findings. First, small states that utilize some iteration of “resource-extraction for security” make themselves not only more relevant to economically powerful countries, but also become actors that are able to punch above their weight. Second, diversification of access increases stakeholders, as extraction fields or mines are strategically contracted with powerful or multiple sets of countries, thus making such small states relevant to numerous large or economically powerful countries. Third, small states that attract numerous international or transnational corporations also, by extension, enhance relations with the parent countries of those corporations, thus aligning the security of a small state with the economic interests of larger actors. And fourth, mining for security serves as a tacit yet powerful deterrent, for states that have multitudes of international investors, especially in its natural resource sector, are exponentially less likely to be attacked. Mining for security, in this context, offers Armenia a much needed opportunity to utilize its mineral industry as a security and geostrategic instrument, which can allow for not only diversification of investments into the country, but also the diversification of its security toolkit.   

A cursory review of Armenia mineral reserves, an important consideration underlying the Framework Agreement, reveals immense potential that has never been tapped. Copper has been extracted from the mines in Alaverdi from the 1770s, while base metals in Kapan have been extracted from the 1840s. The Sotk gold mine has been operating since the 1970s, while the copper-molybdenum mine at Kajaran has been operational since the 1950s. As one indicator of this potential, Armenia produced approximately 3% of the world’s annual molybdenum concentrate output in the 1950s. 

Today, Armenia’s mining sector produces copper, molybdenum, iron, lead, zinc, gold, silver and antimony.[1] The country also possesses significant reserves of rare metals in gold-polymetallic, copper-molybdenum, and copper pyrite deposits. Beyond these resources, Armenia also possesses a wide range of industrial metals, such as basalt, limestone, granite, diatomite, perlite and gypsum. Collectively, there are more than 670 registered mines of minerals, including 30 metalliferous mines (small- to medium-size), with over 110 deposits having been newly discovered. These, inclusively, are not simply mining or economic data, but rather, should be qualified as data that is to be strategically utilized for enhancing Armenia’s security architecture.  

It is within this context that the signed Framework between the U.S. and Armenia becomes integral to Armenia’s layered deterrence model, as mining-for-security, and American vested interests, produce multi-layered effects upon the country’s security system. The Framework specifically states that both countries “intend to support the supply of raw and processed critical minerals crucial to the commercial and defense industries of both countries,” clearly indicating the security component of the arrangement, as well as aligning with the chapter in the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership agenda on U.S.-Armenia cooperation in developing Armenia’s domestic defense industry. Further, the integration of Armenia into critical mineral supply chains is tied to TRIPP, for the route will play a supporting role in “the transit of critical minerals from South Caucasus and Central Asia.”

At the geostrategic level, the Framework offers Armenia three important instrumental gains. First, the United States will support in mobilizing “private sector support, including capital and operational expenditures via guarantees, loans, equity investments,” while facilitating the “provision of potentially significant financing to projects…expected to generate end products for delivery to buyers in the United States and the Republic of Armenia.” Second, the U.S. will support Armenia in developing new “mechanisms to strengthen critical minerals and rare earths supply chains,” while facilitating “technology transfer to entities of the Republic of Armenia to modernize extraction and processing efficiency. And third, the U.S., with the advanced capabilities that its geological surveying technology has, will support Armenia in mapping its mineral resources, while offering broad assistance in capacity building, such as data collection, training, and “advanced geological assessment techniques.” 

Collectively, American capital will play an instrumental role in financing the scope of projects, offering advanced geological mapping, and helping Armenia develop structural resiliency by being integrated into the critical minerals supply chain systems. At the same time, the U.S. will offer Armenia advanced technology and know-how in allowing the country to modernize and advance its mining industry, an extraordinarily important development. Considering the underdeveloped, over-exploited, and generally horrid conditions of Armenia’s mining sector under the dominance of Russian proxy-companies, the Framework offers Armenia a new toolkit in addressing the waste, environmental harm, and supply chain exclusion that its industry has been subjected to at the hands of Russian companies. 

In its totality, Secretary Rubio’s visit to Armenia was significant not simply because the most powerful and relevant foreign policy chief in the world visited Yerevan, but because of the strategic significance of the agreements that were signed. Armenia remains the only country in the region that has elevated its relationship with the U.S. to the comprehensive partnership level, while also being the first state to sign both a critical minerals deal as well as develop the framework of being integrated in the U.S. supply chains, from technology, to AI, to critical minerals. 

Just as crucially, the Rubio visit highlighted the developing contours of Armenia’s security architecture, as Armenia’s access to American weapons, as well as U.S. support for the development of Armenia’s military industrial complex, speak volumes of the growing importance of Armenia’s security to the Transatlantic system. And in the confluence of these developments, Armenia, who has traditionally been viewed as a resource-poor country that has nothing to offer the world except its potential human capital, is now being positioned to be an important regional actor in the resource-extraction domain. 

Between mining-for-security, economic integration, and growing access to hard power capabilities, the Rubio visit to Armenia was not simply a two-hour detour, but rather, a strategically designed engagement that demonstrated the importance of Armenia’s security architecture to its American partners.    

Footnote:

[1]  Interview with Artyom Geghamyan, Executive Chairman of International Chamber of Mines of Armenia.

Statecraft & Governance