America’s foreign policy effectiveness is being tested in an often-overlooked region of Eurasia.
Can the U.S. still translate power into durable outcomes? In the south Caucasus, the answer is increasingly taking shape.
In August 2025, President Donald Trump brought together Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and helped move their long-simmering conflict toward a durable settlement. What followed was not symbolism, but substance: decisive American leadership replacing decades of diplomatic inertia.
California, home to more than half of the Armenian diaspora population in the U.S., is hardly a bystander in the South Caucasus. Yet for decades, when it came to the Caucasus, that influence was often channeled in one direction — away from cooperation and into an impasse that only served to weaken Armenia as a state. That is why the current White House-led breakthrough matters not only for Baku and Yerevan, but also for Sacramento and Silicon Valley.
For three decades, members of Congress from California — with the lobbying of Armenian groups — helped perpetuate Armenia’s illegal occupation of internationally recognized Azerbaijani territory. They became impediments to peace. But today, leaders across California have the opportunity to write a new chapter. They can step forward as champions of the U.S.-Azerbaijan relationship in a way that advances American interests in Eurasia, opens new markets for California-based companies, and broadens cultural awareness.
Beyond diplomacy and trade corridors, one of the most enduring foundations for peace and long-term partnership is cultural and educational exchange. California’s relationship with Azerbaijan should not be defined solely by geopolitical calculations or the shifting winds of politics in Washington. Instead, it should be strengthened through direct engagement between students, educators, entrepreneurs, artists and civic leaders—building people-to-people ties that outlast political cycles and create mutual understanding.
Last August’s White House-brokered peace agreement was more than a ceremonial moment. It has given way to sustained and structured diplomatic follow-through between Washington and Baku. Vice President J.D. Vance visited Azerbaijan this month to sign a strategic partnership agreement, as the two nations committed to expanding their economic and security cooperation. America will provide Azerbaijan with an undisclosed number of ships to help the country protect its territorial waters, Vance said on Feb. 10 in Baku.
Since last August, there have been at least four senior Azerbaijani delegations to the U.S. and multiple American delegations to Azerbaijan, in addition to Vance’s trip. Aliyev himself traveled to the U.S. twice — once to Washington, D.C., and again to New York for the U.N. General Assembly. Azerbaijani delegations included members of parliament; the Prosecutor General; the ministers of economy, energy, education, and digital development and transport; as well as Sheikhulislam Allahshukur Pashazade. U.S. congressional delegations and business leaders also visited Azerbaijan, while Trump and Aliyev met at the World Economic Forum in Davos.
Equally important is the people-to-people dimension. Azerbaijani civil society representatives are currently visiting Armenia, marking the latest initiative in a series of reciprocal meetings and exchanges between the countries that would have been politically impossible in the past. These interactions lay the social groundwork that durable peace requires — trust built not only by governments, but by citizens.
It is time for Californians to take notice of this historic momentum. In an era when international politics can feel distant and polarized, people-to-people diplomacy offers something more durable: human trust. Expanding cultural and educational exchange between California and Azerbaijan would allow both populations to transcend stereotypes and political narratives, replacing suspicion with curiosity and building cooperation through shared experiences.
If Californians are serious about shaping the future of America’s ties with the south Caucasus, they should invest not only in policy but in the friendships, exchanges and civic partnerships that will make strategic cooperation sustainable for generations to come.
Peter Tase is the founder of the Azerbaijan-United States Economic and Education Council, an expert on South American geopolitics, and the author of six books on international relations. He is a Distinguished Fellow in U.S. Foreign Policy at the National University of Santiago del Estero, Argentina.
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