the nineteenth century and how it was by the time the Azerbaijani authorities received it in the twentieth. The local inhabitants often had no wish to colonize and develop these inhospitable territories, and these were the very regions to which the colonists were sent. Shafiyev reduces the whole complex and ambiguous Soviet period to a few brief episodes in time and to certain operations – deportations and relocations. He fails to look at Soviet national policies, the struggle of republican elites, the changes in external political circumstances, all of which also had their effect on the construction of relations between the centre and the Caucasus republics and their elites. Instead of a chronicle of events we have just a few fragmentary episodes, on the basis of which we are asked to judge the entire Soviet period and the situation in the sphere of international relations. Shafiyev continually nudges the reader towards what he considers to be the only correct explanation of the reasons, preconditions and motives of conflict, bypassing any tricky aspects. Above all, he completely ignores the precipitate upsurge in nationalism in the 1980s, especially in the Caucasus, and the headlong disintegration of the USSR with the equally rapid collapse of Soviet power in the region. This was what provided the main impetus for bloody conflicts leading to all-out war. Certainly, this was detonated by Soviet nationality policies: with the break-up of the USSR, hastily-conceived Soviet administrative borders became state borders almost overnight (first and foremost, Karabakh and Abkhazia). The author does not even mention the significant part played in the conflict by the Soviet Azerbaijani and Armenian authorities, the leaders of the Azerbaijani National Front, the butchery of the Armenian and Russian population in Baku, Azerbaijan and Nakhichevan, or the willingness of the new post-Soviet politicians of the Southern Caucasus to seize power by any available means. This last point could be illustrated by the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict over Karabakh, as well as the Georgian-Abkhaz and Georgian-Ossetian conflicts, which have served to break the region up into several isolated fragments. Overall, Farid Shafiyev’s book is less an academic work, and more an affirmation of the Azerbaijani authorities’ version of the conflict, which they have been peddling to their people for many years. The politics of stirring up hostility by pointing to the failings and non-indigenousness of neighbouring nations will not disappear from the Caucasus any time soon, but books like this can only add fuel to the fire.

中文翻译：

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JC Sharman，弱者帝国：欧洲扩张的真实故事和世界新秩序的建立

十九世纪以及阿塞拜疆当局在二十世纪收到它时的情况。当地居民往往不愿意殖民和开发这些荒凉的领土，而这些正是殖民者被派往的地区。沙菲耶夫将整个复杂而模棱两可的苏联时期缩减为几个短暂的情节和某些行动——驱逐和搬迁。他没有看到苏联的国家政策、共和精英的斗争、外部政治环境的变化，所有这些都对中央与高加索共和国及其精英之间关系的构建产生了影响。我们只有一些零碎的情节，而不是事件的编年史，我们被要求在此基础上判断整个苏联时期和国际关系领域的局势。沙菲耶夫不断地将读者推向他认为是对冲突的原因、先决条件和动机的唯一正确解释，绕过了任何棘手的方面。最重要的是，他完全忽视了 1980 年代民族主义的突然高涨，尤其是在高加索地区，以及苏联在该地区同样迅速瓦解的苏联解体。这是导致全面战争的血腥冲突的主要推动力。当然，这被苏联的民族政策引爆了：随着苏联的解体，仓促设想的苏联行政边界几乎在一夜之间变成了国家边界（首先是卡拉巴赫和阿布哈兹）。作者甚至没有提到苏维埃阿塞拜疆和亚美尼亚当局、阿塞拜疆民族阵线领导人、在巴库、阿塞拜疆和纳希切万屠杀亚美尼亚和俄罗斯人民在冲突中发挥的重要作用，或者新政府的意愿。南高加索地区的后苏联政治家以任何可用的方式夺取政权。最后一点可以通过亚美尼亚-阿塞拜疆围绕卡拉巴赫的冲突以及格鲁吉亚-阿布哈兹和格鲁吉亚-奥塞梯冲突来说明，这些冲突导致该地区分裂成几个孤立的碎片。总的来说，法里德·沙菲耶夫的书与其说是学术著作，不如说是对阿塞拜疆当局多年来一直向人民兜售的冲突版本的肯定。