The power vacuum created by the fall of Karabakh, and a joint NATO accession of Armenia and Azerbaijan as the unlikely solution for it

In an operation taking less than 24 hours from the 19^th to the 20^th of September 2023, Azerbaijan took over the de facto independent ethnic Armenian polity of Artsakh a.k.a. Nagorno-Karabakh, and within two weeks, the entire ethnic Armenian civilian population of the polity fled to Armenia proper. This marks the swift but brutal end of a conflict that has been going on for 35 five years now, and also likely represents a reset for the geopolitics of the South Caucasus. Azerbaijan, relieved from the 35-year-long conflict on its de jure soil may take a more influential position in the region than it previously had. Armenia, abandoned by its ally Russia, seeks alternate partners, with the United States and Iran being the most willing applicants. The prospect of another war of Azerbaijan possibly attempting to open a corridor to its Nakhichevan exclave across the southern Zangezur panhandle of Armenia is still hanging in the air. In this fluid power vacuum, a scramble among great powers may soon start for the region, in which apart from Turkey of course, the United States may have better chances, than it would appear at first look.