After besieging and starving 120,000 Armenians of the South Caucasus Republic of Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) since December 2022, Azerbaijan launched a large-scale military offensive against Artsakh on September 19, subjecting the capital Stepanakert and other cities and villages to intensive fire using heavy artillery and drones.

"My Facebook feed is full of pictures of missing children since yesterday. Most of them were at schools when the Azerbaijani military attacked so they were separated from their families. The lack of electricity, mobile and internet disruptions complicate the search efforts." — Anush Ghavalyan, journalist in Armenia, on X (formerly Twitter), September 20, 2023.

Artsakh has never been part of independent Azerbaijan. Artsakh -- ruled by Armenian monarchs, and even by Persian rulers -- has always preserved its Armenian identity.

Today, Azerbaijan is falsely claiming Artsakh as Azeri land, on the pretext that in the 1920s, Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, as part of his strategy of divide and conquer, decreed that Artsakh should be part of the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic as an autonomous oblast (province) even though Christian Armenia could not be less compatible with Muslim Azerbaijan.

"Failure to stand up to Azerbaijan could also result in an escalation that leads not only to the total destruction of the Armenians of Artsakh but also to a wider war in the region as Azerbaijan and its ally Turkey pursue territorial ambitions in southern Armenia and northern Iran." — Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention, on X (Twitter), September 19, 2023.

The US government also has influence regarding Azerbaijan. President Joe Biden can discourage any such expansionist projects with one strong phone call to Azerbaijan's President Aliyev, by urging him to stop the invasion of Artsakh and Armenia if he does not want serious consequences. Those could include U.S. sanctions on Azeri government officials and an end to U.S. military assistance to Azerbaijan. The latter would be consistent with the FREEDOM Support Act. The US should also send a humanitarian airlift to the starving population of Artsakh -- consistent with America's heralded tradition of aiding at-risk populations.

The frightening question is: Is the US internationally regarded as having leadership anymore?

Africa today consists of 56 different experiences in nation-building with some remarkable successes and many inevitable failures. In many African countries a new player has entered the game: a younger generation that is better educated, more ambitious and, at the same time, less gullible than its ancestors in the 19th century who looked away while imperial powers carved the golden goose.

With a one-size-fits-all scheme being out of the question, maybe the best way to "reset" relations with Africa is on a bilateral basis. As the nation-state is making a comeback even in old Europe, there is no reason why it should not be seen as the best vehicle for redefining Africa's role in reshaping the global system.