Capstone Final Report
AZERBAIJAN’S WESTWARD EXPANSION IN THE NAGORNO-KARABAKH REGION
A USC - NGA Tearline Collaboration
Eric Allen, Jack Brietowich, Philippa Burgess, Cerllin Chill, Hana Feingold, David Jurbala, Nicholas Lee, Jonathan Palmer, Philippe Tousignant
May 3, 2024
SSCI 595 - Applied Geospatial Intelligence Problem Solving
Spatial Sciences Institute
Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences
University of Southern California
Executive Summary.
This report presents imagery intelligence indicating Azerbaijan developed residential and road infrastructure in Nagorno-Karabakh between 2019 and 2023, prior to and after officially gaining control over the territory. NDVI indications are verified by natural color imagery and open-source context to discover and interpret the non-obvious stories of Azerbaijan's Westward Thrust. After sharing key findings and introducing the activity and approach, the report follows the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency’s Four-Step Analytic Process for GEOINT across the sections of: situational awareness for Nagorno-Karabakh, analytical methods used to make assessments, geographically organized evidence and interpretations, critical discussion, and perspectives for future monitoring.
Key Findings (BLUF).
New residential development activity detected at 4 sites in Western Nagorno-Karabakh.
New road and surface infrastructure development activity detected at 3 sites near Lachin and 8 sites in close proximity to Azerbaijan's border with Armenia.
