There is an uncomfortable question hanging over one of the most consequential geopolitical projects in the South Caucasus: What happens to the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity (TRIPP) when Donald Trump is no longer in the White House?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
TRIPP emerged from the breakthrough between Azerbaijan and Armenia brokered in Washington in August 2025. If implemented properly, it could connect mainland Azerbaijan through Armenia to Nakhchivan and T\u00fcrkiye, while strengthening the wider Middle Corridor linking Central Asia, the Caspian, the South Caucasus, T\u00fcrkiye and Europe. But its greatest political strength today may become its vulnerability tomorrow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The project is unusually personalised. Trump\u2019s name is literally attached to it. Its momentum comes substantially from his administration, and some of those shaping it belong firmly to the Trump foreign-policy ecosystem. American administrations change. Strategic geography does not. The challenge for Baku and for Yerevan is therefore to transform TRIPP from an American presidential initiative into an international economic reality before the political weather changes in Washington.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Having followed Azerbaijan for many years, I would hesitate to conclude that Baku is putting all its geopolitical eggs in the Trump basket. Azerbaijani foreign policy has traditionally been more sophisticated than that. It has learnt to operate simultaneously with Ankara, Moscow, Washington, Brussels, Beijing, Israel and, when necessary, Tehran. Strategic balancing has been one of the defining features of President Ilham Aliyev\u2019s foreign policy. But a good relationship with an American president is not the same as institutional depth in Washington. Presidents leave. Congress remains. The bureaucracy remains. Think tanks, corporations, investment funds, universities, lobby groups and diaspora networks remain. This is where Azerbaijan has more work to do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Baku enjoys significant relationships in American energy, security, business and Israel-related circles. Its relationship with parts of the Democratic foreign-policy establishment, Congress and the human-rights community has often been more complicated. Armenia, meanwhile, has a sophisticated diaspora network capable of operating across American political cycles. The answer is not for Azerbaijan to become Republican or Democratic. It is to become bipartisan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A future Democratic administration does not need to love the name TRIPP. It does not even need to retain it. What matters is whether the railway runs. For Republicans, the corridor can be sold as expanding American strategic influence, opening commercial opportunities and reducing Russian and Iranian leverage. For Democrats, precisely the same infrastructure can be presented as consolidating Armenian-Azerbaijani peace, protecting sovereignty, promoting regional economic integration, strengthening European energy security and diversifying supply chains. Different language, same path. That is how durable international projects survive political cycles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What the World Can Teach the Caucasus<\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n There are useful precedents. The Channel Tunnel between Britain and France is perhaps the clearest. Its construction was politically championed by Margaret Thatcher and Fran\u00e7ois Mitterrand, two very different leaders. But they did something more important than lend their names to it. They institutionalised it. The 1986 Treaty of Canterbury established a bilateral legal framework, an intergovernmental commission and a long-term concession. Private capital then acquired an enormous financial stake in its success. Governments subsequently changed repeatedly. Britain even left the European Union; the tunnel remained because it ceased to be Thatcher\u2019s tunnel or Mitterrand\u2019s tunnel. It became infrastructure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Rhine\u2013Danube corridor offers another lesson. Today it connects a web of railways, roads, ports, terminals and waterways across nine EU member states and neighbouring countries. Its resilience comes precisely from having many stakeholders. No single capital owns it politically. Too many economies benefit from it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Panama Canal offers a third, different lesson. For much of the twentieth century it was inseparable from American power and generated enormous political controversy. Yet the 1977 Carter\u2013Torrijos treaties created a structured transition that ultimately transferred operational control to Panama while maintaining the canal\u2019s permanent neutrality. Presidents, governments and political systems changed. The canal remained indispensable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The lesson for TRIPP is straightforward: Infrastructure becomes durable when political ownership is dispersed, and economic ownership is multiplied.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Russia Does Not Have to Destroy TRIPP<\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n There is another reason why institutionalisation matters. Russia does not necessarily need to confront TRIPP directly. Moscow knows the South Caucasus exceptionally well. It possesses political relationships, economic leverage, intelligence networks and considerable experience exploiting regional disagreements. Destabilisation need not involve tanks. Delay can achieve much the same objective. There is a customs dispute here. Political opposition in Armenia there. A disagreement over sovereignty. Financing difficulties. Security incidents. A deterioration in Armenian-Azerbaijani relations. Combine enough small obstacles and a railway can remain \u201cunder development\u201d for 15 years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Iran will also watch closely any arrangement that changes the strategic geography along its northern frontier. The best defence, therefore, is not another geopolitical declaration. It is to create facts on the ground. Build the railway. Agree on the customs regime. Establish logistics centres. Connect electricity and fibre-optic infrastructure. Bring companies and banks into the project. Most importantly, give Armenia a substantial economic stake in its success. A corridor that Armenians themselves profit from will be much harder for outsiders to undermine than one perceived merely as an Azerbaijani passage through Armenian territory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n TRIPP Should Become Bigger Than TRIPP<\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n There is also a danger in seeing the project only through the Armenia-Azerbaijan prism. Its potential significance is much greater. Central Asian states want more routes to global markets. T\u00fcrkiye wants to strengthen its role as Eurasia\u2019s principal economic bridge. Europe needs resilient supply chains and better access to the Caspian and Central Asia. China also has an obvious interest in diversified Eurasian connectivity. TRIPP should therefore eventually become not merely a railway but part of an integrated transport, energy, digital and commercial corridor with railways, roads, energy, fibre optics, logistics centres, industrial zones, etc. Once billions of dollars and multiple countries become economically invested, political sabotage becomes much more expensive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There are three Strategic Recommendations. First, de-Trump TRIPP without repudiating Trump. Baku should use the current administration\u2019s political momentum while immediately building relationships with Democrats, Congress, think tanks, US companies and institutional Washington. Azerbaijan should invite senior Democratic figures, congressional staff and American investors to Baku and the corridor itself. By the next US presidential election, TRIPP should no longer belong politically to one American party.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Second, create irreversible economic facts on the ground. The next two or three years are critical. Azerbaijan, Armenia, T\u00fcrkiye and the United States should accelerate construction, customs agreements, financing and private-sector participation. Armenia must visibly benefit through transit revenues, investment, employment and new economic activity. Bring in American and European companies, development finance and institutional investors. The objective should be simple: create enough winners that too many people have something to lose if the project fails.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Third, transform TRIPP into a multinational Eurasian corridor. Do not stop at Azerbaijan\u2013Armenia connectivity. Connect TRIPP explicitly to T\u00fcrkiye, Georgia, the Caspian, and Central Asia, and integrate rail, road, energy, and digital infrastructure. Invite Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, European partners and eventually other interested Asian economies into its commercial ecosystem. The more international the corridor becomes, the less vulnerable it will be to pressure from any single power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Real Test<\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n There is an irony in all this. Donald Trump may deserve considerable credit if TRIPP succeeds, but the best way to preserve his achievement is ultimately to make the project less dependent on him. If TRIPP remains primarily Trump\u2019s Route, I would worry about what happens after Trump. If it becomes a functioning economic artery linking Central Asia, the Caspian, Azerbaijan, Armenia, T\u00fcrkiye and Europe, the next American administration can rename it. Names are politics, railways are geography. Trade is economics, and economic interests usually outlive presidents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The ultimate test of TRIPP will therefore not be who signs the agreements in Washington. It will be whether, ten or twenty years from now, trains are still crossing the South Caucasus regardless of who sits in the White House or the Kremlin. That would be the real strategic victory.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" There is an uncomfortable question hanging over one of the most consequential geopolitical projects in the South Caucasus: What happens to the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity (TRIPP) when Donald Trump is no longer in the White House? TRIPP emerged from the breakthrough between Azerbaijan and Armenia brokered in Washington in August 2025. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":275,"featured_media":17353,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[486],"tags":[695,670,653],"class_list":["post-17352","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinion","tag-armenia","tag-azerbaijan","tag-international-politics"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.globalpanorama.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17352","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.globalpanorama.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.globalpanorama.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.globalpanorama.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/275"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.globalpanorama.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17352"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.globalpanorama.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17352\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17355,"href":"https:\/\/www.globalpanorama.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17352\/revisions\/17355"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.globalpanorama.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17353"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.globalpanorama.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17352"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.globalpanorama.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17352"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.globalpanorama.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17352"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}