‘Promising is not the same as delivering’ – political scientist on US promises to build modular nuclear power plants in Armenia

Political scientist Danila Gureyev spoke to Alpha News on the US intention to build modular nuclear power plants in Armenia to replace the existing Metsamor Nuclear Power Plant.

“Transitioning from one energy model to another is an enormous undertaking. In this area, the Americans cannot simply step in and replace Russia in the sphere of peaceful nuclear energy. Why? Because this involves large-scale, systemic cooperation that has existed since the post-Soviet period, where Armenia and Russia are closely connected.

There are already examples of countries that tried to switch from Russian nuclear energy to American. The most illustrative case is Lithuania and the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant. In the end, the plant was simply shut down, and no replacement was ever built. A similar situation could occur here.

Essentially, the US goal in this context is not the creation of a new nuclear industry, since implementing such a project is extremely difficult. But dismantling existing Russian-Armenian projects is a much more achievable objective,” Gureyev said.

According to the expert, Washington’s plan may be aimed at dismantling current infrastructure without real guarantees of building new facilities.

“Of course, it sounds good when promises are made. But one should remember a simple truth: promising is not the same as delivering. The logic may be as follows: first, abandon existing projects, dismantle the current infrastructure, and then we will compensate and build something new. The problem is that dismantling is a tangible result—you can see it. Construction, however, remains only a promise. These projects have not yet been implemented; we have not seen them in practice. Whether they will ever be realized is a big question. But the proposal is clear: first destroy what already exists,” the expert concluded.