The Trump administration reportedly used access to advanced AI chips from US tech giant Nvidia as a bargaining tool in an effort to help end a long-running conflict between two rival nations.
American negotiators leaned on the prospect of Armenia gaining access to Nvidia’s high-powered artificial intelligence hardware as part of a push to move a peace agreement with neighboring Azerbaijan over the line, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Armenia and Azerbaijan have been locked for decades in a bitter dispute over Nagorno-Karabakh, a contested region that has repeatedly drawn the two countries into armed conflict.
Their leaders initialed a US-brokered peace agreement last August after White House involvement, and new reporting suggests that what has been described as “chip diplomacy” played a significant role behind the scenes.
As part of the diplomatic effort, the US was able to point to 70,000 Nvidia AI processors earmarked for a proposed $5 billion Armenian data center project known as Firebird.
The episode underscores the growing geopolitical importance of AI processor technology, as governments compete to build out artificial intelligence infrastructure and Washington gains a new form of leverage abroad.
“For this administration, chip diplomacy is front and center,” Rev Lebaredian, a senior Nvidia executive of Armenian descent, told the Wall Street Journal.
“Our presence in Armenia and our investment in it is a big factor in creating the conditions by which peace can unfold,” he said.
The Trump administration dangled access to AI chips made by the US tech company Nvidia to try and broker peace between warring nations
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, center, flanked by tech and political leaders at the opening of the data center in Hrazdan, Armenia. He credited President Trump’s ‘chip diplomacy’ with ending their war with Azerbaijan and creating deeper economic ties
Amenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan thanked President Donald Trump for making the data center happen, as part of the deal gave his nation deeper economic and tech ties with the US.
On a February visit to the country, Vice President JD Vance said the deal meant ‘new markets for American workers and for American businesses, but it also means greater prosperity for the people of Armenia.’
Washington has also used AI hardware as a benefit for deals with the UAE and Saudi Arabia.
The deals have become a part of Trump’s increasing ties with Jensen Huang, Nvidia’s CEO and eighth on the Forbes Rich List, who advises the President on artificial intelligence.
Huang called the data center the start of their work to ‘connect this region to the global AI economy’ in a video message at the ribbon cutting.
US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff has proposed building rail lines, pipelines and roads that connect Azerbaijan to its exclave of Nakhchivan, named the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity and set to begin construction next year.
Trump has often bragged of having ended multiple wars during his second term in the White House.
But his status as ‘the peace President’ has been tenuous as the fighting in Iran has now surpassed months.
An aerial view of Firebird’s data center in Hrazdan, Armenia
The deals have become a part of Trump’s increasing ties with Jensen Huang, Nvidia’s CEO and eighth on the Forbes Rich List, who advises the President on artificial intelligence
However, Trump has claimed to have ended at least ten wars during his second term after a mid-August ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon.
Trump said on Truth Social at the time: ‘It has been my honor to solve nine wars across the world, and this will be my tenth, so let’s GET IT DONE!’
Trump insisted Friday that the US conflict with Iran is not a war, doubling down on his assertion that the deadly, more than six-month military campaign in Iran is ‘small potatoes.’
Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office, Trump was asked about the war in Iran, and to respond to Vice President JD Vance’s claim, one day earlier, that the ongoing conflict is ‘not a war.’
‘I’ll tell you what,’ Trump said. ‘A lot of people call it a war. I call it a military conflict, because it’s small potatoes,’ Trump said.
At least 18 US service members have been killed in the war with Iran since it began in February 2026, according to data from the Department of Defense, and a much higher number – at least 767 US service members – have been injured.
