The last time Russia and Belarus held major joint military drills in 2022, Moscow sent its troops into Ukraine just days later. Now the two close allies are conducting war games again, raising tensions anew in the region The war games, dubbed “Zapad 2025,” or “West 2025,” take place in Belarus starting Friday and will last until Sept. 16. Troops from both countries will simulate repelling an attack, including airstrikes and sabotage, according to official reports. The aim is to showcase the close links between Moscow and Minsk, as well as Russian military might amid its 3½-year-old war in neighboring Ukraine.
The war games have drawn concerns in Kyiv and its Western allies of Latvia, Lithuania and Poland, which border Belarus.
Russian President Vladimir Putin sent troops rolling into Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022, many of them crossing from Belarus. The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry said this year’s exercise “hinders peaceful efforts” by U.S. President Donald Trump to end the war and “poses an immediate threat not only to Ukraine, but also to Poland, the Baltic states and all of Europe.” On Wednesday, tensions in the region spiked even further after
Poland said multiple Russian drones entered its territory and were shot down with help from NATO allies. A significant number came from Belarus, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said.
Belarusian defense officials initially said about 13,000 troops would participate in the exercise that was to take place near its western border. In May, however, its Defense Ministry said the number would be cut nearly in half, and that the main maneuvers would take place deeper inside the country. Parts of the exercise will also take place inside Russia. Last month, Defense Minister Viktor Khrenin said most of the exercise will happen around the city of Barysaw, about 74 kilometers (46 miles) northeast of Minsk, although some “small units will carry out practical tasks to repel a hypothetical enemy” in areas close to the border with Poland and Lithuania. Two of five new fortifications that have been erected for the drills also are located in those areas, Khrenin said. Belarus also sent formal invitations to all member states of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and nine countries with NATO military attaches in Minsk to monitor the drills. The past year has seen regular releases of political prisoners and public calls for a rapprochement with the West. Lukashenko spoke by phone last month with Trump, who called him a “highly respected President” in a social media post. That’s a stark contrast from other Western leaders, who have largely shunned the Belarusian. During this year’s drills, the troops will practice “planning the use of” Russian nuclear weapons and nuclear-capable intermediate range missiles that Moscow has promised to supply to Minsk, according to Khrenin. In December, Lukashenko and Putin signed a treaty giving security guarantees to Belarus, including the possible use of Russian nuclear weapons to help repel any aggression. Even before the Polish drone incursion, Tusk said Tuesday the Zapad exercises constituted “very aggressive” military maneuvers “very close” to his country’s border, accompanied by “provocations” by Russia and Belarus. Poland is responding with its own military exercises. Tusk added that the Suwalki Gap — a strategic stretch of land in Poland and Lithuania that separates Belarus from Russia’s Baltic Sea exclave of Kaliningrad — was one of the targets of Zapad, and he suggested there was a fear in Poland that they might be practice for a later attack. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy repeatedly has warned that Russia might be plotting another attack during the drills.
NN: For whom the bells toll……. Lithuania y be next
