Lukashenka Plays The Servant Of Two Masters

The Belarusian dictator is torn between Moscow and Beijing.

Deployment of tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus. Is this the last raise of bets by Putin?

1. Putin de facto goes all-in. He goes for direct nuclear blackmail, although, as usual, the devil is in the details.

2. He does not transfer weapons to Lukashenka, but only builds a storage facility in Belarus. In other words, he is building his nuclear military base in Belarus covering it with the "union state" (he is going to exclude the argument about the violation of the non-proliferation treaty by Belarus this way). It is important that in this way he narrows the field of manoeuvre for Lukashenka, who has begun to play the servant of two masters for Moscow and Beijing.

3. Putin clearly announced the date for the commissioning of this facility - June 2023. That is, this construction has already begun, but now he is telling the whole world: "You have time until June. Who knows what happens next?"

4. What will happen next? I am deeply convinced that nothing. This is another raising of bets so that the world gets scared and sits down with Putin at the negotiating table.

De facto, this is almost the last round of raising bets by Putin. He is looking forward to getting the world scared. If not, then he simply will not have trump cards. And so the main task of our diplomacy is to prevent fear among our partners.

Particular attention should be paid to the "Chinese trace" in this story.

Beijing is definitely not interested in any kind of nuclear strike. After this statement, Beijing's role in resolving this issue has only grown. Consciously or not, Putin is reducing Moscow's role in the international game, acting as the "Great Kim" and forcing Beijing to become an intermediary in this vast and primitive game.

Putin is pushing the Western world not so much to talk to him as to talk to Xi Jinping.

Vadym Denysenko, Facebook