Military Expert: Lukashenka’s Provocations Pursue Two Goals

Alarmist statements may be heard from Minsk again.

Self-proclaimed ruler of Belarus Aliaksandr Lukashenka said that Ukraine is moving its troops to the borders, where it is allegedly deploying American equipment.

In turn, press secretary of the Ukrainian border service Andriy Demchenko assessed such statements as another manifestation of information provocations on the instructions of Russia.

“This is not the first time that Belarus has provided information that Ukraine poses a threat and is getting stronger. This is another part of the information operation carried out by Belarus with the support of Russia,” Andriy Demchenko said in a commentary for Ukrainian television.

Also, reserve major of the National Guard of Ukraine, veteran of the Russian-Ukrainian war Oleksiy Hetman emphasized in a commentary for the Charter97.org website that Ukraine is not going to attack Belarus. “We definitely do not need this. We have no imperial ambitions, no territorial claims against your country. An attack from Belarus is a very possible scenario, because it is an ally of the Russian Federation, which is waging a war against us. But there is practically no chance of passing the line of defense that we have built in the north,” Oleksiy Hetman is sure.

A Voice of America correspondent asked Oleksandr Kovalenko, a military and political observer for the Information Resistance group, whether Minsk’s escalation of the situation was a deceptive trick, so that Ukraine would pull troops to the border with Belarus, weakening its group in other areas of Russian aggression?

According to the Ukrainian expert, this is a very realistic assessment of the situation, since the Belarusian authorities have been doing this since 2022, when Russian troops retreated from the northern bridgehead, and later even left the territory of Belarus. “Minsk constantly encourages provocations, makes various statements regarding threats, so that people pay attention to it,” Kovalenko believes.

He believes that two goals are being pursued in this case. The first is aimed at the domestic consumer in order to intimidate local residents that there is allegedly a threat of war with Ukraine, which has “predatory intentions” towards Belarus.

“And this is not Lukashenka's invention. The same thing is happening in Transnistria, where for 30 years various rumors have been spreading that Moldova, Ukraine, Romania or NATO are about to attack them. And the Minsk regime has been using this since 2022 to distract the attention of Belarusians from internal problems — social, economic and so on,” the military-political observer of the Information Resistance group gives an example.

The second reason for this information-psychological special operation of Minsk and Moscow, according to Oleksandr Kovalenko, is an attempt to tie down the forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the northern direction. “Since 2022, a significant number of forces have been on the border with Belarus, which are intended to prevent possible attacks from the territory of Belarus, including Russian troops. These are combat-ready units and this is a constraining element that affects the fact that we cannot use them in some other important area of real combat clashes,” he emphasizes.

And he adds that this is not about the transfer of forces from the front, since the situation there is already difficult, but about the fact that combat-ready units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine will be forced to remain on the northern borders of the country without the possibility that they can be transferred to reinforce the Pokrovsk or Kramatorsk direction.

“Lukashenka regularly states that he is threatened by Poland, Ukraine, and NATO in general. The only difference in the current statements is that threats have begun to use nuclear weapons, which Belarus itself does not have. He is already competing with Medvedev in this rhetoric. Currently, units are deployed on the territory of Belarus that provide air defense cover, technical personnel, a radar complex, and electronic warfare operators — that is, rear support, and not combat assault units. There are about 400 Wagnerites there on a permanent basis, who are engaged in training Belarusian units of both regular troops and other security agencies,” Oleksandr Kovalenko shares information.

And at the end of the conversation, he notes that, most likely, alarmist statements about a “threat” to the security of the Republic of Belarus from Ukraine and neighboring EU states will be heard from Minsk at intervals of three to four months. “The cyclicality of such statements is quite stable,” the military-political observer of the Information Resistance group sarcastically concludes.

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