Things Will End Badly For Lukashenko

The AFU is ready to respond to provocations.

Russia is preparing "something" in Belarus for the summer of 2025 under the cover of military exercises, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky said. And Russia can only prepare one thing - an invasion.

Beginning from 2022, the territory of Belarus has always been a potential threat to all its neighbors: to Ukraine (and it was from the Belarusian territory that the invasion of Russian troops took place), to the Baltic States (Russia still seeks revenge), to Poland (Moscow has not given up the idea of getting access to the Kaliningrad region and the Suwalki corridor). These threats persist to this day.

The threat level increases during military exercises, as they can be used to prepare for an attack. Therefore, it is important to keep an eye on what is happening in Belarus. However, the Russian contingent, which is now on the territory of Belarus, will not be enough for any operations. And there - about 2 thousand personnel, and it's mostly radio-technical units, airfield maintenance, air defense units and about a hundred "Wagnerites", that is, not even assault units. The Belarusian army is also not enough for any serious actions, and Lukashenko has never granted Russia permission to use the Belarusian army.

We need to watch how the size of the Russian contingent will change, and whether Russia uses the exercises as an excuse to build it up. If there are 10 thousand Russian troops in Belarus, it is not a big threat, and in this case we will not talk about any large invasions, but there will still be a risk of provocations and sabotage.

If on the eve of the exercises Russia increases the contingent to 20-30 thousand people, it will be dangerous. It will no longer be about the exercises, but about something else. Let me remind you that in 2022, almost 40,000 troops of the Russian Federation were advancing from the periphery of Belarus to Kiev. These troops were fully staffed with equipment, and they were elite units: Russian paratroopers, marines and SDF, i.e. military elite, well-trained and experienced. But even these forces were not enough for Moscow to capture Kiev. Russian troops reached Kiev, but after a month they "deflated".

But moreover, given the fact that today Russia has a catastrophic shortage of equipment, inexperienced troops, serious problems with human resources and officers, we can conclude that 40,000 Russian troops will definitely not be enough to carry out an operation against Ukraine as in 2022. Now Russia will need an 80,000-strong army, even more. After all, now there is almost 100-thousand group of Russian troops near Pokrovsk, but there is no result.

In addition, the Kiev and Chernigov regions are ready to meet the enemy.

If we talk about the threat to Europe, Russia's 40-thousand troops will not help either. If there are 80-100 thousand servicemen, their fulfillment of serious tasks will be more or less realistic, but it takes months to gather such a number of people. At the same time, the process of forming a strike group cannot be carried out unnoticed - we will observe it not for days or weeks, but for months, and, accordingly, we will be preparing to meet "neighbors".

Now there are no significant Russian movements in this direction at all. Except that the enemy has revitalized railroad communication, but even this revival is not too significant. In addition, some military units are building and expanding personnel quarters - most likely, this is being done just for exercises to accommodate Russian personnel in these quarters. I do not rule out that they will deploy field camps in the summer.

But I emphasize that if a serious threat to Ukraine or the EU countries was being prepared, the Russians would have to move a huge group of troops to Belarus, which cannot be assembled even in a month. If Russia wants to repeat the invasion in 2022, there should be 80-100 thousand people. If it plans to carry out sabotage operations and provocations, a small number of people will suffice. Remember 2020-2021, when Belarusians gave Poland a migration crisis on the border - this is one of the "hybrid" tools. In the same way, they can carry out some daring operations in the border strip now, for example, mining the tracks where Polish border patrols pass.

At the same time, it is possible that Russia may try to stretch the front line with small forces and start fighting in Chernihiv region, without digging deep into the territory of Ukraine. But if such actions are carried out from the territory of Belarus, Ukraine will definitely respond, and on Belarusian territory. If in 2022 we behaved with restraint and political correctness towards Belarus, even not responding to strikes from the Belarusian territory against our country, this time everything will be different - Ukrainian units and our zones of control will definitely appear on the territory of Belarus.

By the way, it will be the same story with the Bryansk region, if the Russians decide to start hostilities from there and enter the territory of Ukraine. For them it will be the worst option, because the group of Russian troops "Bryansk", located in the Bryansk region, has a little more than 10 thousand personnel. This is not comparable to either the Kursk group, which has almost 60 thousand, or the Belgorod group, which has 55 thousand. Therefore, the question is what these 10 thousand will do there.

In addition, if we talk about the threat to Sumy region or Chernigov region from the Bryansk region of the Russian Federation, the Bryansk region is forests and swamps, and there are only some areas where it is possible to entrench and take positions. If the Russians do not aim to penetrate deep into the territory of Ukraine along the main routes and logistic arteries, for example, through Gorodnya or Semenovka, but fight exclusively in the border strip, then, firstly, they will be eaten there by insects (especially ours, from biolaboratories), and, secondly, our counter-sabotage actions will dominate both Ukrainian and Russian territory, because we can enter the territory of Bryansk region and form buffer zones there. There are not so many forces and means in the Bryansk region that could stop us.

Lukashenko will not provide the Belarusian troops to Putin for new operations - unless he allows them to operate from the Belarusian territory. Lukashenko is unable to do more than that, because he needs the Belarusian army to defend himself from his own people.

And what is there in the Belarusian army! It is only 14 thousand ground troops. But - an interesting point - the Belarusian army has more regular equipment than the Russian army. Nevertheless, the Belarusian troops are not trained and have no military experience. It is such a "paper" army.

And besides, how long will these 14 thousand be enough for! Look at the losses incurred by the Russian army in this "meat grinder" every month - at this rate there will be nothing left of the Belarusians in a month. Then how will Lukashenko defend himself from his own people? Then protests may start in Belarus, and things will end badly for Lukashenko.

However, I wouldn't be surprised if Putin does go ahead and invade one of the NATO countries. He sees that the Trump administration is destroying the concept of world security that has existed for centuries and all the advances in world law, and he may try to test the West to see if it can be tested. And that would be a disaster, because no matter how amorphous and archaic NATO is, this alliance slowly but slowly works. So for Russia to attack one of the NATO countries would be a shot in the temple.

Putin's attack on Ukraine in 2022 was irrational and illogical because Russia was not prepared for such a war. Unpredictable and irrational steps on Putin's part are quite possible now - he needs "movement", so he can arrange it in one of the NATO countries. And he can resort to such actions not only with regard to the Baltic States or Poland, but also with regard to the Scandinavian countries, Sweden and Finland.

If Putin sees that NATO is not working, he will continue the world war against everyone. Moreover, he will drag other dictatorships into this war, and then in the long run North Korean soldiers may well appear not only in Ukraine, but also in Estonia.

If we are talking about such countries as Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, the quantitative advantage of a 100,000-strong group of Russians over the armies of these countries will be obvious. Therefore, the threat of a quick and complete takeover of these countries by Russia is quite real if it can gather such an army. Almost all of these countries have pretty good transportation branching, and the logistics work fine - Russia can take advantage of this for a quick advance and takeover. 100,000 troops could be enough for Russia to move into Estonia, and Russian troops will be very hard to dislodge when NATO finally comes to its senses.

So the Russians do have the ability to move in and take over parts of certain NATO countries at the same time. For example, if we talk about the Suvalka corridor, then to maintain control over it Russia will need to take control of Lithuania, blocking ports in Latvia and Estonia, so that there is no support for Lithuania through the sea. Accordingly, Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia, all three countries at once, are at risk. And Poland is a kind of southern and southwestern flank, which will have to be formed to hold the corridor. So even in four countries Russia will have to conduct an operation to control the exit to the Kaliningrad region.

Alexander Kovalenko, "Glavred"

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