Putin-Lukashenko Alliance: New Front with 120,000 Soldiers?
An expert strongly disagrees
Created: 2022-10-16 04:50
By: Patrick Mayer
A Belarusian opposition politician warns of a huge army in his country with Russia and a Ukraine front in the north.
A military expert has a different take on Vladimir Putin's plans.
Munich/Minsk/Moscow — They want to try it together in the Ukraine war.
At least they say so.
Russia's ruler Vladimir Putin and Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko want to jointly set up a regional army association in Belarus.
Lukashenko announced this earlier in the week.
Allies in the Ukraine war: Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko and Russia's ruler Vladimir Putin.
© IMAGO / SNA
Ukraine war: Is a military alliance between Russia and Belarus coming?
An empty or serious threat from Minsk?
At least Kyiv reacted immediately.
Ukraine is taking "measures" to ensure that Ukrainian troops are "available in adequate numbers, with the necessary weapons, military equipment and combat capability" on the border with Belarus, Lt. Gen. Serhii Naiev said, according to
The Kyiv Independent
.
Advisable?
hasty?
At least one Belarusian opposition politician is convinced that Putin and Lukashenko are planning an invasion from Belarus next spring.
"Our sources say that the Russians want to station 120,000 soldiers in Belarus by then," Pawel Latuschka, who lives in exile in Warsaw, told the
editorial network Germany (RND)
.
Our sources say that the Russians want to station 120,000 troops in Belarus by then.
Pavel Latushka, Belarusian opposition politician
After agreement between Vladimir Putin and Alexander Lukashenko - new Ukraine front in the north?
He currently estimates the number of Russian soldiers in his country at around 5,000, spread across four Russian military bases.
The background to the Russian-Belarusian plans is to build up a potential threat in order to force Ukraine to move more troops to its own northern border, explained former Minister of Culture Latuschka: "That would force Ukraine to withdraw forces in the south or east.
Putin uses our country for his aggression and Lukashenko is the useful idiot.”
Lukashenko will try to upgrade the Belarusian army from the current 65,000 to 100,000 soldiers by spring, says Latuschka: “It will be difficult for him.
We are a peaceful people, our people don't want to fight against the Ukrainians.
They see no reason for this war and do not want to die for Putin.”
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But how big is this potential threat really?
Belarusian Defense Minister Viktor Chrenin had ruled out his country's active participation in Russia's war of aggression shortly after Lukashenko's announcement.
"We don't want to fight Lithuanians, or Poles, or Ukrainians," he said in a video message this Monday (October 10).
France's Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna had also warned Belarus against entering the war.
"We must warn the country.
Any additional support for the war that Russia is waging against Ukraine will result in further sanctions," she said on French television.
In addition, a military expert doubts that Belarus is able to field such a large army together with Russian troops.
The Austrian Gustav Gressel from the European Council on Foreign Relations explained his assessment at the beginning of the week in the program "ZDF spezial".
Russia-Ukraine War: Belarusian army ties up Ukrainian troops in north
“We still have to watch what comes out of it.
The Belarusian armed forces are undermanned.
They also have far fewer contract and professional soldiers than the Russian armed forces.
They are not designed to lead these, in quotation marks, special operations," Gressel told ZDF and said: "It is difficult for Lukashenko to keep up with the Russian pace, despite the pressure that Putin is putting on him.
So far, maneuvers have been held and attempts have been made to make Ukraine nervous with military movements so that it will keep troops in the rear and not send all its forces to the Donbass.
But they didn't dare to march in and form a new axis.
The Belarusian army itself is too small for that.”
Because according to Western estimates, the army of the autocratic country with its approximately 9.5 million inhabitants has around 45,000 active soldiers.
"Because it mainly relies on conscripts, it is not without risk domestically" for ruler Lukashenko, explains Gressel.
Now you have to see “whether something with substance is created there”.
Nevertheless, he makes it clear: "The de facto entry into the war has been going on since February because Belarus is making its territory available, because Belarus is making ammunition and material available to continue the war."
(pm)
