With the quadrennial Zapad military exercises just six weeks away, Russian troops and military equipment have begun arriving in Belarus.
The Belarusian Defense Ministry announced on Telegram on July 27 that the latest contingent of Russian soldiers arrived at the Polonka railway station in western Belarus where they were greeted with bread and salt by servicemen from the Belarusian 11th Separate Guards Mechanized Brigade.
According to Rochan Consulting, which is tracking the runup to Zapad-2021 on its blog, we are “seeing the introduction of the most prominent, best equipped Russian ground units into Belarus, which in itself is significant. But it is just the start.”
Every four years, the Zapad exercises are a cause for vigilance and concern for Western military planners and analysts, as well as for the countries along NATO’s eastern flank.
In the runup to the Zapad-2017 exercises, some observers feared that Russia could use the exercises to launch a fresh assault on Ukraine, stage a provocation against Poland or Lithuania, or as a pretext to keep troops in Belarus. And while those fears were not realized then, there is growing concern that this year’s Zapad exercises, scheduled for September 10-16, could be different.