Ukraine frets about new Belarus front in war with Russia

Belarus is being dragged by Moscow into opening a new front in the war in Ukraine, which could force Kyiv to divert resources and attention away from its counteroffensives in the east and south of the country, Ukrainian officials say.

Alexander Lukashenko, the Belarusian leader, on Monday said he was sending his troops alongside Russian forces close to the border with Ukraine, accusing Kyiv and its western allies of preparing an attack against Belarus. Lukashenko announced the deployment two days after meeting Russian president Vladimir Putin in St Petersburg.

In a video call on Tuesday Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy told G7 leaders that “Russia is trying to directly involve Belarus in this war, playing a provocation with the fact that we are allegedly preparing an attack on this country”.

“Indirectly, she has already drawn them in. And seeks to pull in directly,” he added.

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Zelenskiy insisted Kyiv had no plans to attack Belarus. He called on G7 allies to support the deployment of an international monitoring mission along the 1,000km border between Ukraine and Belarus “to remove even the suggestion of any threat allegedly from us”.

Russia used Belarus as a staging ground for its February 24th invasion, sending thousands of its troops across the border in the assault on Kyiv and firing missiles from Belarusian air bases against Ukrainian targets. In recent days, it has deployed Iranian-supplied Shahed-136 kamikaze drones to Belarusian air bases, according to Ukrainian military intelligence.

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Minsk is supplying Russian forces with arms and ammunition but has so far not sent any of its 60,000 mostly conscripted troops into battle – at least not under the flag of Belarus. Lukashenko has resisted direct involvement in the conflict, fearing a public or even military backlash that could endanger his grip on power, say analysts and opposition leaders.

Lukashenko has ruled the country since 1994 and clung to the presidency in 2020, using Moscow’s help to crush mass protests over a fraudulent election.

“If there is such an order from Lukashenko [to fight], people will just switch sides and defect,” said Franak Viačorka, senior adviser to Belarus opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya. “What they can do is recruit people in [paramilitary] groups like Wagner but not engage with a regular army. I don’t believe Belarusians will go to Ukraine to fight on the Russian side.”

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Viačorka said the joint deployment of Belarusian and Russian troops – the so-called regional grouping of forces – was intended to legalise the Russian presence in Belarus and “create pressure on Ukraine, distract their forces and create tensions on the border”.

The RGF deployment could herald the arrival of new Russian military formations following Moscow’s partial mobilisation order last month. Unconfirmed reports this week suggested Russian forces had already started to arrive at bases in Belarus.

Mykhailo Samus, director of the New Geopolitics Research Network in Kyiv, said with the threat of fresh attack from the north of Ukraine, Moscow could pin down “several brigades” of Ukrainian troops – some 30,000 – that could otherwise be engaged in counter-offensive operations in the east and south of the country.

“It would be trying to open a new front, which would be a challenge for Ukraine,” Samus added.

Analysts at the Institute for the Study of War said that, while Russia might use Belarus’s military bases to house and train thousands of freshly mobilised troops, it would not turn them quickly into a ground strike force. They also judged it was “exceedingly unlikely that these are leading indicators of imminent Belarusian involvement in Ukraine on Russia’s behalf”.

“The Kremlin may seek to use additional Russian forces in Belarus to fix Ukrainian forces near Kyiv and prevent their redeployment elsewhere to participate in counteroffensives. ISW has previously assessed that Lukashenko cannot afford the domestic ramifications of Belarusian involvement in Ukraine.”

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Reports from Ukrainian military intelligence that Belarus had sent 492 tonnes of weapons and military equipment by rail to Russian forces in Crimea and was preparing several other trainloads suggested Moscow was probably not building up a new attack force in Belarus, the ISW said.

“If troops are deployed, we will need to see where they will be sent to and what capabilities they will display. Only then will we be able to assess whether Ukraine is again under threat from the Belarus direction,” said Konrad Muzyka of Rochan Consulting, a Poland-based military advisory service.

For the moment, Belarus was not concentrating its forces and its posture still looked defensive, Muzyka added. But he said the threatening rhetoric from Minsk could be preparation for a false-flag operation to provide a pretext for Belarusian involvement.

Daniel Speckhard, a former US ambassador to Minsk, said it made no sense for Russia’s overstretched military to open up another long front in Belarus. But Moscow did not always think rationally in its war with the West – “an eastern way of thinking that the Ukrainians understand”.

“To start this other front, it is going to be through manufacturing a provocation which means that Belarus has no alternative but to join Russia in the fight.” – Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2022