Military drills in Belarus unlikely to turn into new offensive against Ukraine – expert

This was stated in an interview with Ukrinform by military expert Mykhailo Samus, Director of the New Geopolitics Research Network.

"No, currently, there are no grounds for that. In fact, the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Republic of Belarus has already officially announced a reduction in the scale of the drills: the number of participants will be halved – from the originally announced 13,000 to 7,000 troops. That scale no longer seems serious," the expert noted.

According to Samus, if that number includes Russian troops as well, then any talk of a threat to Kyiv or Volyn region is “completely inappropriate.”

“To carry out such an operation, they would need to deploy a force of 150,000 to 200,000 troops,” he emphasized.

At the same time, the expert does not rule out that under the guise of these exercises, Russia may redirect efforts to another region — specifically toward the Baltic States and Northern Europe.

“There’s another, far more realistic hypothesis: under the cover of these exercises, the Russians could concentrate forces in the Leningrad Military District, creating potential threats to new NATO members and the Baltic states,” Samus said.

He stressed that the Zapad (West) drills are not limited to Belarusian territory. According to him, it involves broader military activity that spans the territory of the former Western Military District, which is now split between the Leningrad and Moscow districts.

“The reduction in the number of troops involved in the Belarusian exercises may be a deliberate move to redistribute military activity to the northwest of Russia,” the expert suggested.

In his opinion, a new strike group could be formed there, aimed not so much at the Suwałki Gap, but rather at applying potential pressure on Finland, Estonia, and other Nordic countries.

“This is not just about a demonstration of force, but also about possible provocations aimed at testing NATO’s unity and triggering debate about the application of Article 5 of the NATO Charter. That scenario seems much more likely,” Samus concluded.

As reported earlier, the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) believes that Russia and Belarus have scaled back the joint Zapad-2025 drills planned for September, and moved the main maneuvers farther from Belarus’s western borders likely to create the appearance of cooperation while diverting attention from Russia’s limited military capabilities outside Ukraine.