Russia does military exercises regularly, but this year’s version, underway right now, deserves especially close attention. It’s called Zapad (“West”) and involves thousands of troops doing maneuvers on the borders of the Baltic states and Poland. The motivating scenario is to defend against an imagined invasion of Belarus by foreign-backed extremists. One of the fictional enemy states, “Vesbaria,” seems to be a thinly disguised Lithuania; the other, “Lubenia,” looks a bit like Poland. There will no doubt be the usual low-level provocations, with Russian planes buzzing borders, that will make the whole passive-aggressive show of strength look more like an invasion of the West than the other way around.
OP-ED
Andrew Wilson: Is Russia practicing a dry run for an invasion of Belarus?
A Belarus' military helicopter team take part in a pilot rescue training as part of the Zapad military exercises, near the town of Ruzhany, some 235 km (147 miles) south-west of Minsk, on Sept. 17. Russia and Belarus began an operation involving thousands of troops, tanks and aircraft on NATO's eastern edge practicing how to hunt down and destroy armed spies, among other maneuvers.
