Muraveiko: everything ready for deployment of troops and start of Zapad-2025 exercise on time
The Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces, First Deputy Defence Minister of Belarus Pavel Muraveiko, shared some details about preparations and specifics of the upcoming Zapad-2025 exercise, sb.by reports with reference to the Telegram channel of the Defence Ministry
Photo by Belarus’ Defence Ministry
"We have actually entered the final phase of preparations for the main event of this year: the Zapad-2025 joint strategic exercise of the armed forces of Belarus and Russia," Mr. Muraveiko noted. “The final reconnaissance – as part of which we co-ordinated the areas of deployment of troops and command posts, and also identified the territories and training ranges where the drills will be mostly concentrated – is over by now, and all these facilities, which have been prepared in terms of engineering, meet the requirements envisaged by the exercise. They are ready for the deployment of troops that are arriving and for the practicing of a whole range of combat training tasks. Today's reconnaissance [held on July 23rd] has been prescheduled, and I am satisfied with the work of all those who are interested in the process, who are responsible for preparing and conducting it. In fact, we are ready to receive troops and begin the exercise on time.”
Speaking about the specifics of the upcoming manoeuvres and the reaction of neighbouring countries to the exercise, the Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces stressed, “Taking into consideration the difficult military and political situation, given that Belarus is constantly being accused of aggressive intentions, we made a decision to relocate the areas where the exercise will be held away from our borders. I would like to note that this move should not be viewed as our weakness, loyalty or a response to some claims. This is just one of the steps aimed to stabilise the situation and calm the international community down. However, our Western colleagues began to speculate on this process. Poland has announced that it is ready to conduct divisional-scale exercises near our borders in the area of Grodno and Belovezhskaya Pushcha. Lithuania is redeploying its Iron Wolf brigade to the Pabrade training ground, planning to conduct operations just 15km from our border. Under these conditions, we reserve the right to make a decision and relocate some of our units during the exercise in order to practice episodes of an exclusively defensive nature, including in the areas I have mentioned.”
Another feature of the exercise is the deliberate avoidance of any issues of the offensive nature. Zapad-2025 envisages exclusively defensive episodes that enable the Union State to protect and ensure its security.
"Thirdly, we have reduced the number of troops, since the territory of the exercise and the directions we would like to practice have been narrowed,” Mr. Muraveiko continued. “Earlier, we stated that this would be a fairly large-scale event, but the number of troops participating in the exercise has actually been halved by now. Fourthly, we plan to use all the latest achievements of modern military art during the main combat training episodes – in particular, unmanned aerial vehicles, electronic warfare systems, various robotic and automated complexes – and to develop and use modern techniques of air defence and anti-drone warfare.”
Belarus is committed to the established principles. "Demonstrating our peacefulness and openness, we plan to invite observers from various countries to our exercise in order to confirm our commitment to a set of measures to ensure confidence and security. Among those planned for invitation are member states of the CSTO, the Commonwealth of Independent States, the Shanghai Co-operation Organisation, and the countries of the far arc. In addition, we plan to invite the accredited military attaches, as well as the OSCE participating states within the framework of the Vienna Document, to which we remain committed and which provisions we continue to meet,” the Major General added.
