Posted:
03.02.2022 14:13:00
War and peace
World military spending is growing, militarisation is intensifying in Europe, foreign military forces are becoming more active near the Belarusian borders
There are from 8 to 10 thousand military personnel of the United States of America on a rotational basis in the territory of Poland and the Baltic countries. What are Americans doing here? Why do you reproach us, Russia, that we are carrying out some kind of manoeuvres, training exercises and so on, if you have come to distant lands here? What will you do here? Certain ‘hotheads’ are already openly calling for war. We hear these statements.
(January 17th, 2022, when listening to a report on the concept of a joint operational exercise of the Armed Forces of Belarus and Russia).
Fighting spirit
Aleksei Avdonin, an analyst with the Belarusian Institute of Strategic Research (BISR), notes the constant growth of military spending and the formation of an offensive infrastructure and a grouping of NATO forces in relation to the Union State,“By the level of growth in defence spending and the purchase of weapons and military equipment by countries, one can judge the degree of ‘pumping’ the regions with the ‘spirit of militarism’ and creating conditions for subsequent bloodshed. Recent events in the European part of the Eurasian continent reflect the constant growth of tension and the mutual demonstration of military force.”The key indicator of the militarisation of the regions of the world is the level of defence spending, which determines the possibilities for the purchase of weapons and military equipment.
In general, in Europe, according to the UN Register of Conventional Arms, intensive deliveries of weapons and military equipment were observed to Poland, the Baltic countries, Scandinavia, the Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Romania and Ukraine.
Aleksei Avdonin notes that over the past three to five years, military exercises have been intensively conducted in the territory of Poland and the Baltic countries with full or partial deployment of NATO forces and assets in the eastern direction. The nature of the exercise indicates that the United States and NATO are practicing the issues of conducting a full-scale offensive operation using tanks, artillery, and anti-tank brigade groups.
The situation with the neighbours is escalating
Indicative figures were announced by Pavel Muraveiko, Deputy Chief of the General Staff, Chief of the Central Operations Office:• More than 12,000 US troops are deployed in Europe under NATO’s two operations Atlantic Resolve and Enhanced Forward Presence alone.
• The mission to protect the airspace of the Baltic states is carried out by about 300 different military personnel from NATO countries, as well as 6-8 F-16 or F-35 aircraft.
• Within the framework of this activity alone, more than 20,000 military personnel are deployed on the territory of Poland. Of these, 15,000 are representatives of the ground forces.
• In the Baltic States, there are more than 12 thousand military personnel: representatives of the army, police, border guards.
• Today, there are more than 32 camps where these military personnel are deployed in the immediate vicinity of our border and perform various tasks.
Living under a rock
“We order the most modern tanks. Top-of-the-line tanks, battle-tested, built to take on Russia’s most advanced T-14 Armata tanks. These tanks will be on the first line of defence, if, of course, there is a need for such protection,” the Polish media quoted the Head of the Ministry of Defence.
By the way, in August 2020, Poland and the United States completed negotiations on expanded cooperation in the defence sector. One of the new measures was the deployment of a thousand additional American soldiers in Poland — 4.5 thousand US troops were already stationed there.
In addition, Poland wants to completely upgrade the air defence of the ground forces and strengthen the air defence with the latest short-range systems. To achieve their goal, by 2035, the Poles plan to buy 23 batteries of the latest air defence systems. The cost of the programme is estimated at $7.5-15 billion.
Not for safety
Earlier, the United States also promised to supply Ukraine with a new batch of military aid in the coming weeks to strengthen the country’s defence capability. According to a State Department official, Washington has delivered more security systems to Kiev in 2021 than at any time since 2014, “I can assure you that these shipments are ongoing and more are planned in the coming weeks. As soon as Russia invades Ukraine, we will provide Ukrainians with additional defence materials.”
The Ukrainian authorities also announced that they intend to create a new type of troops by 2026 — coastal missile troops, which will include three divisions of the new Neptune complex. By the second quarter of 2022, the first division will be fully formed, which will soon be on combat duty.
Cover
At the end of December last year, it became known that the US authorities approved the sale of Javelin anti-tank missile systems to the Lithuanians in the amount of $125 million. Vilnius acquired 30 launchers, as well as 341 missiles. At the same time, Lithuania’s initial request was about three times less. According to Washington, ‘the sale of weapons to the Lithuanians will not lead to a change in the balance of power in the region’.By the way, Lithuania’s military budget last year was 2.01-2.09 percent of GDP, or more than $1.2 billion. The BISR analyst Aleksei Avdonin notes,
“To justify the need for a constant increase in defence spending, Poland and the Baltic countries are using the hysteria around ‘possible Russian aggression’, including to cover up their own plans to pull weapons and NATO forces to the borders of the Russian Federation.”
By Dmitry Umpirovich, Polina Konoga
