For more than a week, the situation on the Belarus-Ukraine border has remained tensely stable. This naturally causes alarm about the threat of a repeated attack on Kyiv, or on the Volyn and Polissya directions. The situation is fueled by the creation of a “joint grouping of troops” by lukashenko and putin, constant threats towards Kyiv and baseless accusations that Ukraine is preparing for an attack.
❗️That is why the possible offensive of russian and Belarusian troops in the North of the country remains one of the main topics of discussion among Ukrainian politicians, military and experts.
As of mid-October, a group of about 9,000 russian troops entered Belarus, about 170 tanks, up to 100 guns and mortars with a caliber of more than 100 mm, and up to 200 combat vehicles under the command of the general staff of the russian federation are expected to arrive.
❓ What are the prospects for new offensive actions by russia from Belarusian territory and what could be behind the beginning of the transfer of russian forces to the north of Ukraine?
🔸For russia, the main idea of the “Belarusian direction” is to open a “second northern front” by the end of the year in order to improve its situation in other areas of the contact line, in particular in the Kherson region. However, this opportunity for russia is complicated by the following factors.
🔸According to the estimates of military experts, the resource that must be concentrated by the russians in Belarus to create threats to Ukraine as part of a full-scale invasion should be at least 40 battalion tactical groups (BTGr) numbering about 24,000-28,000 fighters.
🔸The stated contingent of 9,000 poorly trained and not very motivated mobilized russians, who are currently being redeployed to Belarus, is about 12 BTGr, and without equipment. As of the end of 2021, the own ground forces of the Armed Forces of the Republic of Belarus numbered up to 17,000 soldiers, a large part of which are conscripts. The ability of the russians to form a sufficient group for the northern offensive in the planned time is highly doubtful.
🔸The combined forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine will not allow a repeat of the “Kyiv” scenario of February 2022, when the russians managed to advance to the suburbs of the capital in just a few days. The dynamics of the russian forces in the north are closely monitored, and our forces have the appropriate numbers, the necessary weapons and military equipment with a higher combat potential. The border regions of Rivne region (which shares a 218 km border with Belarus) prepared anti-tank ditches, mined areas on the border and took other defensive measures. The Armed Forces of Ukraine, including ground defense as a separate type of ground forces, and voluntary formations of territorial communities (VFTC) carry increased combat duty.
🔸40% of the northern regions of Ukraine bordering Belarus are covered with forests and swamps and crossed by 170 rivers, which are natural barriers for the movement of enemy equipment and troops.
🔸Such a scenario is personally unprofitable for lukashenko. Even with putin’s pressure, he will look for ways to avoid it. The beginning of a hidden partial mobilization in Belarus and the declared increase in the number of Belarusian soldiers to 70,000 may mean that moscow sees the Belarusian army as the basis of the group attacking from the north, which has no special motivation to fight in Ukraine. An independent Internet survey by the British think tank Chatham House showed that only 3% of respondents want to participate in hostilities on the side of russia, and more than 50% of respondents expressed their opposition to russia using Belarus as a springboard for an attack on Ukraine. It is very likely that in the event of hostilities, a large part of the Belarusian army will immediately disperse, others will surrender, and some will turn their weapons against lukashenko’s regime.
Therefore, a direct invasion of the Armed Forces of Belarus into Ukraine is only one of the options for the development of events.
🔸British intelligence analysts believe that russia currently does not have the necessary number of additional troops in Belarus to attack Ukraine again, and the activity of the Belarusian army and russian mobilized forces is aimed at withdrawing the forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine from more important directions in the East and South.
🔸However, the risk of a full-scale invasion of the Belarusian army has not disappeared, the potential threat from Belarus remains.
After all, Belarus will continue to remain a “military district” of russia, a buffer zone for russia to fulfill its tasks in the western strategic direction.
🔸The presence of a significant number of mobilized russians on the territory of Belarus gives putin a certain guarantee to advance any military scenario from the territory of Belarus, despite the position of lukashenko and the likely resistance of the armed forces and the population. Now the kremlin is implementing in Belarus the scenario of training a russian strike group without the participation of Belarusians, continuing to support the russian army at the expense of the Belarusian military-industrial complex, as well as training russian mobilized troops on Belarusian training grounds.
❗️But when the forces of the russian army will no longer be able to hold the defense on other fronts, putin can implement the scenario of the involvement of Belarusians for the offensive to the west of the Belarusian-Ukrainian border.
The level of preparation for this does not decrease. It is not for nothing that russia is trying to form a group of 120,000 on the territory of Belarus by the end of the year to implement the plan, which involves an attack in the direction of Lutsk-Lviv.
The russians have completely taken control of the air bases in Baranovichi and Lida and continue to use them for attacks on the territory of Ukraine. Iranian instructors were spotted in Belarus coordinating the launch of Shahed-136 kamikaze drones at infrastructure facilities in Ukraine. Also, since October 20, the Belarusian road center has completely closed access to video from cameras on the country’s roads. Before the beginning of the russian invasion of Ukraine, Belarus also closed access to cameras, in particular at the entrance and exit from the Belarusian border crossings.
In these conditions, Ukraine needs to be ready for any scenario of the development of events and work out ways to counter a possible attack from Belarus.
