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Why the world should be paying attention to Putin’s plans for Belarus
Belarus president Alexander Lukashenko and Vladimir Putin
An incorporation of Belarus into the Russian Federation would provide Moscow with an unbroken land-bridge from Russia proper to the Baltic Sea.
A strategic coup that Putin would certainly utilize to destabilize the Baltic States, and create a massive military problem for NATO.
Belarus president Alexander Lukashenko and Vladimir Putin
1/4/19
While Belarus essentially stays the same, its large eastern neighbor is changing. In particular, the ambitions of Lukashenko’s fellow de facto dictator, Russian President Vladimir Putin, are growing. With his economy still weak and his popularity wavering, Putin has acquired a need for spectacular foreign policy successes. The warm glow that followed his occupation of Crimea has faded, his intervention in Syria is complicated, and it would take a real military effort to occupy more of Ukraine. Though he may eventually decide to make that effort, it’s also possible, in the meantime, that Russia will swallow Belarus. The two countries are already, theoretically, part of something called the “Union State of Belarus and Russia,” and the two countries conduct joint military exercises. But in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2014, Lukashenko has sought to protect his independence and project a different image, occasionally defying Russian requests, pursuing a somewhat independent foreign policy and even, as a gesture toward the West, releasing his political opponents from jail, though they still get detained on the way to demonstrations.
Now Moscow seems intent on removing the fig leaf. In the past few weeks, Lukashenko and Putin have met at least twice. The Russian finance minister has announced the “further integration” of the two countries. The Belarusian defense minister has declared that U.S. troops in Poland could perhaps constitute a “military threat,” which is not language that Lukashenko’s government has used before. The Russian government has raised energy prices in Belarus. There is talk of Russia taking over a whole suite of Belarusian government operations, including customs, visas, and monetary and tax policies. And that’s the “moderate” takeover model: A more extreme version could include the declaration of a new political entity, ruled by a single president, presumably one whose first name starts with a “V.” Lukashenko has already publicly dismissed Russian pressure as “blackmail,” and a Belarusian dissident told me that independent economists there believe Belarus could hold out, even if Russia uses its gas pipelines as a form of pressure. But she also agreed that a future Russian-Belarusian state can’t be ruled out: Lukashenko has stayed in power all of these decades because he is good at understanding which way the wind is blowing. If Russia makes him an offer he can’t refuse, then he won’t resist.
An incorporation of Belarus into the Russian Federation would provide Moscow with an unbroken land-bridge from Russia proper to the Baltic Sea.
A strategic coup that Putin would certainly utilize to destabilize the Baltic States, and create a massive military problem for NATO.