Belarus announces major joint exercise with Russia for 2025

Exercises of the so-called regional grouping of troops of Belarus and Russia will take place in Belarus in 2025.

Source: Viktor Khrenin, Minister of Defence of Belarus, in an interview with Russian propagandists; Belaruski Hajun, a Belarusian independent military monitoring project

Details: Khrenin said that the main task of the regional grouping of troops is to "ensure the military security of the Union State".

Quote: "The whole range of activities that we are planning and carrying out revolves around this task. The regional grouping includes almost all the Armed Forces of the Republic of Belarus. From the Russian Federation, we have a number of formations and military units from the Aerospace Forces. But it is not static, it can change based on the conditions."

Details: Belaruski Hajun noted that the decision to hold joint military exercises on the territory of Belarus or Russia every two years was made in 2009. The West and Shield of the Union exercises were held in the form of joint exercises (operational and strategic) every two years.

Based on the established order of priority, the Shield of the Union exercise was to take place in 2023. They were scheduled for 22-26 September, but were cancelled. No joint exercises (operational/strategic) between Belarus and Russia were announced for 2024, meaning they’ve missed the biannual exercise.

It is also known that from 10 to 20 February 2022, the Republic of Belarus hosted the unscheduled exercise Allied Resolve 2022. Four days after the end of these "exercises", Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Quote from Belaruski Hajun: "Based on the experience of the non-conduction of the Shield of the Union-2023 exercises, the exercises in 2025 in Belarus may not take place due to the continuation of the war in Ukraine. The Russian Federation may simply not have enough soldiers for both the war and the exercises. We can also recall the Collective Security Treaty Organisation exercise Combat Brotherhood-2023, which took place in September 2023 in Belarus, in which a very modest Russian contingent took part.

However, even if the 2025 exercises are not cancelled, all troop movements in Belarus will be closely monitored to avoid a repeat of February 2022."

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