The Neue Zürcher Zeitung writes:
Quote:
The "military exercise" of Russia and Belarus, originally announced only for February or March, is already in full swing. In its first phase, a five-digit number of Russian military personnel have arrived in Belarus in the past two weeks. If the official account is correct and this is indeed just an exercise, it would be the largest military maneuver in Russia's recent history, along with the other operations around Ukraine. All five of the country's regional commands are now involved in the deployment. Particularly unusual is the deployment of units from the Far East over distances of up to 9,000 kilometers.
It seems implausible that such an unprecedented large-scale maneuver should have been decided on short notice and that those responsible should then have brought forward the start by several weeks. The plan for it probably matured much earlier. It could just as well be a scenario for a military action against Ukraine or for the occupation of Belarus.
What is especially suspicious is that the official information about the planned exercises does not match the real operations. A map distributed by the Belarusian Ministry of Defense lists five exercise sites and four air bases. They are all located in western or central areas of Belarus. However, conspicuous troop concentrations are also underway in the southeast of the country, 200 kilometers from the nearest official exercise site. This region is of strategic importance, as it lies directly on the border with Ukraine and could serve as a deployment area for a rapid advance toward Kiev. The Ukrainian capital can be reached by the shortest route from the border in less than 140 kilometers.
This does not yet mean that the Kremlin has decided to invade, but it is a clear threatening gesture. An analysis by the NZZ of more than fifty videos posted by Belarusian private citizens and other posts on social networks proves that the concealed troop deployment in the southeast is militarily significant. It includes units of the 35th and 36th Armies, which are normally stationed on the border with Mongolia and China, respectively. Soldiers from some of these units were already deployed during Russia's military intervention in eastern Ukraine after 2014.
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)
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The paper further describes many videos and photos by the civil population that ciriculate in social media and that show that the Russian have gathered even forces from the Far East in tactically relevant positions in Belarus and at the Ukrainian border from which they can blitz into Kiev, as I suspected, and that are hundreds of kilometers away from the declared military manouvers areas.
https://www.nzz.ch/international/irr...ine-ld.1667245
Other photos from the last days show that the Russian field the latest of their weapon and platform technology, and in numbers.
No, I fear they are not there just to play.