15 September 2025 , 16:58
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I’m at the Borisov military ground in Belarus, on a rare Guardian trip to the authoritarian state, where Zapad – the joint Russian-Belarusian drills – are under way.
The two allies are rehearsing scenarios of an attack on Belarus in what are the first of such exercises since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
I watched as Russian and Belarusian forces staged what they called a defensive scenario against an imagined western invasion – in effect, NATO.
Fighter jets roared overhead, tanks shelled mock wooden houses and drones struck targets before troops stormed in to raise Russian and Belarusian flags over a “liberated” village.
The exercises come amid heightened regional tensions after more than a dozen Russian drones entered Polish airspace, some of them flying over Belarus. On Sunday, a Russian drone entered Romania’s airspace and was tracked by its air force for nearly an hour before leaving.
This year’s drills are a fraction of the size of Zapad-2021, which involved some 200,000 personnel, with only a few thousand Russian troops taking part alongside Belarusian forces.
The reason is straightforward: Moscow is tied down in its war in Ukraine and short of spare manpower. Even so, western capitals will be watching closely, mindful that Zapad-2021 gave Vladimir Putin cover to shift large parts of his army and equipment westwards, months before launching the assault on Ukraine – including from Belarusian territory.
For Alexander Lukashenko, the exercises come at a delicate moment. Long practised at hedging between Moscow and the west, the Belarusian leader has recently made fresh overtures to Donald Trump’s administration. Last week, he secured limited US sanctions relief after releasing more than 50 prisoners, among them a British-Belarusian woman.
Lukashenko has been at pains to play down Zapad-2025, insisting the drills are defensive in nature and staged deep inside the country – away from Nato’s borders, where Poland has massed troops and western jets are patrolling the skies after a recent Russian drone incursion.
But tensions with Warsaw have nonetheless spiked after Poland shut a key border crossing with Belarus last week after the drone incident, delivering a painful economic blow to Alexander Lukashenko, who depends on the route for the transit of primarily Chinese goods.
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