Belarus announced on Tuesday that it had started military exercises along its shared border with Ukraine in an effort to assess the readiness of its territorial troops, Belarusian officials said. The exercises are scheduled to run from July 12 to 14 and will assess the troops’ readiness for combat operations and test the command abilities of reserve officers, the Belarusian Defense Ministry said in a Telegram post. The drills will be held in the Gomel region, which shares a border with Ukraine in an area just north of Kyiv. Separate communications exercises are taking place from 11 to 15 July and will be led by the Chief of Communications for the Armed Forces. The Ministry of Defense of Belarus said that the training will not only assess the readiness of military units in the region, but will “solve the issues of creating and operating the communications system.” A photo taken on February 17, 2022 shows Belarus’ armored personnel carrier (APC) during joint exercises of the armed forces of Russia and Belarus as part of an inspection of the Union State Reaction Force, at a firing range near a city Osipovichi outside Minsk. (Photo by MAXIM GUCHEK/BELTA/AFP via Getty Images) UKRAINIANS DEFEND BELARUS INVASION UNTIL JULY, escalating PUTIN’S WAR “Regular and special training with communication forces” will be overseen by the Chief of the Communications Department of the General Staff of the Armed Forces, Major General Oleg Myshchenko. Soldiers will also be trained in new forms of communications networks for field support during combat. The drills were previously planned according to Belarus’ defense ministry, although it was unclear when they were planned. The announcement of the latest round of military exercises near Ukraine’s northern border comes just a month after Minsk said its forces had begun combat readiness training and weeks after Russia was allowed to fire missiles at Ukrainian targets inside Belarus’ border. In early June Ukrainian President Volodymy Zelenskyy said the threat of a ground invasion by Belarus in support of Russia was minimal, but noted that Ukraine was “preparing for all the risks of an invasion.” By late June, Zelensky had accused Moscow of trying to drag Minsk into war after Ukraine’s defense ministry said a “massive rocket attack” was launched after 12 cruise missiles were fired by Russian planes flying over its airspace. of Belarus. Western defense officials have long assessed that Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko – the only European leader to back Moscow – balances the threat of war with his unwavering support for Russian President Vladimir Putin. Russian President Vladimir Putin, right, and Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko pose for a photo during their meeting in Moscow, Russia, Friday, March 11, 2022. (Mikhail Klimentyev, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP) UKRAINE ACCUSES RUSSIA OF TURNING BELARUS TO WAR AFTER MISSILES FIRED BY NORTHERN NEIGHBOR Lukashenko – who faced massive protests after a 2020 re-election that many believed was rigged – could face a backlash at home, international sanctions and resistance from Belarus’s armed forces if he joins Putin’s war. It is unclear how well Ukraine would be able to fend off a second attack in the north, as its eastern and southern regions continued to be battered by Russian forces. Ukrainian officials have suggested they have a plan to counter Russia’s forces in its southern regions by launching a “million-strong” resistance force equipped with modern Western weaponry. The armed forces of Russia and Belarus take part in a military exercise in Gomel, Belarus on February 19. (Photo by Stringer/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images) CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP “We have about 700,000 in the armed forces and if we add the national guard, the police, the border guard, we are about a million.” Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov told The Times on Sunday. Ukraine urged civilians in its southern regions to evacuate as soon as possible before a counterattack. Caitlin McFall is a reporter for Fox News Digital. She can be reached at [email protected] or @ctlnmcfall on Twitter.
