Moscow Is Using Zapad 2021 Military Exercise to Put Pressure on Belarus - RAND Corporation
9/15/2021
Forty years ago, Russia used large-scale military exercises to intimidate Poland's communist leaders - they had to crack down on protesters, many of whom associated with the independent trade union Solidarity. A similar Russian exercise now could be aimed in part at pressuring Belarus. William Courtney, a senior researcher at the American think tank RAND Corporation, wrote about this in his blog.
According to W. Courtney, the resistance movement in Belarus evokes memories from the late 1970s and early 1980s of Polish protests. In Soviet-controlled Eastern Europe, they were the greatest nonviolent challenge to power.
In September 1981, the Kremlin used Zapad to put pressure on Polish leaders. Three months later, the Polish Communists imposed martial law. Thousands of oppositionists were jailed and nearly a hundred were killed. Today, the Kremlin might employ Zapad-2021 to induce tougher repression in Belarus.
In 1981, the USSR was struggling with food shortage and a demoralizing war in Afghanistan. Any attack on Poland may have faced armed resistance or a longer-term insurgency. Today, Russia's economy is sluggish and living standards have fallen. Russia may not like generous subsidies to strengthen the obedient regime in Belarus.
William Courtney is also sure that Russia can use Zapad 2021 as a feint to divert attention from military actions against Ukraine.
RAND Corporation (“Research and Development”) is an American think tank, founded on May 14, 1948 in Santa Monica (California), the first think tank in the world. It began as an analytical unit in the United States Air Force, focusing exclusively on US national security issues. Since 1948, it has become an independent research organization whose goal is to spread public welfare through the application of a scientific approach to social issues.
William Courtney is a former US ambassador to Kazakhstan and Georgia.
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