Vladimir Putin planning to take over Belarus under guise of unification with Russia: Alleged Kremlin document

New Delhi: Vladimir Putin’s plan to form the United State of Russia and Belarus by 2030 has been revealed, thanks to an alleged internal document that lays down the strategy to take full control of the neighbouring Belarus, situated in the north of Ukraine that borders three NATO members. The document obtained by Yahoo news details how Putin will take over Belarus in the next decade on the pretext of a merger between two countries. According to Michael Carpenter, the United States ambassador to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, Russia’s objectives in relation to Belarus are the same as those in reference to Ukraine. Only in Belarus does it rely on coercion as opposed to conflict. Still, total inclusion is the eventual goal. Alexander Lukashenko, the president of Belarus since the Soviet Union collapsed in 1994, is a strong ally of Vladimir Putin and an outspoken advocate of the invasion of Ukraine. According to reports, Russia is using political, economic, and military strategies to accomplish this. Both Russian and Belarusian embassies in the United States have not issued any statements on the matter. Last year, Russian troops positioned themselves on Belarusian soil in preparation for Putin’s invasion, but Lukashenko has so far refrained from taking a direct part in the battle. The Belarusian president warned that troops would be sent out if the Ukrainian government intruded on their land before his most recent trip to Moscow, which took place last week. Lukashenko declared last Thursday that he was “willing to fight alongside the Russians from the territory of Belarus in one case only: if so much as one soldier from (Ukraine) comes to our land with a gun to kill my people.” Viktor Khrenin, the defence minister of Belarus, announced on Monday that the nation would create a new paramilitary force made up of up to 150,000 volunteers. The internal plan document is a component of Putin’s ultimate objective in invading Ukraine, as several Western officials have cautioned. What is the plan? The Belarus strategy document has two sections. The first outlines Russia’s objectives for the near (2022), medium (2025), and long (2035) terms (2030). They are divided into three groups: the commercial and economic sector; the humanitarian sector; and the political, military, and defence sector. The hazards connected to the goals are listed in the second section of the text. The plan, for instance, calls for “reducing the influence of ’nationalist’ and pro-Western forces in Belarus” while also promoting the “development of pro-Russian emotions in political and military elites and the people” by 2022. Additionally, it envisions the conclusion of Belarus’ constitutional reform, which would be based on Russian priorities. Those changes are consistent with what has already been made in Belarus over the past 12 months. Lukashenko held a referendum in February 2022 based on changes to the constitution of Belarus. One of the proposed amendments would remove Belarus’s constitutional declaration of neutrality, which the BBC described as a capitulation to Putin. The vote was successful. According to the plan document, “sustainable pro-Russian groups of influence in Belarusian politics, military, and business,” are required by 2025. It also promotes enhancing the Russian military’s presence in Belarus and streamlining the process for granting Russian passports to Belarusians. In reality, this would be the end of Belarus’s remaining sovereignty and the elevation of a nation the size of Kansas with a population of 9.3 million to that of a Moscow satellite. Belarusians would be at the whim of Moscow priorities, whether in agribusiness, industry, espionage, or warfare. Also, three of Belarus’s European neighbours — Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland — who are all members of NATO and the European Union, would face a security danger. Who created the document? The Presidential Directorate for Cross-Border Cooperation, a part of Putin’s Presidential Administration, was founded five years ago, according to a Western person with intimate knowledge of the strategy document’s creation. The true duty of the rather innocently called directorate is to exercise control over the nations that Russia considers to be within its sphere of influence, namely Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Belarus, Ukraine, and Moldova. Alexei Filatov, who oversees the directorate, reports to Dmitri Kozak, the deputy leader of the Presidential Administration. With the resources and input from the majority of the crucial Russian state organisations, Filatov’s team was entrusted with developing new strategies that would outline Russia’s strategic goals in all six nations. FSB, SVR, and GRU, respectively, together with the General Staff of the Armed Forces, all actively participated in the development of the Union State plan, according to a Western intelligence officer with firsthand knowledge of the strategy paper. According to the same person who spoke to Yahoo News, Kozak received the finished product in the fall of 2021. Why Belarus? Like the other six countries the directorate covers, Belarus was once a part of the Soviet Union. But as Ukraine and the Baltic states went towards Europe and Western-style democracy, Belarus has been ruled for three decades by Alexander Lukashenko, who is frequently referred to as “Europe’s last tyrant.” Lukashenko obtained the president in 1994 and has held it ever since. He has conducted a series of elections, none of which have ever been certified as free by outside observers. Most egregious was Lukashenko’s most recent election, which was dubbed a fraud by a large-scale public protest movement in 2020. As a result, Lukashenko is no longer acknowledged by the U.S. or the EU as Belarus’ legal president. Competitors of Lukashenka, including Tsikhanovskaya, have been driven into exile or prison. Human Rights Watch has documented instances of torture of Belarusian dissidents and pro-democracy activists in its prisons, including the use of electric shock and rape. How far has Russia reached? Russia has been steadily encroaching on the territory of its neighbors, with an emphasis on Russian-speaking populations. Putin invaded and illegally annexed Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula in 2014. That year, the Kremlin fomented, armed and financed a “separatist” movement in Donbas, in eastern Ukraine, drawing from a well-tested playbook for hybrid warfare already long in use in the breakaway territories of Abkhazia and South Ossetia in Georgia, and in Transnistria, Moldova, where 1,500 Russian troops are currently garrisoned. In September 2022, Russia announced it was annexing four regions in southern and eastern Ukraine last year, even as its military was being pushed back in those very areas. Rumors abound that Belarus will directly join Putin’s war against Ukraine, after allowing its territory to serve as a launchpad for the invading Russian military and ongoing fusillades of Russian rockets and drone attacks on Ukraine. Doing so would further link Lukashenko’s fortunes with Moscow and open up his regime to even further isolation and sanctions from the West. The leaked document also outlines how Russia’s military presence in Belarus will expand to feature a joint command system and Russian weapons depots. Such a development would be deeply concerning to the NATO members along Belarus’s western border. ‘Humanitarian Sphere’ The “humanitarian sphere,” which is code for Russianizing and repressing the nation’s civil society, is a key component of Russia’s agenda for Belarus. One long-term goal is the “establishment of new centres of science and culture” in the Belarusian cities of Mogilev, Grodno, and Vitebsk, or “doubling the number of Belarusian students studying in Russian universities.” These facilities would be outposts of Rossotrudnichestvo, a charity that promotes Russian culture and is officially run by the Russian Foreign Ministry. Rossotrudnichestvo, however, is a notorious hub for Russian influence agents and intelligence operators, which makes it easier for Moscow to enlist Belarusians in its security forces. According to the strategy plan, Russia must build “a unified cultural space” and “a common approach to the interpretation of history” in Belarus by 2030, as well as have “management over the information space.” The domination of the Russian language over Belarusian, which is already largely in place, is one important deliverable in this area. The Belarusian constitution specifies Russian as one of the two official languages. More than 60% of Belarusians identified Belarusian as their mother tongue in a 2019 census, although more than 70% of the population said they also spoke Russian at home. Lukashenko A western intelligence source told Yahoo news that “neither the politicians nor the local oligarchs have a desire to join the Union State”. “Despite its closeness to Russia, Lukashenko has always emphasized the independence of the country in the past. He and Putin don’t like each other very much. Either is waiting for the other to die.” Compared to other foreign heads of state, the dictator of Belarus has met with his Russian counterpart most (14 times) in the past year. Nearly everytime, Lukashenko emphasises that the two countries are “allies.” He has, however, been notably reluctant to ratify that partnership by sending his own soldiers into Ukraine, despite continuous pressure from Putin, according to reports. 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