Highways of war

Why is the West inflaming passions on the border with Belarus and Russia?

Several influential Western media outlets, including The Economist, The Telegraph and The Daily Mail, have recently revealed the information that NATO is armed with a developed step-by-step plan for the deployment of 300,000 soldiers to the borders of the Union State of Belarus and Russia. As stated in the publications, this logistics strategy has been reserved solely in case Russia dares to attack one of the NATO countries. However, the position of both presidents, Aleksandr Lukashenko and Vladimir Putin, on this issue is unequivocal — we will only make a retaliation strike. This means that the military preparations by the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation and the accompanying media hysteria apparently have another explanation…

Chariots of Mars

Western media have caused a sensation from NATO’s plans that have been actually developed for a long time and which NATO generals have never particularly kept a secret. 
Even under Barack Obama, Operation Atlantic Resolve was launched following the events of 2014 in Ukraine. Within its framework, one armoured brigade and one army aviation brigade were to be permanently stationed on NATO’s eastern flank, operating on a rotational basis. The term of service for tankers and helicopter pilots was nine months. Thus, the US military simultaneously created tension on the borders of the Union State and mastered a promising theatre of military operations. The logistics service of the grouping was provided through five European ports.
However, since 2017, the number of ‘gates to Europe’ for the US military staff has been steadily growing. As a result, the first five ‘pioneer’ gates have been joined by 12 more harbours by now, while it is clearly visible from the list that the efforts of US logisticians are primarily focused on Poland and the Baltic states. 
Strengthening the US army’s logistical capabilities in Europe cannot be considered in isolation from the ‘military Schengen’ — an agreement between European countries that allows the rapid transportation of large amounts of military hardware bypassing EU bureaucratic norms. In late January, a military transport corridor through the Netherlands, Germany and Poland was officially established.
The increased number of ports involved also implies the formation of new land corridors, which will enable to quickly build up the grouping of troops near the western borders of Belarus and Russia that have already exceeded all international limits. The plans recently announced in the media indicate that NATO is focusing on the five most convenient routes. As the presented in the media infographic shows, the logistics route in the north that involves both Norway and a new member of the alliance, Finland, as well as those routes that lead from the ‘pioneer’ ports to Poland are of particular interest since the troops surged through them will pose a threat to Belarus.
The neophyte NATO members are joining the hospitable organisation at an accelerated tempo. In the waning days of 2023, the United States signed agreements with Denmark, Finland and Sweden to gain access to 36 military facilities in these countries. Finns have also decided to convert the railway network across the country to the European gauge standard in place of the Russian gauge that the Finnish rail network is currently equipped with. The country’s authorities have been so modest as not to mention how much it will cost, but Pavel Ivankin, President of the Russian National Research Centre for Transportation and Infrastructure, has estimated that Finns will spend between €14 and €18.5 billion in two to four years. 
The number of US military personnel, both deployed within the framework of Operation Atlantic Resolve and stationed in Europe on a permanent basis, is steadily growing. The events of February 2022 served as a handy excuse for a significant expansion in the star-spangled military contingents. Just from February to June of the first year of the special military operation, 20,000 soldiers arrived from overseas, thus increasing the number of expeditionary forces to 100,000. 

Until 2022, US forces concentrated on our continent mainly in Western Europe, regularly staging drills in close proximity to the borders of the Union State. However, the centre of gravity is now shifting to Central and Eastern Europe, where new facilities are being hastily built and the existing ones are being expanded.

Thus, the largest in 30 years reconstruction of the equipment storage base in Powidz was carried out in Poland last year. In December 2023, US missile defence bases were put into operation on Polish territory. In the middle of May 2024, the US easternmost special forces military base named Miron Camp, was opened close to Kraków, where 150-200 special forces soldiers can be permanently stationed at the same time. 

Enemy at the gates

What is the point of this grandiose construction that has captured the entire eastern flank of the alliance? The answer is obvious: NATO is preparing to wage war, and the decision to prepare the next ‘Drang nach Osten’ was made long before the start of the special military operation.
Illegal sanctions, which were slapped against Belarus and Russia under various pretexts — in fact, against Belarusians for supporting the President and resisting the ‘colour revolution’, and against Russia for protecting Russians in Ukraine — can be considered the first evidence of preparation for military operations. The fact is that the West aims to weaken Belarus’ and Russia’s economies as much as possible, as well as to undermine stability and unleash chaos, since a clash with mighty industrial powers is fraught with the situation that an attacker may wrongly assess its strength and break down at a critical moment with fatal consequences.
The second sign of an impending thunderstorm is increased pressure on the Republic of Belarus and the Russian Federation on all fronts, from diplomatic to military. 
Finally, the third indication of the West’s belligerent mood is the use of Ukraine as a ‘battering ram’ against Russia and as a constantly unnerving factor against Belarus. The reason for the existence of the Kiev regime, as attested by the latest news about the lifting of restrictions on the use of long-range precision missiles for strikes on Russian territory, is to inflict as much damage as possible on Moscow without the direct participation of NATO countries.    

Every point of the West’s diabolical strategy revealed a flaw, though. Thus, sanctions stimulated an unprecedented increase in import substitution, while political pressure boosted the development of relations with the countries of the Global South and East.

In the case of Ukraine, the West will face a full-blown dilemma in the foreseeable future — what is the next step? It is obvious that the Kiev regime is barely capable of defence, and with the continued stretching of forces at the front, the Armed Forces of Ukraine may soon inevitably lose this opportunity at all. In that case, Washington will have to choose — either admit defeat, which will put an end to the protracted fall of the hegemon, or send its troops into battle. It is impossible to say exactly what Biden or his replacement will do, yet the announced plans to deploy troops and create military infrastructure for them, as well as active work to expand the Overton window regarding the surge of troops into Ukraine may indicate that NATO is going to fight for the rotten ‘American dream’.

By Anton Popov