Zapad 2017

According to the information made public by the Defence Ministry of Belarus prior to the exercise,[1][2] fewer than 13,000 personnel of the Union State were to take part in the military maneuvers, a number that was not supposed to trigger mandatory formal notification and invitation of observers under the OSCE's Vienna Document.

The plan of the exercise was approved by Belarus president Alexander Lukashenko on 20 March 2017: it envisaged two stages and its theme was defined as "the use of groupings of troops (forces) in the interests of ensuring the military security of the Union State".

[17][18] The number of troops to be involved, according to Belarusian Defense Minister Andrei Ravkov, would not to exceed the threshold stipulated by the 2011 Vienna Document – no more than 13,000 personnel; geographically, it would span from multiple locations in Belarus to the Kola Peninsula within Russia's Arctic Circle.

[28][29] The Belarusian foreign ministry said in mid-July 2017 that they had notified all the OSCE countries and intended to invite observers from a number of international organisations as well as from Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Ukraine, Estonia (NATO contact state in Belarus in 2017[30]), Sweden, and Norway.

[32] On 12 July 2017, in Vienna, Major-General Pavel Muraveiko, Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Belarus, gave a detailed briefing on Zapad-2017 to the participants of the OSCE conference.

[36] On 22 August, the Belarusian defence ministry said that observers from the UN, OSCE, NATO, Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), and International Committee of the Red Cross as well as from Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Ukraine, Estonia, Sweden, and Norway had been invited to Zapad 2017.

"[42] Months prior to the Zapad 2017 exercise, NATO officials and Western military analysts began to speculate about the true number of troops to be involved as well as Russia's possible objectives other than those publicly announced.

[47] Western analysts speculated in July 2017 that the total number of Russian troops, security personnel and civilian officials to be involved in the broader war-games will range from 60,000 to 100,000,[4] which would make them Russia's largest since the Cold War.

[53] On the other hand, Igor Sutyagin, a Research Fellow at the Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies in London, suggested in August 2017 that the Zapad 2017 exercise was primarily meant as "a show of force", with the main rational purpose to ensure Moscow is capable of moving its troops around quickly through the vast terrain; he also noted that Russia's military efforts were "already overstretched".

[56] In the same vein, Finland's defense minister Jussi Niinisto opined that by reacting so loudly the "Western countries had swallowed the bait" laid by Moscow in its information war with NATO.

[69][70] Also, as part of the U.S.-funded Operation Atlantic Resolve, the U.S. was planning to deploy some 600 paratroopers (the 173rd Airborne Brigade′s 1st Squadron, 91st Cavalry Regiment) to the Baltic countries to be positioned in Estonia, Lithuania, and Latvia for the duration of the Zapad 2017 exercise.

[76][77][78] In his annual address to parliament on 7 September 2017, Ukraine's president Petro Poroshenko, referring to Zapad 2017, said that there was "more and more evidence for [Russia's] preparations for an offensive war of continental proportions.

"[89][91] Russia's state-owned news agency RIA Novosti additionally reported on another, authorised rally in Minsk the same day, held by the opposition Belarusian Conservative Christian Party – BPF, at which anti-Zapad slogans were voiced as well.

[109][110] On early morning 15 September, it was announced that the 6th Air Army′s Staff and several formations and units were being re-deployed to operational airfields for drills ″at combined-arms ranges and in the Baltic Sea water zone″.

[111][112] On 16 September, it was announced by the Western Military District's press service that 20 ships and support vessels of the Russian Baltic Fleet had gone to sea to conduct tasks within the Zapad-2017 exercise such as anti-submarine and air defense, artillery firing on different types of targets.

I am drawing special attention to the fact that all means and forces involved were returned to their permanent bases"; he also noted, "Western media outlets were whipping up some very incredible and frightening scenarios of the exercises.

"[138][139] On 12 October 2017, the Russian defence ministry said that the United States had used the ″unprecedented hysteria″ fuelled by Western media around the Zapad 2017 exercise as cover to have illegally deployed the 2nd Armored Brigade Combat Team (the U.S. 1st Infantry Division) to Poland while the tanks (eighty-seven M1A1 Abrams tanks) and armoured vehicles of the 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team (the 4th Infantry Division) had stayed in the region, despite the fact that the latter would have had to leave to comply with the 1997 NATO–Russia Founding Act on Mutual Relations, Cooperation and Security.

[6] Mathieu Boulègue of Chatham House wrote: ″The Kremlin could therefore credibly claim that the West overreacted and fell victim to scaremongering and reporting rumours that Moscow was not being transparent about the nature of the exercise and its intentions.

< ... > Zapad showed that any army seeking to burst Russia's A2/AD bubble would bear a high enough cost as to be effectively beaten.″[6] On 1 October 2017, The New York Times published a summary of the exercise emailed to them by the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency: ″Russia's forces are becoming more mobile, more balanced and capable of conducting the full range of modern warfare.″[151] Professor Lamont Colucci argued that one of the three strategic objectives that, according to him, Russia had achieved through the Zapad drills was ″remind[ing] Belarus who was the boss in the region″.

[152] Brian Whitmore of Radio Liberty concluded: ″[W]hile the Kremlin saw Zapad as a big psy-op to intimidate Poland, the Baltic states, and Ukraine, Belarus wasn't interested in a conflict with the West.