A deployment of special operations forces appears tied to what Western leaders believe are Russia’s latest provocations to challenge European powers and their U.S. partners.
Russia has orchestrated the deployment of special operations troops to the northern border of Belarus to see how sudden surges of migrants to the area are straining neighboring NATO countries’ ability to respond, a source familiar with local governments’ assessments tells U.S. News – the latest development in Moscow’s troubling campaign of destabilization against Europe.
It was not immediately clear whether the commandos came from Russia or from Belarus, says former U.S. Army Europe Commander Ben Hodges, who says senior officials in Latvia believe the deployments are at least for reconnaissance, if not some other form of nefarious distraction.
The two former Soviet militaries have functioned with greater interoperability in recent years as the fate of embattled Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko becomes increasingly tied to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s grip on his own country’s government. Russia revealed on Friday it had deployed forces to northwestern Belarus for “snap exercises” by announcing the death of two paratroopers who reportedly collided during an airborne drop.
NATO and EU countries have criticized Lukashenko’s government in recent weeks for supposedly forcing northward flows of vulnerable migrants displaced from war zones in the Middle East. Many believe the manufactured crisis, backed by Russia, serves as retaliation for EU and other sanctions on the embattled Belarusian leader, whose reelection to a sixth term in September has been widely blasted as a rigged.
It also follows growing concern in Western capitals about a conspicuous surge in Russian military forces and equipment at its war-torn border with Ukraine, where Moscow continues to support separatist rebels in what has become a low-intensity but persistent seven-year-old war.
The moves all appear to represent Putin’s first major challenge to the Biden administration despite its attempts to reset relations with Russia, including a high-profile summit in Switzerland in June. And following growing concerns in the U.S. at how Russia has attempted to weaponize energy flows through Europe, many believe Western powers now find themselves in a vulnerable position. Leaders in Washington also criticized Russia on Monday for an apparent anti-satellite missile test that created debris in space that U.S. officials warned could grievously damage the International Space Station and harm the seven astronauts on board.
The Russian and Belarusian ministries of foreign affairs did not respond to inquiries. The Latvian government did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the record.
The Kremlin has repeatedly claimed any military movements inside its borders are exclusively a domestic matter and denied accusations of any malevolent intent. The Pentagon similarly has refused to classify the growing military presence near Ukraine and has called on Moscow to explain its actions. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg referred to them on Monday as an “unusual concentration of forces,” adding, “we know that Russia has been willing to use these types of military capabilities before to conduct aggressive actions against Ukraine.”
Putin, however, issued another less-than-subtle volley early Monday, signing a decree stating Russia may need to intervene in contested territory in eastern Ukraine for humanitarian reasons – a justification Moscow has previously employed to excuse its intervention in foreign countries.
The order is designed to “to provide humanitarian support to the population of certain areas of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions of Ukraine and to prevent a further decline in living standards amid the ongoing economic blockade and new coronavirus infection,” according to a translation of it reported by Russian state news service Tass. It was not immediately clear if Russia felt it would require military or paramilitary escorts to carry out the supposedly benevolent mission, as it has previously.
Despite the Western concerns, Ukraine has already interpreted Russia’s actions as a threat to its sovereignty.
“The events on the Belarusian-Polish border considered, the [National Security and Defense Council] decided to strengthen the presence of the State Border Service on the Ukraine-Belarus border,” according to a bulletin from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s office on Friday. “The migrant crisis on the Polish border caused by the Belarusian authorities’ actions is a humanitarian and security challenge for both the European Union and the region.”
The Pentagon has previously backed away at asserting that the collection of Russian actions is clearly connected.
“We’re not seeing specific linkages between all these different operations,” spokesman John Kirby told reporters last week, reiterating U.S. concern about the buildup along Ukraine’s border. “It’s not exactly clear what the Russian intentions are. We obviously would like to better understand that. And we don’t want to see any action further destabilize what is already a very intense part of the world. And we urge Russia to be clear about their intentions.”
He repeated Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin’s assertion during a recent visit to Europe that U.S. support for Ukraine’s territorial integrity is “unwavering.”
France’s top officials for defense and foreign affairs met with their Russian counterparts on Friday and raised concerns about the troubling presence of troops near the Ukraine border and the migrant crisis, calling it “irresponsible and unacceptable.” A French readout of the meeting did not indicate whether the Russian officials offered any clearer explanation.
Despite the opaqueness of Russia’s latest behavior, those who have operated in the region and followed its aggressions closely say Putin is clearly preparing for new forms of destabilization should he choose to act on them.
“An expansion of the current kinetic conflict in Ukraine is not inevitable, but the pieces are increasingly being put into place should the Kremlin decide to act,” says Hodges, who oversaw all U.S. soldiers in Europe beginning in 2014, when Russia first intervened in Ukraine.
“I think that the weaponization of migrants along the border of Belarus with Poland, Lithuania and Latvia is connected somehow to the Russian activities in and around Ukraine,” says Hodges, who now works with the Center for European Policy Analysis think tank. “Not coincidental. Either as reconnaissance or disruption or distraction – or all of the above.”
He describes the totality of Moscow’s latest actions as “classic Russian ‘warfare’ – use of all sorts of tools, leverage, threats, language, disinformation, migrants.” Controlling flows of natural gas into Europe also serves as a weapon for the Kremlin, Hodges says, “all of which is to clearly unsettle or destabilize the EU, present Ukraine to the West as a ‘failed state’ and keep us off balance.” Putin also appears interested in disrupting Germany as its caretaker government transitions beyond the historic tenure of outgoing Chancellor Angela Merkel, who did not seek reelection this year.
Hodges expressed concern about the area around the Suwalki Corridor, the strip of land along Poland and Lithuania’s border and the closest point between Belarus and Kaliningrad – the island of Russian territory in northern Europe isolated from the rest of the country. Though unlikely, the latest moves by Russia could be an attempt to create some sort of humanitarian crisis that would prompt Russian troops to move to secure that corridor and interrupt the Polish-Latvian border.
The latest broad concerns represent hardly the first time Russia has attempted to exploit vulnerable migrant populations. Moscow deployed mercenary forces to Libya in 2019 in what was widely considered at the time to be a similar attempt to threaten and destabilize the EU.
And they have spurred new concerns from American officials. Bloomberg reported early Monday that U.S. leaders spoke with European allies to weigh potential responses to Russia should it choose to escalate conflict in Ukraine or engage in another similarly provocative move. None of them had yet agreed on what would comprise that response.
Yet some have begun to ramp up responses to the immediate and pressing concerns. Latvia also announced Monday it had deployed 3,000 troops for a previously unannounced military exercise to its border with Belarus.
“We cannot exclude that part of these [migrant] groups will move further north and can reach the Latvian border,” Latvian Defence Minister Artis Pakbriks told the country’s national broadcaster, Reuters reported. “We’re ready for it.”