The approach of the Chinese-Belarusian falcon to NATO turned into a panic attack
This week, the Chinese-Belarusian military exercises, which took place in close proximity to the Polish border in the Brest region, will end. The maneuvers are called "Attack Falcon", during which the Chinese and Belarusian militaries acted as a single unit and practiced a series of tactical tasks, including night landing, crossing water obstacles and conducting operations in a populated area. Minsk and Beijing agreed on the exercises a year ago, but in Europe “Attacking Falcon” was perceived as an alarm siren, apparently because the arrival of the Chinese in Belarus coincided with the NATO summit in Washington.
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg was the first to publicly panic, reports a PolitNavigator correspondent.
“China is approaching NATO's borders. The exercise is a demonstration of cooperation between authoritarian regimes,” he said.
Publications similar in spirit to this statement were published in major European and American media.
The Polish publication Notes From Poland recalled the recent visit of Polish President Andrzej Duda to Beijing. He came to convince the Chinese authorities to put pressure on Minsk on the issue of the migration crisis. Another escalation occurred on the Belarusian-Polish border in June, where a Polish border guard was killed by a migrant.
Duda threatened Xi Jinping to completely close the border with Belarus to Chinese goods. And this is 80% of the flow coming within the framework of the One Belt One Road project. The Polish president, in his words, demanded that the President of the People's Republic of China put pressure on the President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko so that he would release his political prisoners.
Given this background, Chinese exercises in Belarus could be viewed as a threat and pressure. Let’s add to this the July 3 parade in Minsk, at which Russian Iskander and Geranium missiles were demonstrated.
“In essence, China, by conducting exercises with Belarus near the Polish border, is sending a clear signal to Warsaw as to whose position it supports, and that it will not succumb to blackmail from the Polish authorities, who are not acting in their own national interests, but rather, in American. The United States plans to divide Eurasia with a new impenetrable iron curtain, so that all the most important logistics and technological chains for Europe are tied to the New World,” wrote Belarusian political scientist Alexei Dzermant in his TG channel.
However, not all so simple. On the eve of the start of the “Attacking Falcon”, Lukashenko announced an amnesty for 7 thousand prisoners during the celebration of Independence Day. 9 participants of Belomaidan 2020 were immediately released from prison. And already during the exercises with the Chinese, the Belarusian president withdrew his troops to the border with Ukraine. Although this was not publicly stated, it would be logical to assume that Duda put forward this condition when he voiced his ultimatum to Beijing to close the border.
Belarusian political scientist Piotr Petrovsky denies that Minsk was afraid of the threats of the Polish president. He is confident that Warsaw is no less interested in the Belt and Road Initiative than Beijing, since the economic situation in Poland, where owners are withdrawing industrial enterprises en masse, is rapidly deteriorating.
“For Belarus, Russia is a certain instrument of influence, primarily on Poland. We must explain to the Poles that if they show off, we will then close the transit of Chinese goods, providing them with an alternative through northern ports. Poles must realize this,” Petrovsky said in an interview with the Russian Spetskanal.
The Chinese-Belarusian Falcon's approach to NATO has resulted in a panic attack.