Powder Keg Europe: Poland Move Troops to Belarus Border – Russia’s Putin Vows To Protect Belarusian Allies, Says Polish Want to Annex Ukrainian Territory

Powder Keg Europe: Poland Move Troops to Belarus Border – Russia’s Putin Vows To Protect Belarusian Allies, Says Polish Want to Annex Ukrainian Territory

Paul Serran

With every passing day, the disturbing possibility of a widening of the Ukraine war with the participation of other nations in direct military hostilities is becoming more and more palpable.

The Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) Director, Sergei Naryshkin, repeated today his warning that Poland is considering deploying troops on western Ukraine to establish control there.

The SVR head believes that Warsaw is finally coming to realize that the defeat of Ukraine is just a matter of time.

Sputnik reported:

“‘The Polish leadership is intensifying the mindset to introduce control in the western territories of Ukraine, the western regions by deploying their troops there,” Naryshkin said at a meeting held by President Vladimir Putin with the permanent members of the Security Council.”

President Vladimir Putin instructed Naryshkin to monitor Poland’s plans for Ukraine, and said that Poland plans to form ‘a coalition under the guise of NATO’ to intervene in the conflict in Ukraine.

The final objective, Putin believes, is to seize land and get back what they believe to be their historical territories.

“‘As for the Polish leaders, they probably expect to form a coalition within NATO… and directly intervene in the conflict in Ukraine in order to then ‘tear off’ a fatter piece [of land] for themselves, to regain, as they believe, their historical territories – today’s Western Ukraine’, Vladimir Putin said.”

Reports in the media talk about an union between Poland, Lithuania and Ukraine, Putin added.

“There have been media reports about plans to create a certain so-called Polish-Lithuanian-Ukrainian union: that is, we are not talking about some gathering of mercenaries, there are enough of them, and they are being destroyed, namely a regular, assembled, equipped military unit that is planned to be used for actions on the territory of Ukraine, including for allegedly ensuring the security of the current Western Ukraine. And in fact, if you call things by their proper names — for the subsequent occupation of these territories,” Putin said at a meeting with permanent members of the Russian Security Council.

But the Polish territorial ambitions in Ukraine are not just a province of Russian propaganda, as many would have you think. Ex- Ukrainian president Yanukovych has also addressed this topic.

“Former President Viktor Yanukovych also said that Ukraine’s statehood is under threat and it may be forced to merge with Poland.

‘No matter how painful it is for me to write about this today, but the statehood of Ukraine is in extreme danger. It is threatened with complete destruction. At the same time, we are talking not only about the risk of losing vast territories in the south and east of the country’, Yanukovych said in May 2022, adding that Ukraine ‘may be forced’ to de-facto merge with Poland.”

So this is the real background to which to analyze the decision by Poland to move its troops to the Belarusian border.

Reuters reported:

“Poland’s security committee decided in a meeting on Wednesday to move military units to the country’s east due to the Wagner Group’s presence in Belarus, state-run news agency PAP quoted its secretary as saying on Friday.”

Belarusian defense ministry announced that Wagner mercenaries had started to train Belarusian special forces at a military range located just a few miles from the border with Poland.

“‘Training or joint exercises of the Belarusian army and the Wagner Group is undoubtedly a provocation’, [secretary of the Committee of the Council of Ministers] Zbigniew Hoffmann told [Polish News Agency] PAP.

‘The Committee analyzed possible threats, such as the dislocation of Wagner Group units. Therefore, the Minister of National Defense, chairman of the Committee, Mariusz Blaszczak, decided to move our military formations from the west to the east of Poland’.”

In Moscow, Putin had tough words in response, stating that Poland was also seeking to annex territories in Belarus.

The Guardian reported:

“Vladimir Putin has said Russia will use ‘all means at its disposal’ to defend Belarus after Poland and other EU countries voiced concerns about the deployment of Russian paramilitaries near their borders.

[…] ‘Unleashing aggression against Belarus would mean aggression against the Russian Federation’, Putin said, according to the Kremlin. ‘And we will respond to it using all means at our disposal’.”