Images from Planet Labs of the sprawling site in the Slutsk district, 60 kilometers south of Minsk, show substantial construction on what TV footage from May 2024 indicates was in part an empty field at the time.
Belarusian authorities have been secretive about the project, which is located on a site that housed nuclear-capable missiles during the Soviet era and is the subject of an investigation by RFE/RL’s Belarus Service along with Schemes, the investigative unit of RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service, and the Estonian media outlets Delfi Estonia and Eesti Ekspress.
There are no references to the changes in official public documents, no coverage in local media, and no updates of cadastral maps indicating land allocation for such a site. Neither authoritarian leader Aleksandr Lukashenko nor any other official has made an announcement about it. Attempts to reach the Defense Ministry for comment were unsuccessful.
The construction comes as Russia ramps up military cooperation with its ally Belarus while pressing its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in a war that has vastly increased tensions with the NATO and the West. A buffer state for Russia, Belarus is bordered on the south by Ukraine and on the west and northwest by NATO members Poland, Lithuania, and Latvia.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has boasted about the development of a new hypersonic, intermediate-range ballistic missile called the Oreshnik, which Moscow says it tested in an attack on Ukraine last November.
A satellite image from August 31 shows four distinct sections at the site near the village of Paulauka encompassing more than 2 square kilometers, the equivalent of about 280 soccer fields, all connected by new roads.
Images from August 13 show numerous structures in the largest section, including what appear to be 13 ammunition depots surrounded by protective walls and three larger sheds or hangars, each about 100 meters long, as well as foundations for several other buildings.
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