Belarus and Moscow have signed a new Union State Military Doctrine, though the document remains unpublished. This comes within the context of the Belarus crisis that began with President Alyaksandr Lukashenko’s disputed reelection on August 9, 2020, and recently worsened due to the migrant issues on the borders with Poland, Latvia and Lithuania. The Union State Military Doctrine is intended to replace its previous iteration from December 2001. The draft text was, in fact, already agreed in 2018 by the two countries at the defense ministry level (see EDM, December 11, 2018); but it remained unsigned for three years. However, in the aftermath of the Belarusian-Russian Zapad 2021 combined strategic exercise (sovmestnoe strategicheskoe uchenie), held on September 10–16, Moscow and Minsk undertook rapid steps to formalize the doctrine at the presidential level (Gazeta.ru, November 7).
The Belarus Crisis and the Union State Military Doctrine – Jamestown
