Anti-Russia Tensions Cranked Up as Zapad 21 Nears

In 2017, politicians in the Baltic States and Warsaw, along with their allies in the military-industrial complex, were spreading hysterical fantasies that the then-upcoming joint Russian-Belarusian ZAPAD (meaning “west”) military exercise was nothing but a cover for Russian invasion of NATO countries. The anticipated invasion never materialized, but the same forces are at work again as Russia and Belarus prepare for ZAPAD 21. This time, the scenario of the cover of an invasion involving more than 100,000 troops can’t be played up, as the Russian and Belarusian defense ministries have already announced that the exercise will only involve 12,800 troops—hardly a force that could overwhelm NATO. Instead, according to the paranoid politicians on the other side of the NATO frontier, ZAPAD is part of a hybrid warfare operation which includes the migration crisis on the border between Lithuania and Belarus.