Meeting to review results of inspection of Belarus’ uniformed agencies

President Aleksandr Lukashenko hosted a meeting to review the results of the inspection of the country’s uniformed agencies.

“If you want peace, prepare for war. It was not invented by me and not by you either. By saying this I want to respond to all sorts of rumors circulating in our society, especially on the internet, about the movements of the Armed Forces of Belarus and the joint movements of the Armed Forces of Belarus and Russia,” the President said.

He recalled that in line with an earlier agreement Belarus and Russia created a joint military task force to respond to threats to the Union State. “We have been conducting exercises. Now they have a larger scale due to the current situation and threats. Therefore, we are conducting drills on our territory. We are sending the joint military task force and our Armed Forces to where we see fit. Period. There is no other plan, no conspiracy theories,” the Belarusian leader emphasized.

Aleksandr Lukashenko noted that the meeting should discuss two important and intersecting matters. “We cannot rule out an aggression against our country. At least, we see that our neighbors are ready for it. We know who is pushing them in the back (or in another part of the body) in order to create tension on our borders,” he said. In this regard, the head of state had decided to conduct an inspection of the rapid response forces: “We have the so-called rapid response forces in the army. If something unexpected suddenly happens, these forces are sent to the place where this tension is building. I decided to check these rapid response forces,” Aleksandr Lukashenko explained.

The second part of the inspection dealt with anti-terrorist actions.

By now the operations have been fully completed and the Armed Forces, special operations forces, special forces are in places of permanent deployment.

According to the President, two flanks were checked - western and northwestern. The inspection was overseen by State Secretary of the Security Council Aleksandr Volfovich and the State Secretariat of the Security Council.

“I know for sure that everything was absolutely discreet, like in wartime. A number of units performing certain tasks were checked,” the head of state said.

The media, and especially television, provided coverage of these activities, including the crossing of the Neman River and the Berezina River by two units, the construction of pontoon bridges that had to be quickly mounted to enable the crossing. “We also covered the southern flank using the forces of Denisenko [Vadim Denisenko, commander of the special operations forces of the Armed Forces]. The guys did their part of the work without crossing any obstacles,” the Belarusian leader continued.

“We conducted drills and exercises of the rapid response forces. Just in case. We all need to learn,” Aleksandr Lukashenko emphasized.

“No one excludes a possibility that terrorist groups might appear on the territory of Belarus from inside (which is unlikely, almost impossible) and from outside and seize either a building, a house, a government institution, a school, God forbid, or some kind of population center. And this is the case when a counter-terrorist operation is needed,” Aleksandr Lukashenko explained.

According to him, the necessary conditions were created for the inspection. The best trained military personnel was involved in staging the capture of part of a settlement. “Our guys from the special operations forces were involved. They were opposed by the anti-terrorist unit of the State Security Committee. An anti-terrorist direction is not a prerogative of the army, but a prerogative of the KGB, it runs a counter-terrorist operation using the necessary means and forces,” the President said.

The head of state gave an instruction to analyze how these operations were carried out.

“I’ll tell you straight, without hiding anything, some flaws and faults were identified. I would like to focus on these flaws today, because in the event of hostilities, these flaws will become critical and will lead to casualties. We cannot let it happen,” Aleksandr Lukashenko said.