Sapad 2017

The banner of the Sapad 2017 shows soldiers of the Belarusian and Russian armed forces

Sapad 2017 ( Russian Запад-2017 Sapad-2017 , English Zapad 2017 , Belarusian Захад-2017 Sachad 2017 , translated West 2017 ) was a joint strategic military maneuver of the armed forces of Russia and Belarus in September 2017.

The “Sapad 2017” maneuver took place from September 14 to 20, 2017. According to Russian information, 12,700 soldiers took part in the maneuver. In accordance with the provisions of the Vienna Document of Negotiations on Confidence- and Security-Building Measures of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), foreign observers must be admitted if the troop strength exceeds 13,000 .

General information

history

A Soviet maneuver called " Sapad 81 " took place as early as 1981 , at the height of the Cold War . The Russian armed forces later carried out other "Sapad" maneuvers:

• "Sapad 1999" in 1999 in Belarus and
• " Sapad 2013 " in November 2013.

scenario

The purpose of the military exercises is to test the ability of Russia and Belarus to ensure the security of the Union state. The interaction of the military authorities, the level of training of field and air units should be improved.

Accordingly, the scenario of the exercise was to fend off an attempt by a Western power to overthrow the government of Belarus.

Maneuvers of other countries

In the same period as “Sapad 17”, Sweden carried out the “ Aurora 17 ” maneuver with the participation of others, including NATO forces with a total of 19,500 men.

Observers and reports

International observers in front of a schedule of the exercise "Sapad 2017".

Belarus (only) invited international observers from the CSTO, EAEU, CIS and NATO to the maneuver "Sapad 2017". The representatives of the OSCE delegations from the USA also received the invitation at the session of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly in Minsk.

On July 12, the Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Belarus Pavel Muraveyko held the briefing on “Sapad 2017” as part of the OSCE Forum for Security Co-operation in Austria. On July 13, at the meeting of the NATO-Russia Council, representatives of the Russian Defense Ministry held a briefing and provided information about "Sapad 2017". Information was given about the tasks to be performed, the military training areas used, the forces and resources involved, the number of personnel, the main weapon systems and material. An extended briefing was scheduled in Moscow immediately before the maneuver.

There was no joint visit to the maneuvers by the two presidents of Belarus, Lukashenko, and Russia, Putin.

Forces and structure

A T-90M -Kampfpanzer and a BMPT -Kampfunterstützer refer while "Sapad 2017" firing position on a firing range of the training area Luschski at Luga .

“Sapad 2017” took place in two stages on the territory of Russia and Belarus . According to Russian sources, about three thousand soldiers of the armed forces of the Russian Federation were stationed on the territory of Belarus .

Part of the forces and resources of the United Strategic Command West took part in the military maneuver. The support for ground units was provided with more than 25 aircraft of the air and space forces of Russia, with the air force and air defense of Belarus. 680 combat vehicles were involved in the military maneuver.

According to this information, "Sapad 2017" was carried out on six military training areas in Belarus :

• the Lepel military training area ( Лепельский бригадный полигон near Lepel ),
• the Borissowka military training area ( Борисовский полигон near Borissowka ),
• the Loswido military training area ( Полигон "Лосвидо" near Haradok ),
• the Ossipowitschi or Assipowitschy military training area ( Осиповичский полигон near Assipowitschy ),
• the Rushani military training area ( Ружанский полигон near the settlement of Rushani in Pruschany district ),
• the military training area Domanowo or Damanawa ( Домановский полигон near the village of Damanawa )
• and in a location near the village of Dretun.

In Russia, the military maneuver was carried out on three military training areas: Luzhsky , Strugi Krasnye and Pravdinsk .

Reactions

The German Federal Minister of Defense Ursula von der Leyen assessed the exercise as a “demonstration of the ability and power of the Russians” and expressed doubts about the official information. She estimates the number of soldiers and civilians taking part at 100,000. The nuclear physicist Igor Sutjagin , who works at the Royal United Services Institute , also had 70,000 men based on Russian information on the device used. According to Russian information, the troop mobilizations along the NATO border, in addition to the 12,700 soldiers in the maneuver, are separate exercises.

reviews

A researcher from the Institute for Peace Research in Oslo concluded that the exercise went as expected. However, the newly established Russian divisions had not demonstrated a quick operational readiness, so that it was possible that they were still quite a long way from being fully operational. The Russian air force is also apparently suffering from continuous use in the Syrian civil war , which is initially reflected in lack of maintenance. Two major accidents during the exercise involved a Ka-52 attack helicopter that hit a group of observers with a mis-launched missile, and a Tu-22M bomber that aborted take-off and went over the runway.

Web links

Commons : Sapad 2017  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Lorenz Hemicker: Russia wages war three times as often as NATO -FAZ.net August 23, 2017
• nytimes.com September 7, 2017: Germany Disputes Size of Russian Wargames, Predicts 100,000 Troops
• Tobias Matern and Frank Nienhuysen: Fear of Russia's “green men ” -sueddeutsche.de August 12, 2017
• Lorenz Hemicker: Putin's army is at the border -FAZ.net September 13, 2017
• Alice Bota : You just want to practice - DZ 38/2017, p. 10

See also

• NATO Enhanced Forward Presence
• NATO expansion to the east
• Aurora 17th
• Russian-Belarusian Union

Individual evidence

1. ↑ press release
2. ^ Vienna Document 2011 (PDF; 210 KB), Vienna Document of November 30, 2011, page 27; accessed on September 15, 2017.
3. ↑ Information about the complexes of the strategic attack forces of the USSR demonstrated during the maneuvers "Sapad-81" , letter from the GDR Defense Minister Heinz Hoffmann to Erich Honecker , Geheime Kommandosache, GKdos-Nr .: A 465 671 (provided as part of the Parallel History Project (PHP) at ETH Zurich)
4. ↑ ^{a b c} Military maneuvers report by the Tagesschau (ARD) from September 14, 2017.
5. ↑ ^{a b} Michael Birnbaum and David Filipov: "Russia held a big military exercise this week. Here's why the US is paying attention." Washington Post September 23, 2017
6. ^ Frankfurter Rundschau : Military maneuvers in the Baltic Sea: Sweden practices war . In: Frankfurter Rundschau . ( fr.de [accessed on September 16, 2017]).
7. ↑ ERR: Belarus invites Estonia to observe Zapad military exercise (en) . In: ERR , July 28, 2017. Retrieved August 6, 2017. 
8. ↑ Лукашенко пригласил американскую делегацию ОБСЕ на учения «Запад-2017» (ru-RU) . In: Белновости , July 10, 2017. Accessed August 6, 2017. 
9. ↑ Грушко: Россия будет пресекать спекуляции НАТО по поводу учений «Запад-2017» (ru) . Retrieved August 6, 2017. 
10. ↑ Russian major maneuver completed , NZZ, September 21, 2017, page 2
11. ↑ ^{a b} Глава Минобороны Белоруссии: учение "Запад-2017" не направлено против третьих стран (ru) . In: ТАСС . Retrieved August 6, 2017. 
12. ↑ Christina Hebel, Matthias Gebauer: Major maneuvers of Moscow and Minsk: war of nerves on the NATO border. In: Spiegel Online. September 14, 2017. Retrieved September 15, 2017 . 
13. ↑ https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/sep/19/russian-helicopter-accidentally-fires-rocket-onlookers-zapad-war-games