Before Thunderstorm
- ALES CHAICHYTS
- 4.04.2023, 9:24
On why Lukashenka and Putin's statements don't scare anyone anymore.
Nuclear weapons can (and could) be deployed in Belarus at any moment and without any public statements made by Putin and Lukashenka. They could (and can) be used from the Belarusian territory at any moment.
And if it is really necessary to "set up" Lukashenka and Belarus (although who would believe it?), it would be enough to redraw the Russian red stars on the plane to Lukashenka ones, almost the same. So here we have a dog that barks, but so far does not bite.
Lukashenka said nothing new in his address on Friday, only once again acted as a rebroadcast of Russian fear of a future Ukrainian counteroffensive. At the same time, he repeated the already usual insults to the West and Putin's "nuclear" threats, which are also no longer surprising or almost frightening.
Our whole region froze in anticipation of an escalation of the war. In a suffocating nervous expectation - just like Lukashenka's stale uninteresting addresses to the "city and the world".
Just like Lukashenka's pressure on Belarusianness in Belarus remains a suffocating routine: what will they do with the monument to Larysa Heniush in Zelva? When will they finally ban the Belarusian language and any manifestations of un-Russianness? And, a little more interesting: are the enthusiastic Belarusophobes of petty bureaucracy, urban freaks and propagandists doing their best for Lukashenka? Maybe for someone more important? Isn't it Moscow that is coordinating their activities?
The Russians are trying unsuccessfully and in vain to capture little Bakhmut at the cost of heavy casualties, with barrier troops and other characteristic signs of Russian "military art". And the Ukrainians heroically defend their town.
The Belarusian economy continues to go down slowly: now, the Mazyr refinery has suddenly expressed its intention to halt production indefinitely for unreliable reasons. Is it really modernisation carried out by dubious suppliers and contractors from those countries where Belarus is not yet under sanctions? Or is it clinical death of the refinery after cutting off the European and Ukrainian markets? Or perhaps mothballing in case of shelling by Ukraine, when the attack on Kyiv or Volyn is launched from the territory of Belarus again?
We live in a scary, stuffy, tense time.
And sometimes one gets the impression that a Ukrainian counter-attack in the south or in the east could start literally any day. The Ukrainian leadership speaks publicly of "April-May". April has already begun. And one must realize that any around-the-war public statements by the Ukrainian leadership or military experts close to it are intended for Russia among others (and perhaps first and foremost). This means that, for the sake of surprise effect, the dates are probably named as far away as possible, not real ones. And the phrase "a few weeks" could mean "a few days".
And the unpredictability of a Ukrainian offensive makes both Putin and Lukashenka more afraid than it makes us. This can be seen in the anxious faces of the propagandists on Solovyov and Skabeyeva's programmes. By Lukashenka's slight panic on Friday and by the hysteria of Russian Telegram after the murder of propagandist Vladlen Tatarsky. It's scarier and more stuffy for them than it is for us.
Ales Chaichyts, Radio Svaboda