Belarus’ military academic: Poland number one target for nuclear strike

May 24, Pozirk. Poland is the number one target for a potential nuclear attack, Andrej Bahadziel of Belarusian Military Academy, told the First National Channel, a state-run radio station, on Thursday.

Warsaw sealed this fate by allowing the United States to set up an anti-missile facility in Redzikowo about 150 kilometers off Russia’s exclave of Kaliningrad, he said.

The base can detect and intercept ballistic missiles, including those with nuclear warheads, thus representing a security threat both to Belarus and major Russian cities, such as Moscow and St. Petersburg, he added.

The deployment of US forces in Poland indicates that Warsaw would be assigned some “very important role” in the future European security architecture, Bahadziel said.

He also claimed that the US plans to drag Russia into a “protracted war” to defeat it “in the political, economic and mental spheres,” following the initial shock caused by the Kremlin’s deployment of tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus last year.

Belarus regularly conducts drills amid tension with the West and Russia’s war against Ukraine, in which Minsk supports the Kremlin.

On May 7, Alaksandar Łukašenka ordered the army to hold a tactical nuclear drill involving “delivering special munitions to missile and aviation military units, loading them onto launchers and attaching them to aircraft.”

The move came a day after the Russian General Staff reported preparations for a similar exercise.

The US-based Institute for the Study of War played down threats from Minsk and Moscow, noting that Russia is unlikely to use nuclear weapons.

Also read: Warsaw: Belarus’ dependence on Russia forces us to view it as threat