VITEBSK, 16 July (BelTA) – It is important for the country to maintain an efficient army, Belarus President Aleksandr Lukashenko said as he inspected the 103rd Independent Guards Airborne Brigade in Vitebsk on 16 July, BelTA has learned.
During the meeting with the military, the head of state recalled the developments in the build-up to the Great Patriotic War. “We did not want a war, the leadership of the Soviet Union made every effort to prevent a war realizing that it would be hard to avoid it. This prompted extensive rearmament and re-equipment. Naturally, Nazi Germany that had its eyes on the east was fully aware that it should not let the rearmament and upgrade happen. However, let us be frank: we (our leadership) messed it up at the beginning of the war and we had to pay dearly for the victory of 1945,” the president said.
He said that specially trained military units crossed the Soviet border and penetrated the territory of Belarus. “They wore a Soviet military uniform. They did not only neutralize the frontier area. They knew very well that they would not be able to implement the blitzkrieg tactic without bridges and crossings, therefore they killed virtually everyone who defended the Belarusian infrastructure. That was the main reason why the Nazi army marched across Belarus so fast. Belarus took the brunt of the Nazi attack,” the head of state said.
In his words, back then it was an ordinary beginning of the war, however a lot of time has passed and the situation has changed. “It is impossible now to start a war unexpectedly, to send large formations of aircraft even to Belarus. It will not be as easy to cross our border as back then. We should keep our powder dry. This is the main lesson that I learned as the commander-in-chief from that devastating war. So did our leadership and you, officers. Those who are reluctant to feed their own army shall feed a foreign army. This is not my quote, but we have learned this very well, this is in our genes,” Aleksandr Lukashenko said.
The president noted that over the past decades the world witnessed several wars. Belarus closely followed and studied them, starting from the war in Afghanistan that is still going on, the developments in Iraq, the Chechen war in Russia, up to ongoing clashes in Syria and Libya. “We carefully studied the wars that raged over the past quarter of the century. With this in mind, we upgraded our Armed Forces. During my presidency I had to take decisions on changing our actions amidst military conflicts four times,” Aleksandr Lukashenko said.
