Original title: International Observation｜Sword points at Russia and NATO’s large-scale military drills exacerbating regional tensions and confrontations
Xinhua News Agency, Brussels, January 25
Xinhua News Agency reporter Zhang Zhang and Li Jizhi
NATO recently launched its largest military exercise since the end of the Cold War. Analysts pointed out that NATO held an unprecedented military exercise aimed at Russia, not only to cheer up Ukraine, which was frustrated on the battlefield, but also to exaggerate the so-called “Russian threat” to persuade the people of NATO countries to support military expansion and prepare for war. This move provokes confrontation between the camps and is not conducive to regional peace and security.
NATO flexes muscles
The exercise, codenamed “Resolute Defender 2024”, was launched on January 24 and will last until May 31.
According to information released by NATO, this military exercise has been planned for several years and is the largest military exercise held by NATO since 1988. About 90,000 soldiers from 31 NATO member countries and partner country Sweden will participate. The participating equipment It includes more than 50 ships such as aircraft carriers and destroyers, more than 80 fighter jets, helicopters, drones and other aircraft, as well as more than 1,100 combat vehicles including 133 tanks and 533 infantry fighting vehicles.
The military exercise will consist of a series of national exercises and multinational joint exercises, covering a wide area from North America to NATO’s eastern flank. Christopher Cavalli, NATO’s Commander-in-Chief of Allied Forces in Europe, said that NATO “will demonstrate the ability to mobilize forces across the Atlantic from North America to strengthen the Euro-Atlantic region.”
Intended to suppress Russia and Ukraine
This large-scale NATO military exercise is obviously aimed at Russia. NATO said that this military exercise is the first implementation of the “Regional Defense Plan” adopted at the NATO Vilnius Summit last year. The plan lists Russia and terrorism as the two major threats to NATO. Russian Presidential Press Secretary Peskov said on the 25th that NATO’s military exercise was unprecedented in scale and “they did not hide who the exercise was aimed at.”
At the same time, this military exercise was held against the background that the Ukrainian army’s counterattack was frustrated on the Russian-Ukrainian battlefield and Western countries showed “aid fatigue to Ukraine”. It was also considered to be intended to cheer up Ukraine.
Victor Mizin, a researcher at the Primakov Institute of World Economics and International Relations of the Russian Academy of Sciences, said that this NATO military exercise is intended to put pressure on Russia, which is closely related to the frustration of Ukraine’s counterattack against Russia last year. Alexander Duchak, an expert at the Russian Institute of CIS Countries, believes that NATO wants to use war propaganda to make Western people continue to support their governments in providing military assistance to Ukraine.
However, analysts pointed out that NATO’s use of military exercises to deter Russia will not have a substantial impact on the Russia-Ukraine battlefield. William Courtney, a former U.S. diplomat and part-time senior researcher at the RAND Corporation, said that Russia is observing but not panicking in the face of NATO’s largest military exercise since the end of the Cold War.
Provoke camp confrontation
Before the start of this military exercise, Rob Power, chairman of the NATO Military Committee, claimed on the 18th that NATO countries and their people need to prepare for possible military conflicts with Russia in the next 20 years.
Analysts believe that NATO continues to exaggerate the “Russian threat” and possible future war with Russia in order to create excuses for NATO’s eastward and northward expansion, and to make the people of member states willing to pay more military expenditures and join the military.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Glushko criticized that this large-scale NATO military exercise is another component of the West’s “hybrid war” against Russia, marking NATO’s return to the model of confronting Russia during the Cold War.
Judging from the arrangement of this military exercise, the main exercise locations include the so-called Baltic countries with the greatest risk of being attacked by Russia, Poland, Romania and other NATO eastern flank countries, as well as Germany, the hub of reinforcements. NATO’s move seems to be to provide security guarantees for its eastern flank countries, but Michael O’Hanlon, a senior researcher at the Brookings Institution in the United States, believes that this exercise is unlikely to bring any impact on the security environment of NATO member states, especially the eastern flank countries. What a change.
Analysts pointed out that the confrontational measures adopted by NATO cannot resolve the security concerns of member states. Instead, they will deepen the hostility between European countries and Russia and worsen the security situation in the entire region. (Participating reporters: Geng Pengyu, Deng Xianlai)
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2024-01-26 10:03:00
