Belarus deploys air defence detachment to Russian border

Stock photo: Belaruski Hajun
Stock photo: Belaruski Hajun

Belarus has moved an air defence unit to the border with Russia amid increasing Ukrainian drone attacks on military targets within Russia itself.

Source: the monitoring project Belaruski Hajun

Details: One of the units of the 740th Anti-aircraft Missile Regiment of the Armed Forces of Belarus has been transferred to the Klimavichy district in Mogilev Oblast, Belarus.

The 740th Anti-aircraft Missile Regiment (military unit 15847) is located in the settlement of Barysaw and is part of the North-Western Operational Command. The regiment is armed with Osa surface-to-air missile systems.

The troops have been deployed on the outskirts of the settlement of Fedotova Buda near the Belarusian-Russian border (next to Russia’s Smolensk Oblast). The settlement is about 5 km away from the border.

The purpose of moving Belarusian troops to the Russian border area is unknown. There are no strategically critical industrial facilities which could be additionally covered by air defence in the Klimavichy district. The settlement has a distillery, a grain processing plant and a lime production plant. There are no military facilities in the district.

Light industry and the food industry predominate in the neighbouring districts in Mogilev Oblast (the Kastsyukovichy, Klichaw, Cherykaw, Khotsimsk and Krasnapollye districts). The only exceptions are the Belarus Cement Factory in Kastsyukovichy and the Krichevsky Cement Plant, which produces Portland cement.

Belaruski Hajun’s analysts note that the main anti-aircraft missile units of the Armed Forces of Belarus are located in the west and centre of the country. Apart from Bobruisk, where the 147th Anti-Aircraft Regiment is deployed, there are no anti-aircraft missile units in the east of Belarus.

Belaruski Hajun suggests that due to Russian air defence’s inability to completely prevent drone strikes (of which further proof was provided by a strike on oil depots in Smolensk Oblast in the small hours of 24 April), the Belarusian military has become concerned about covering the airspace in the east of their own country.

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