Russian Policy toward Belarus after 2020

Russian Policy toward Belarus after 2020
Author: Arkady Moshes
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 185
Release: 2023-04-17
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1666925985

Traditionally Belarus has always had a special status in Russia’s foreign policy. Russia’s approach towards a key political and military ally and a “Slavic brother” was always an indicator of how Russia would see the optimal relationships with other countries of the post-Soviet space. At this moment Belarus-Russia relations are evolving in unexpected ways. The two interconnected crises – the Belarusian mass protests of 2020 and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine – have had a profound impact on the Belarusian regime and society, the regional security and Russian policy towards Belarus. This book explores the ongoing development of Belarus-Russia relations and discusses the future of the relationship. This edited volume reviews the state of the relationship and underlines key emergent trends of Belarus’s and Russia’s policies towards each other to identify new mechanisms and practices as they shape into a new model. The book is comprised of in-depth empirical contributions in a range of interdisciplinary perspectives on cooperation in political, economic, security, media, and societal domains within a broader regional context.

NL ARMS Netherlands Annual Review of Military Studies 2020

NL ARMS Netherlands Annual Review of Military Studies 2020
Author: Frans Osinga
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 538
Release: 2020-12-03
Genre: Law
ISBN: 9462654190

This open access volume surveys the state of the field to examine whether a fifth wave of deterrence theory is emerging. Bringing together insights from world-leading experts from three continents, the volume identifies the most pressing strategic challenges, frames theoretical concepts, and describes new strategies. The use and utility of deterrence in today’s strategic environment is a topic of paramount concern to scholars, strategists and policymakers. Ours is a period of considerable strategic turbulence, which in recent years has featured a renewed emphasis on nuclear weapons used in defence postures across different theatres; a dramatic growth in the scale of military cyber capabilities and the frequency with which these are used; and rapid technological progress including the proliferation of long-range strike and unmanned systems. These military-strategic developments occur in a polarized international system, where cooperation between leading powers on arms control regimes is breaking down, states widely make use of hybrid conflict strategies, and the number of internationalized intrastate proxy conflicts has quintupled over the past two decades. Contemporary conflict actors exploit a wider gamut of coercive instruments, which they apply across a wider range of domains. The prevalence of multi-domain coercion across but also beyond traditional dimensions of armed conflict raises an important question: what does effective deterrence look like in the 21st century? Answering that question requires a re-appraisal of key theoretical concepts and dominant strategies of Western and non-Western actors in order to assess how they hold up in today’s world. Air Commodore Professor Dr. Frans Osinga is the Chair of the War Studies Department of the Netherlands Defence Academy and the Special Chair in War Studies at the University Leiden. Dr. Tim Sweijs is the Director of Research at The Hague Centre for Strategic Studies and a Research Fellow at the Faculty of Military Sciences of the Netherlands Defence Academy in Breda.

Defending Eastern Europe

Defending Eastern Europe
Author: Jacek Lubecki
Publisher: Manchester University Press
Total Pages: 323
Release: 2021-08-24
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1526147556

Following the passage of the fifteenth and twentieth anniversaries of the entry of many former communist states into both NATO and the EU in 2019, this book takes a comprehensive look at the changed security conditions of these new member states. How has NATO and EU membership improved their overall defence protection, and what elements are still missing for them on an individual state basis? Utilising alliance politics theory, convergence/divergence theory and defence policy theory, the book provides an invaluable assessment of defence policies, from the stable East Central European states to the most jeopardised Baltic states in the north of Europe. With chapters on the Cold War defence conditions during the last two decades of Soviet domination, post 1989–91 transformations in the direction of democracy and the impact of the 2014 Ukraine–Russia–Crimea crisis, this book is essential reading for those seeking to understand the changed landscape of European politics in the twenty-first century.

Baltic Security Strategy Report

Baltic Security Strategy Report
Author: Olevs Nikers
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2019
Genre: Politique militaire
ISBN: 9780998666051

The Baltic Security Strategy Report provides an indepth security review of the Baltic countries of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. As highlighted in this important work, the Baltic States' various national and collective strategies to address recurring regional threats since achieving statehood over a hundred years ago present notable case studies useful to contemporary policymakers and defense planners. Scholars Olevs Nikers and Otto Tabuns based this report on a series of discussions and workshops involving key European and American experts and stakeholders engaged in Baltic regional security matters. The participating experts assessed current challenges pertaining to defense and deterrence, societal security, economic security and cyber security. In addition to exploring the security considerations of each of the three Baltic States, the workshop discussions and resulting papers collected in this report specifically examine avenues of subregional cooperation that may prove more potent than individual national effort in certain fields. Consequently, the authors provide a detailed list of recommendations on how to proceed with a more coherent, goaloriented, and efficient regional cooperation strategy that serves to buttress the security of each of the Baltic States and the Transatlantic community more broadly. The report is a rich guide to issues and opportunities of Baltic intraregional security, and a valuable resource for policymakers, advisors, scholars and defensesector professionals on both sides of the Atlantic.

Regional Security Governance in Post-Soviet Eurasia

Regional Security Governance in Post-Soviet Eurasia
Author: Igor Davidzon
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 211
Release: 2021-10-06
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 3030828867

This book explores post-Soviet Eurasian regional security governance, as embedded in the military alliance of Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO). CSTO was established in 2002 and consists of six post-Soviet countries: Russia, Belarus, Armenia, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. Moving studies of regional security governance beyond the so-called Eurocentrism trend expressed, inter alia, via the focus on Western military alliance, such as NATO, this book examines CSTO as a new, post-Soviet form of regional security cooperation by looking at the reasons and drivers behind the establishment of the post-Soviet Eurasian security governance; the organization's institutional design; the military capabilities of its member states; the degree of the members' integration within the alliance; the cooperation pattern adopted by CSTO members; as well as the effect and effectiveness of this military alliance.

The Ukrainian Crisis and European Security

The Ukrainian Crisis and European Security
Author: F. Stephen Larrabee
Publisher: RAND Corporation
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2015
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780833088345

Discusses the implications of Russia's annexation of Crimea and attempt to destabilize eastern Ukraine for European security and the United States, particularly the U.S. Army.

Reinforcing Deterrence on NATO's Eastern Flank

Reinforcing Deterrence on NATO's Eastern Flank
Author: David A. Shlapak
Publisher:
Total Pages: 15
Release: 2016
Genre: Baltic States
ISBN:

"Russia's recent aggression against Ukraine has disrupted nearly a generation of relative peace and stability between Moscow and its Western neighbors and raised concerns about its larger intentions. From the perspective of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the threat to the three Baltic republics of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania -- former Soviet republics, now member states that border Russian territory -- may be the most problematic of these. In a series of war games conducted between summer 2014 and spring 2015, RAND Arroyo Center examined the shape and probable outcome of a near-term Russian invasion of the Baltic states. The games' findings are unambiguous: As presently postured, NATO cannot successfully defend the territory of its most exposed members. Fortunately, it will not require Herculean effort to avoid such a failure. Further gaming indicates that a force of about seven brigades, including three heavy armored brigades -- adequately supported by airpower, land-based fires, and other enablers on the ground and ready to fight at the onset of hostilities -- could suffice to prevent the rapid overrun of the Baltic states"--Publisher's web site.

Geopolitical and Humanitarian Aspects of the Belarus–EU Border Conflict

Geopolitical and Humanitarian Aspects of the Belarus–EU Border Conflict
Author: Elżbieta Kużelewska
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 221
Release: 2024-02-16
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1040008356

This book provides a broad geopolitical and legal analysis of the longer-term dispute between the Belarusian regime and the European Union, played out through conflict on the Polish–Belarusian border, which started in 2021. Although Poland finds itself at the center of this conflict, the book covers all countries whose territorial integrity has been affected, revealing a Belarusian regime taking advantage of the refugee crisis as a tool of hybrid warfare for destabilizing the political situation. As such, it also examines the role of Russia and its influence by means of its Belarusian neighbor, exposing the underlying motivations and mechanisms used by the Lukashenko regime towards the European community. This book will be of key interest to scholars and students of Central and Eastern European politics, EU politics, migration politics/studies, global governance, human rights, crisis management and, more broadly, to international relations, security studies, and international law. Chapter 5 of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial-No Derivative Licence (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.

Waking the Neighbour

Waking the Neighbour
Author: Keir Giles
Publisher: CSRC
Total Pages: 53
Release: 2009
Genre: Europe
ISBN: 1905962762

"Because of both history and geography, the Finnish relationship with Russia is unique in Europe. At the same time the Finnish perception of Russia as a source of security challenges is acute. Finland is engaged in a debate over whether it would be desirable to seek membership of NATO in order to mitigate these challenges. A full and frank debate has been difficult because it is constrained by a range of political and societal taboos; nevertheless there are indicators that a move toward NATO is not impossible in the foreseeable future. If Finland were to opt for joining NATO, this would register in Russian defence and security thinking as a serious concern. Unlike the Baltic accession in 2004, the response from the newly assertive Russia could potentially be swift and damaging. This would also have implications for Russian relations with the EU, of which Finland has been a member since 1995. Many in Finland see the EU as a security provider, and there is confusion in the national debate between EU or Nordic security policy cooperation and an actual defensive alliance. Finland's NATO argument is a complex and multi-faceted one, made even more so by regional and cultural specifics; but it needs to be understood because its result could have a major impact on Russia's relationships with both NATO and the EU."--Page i.