Galina Karol | 2025-09-22

What was billed as Russia's thunderous show of force against NATO instead looked more like a Cold War costume party, complete with rusting aircraft, outdated tactics and inflated numbers that even Kremlin loyalists mocked as a "circus performance."

The Zapad (West) war games -- large-scale joint exercises held every four years by the Russian and Belarusian militaries -- took place on September 12-16. They are designed to showcase strength, test coordination and signal readiness to repel outside threats.

This year's drills, however, fell far short of the Kremlin's buildup. Officials promised "the latest experience" and state-of-the-art tactics, including simulated nuclear planning and tests of the new Oreshnik missile.

Yet on September 16, the Telegram channel We Can Explain, which has about 500,000 subscribers, reported the exercises were "significantly abbreviated," with little resemblance to the fanfare that preceded them.

Missile test, minus the missile

Instead of instilling pride, the war games drew ridicule. Pro-Kremlin bloggers derided the spectacle as outdated and pointless. The drills included paratroopers dropping from an Il-76 transport plane and unguided bombing runs -- tactics developed in the Cold War and widely seen as ineffective, even suicidal, in modern warfare.

"What's the point of doing this according to some outdated standards? To mislead NATO? Then we ought to send the cavalry into the breach," said a pro-Kremlin Telegram channel, as quoted by We Can Explain.

The Oreshnik, a new Russian intermediate-range ballistic missile, added to the intrigue. An aide to Belarus' defense minister denied the drills included nuclear planning or Oreshnik tests, even though Defense Minister Viktor Khrenin had announced those intentions on September 13.

On the final day, the Belarusian General Staff chief said the Oreshnik activities were completed, but no photo or video evidence appeared in official coverage.

A numbers game

The Kremlin has long inflated its military numbers, and Zapad-25 was no exception.

On September 16, the Telegram channel Kremlin.News reported President Vladimir Putin's visit to the Mulino training ground, where he claimed 100,000 personnel took part in the drills.

Vladimir Zhigar, speaking for BelPol, an organization founded by former Belarusian security officials, called the number manipulative. In his opinion, the figure refers not to the actual participants in the maneuvers, but to the "total number of service members involved, which, in fact, could be located at command posts in Russia."

In reality, the exercises were "greatly scaled down," Zhigar told Kontur, and "only about 13,000 service members" participated, which is fundamentally different than the 200,000 soldiers involved in the Zapad-21 exercises.

Other independent estimates put participation at 8,000 to 30,000 troops.

President Putin also claimed the drills involved "10,000 weapons systems," including hundreds of aircraft and ships. The numbers were meant to project overwhelming force, but analysts said reality fell short.

Zhigar said the exercises were originally planned on a larger scale but cut back after heavy Russian losses in Ukraine and fuel shortages caused by Ukrainian strikes on refineries.

He added that Moscow and Minsk scaled down the drills and pulled some troops deeper into Belarus to present what he called a "demonstration of peace."

This move intended to "give the impression to society, especially Western society, that we are not planning anything -- we are not a threat to NATO countries," Zhigar said.

US military personnel observed the exercises alongside representatives from other nations. At Minsk's invitation, the current and outgoing defense attachés from the US Embassy in Minsk attended, Reuters reported.

"The US Embassy in Minsk, Belarus received an invitation for our Defense Attache to attend the ZAPAD-2025 military exercise in Belarus as part of the Distinguished Visitor (DV) Day, and we accepted the invitation in light of recent productive bilateral engagements between our countries," said chief Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell.

Hybrid threats linger

Despite the "peaceful" façade, the drills included provocations. Zhigar said drone attacks on Poland and the deployment of Iskander missiles in Kaliningrad were deliberate efforts to study Western responses.

Iaroslav Chornogor of the Ukrainian Prism think tank agreed.

"Hybrid warfare consists of different stages and different forms of action. I also link the drone invasion of Poland with the exercises, because it is an element of psychological pressure," he told Kontur, pointing out that the Kremlin gained information about NATO's reaction and will use that for its own purposes in the future.

Experts added that such actions help Russia test electronic warfare, air defenses and the speed of intelligence sharing.

Zhigar warned that "this will continue even further" and urged NATO countries to recognize "the kind of threat the Lukashenko regime and the Putin regime pose."

Between Moscow and the West

Analysts say Belarus remains a Russian satellite but still shows some independence.

Pavlo Rad, a junior analyst at Ukrainian Prism, said President Alyaksandr Lukashenka seeks to balance ties to preserve his rule, constrained by fears of domestic unrest and personal risk. He added that Lukashenka is not interested in open war with Ukraine or NATO.

"If Belarus loses, completely loses, this sovereignty, there is a risk that Belarus will then become a springboard for possible aggressive actions by Russia in the region," Rad told Kontur.

Chornogor said Russia is keeping Belarus "completely in its orbit" and maintains high combat readiness, though setbacks in Ukraine have delayed broader plans.

Experts told Kontur the Zapad-25 drills demonstrated Moscow and Minsk's limits rather than strength, but also showed the threat persists.

Rad said regional security is impossible without a stable, independent Belarus and urged Ukraine and Europe to guard against further erosion of its sovereignty.

"It should not be forgotten that the Belarusian army numbers just over 60,000 military personnel and there are 2,000 Russian service members permanently deployed in Belarusian territory," said Chornogor, emphasizing that this is more or less the same size as the armed forces of the Baltic states.