Events in Belarus

It is not front-page news in the United States, but events in Belarus are getting interesting. There are now daily demonstrations, the demonstrations are wide-spread, and there are supporting strikes. This does look serious and there appears to be a real chance that the dictatorial rule Lukashenko could be overthrown. I have never done a systematic study of the phenomenon, but once the protests 1) reach a certain size, 2) reach a certain level of sustainability, 3) are broadly based across a country and 4) supported by strikes and business shutdowns…. then I suspect there is a high probability that the current government will be thrown out of power. With some research, I suspect one could come up with a probability of this occurring (much like we did with probability of winning or losing an insurgency: See: America’s Modern Wars).

Now, the Belarus situation is more complex, because Russia is in the neighborhood and has been working on trying develop some form of closer integration or unification with Belarus. So, as things there get more tenuous, one wonders if Russia will not be tempted to intervene. So far, their costs for intervening in many other locales had not been crippling. At this point, suspect we are looking at six or more possible outcomes:

1. Lukashenko manages to remain in power.
2. Lukashenko is replaced by someone in his entourage.
3. Lukashenko is overthrown and replaced by a democratic government.
4. Lukashenko is overthrown and replaced by a government that becomes an oligarchy or another dictatorship.

5. Russian intervenes.

6. Lukashenko forms a combined government with the opposition so as to head off Russian intervention.

 

Russian intervention could have several forms

1. To prop up Lukashenko, possibly in exchange for signing a treaty that surrenders some or much of their sovereignty.
2. To prop up a replacement for Lukashenko, also in exchange for signing a treaty that surrenders some or much of their sovereignty.
3. Russia annexes Belarus.

 

Would not be surprised to see dramatic developments there in the next few weeks.

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Christopher A. Lawrence
Christopher A. Lawrence

Christopher A. Lawrence is a professional historian and military analyst. He is the Executive Director and President of The Dupuy Institute, an organization dedicated to scholarly research and objective analysis of historical data related to armed conflict and the resolution of armed conflict. The Dupuy Institute provides independent, historically-based analyses of lessons learned from modern military experience.

Mr. Lawrence was the program manager for the Ardennes Campaign Simulation Data Base, the Kursk Data Base, the Modern Insurgency Spread Sheets and for a number of other smaller combat data bases. He has participated in casualty estimation studies (including estimates for Bosnia and Iraq) and studies of air campaign modeling, enemy prisoner of war capture rates, medium weight armor, urban warfare, situational awareness, counterinsurgency and other subjects for the U.S. Army, the Defense Department, the Joint Staff and the U.S. Air Force. He has also directed a number of studies related to the military impact of banning antipersonnel mines for the Joint Staff, Los Alamos National Laboratories and the Vietnam Veterans of American Foundation.

His published works include papers and monographs for the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment and the Vietnam Veterans of American Foundation, in addition to over 40 articles written for limited-distribution newsletters and over 60 analytical reports prepared for the Defense Department. He is the author of Kursk: The Battle of Prokhorovka (Aberdeen Books, Sheridan, CO., 2015), America’s Modern Wars: Understanding Iraq, Afghanistan and Vietnam (Casemate Publishers, Philadelphia & Oxford, 2015), War by Numbers: Understanding Conventional Combat (Potomac Books, Lincoln, NE., 2017) and The Battle of Prokhorovka (Stackpole Books, Guilford, CT., 2019)

Mr. Lawrence lives in northern Virginia, near Washington, D.C., with his wife and son.

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2 Comments

  1. It made the front page of the WSJ today.

    Twitter world was posting on it a lot. I am sure at some point people will accuse the CIA of fomenting all the rebellion, but people sure don’t seem real thrilled about the idea of getting close again to the Russians.

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