The severity of his illness is not known, but according to confirmed, Alexander Lukashenko the President of Belarus is sick. He was in Moscow recently for the Victory Day celebrations on May 9, but he appeared to be less mobile and carrying an electronic device. His only appearance since then has been a still photograph and a short video message on Telegram, in which he appears bandaged with an hoarse vocal.
It is possible for the 70-year old dictator to recover. However, it’s also possible he won’t. The West must prepare for his eventual death because Belarus is unlikely to survive as an independent state much longer if he dies. Lukashenko is grooming Nikolai to be the next leader, but he has not reached 20 years old yet.
It is unlikely that Russian President Vladimir Putin would be thrilled if young Lukashenko succeeds his father. Although many people see them as being two peas, the two have never really gotten along and relations between are icy. Putin could choose a willing puppet or put pressure on young Lukashenko, but he might also decide to incorporate Belarus into the Russian Federation defacto.
It is clear that he won’t allow free elections or a selection of a candidate who could move towards the West. The Maidan Revolution of 2014, which dramatically shifted Ukraine towards the West, alarmingly alarmed Moscow. A revolution in Belarus could terrify Moscow.
If Putin were to occupy Belarus, then the West would need to pause and take a moment before taking any action. Belarus is not Ukraine. While Ukraine lacked security guarantees, it had been promised that its territorial integrity will be respected. Ukraine has also been a democratic country for many years, and it is slowly but surely moving away from Russia. Its presidents have tended to be more pro-Western than Russian, both before and after Maidan. Civil society in Ukraine was growing, and so were its ties to the West. Geographically, Ukraine occupies a strategic area for Eurasian geopolitics, as it is located north of the Black Sea, and next to Turkey.
Belarus does not possess any of these characteristics. Belarus has no guarantees of security from the West. It also does not have any promises about territorial integrity. It does not have a free civil society and what little civil society it has has very few Western connections. The United States did not even have an ambassador there for most of the decade.
After absorbing these facts, it is important to consider the Western reaction. Russia is under heavy sanctions because of their invasion in Ukraine. These sanctions were placed to achieve a specific goal: forcing Russia to return to its pre-February 20,22 positions. Even realists like Henry Kissinger have argued such a move is prudent.
Sanctions would not change anything in Belarus. Why? A de-russified Belarus would be of little benefit to the U.S., but Russia would suffer greatly. Russia’s security is boosted by keeping Ukraine outside the West. Controlling Belarus is important to maintain pressure on NATO’s Suwalki Gap – a 100km area that separates the Russian exclave Kaliningrad from Belarus. The loss of Belarus would put the Russian exclave Kaliningrad at serious risk, and be a nightmare to Russia’s strategic planners.
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This puts Russia at risk. Belarus would be the last of Russia’s immediate neighbors to control if Ukraine continued on its path towards Western integration. It was obvious , during a meeting of the security council that Putin held in February last year to discuss the possible invasion of Ukraine on a large scale, that not everyone present supported this move. This would not be true here. Putin could start a meeting with the announcement that Lukashenko was dead and that a prowestern government would likely take power in Minsk. Every member of Russian leadership will support an intervention. Sanctions won’t change this fact.
It’s important to weigh importance in international relations. Does my opponent value X more than I do, for example? Kissinger has called for a similar realistic approach towards Russia, making the case of compromise. In 2016, former president Barack Obama defended by saying that Russia cared more about Ukraine than the U.S. and that it was important to know what America’s core interests were. Belarus is an even more clear case: The Russian Federation’s core interest is to control Belarus. The United States of America has no core interest in this.
It is not to make a moral judgement. If Russia were to absorb Belarus, no one in Western Europe should be celebrating. It does not give us any reason to be in conflict.
