Military exercises in Belarus in 2026: what is known
There is no Zapad exercise in 2026, but Belarus has held several others: nuclear drills with Russia in May, command-and-staff drills near the Polish and Lithuanian borders on 15 to 18 September, CSTO drills on 12 to 16 October, and repeated army readiness checks. Minsk calls them defensive. The last dated event this monitor found is a readiness check of one unit in Brest on 19 October. As of 3 November no later exercise near the Lithuanian or Polish borders has been found, and no fresh source reports troop movement towards them.
Events of 2026
The daily issues start in June, so the first two rows rest on web sources alone.
| Date | Event | Where | Announced by | Confirmation |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 16 January to late March | Snap combat-readiness check ordered by Lukashenko | Eight units inspected by 25 February | Lukashenko, defence ministry | Defence24 and iSANS report it; findings are Minsk's account |
| 18 May (Belarus), 19 to 21 May (Russia) | Joint nuclear drills, led by Putin and Lukashenko by video link | Belarus and Russia; a Belarusian Iskander-M fired from Kapustin Yar | Both defence ministries | AP and Defence24 report the drills; warheads unproven |
| 17 to 26 June | Mobilisation exercise | Grodno region | Defence ministry | Militarnyi and iSANS; reservist figures differ |
| 26 to 28 July | Territorial-defence exercise | Maloryta and Drogichin districts, Brest region | Reported by Euroradio | Single source |
| 24 August onward | Check of an artillery brigade, widened on 11 September to the whole army, "up to mobilization" | Obuz-Lesnovsky range near Baranavichy | Lukashenko, Security Council | The words: Kyiv Independent, Meduza. Start date: Security Council secretariat, as recorded in this monitor's 13 September issue. No mobilisation declared |
| 6 September | Forest Brotherhood 2026 with Kazakhstan | Brestsky range | Reported by Reform.news | Single source, no strength given |
| 15 to 18 September | Western Operational Command staff drills | Hoża, Brest and Ruzhany ranges | Defence ministry | Euronews, Defence24, Kyiv Independent; size is Minsk's claim |
| 23 September | Territorial-defence staff exercise | Gomel region | CTV | Single state broadcaster |
| 29 September to 2 October | Annual mobilisation-readiness classes | Regions not named | Defence ministry, via Radio Racyja | One retelling |
| 12 to 16 October | Indestructible Brotherhood-2026 and Barrier-2026 | Vitebsk area and Starodorozhsky range | CSTO | Organisers' figures only |
| 19 October | Unit of the 38th Air Assault Brigade put on alert | Brest | Defence ministry, via Nasha Niva | Single source |
Belarusian troops also drilled abroad, in China in August (Swift Eagle 2026) and at Chebarkul in Russia from 27 September (the CSTO's Interaction-2026).
At a joint board in Minsk on 22 October, Defence Minister Viktor Khrenin said the 2026 cooperation plan has more than 160 joint events (Vedomosti). Izvestia and BelTA say the board approved the concept of Union Shield 2027, with no independent confirmation.
What was practised
The May drills, by the Belarusian ministry's account, rehearsed "the delivery of nuclear weapons and preparations for their use", with missile units and warplanes moving covertly over long distances. Russia's defence ministry gave figures for its own forces: 64,000 troops and more than 200 missile launchers.
In September, mechanised and tank battalions trained in border protection, against sabotage groups, and against drones and light aircraft. Reservists guarded a water intake and helped police control traffic. Minsk said numbers stayed below the 2011 Vienna Document notification thresholds and called the drills "purely defensive". Defence24 reports the stated aim as joint tasks in preparing and conducting a "strategic operation".
At one engineer brigade in February, a readiness check took 15 vehicles out of long-term storage for a 20 km march (iSANS).
How neighbours responded
The coverage read on the September drills (Euronews, Defence24, Kyiv Independent) quotes no Polish, Lithuanian or Latvian official, and searches in Polish and Lithuanian found none. This does not prove they said nothing. On the May drills, the condemnation found came from Ukraine's foreign ministry, which called Belarus a nuclear "bridgehead", and from opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya.
On 6 October, Lithuanian Defence Minister Robertas Kaunas said Lithuania is surrounded by aggressor states' strategic weapons in Belarus and Kaliningrad, as the Seimas voted in a first reading to lift the constitutional ban on weapons of mass destruction (LRT). That day Latvia's armed forces said masked, armed escorts from Belarus had tried to push at least 20 migrants across the border and that "deliberate provocations and hybrid threats" would continue (LSM). The head of Latvia's border guard allowed that the men could be organised crime, and Lukashenko called the episode a Latvian provocation.
The sources read do not present neighbours' own steps as answers to Belarusian drills. Poland's EP R134 airspace zone (10 September to 9 December) is declared a response to the drone threat. Lithuania's Budri pelėda runs until 4 December, and German forces in Lithuania will collect data on radars in Belarus and Kaliningrad (Defence24, citing Reuters).
Minsk describes the sequence the other way round. Xinhua reports that Belarus defended the May drills as "a direct response" to NATO expansion, and that Deputy Foreign Minister Igor Sekreta told diplomats they were legal. Chief of the General Staff Vladimir Bely said on 30 October that all forces and means would be used "only in an exceptional case".
What this page cannot confirm
Whether real warheads reached Belarus: Defence24 writes that there is no hard evidence of how much of the official message is true. The Oreshnik has the same problem. Lukashenko said in December 2025 that it had arrived and was going on combat duty, while Putin said only that it would enter combat duty that month (AP). Separately, Ukraine's military intelligence chief said on 7 September that a brigade with the missiles is deployed there. The monitoring group iSANS wrote in its June review that it had no credible evidence of deployment.
No source read gives troop numbers for the September drills. Their end is known only from official sources: Belarus24 said on the 18th that they continued, while TASS that day and AFP on the 19th, citing the Belarusian ministry, said they had ended.
Frequently asked questions
Are there exercises in Belarus now?
None near the Lithuanian or Polish borders has been found as of 3 November 2026. The latest dated event is the 19 October alert in Brest. Small drills and checks may go unreported, since Minsk says its readiness checks will continue.
Is there a Zapad exercise in 2026?
No. The series runs every four years and the last was Zapad-2025. The Zapad 2026 page explains how the false premise spread, including in this monitor.
When is the next Zapad?
Around 2029, going by the cadence. The next named Russian-Belarusian exercise is Union Shield 2027, and its dates are unpublished.
Do Belarusian exercises threaten Lithuania or Poland?
Minsk says no and calls its drills defensive. That cannot be verified independently. Kyiv Independent puts Hoża about 6 km from the Lithuanian border and the Brest range about 15 km from the Polish one, and the Vitebsk drills were not placed at the Suwałki Gap. No troop movement towards those borders is confirmed by fresh sources. This page makes no forecast.
Sources
- AP via WTOP: Belarus launches joint drills with Russia (18 May)
- AP via Arab News: Russia holds nuclear drills, joined by Belarus (May)
- Kyiv Independent: Belarus starts nuclear drills with Russia (18 May)
- Defence24: nuclear drills with the Belarusian Iskander-M (22 May)
- Xinhua via The Star: Sekreta on the nuclear drills (29 May)
- Reform.news: Union Shield 2027 announced (21 May)
- iSANS: review of March 2026 and military review of June 2026
- Militarnyi: mobilisation drills in Grodno (25 June)
- Defence24: Belarus announces a readiness check (27 August)
- Kyiv Independent: Lukashenko inspects troops (11 September)
- AP via News4JAX: Lukashenko on the Oreshnik (18 December 2025)
- Kyiv Independent: Oreshnik brigade in Belarus, says Ukraine's military intelligence (7 September)
- Meduza: "Up to mobilization" (11 September)
- Reform.news: Forest Brotherhood 2026 (6 September)
- Defence24: drills near the Polish and Lithuanian borders (15 September)
- Euronews: drills near the Suwałki Gap (16 September)
- Kyiv Independent: 'defensive' drills (September)
- Militarnyi: troops near the Suwałki corridor (17 September)
- Super Express, citing AFP: end of the drills (19 September)
- Radio Racyja: mobilisation classes (30 September)
- LRT: Seimas vote and Kaunas (6 October)
- LSM: Latvian armed forces on the border incident (7 October)
- Nasha Niva: 38th brigade check (19 October)
- Vedomosti: Khrenin at the joint board (22 October)
- Interfax: Bely on readiness (30 October)
- Named without a link, as read in this monitor's issues: Euroradio (26 July), CTV (23 September), Belarus24 (18 September), Interfax on Interaction-2026 (27 September), Zerkalo (16 October), Defence24 and Reuters on German signals work (28 and 29 October), LRT on Budri pelėda (24 October). TASS, BelTA and Izvestia are named as plain text because they are restricted in the region.
This page is maintained alongside the daily digests; the list of related issues above updates automatically.