“Autumn-2008”: on the Watch of Union State Security

In the course of manoeuvres “Autumn-2008” Belarusian Air Forces and Air Defence Forces together with Air Forces of the Russian Federation are to carry out the tasks of joint combat duty at western frontiers of the Union State. The second stage of joint manoeuvres is being held over a period of five days – from 17th up to 21st October, 2008. Major efforts of Belarusian and Russian soldiers are bent to redouble the security and defence of Belarusian state frontier as well as of the Union State as a whole.

In the course of manoeuvres “Autumn-2008” Belarusian Air Forces and Air Defence Forces together with Air Forces of the Russian Federation are to carry out the tasks of joint combat duty at western frontiers of the Union State. The second stage of joint manoeuvres is being held over a period of five days – from 17^th up to 21^st October, 2008. Major efforts of Belarusian and Russian soldiers are bent to redouble the security and defence of Belarusian state frontier as well as of the Union State as a whole.

On October 18^th the correspondent of www.soyuz.by watched the repulsing of the subversive group’s attack on the plane Су -27 as well as the extinguishing of a fire on its board which took place at the airfield of the 61^st aircraft fighter depot in Baranovichi.

Special operations troops, Ministry of emergency situations as well as territorial defence forces participated in the simulation of a diversion. Having applied well-tried joint efforts, “our lot” terminated the enemy and extinguished the fire.

Overall strength of the troops that take part in “Autumn-2008” amounts to 8.5 thousand people. Both warlike and special equipment, including more than 40 aircraft (12 belonging to Russian Air Forces), more than 60 tanks, about 250 fighting armored vehicles and up to 40 artillery pieces take part in manoeuvres. About 300 people of Russian flight personnel as well as planes МиГ -29, Су -25 and helicopters Ми -24, Ми -8 are based at three Belarusian airfields.

In an interview with the correspondent of www.soyuz.by major S.Tyuschanev noted that according to the plan of manoeuvres “Autumn-2008” the Russians train combined operations together with Belarusian army aviation. “We destroy the targets of a probable enemy, land tactical troops, carry out air reconnaissance,” he specified.

It should be noted that the zest of manoeuvres “Autumn-2008”, according to Belarusian Minister of Defence Leonid Maltsev, is the participation of all new arms as a special-operation force. “We took into account all nuances which occurred during the conflict in the Caucasus, in Iraq and other hot spots and will work the issues through in consideration of these nuances,” said L.Maltsev.

Besides that, during the manoeuvres the system of control is being perfected: earlier the Ministry of Defence and the General Staff acted mainly as teachers but now the General Staff as well as the whole central machinery act as trainees while the system of control, methods and approaches of the machinery are being checked.

As was explained by the Ministry of Defence, an important part of preparation for combined strategical manoeuvres of the Armed Forces “Autumn-2008” was the high results achieved by the armed forces personnel of our formations and military units during the instruction practice on the Russian firing ground “Ashuluk”.

As was reported earlier, the first part of manoeuvres was held on October 15^th-16^th. At this stage all the planning documents of the defensive operation were adjusted, the issues concerning overall security of troops’ and military units’ operations were worked through.

According to the Ministry of Defence, within the framework of cooperation with sub-units of Land Forces and special-operation forces the most responsible tasks were carried out by the crews of the helicopters Ми -8 and Ми -24 of the 181^st battle helicopter base. According to the decision taken by the command of Air Forces and Air Defence Forces, on-duty air defence forces of the 181^st battle helicopter base practiced the training tasks aimed at suppression of illegal crossing of Belarusian frontier in the air. The crews of the helicopters were training to escort and protect the column of military equipment of Land Forces as well as landing of troops. While pushing forward and deploying the troops in the regions specified, the military practiced to repulse the attacks of landing subversive forces.