Lukashenko’s regime in belarus is opening its own "lend-lease" for the russian military. In April–August we talked about transferring large amounts of artillery ammunition to the russian armed forces – for instance, one batch could provide half a day of intense artillery fire on the entire frontline;
And in September–October we got first visual evidence of russia receiving from Lukashenko T-72A tanks from belarussian army’s reserve arsenal and Tor-M2E air defense systems from service, despite having only 20 units of the latter.
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Quite possibly, Lukashenko’s "lend-lease" will continue, and we’ll see even more turnarounds with belarus giving away its more precious weapons. For example, its "surplus" military aircraft from reserve stocks.
One could wonder, but how come belarus have these "surplus" planes? Here we should recall the following. Until 2012, belarussian air force had 21 Su-27 fighters, 23 Su-24M bombers, and 12 Su-24MR surveillance aircraft in service.
In February 2012, Lukashenko issued an order to discard all the Su-27 jets, and in December same year, all the Su-24M/MRs, due to "budget savings", and put them in storage at the 61st Air Base near Baranovichi. It's just that at that time, the belarusian dictator was still playing with the illusion of a "welfare state" in his country, so he starved the army with annual funding of no more than 1.5% of annual GDP.
There are data in open sources that in 2013, belarus sold at least 4 Su-24M bombers to Sudan, and that in 2016 it planned to sell 12 more such aircraft. There was no information about the fate of the belarusian Su-27s after they were put into storage.
In April 2022, Google Maps suddenly improved its service, in particular, by revealing all the military objects belonging to russia and its allies in aggression. Pictures of them showed, in particular, that at least 8 Su-27 fighters and at least 5 Su-24M bombers are still stationed at the Belarusian 61st Air Base.
A little more than six months passed, and it seems that Lukashenko has found a "use" for these "surplus" planes.
According to Defense Express’s sources, the Belarusian dictator has promised to hand over some of its Su-27 jets to the russian federation. Probably, at least two belarusian Su-27s have already been repaired at the "558th Aircraft Repair Plant" and transferred to the territory of the russian federation. Four more are on the way. We cannot rule out that Lukashenko will also want to transfer his Su-24M to the russians in exchange for something else.
But what may belarus want from russia? Here we should recall that according to the plans belarussian defense industry had before the russian invasion of Ukraine, belarusian military enterprises were supposed to receive next batch of four Su-30SM aircraft from russia. Lukashenko’s regime has no money to pay for them anyway, if only some remnants of the loan for the building of belarusian NPP. So it seems, belarusians are paying for these new Su-30SM with their Su-27 (and Su-24M in perspective) aircraft.
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