Belarusian dictator Alyaksandr Lukashenka announced on 12 May that his army will move to rotating, targeted mobilization of military units to "prepare for war"—formalizing what has been happening on Ukraine's northern border since January.
The rotational model turns episodic theater into permanent pressure—what Ukrainian assessments have long framed as Belarus's real role in Russia's war: pinning Ukrainian forces north without requiring Belarus itself to invade.
"We will selectively mobilize units in order to prepare them for war. God willing, it can be avoided," Lukashenka told Defense Minister Viktor Khrenin during a meeting in Minsk. He added: "We are all preparing for war." The remarks came at a session where Khrenin reported on the results of a months-long combat readiness inspection.
Belarus is abandoning the model of large-scale episodic exercises—like the one that ran from 16 January through 13 March—in favor of a rotational system: units called up in turns for intensive combat training, then returned to their permanent bases. The state armament program for 2026–2030 was discussed at a separate meeting the day before. Belarusian officials said more than 6,000 reservists and personnel had taken part in the recent inspection cycle.
Kyiv: he is working Russia's information agenda
Andrii Kovalenko, who heads Ukraine's Center for Countering Disinformation at the National Security and Defense Council, dismissed the announcement.
"Don't take Lukashenka's statements about 'selective mobilization' seriously. Everything is under control by our forces. The man is working through the Russians' information agenda to make Putin happy. Nothing more. If there is a threat, Ukraine will see it, and Lukashenka will regret it."
Ukrainian intelligence has assessed since 2022 that Belarus on its own lacks the manpower and the logistics—the fuel trucks, the artillery in motion, the equipment trains—to mount an independent invasion. What Belarus does have is the ability to keep Ukrainian forces fixed on a third border, forcing Kyiv to spread air defense and infantry across northern, eastern, and southern fronts instead of concentrating them where Russia is actually fighting.
That, Ukrainian analysts have been saying since the start of the war, is the point.
What is actually on the ground
The rhetoric and the metal do not perfectly match. The metal is real anyway.
On 17 April, Zelenskyy said Ukrainian intelligence had detected road construction toward Ukrainian territory and the establishment of artillery positions in border areas of Belarus. The same day, Lukashenka signed a decree calling reserve officers to military service in 2026—a measure Belarus carries out annually as part of routine training.
In early May, a balloon carrying a drone relay station crossed from Belarusian territory into Ukrainian airspace. Small incursion, but useful: Russia routes its Shahed-type drones through Belarusian cellular infrastructure to reach Ukrainian cities and probe NATO airspace.
On 1 May, Zelenskyy reported "rather specific activity" on sections of the Belarusian border, which he declined to detail. "We are carefully recording everything, controlling everything, and, if needed, we will react," he said.
Two days later, Ukraine's military intelligence assessed that Belarus is building training grounds, transport hubs, and logistical routes that Russia could use for an offensive "at any time."
The pattern, accumulated
The 12 May announcement closes off the fifth winter and spring of this same routine. In August 2025, Lukashenka used a television address to tell Belarusians to prepare for war and pushed through legal amendments easing the path to martial law and full mobilization. Belarus formed a new special operations brigade in Homel, within striking distance of Ukraine's northern flank, and received Russia's Oreshnik ballistic missiles alongside existing Iskanders. The September 2025 Zapad drills with Russia closely mirrored the 2021 Zapad exercises—drills that, a month later, turned out to have been staging for Russia's full-scale invasion.
None of those preparations turned into combat in 2025. The Oreshnik systems have not been fired. The Homel brigade has not crossed the border. The 70,000 Belarusian troops Lukashenka announced in 2022 as a joint force with Russia did not invade.
What did happen, Yevhen Dykyi, a former Aidar Battalion company commander, told UNIAN in April, is that any escalation along the northern border—even a limited one—forces Kyiv to redistribute its forces. The result, Dykyi argued, is additional strain on Ukrainian defense across multiple regions simultaneously. Not a second invasion of Kyiv. A diversion.
What "targeted mobilization" actually is
Belarus is moving from punctuated readiness to continuous readiness. Snap drills end. Rotation begins. Units cycle through training and return, never quite mobilized, never quite at rest.
The model is sustainable. It can run for years.
New roads and artillery positions: Zelenskyy warns of military buildup in Belarus near Ukraine border
It produces, on demand, the kind of border activity Zelenskyy described on 1 May—the rather specific activity Ukraine has to watch, has to record, has to staff against. The artillery positions get built. The roads get widened. The cellular towers stay on. The balloon flies in.
Lukashenka closed the meeting with Khrenin with a sentence the Belarusian presidential press service has been issuing in various phrasings for some time: "God willing, we can avoid it. After all, we are all preparing for war."
He has been saying versions of that sentence since 2022.
