This is not a drill: border offensive is unprecedented

Domination of the ground, air and sea around Ukraine is more than just a show of strength, experts believe

Whether or not one believes the doom-laden warnings that an invasion is now days away, there is one thing that is abundantly clear: Vladimir Putin is ready.

Russia’s most recent military activities in the south-west of the country show that Moscow now has the capacity for a full-scale and far-reaching invasion of its neighbour as never before.

The hint of war first emerged last April with the unusual movement of 25,000 Russian troops to the Ukrainian border. In November, Western intelligence warnings became more urgent when data from satellite images indicated more than 90,000 Russian troops had massed near Ukraine. Now there are at least 130,000.

Aside from troops, recent movements of Russian weaponry, a lot of it captured on video and posted on social media, speak to the staggering scale of the preparations.

In the past weeks, troops and artillery stationed in the Far East and Siberia were seen moving to Russia’s western borders. Some of them have arrived for massive military drills in Belarus, some of them are still close to the Ukrainian border.

Rob Lee, a fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute’s Eurasia Programme and a former US infantry marine, said on Friday: “Russia’s current military build-up near Ukraine is unprecedented: this is not like previous war scares or the build-up in the spring. [The] aerial, ground and naval military power near Ukraine now is quantifiably far greater.”

The number of Russian battalion tactical groups (BTGs) stationed within 125 miles of Ukraine is now estimated to be around 100, compared to three to four dozen permanent BTGs in that area before the build-up.

The variety and types of military equipment amassed in Russia’s south-west are highly unusual for military drills unless they are supposed to imitate a real invasion.

Iskander, a mobile short-range ballistic missile system, has been deployed to Belarus close to the border with Ukraine.

Electronic warfare systems, fuel supplies and a variety of engineering equipment including pontoon bridges have all been spotted on the move in south-west Russia.

Russia is holding major naval drills near Ukraine’s Azov and Black Sea coast and earlier this week moved its large landing ships from the Mediterranean into the Black Sea, building up the force for a potential naval attack.

Open-source intelligence groups also pointed to an unusually large number of National Guard troops and vehicles on the move near the Ukrainian border.

Russia’s Conflict Intelligence Team, which has studied the Russian military and tracked its movement since the war in eastern Ukraine broke out in 2014, says such a sophisticated and versatile presence on the Ukraine border can either be a preparation for war or an uncanny true-to-size imitation of one.

The team said yesterday: “We definitely cannot rule out that building up this offensive force is nothing more than an infowar: but even if this is the case, it is clearly working: what we see on the ground is no different from an actual preparation for an invasion.”