Why Russia is foolish not to invite NATO observers to its war games

NEXT month Russia will hold what is expected to be the biggest military exercise in Europe since the end of the cold war. According to NATO estimates, it will involve at least 100,000 troops (see ). Revived from Soviet times by Vladimir Putin, Russia’s president, the Zapad (West) drills, as they are known, take place every four years. Although the Kremlin insists that the scenarios it is playing out are purely defensive, that is not always how they have looked to its neighbours. Countries that have borders with Russia or Belarus, the operational focus of Zapad 2017, are especially worried.The climax of Zapad 2009 was a dummy nuclear strike on Warsaw, which rather stretches the meaning of “defensive”. Zapad 2013 was less overtly aggressive, but much of the new equipment Russia tested and the tactical techniques it practised were put to use barely six months later when it annexed Crimea and launched a covert invasion of eastern Ukraine. The attack on Ukraine itself started out as a “snap” military drill which gave cover for Russia’s real intentions. Mr Putin had used the same ruse in the invasion of Georgia in 2008.