Russia to swallow Belarus up whole without even belching

Experts try to analyze current events and understand what scenario will be implemented in Belarus. There are many versions, but no one dares to say anything specific.

Of course, the political crisis in Belarus evokes a comparison with the Maidan revolution in Ukraine. However, Russia did not support Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, and the likelihood for the Belarus leadership to resign is extremely low. Even Europe did not express support for alternative candidates for the post of Belarus president. 

Authors of Mayday. Chronicle of the Dive Telegram channel believe that Belarus will eventually go through the mild South Ossetian scenario.

One should bear in mind the fact that the Belarusians, unlike the Ukrainians, are not split into "west", "center" and "east". Belarus as a nation gravitates towards the "west", no matter how strange it may sound.

Final rapprochement with Russia will become the only option if the current "multi-vector" government finally puts an end to Western European cooperation.

"This has already happened. Alexander Lukashenko and his team have become persona non grata in Europe. The absence of national split within Belarus will not let either Poland or any other state incite separatist sentiments inside Belarus." 

If one listens to any Belarusian politician of the new wave, one will not hear even an insinuation about the priority of integration with Russia. Do the Belarusians want to integrate with Russia, though?

"Most of them perceive the Unified State as a political bargaining chip for the current government. If the leadership is replaced, the country's prospects are unclear. And this (and only this) is the reason for the lack of support from the Russian authorities for Alexander Lukashenko's rivals," network experts say.

At the same time, the Belarusians are well aware that there are only two types of support that may come from Russia:

•    Russia either helps the current government to stay afloat,
•    or Russia helps its citizens on a hostile territory.

As long as Alexander Lukashenko does not resort to the use of military force against his own citizens, Russia will endure, as they say, "all the suffering of the Belarusian people."

In the toughest scenario of the development of the political situation in Belarus, citizens will have to face a difficult choice: either to remain Belarusians and perish under the bullets of their own army, or become Russians and hope for guarantees of security from the Russian president.

We would like to draw a parallel with the choice that residents of South Ossetia had made. The international community was forced to accept the new Ossetian reality. Most of those residing in the Tskhinvali region of Georgia, started receiving Russian citizenship under the threat of the armed intervention of Georgian troops.

Russia, of course, gave the go-ahead for this out of humanitarian considerations. The Ossetians permanently residing in Georgia did not have any special conditions for that. However, it became a decisive factor of Russia's operation to coerce George to peace in 2008. 

Based on the above, one does not have to expect a Russian military intervention in Belarus. Nobody threatens Belarusians from outside.

The choice for Belarusians will not be easy: war or peace in virtual Russia. Russia will not annex Belarus. Russia wants to take advantage of Belarus as a separate state. Nevertheless, Belarus will not be completely independent either.

Meanwhile, according to TASS, Lukashenko said that the Belarusians and the Russians "have one common Fatherland from Brest to Vladivostok."

“We are brothers today,” Lukashenko said in Baranavichy. “Why expect someone to hustle us in the West. We will draw appropriate conclusions. The Russian President and I have already drawn those conclusions. No matter what they may say over there, no matter what one may bark on our squares here, we will preserve our common Fatherland. This is our Fatherland from Brest to Vladivostok," Lukashenko said. 

The topic of the upcoming conversation between Putin and Lukashenko, whose visit to Moscow is to take place within the next two weeks, thus becomes clearer. Putin and Lukashenko will get together to decide, in which form they should save "our Fatherland" - either as the Unified State or something else.