Klaskouski: No one can grant security without technical means
Political observer Alyaksandr Klaskouski thinks that the authorities made it worse for themselves by trying to conceal the teddy bears situation.
Euroradio: How do you evaluate this "response to Chamberlain," I mean the resignation of Chairman of the State Frontier Committee Ihar Rachkouski and Commander of the Air Forces and Air Defense Forces Zmitser Pakhmelkin for the improper performance of official duties to ensure the national security of the Republic of Belarus?
Klaskouski: You cannot hide an eel in a sack a truth will out, thus, somebody’s head needed to fall off. Last week, the state leader (who is also a commander in chief) has promised that he would make organizational conclusions, and, as we see, the two generals have been sent into retirement. On the one hand, they are somehow involved in this plot. On the other hand there is still a question whether they are the main persons to be blames, and on the whole, many questions remain unanswered regarding this story.
For example, was the Swedish aircraft detected or not? The generals said that nothing of the kind was fixed, and on this meeting here on July 26, Lukashenka blamed them in a way like, you've seen, you've noticed, but here acted indecisively, whom did you feel sorry for ... So have they seen them or not? If they have, it turns out that they blatantly lied for three weeks. If not, then we must conclude that the chief is now trying to save at least part of esprit de corps of our air defense forces. I guess, before Moscow in the first place. They shook Moscow all the time, trying to "milk" it for more money for the defense, as we have such a powerful shield against NATO here... But the shield turned out to have holes in it.
And the last question, the most important one - whether they will mend this air defense system? Indeed, it appears that for many years there were drum sounded slogans such as "Red Army is the strongest" and it turned out that was not the case, and that some Swedish amateurs on a light-plane can give the sack to the generals.
Euroradio: Who could replace the fired and whether there is potential for the system to correct this situation?
Klaskouski: As you know, the holy place is never empty. Although we have a big question regarding the holiness, since the previous general who led the defense got to prison for the corruption. Here, rather, it is possible to speak of a "firing" position in the figurative sense. This is a case when every joke has a part of a joke, because whoever takes this position, he cannot guarantee the security, if there are no appropriate technical means. During these three weeks there were many comments and the specialists said that in fact the Belarusian air defense is not fit for low-flying targets. When the West bombed the dictators one by one - Saddam Hussein, Gaddafi, Milosevic earlier - there were so many ideological hysterics... Instead of that, they should have analyzed that the most dangerous weapons today are cruise missiles, unmanned aerial vehicles, those that fly low.
They could have applied some technical measures. It should have been done five or 10 years ago. This leads to a conclusion that it is primarily the main shortcoming of strategists, those who are at the top. Because it cannot be solved in one day. What they need is money, and - most importantly - the right vision. I have heard such unofficial talks of the Belarusian defense men that we have the dominance of the tankmen at the leading positions in the force structures - they just do not understand some things ... It should have been done long ago, because sooner or later something like this was bound to happen. Therefore, the question is whether the conclusions are made in technical terms, whether this defense industry, this direction will be equipped with the appropriate technical means. Moreover, there are some elaborations of the Belarusian scientists, not very expensive. However, you see, the cobbler always wears the worst shoes. The question is, who will bear responsibility for these flaws and whether they will make conclusions.
Euroradio: After the explosion in the subway, when there were 15 victims, none of the generals had been fired. Here, heads fall off after a simple hooligan PR action. What can you say about that?
Klaskouski: Taking into account that it was a terrible tragedy in the metro, but, relatively speaking, it was an internal phenomenon. As for the air defense - we share it with Russia. The Belarusian side twisted and defended for a long time, it all lasted for 12 years and at last Lukashenka signed a decree on creating the common regional system of air defense in February. Another problem is that whether it had indeed been created, or is it just on paper. It looks like it is mostly on paper, and there is another problem - the Belarusian bosses do not want the Moscow generals to command here much. Any state leader, especially an authoritarian one, does not like to share power with anyone in any sphere, he gets alerted any time some other people from some other countries start giving orders. Moscow now has a good opportunity to put pressure on us like stop trying to escape, let out general command the united system. So, I think that if Medvedev flew to Minsk, perhaps there were unpleasant talks behind the scenes, and the pressure from the Kremlin will continue. That is why they need to make some conclusions whether they like it or not, to show that we react to this carelessness somehow, like, see, we make our own conclusions, we solve the case ourselves, we do not wait for the Kremlin to get in. I think that this is the nuance of the situation.
Euroradio: Did a month of silence bring the Belarusian authorities some media-benefit, or vice versa?
Klaskouski: On the one hand - this is a common tactic of non-democratic regimes: concealing something which is not beneficial. In earlier times, it worked. I remember when we lived in the Soviet Union, there was no Internet, the Western "voices" were muted, and the Soviet people often did not know what was happening. However, today, in the epoch of the Internet, such silence is absolutely pointless and short-sighted. .As a result, we see that all the propaganda apparatus of all these media, which kept silence silent, or (sorry for such a word) stupidly repeated the official version, false, as it turns out now, or poured mud on the independent media who tried to untwist this tangle - all obsolete propagandistic system fails, and now the government's image suffered a great loss. The people got convinced once again that the whole system is rotten. The same was last year when there was the currency crisis and the governmental media and big bosses kept silence and pretended there is no helter-skelter near the currency exchange offices, shops etc. The system is not modern. It is fashionable to say about challenges nowadays… So, such untimely conservative system cannot respond to the challenges of the XXI century, and we will step onto the same rakes again and again in the future.
