On May 16, 2025, the defense ministers of Belarus and Russia met in Minsk. Officials discussed the Zapad-2025 exercises, which are scheduled to take place in Belarus in September. According to officials, more than 13,000 troops will take part in the event, practicing how to repel aggression against the Union State of Belarus and Russia.
On the May 19 episode of "Po forme" on Belarus 1 TV channel, anchor Anna Litash said Western countries are afraid of the upcoming exercises:
“Hysteria in Europe’s political and military circles continues. The Belarusian-Russian Zapad-2025 exercises remain one of the main topics of the day. Western media are constantly running headlines about a supposed attack by the Union State army on Eastern European countries.”
To back up the anchor’s words, the broadcast showed headlines from Western outlets in Lithuanian and Polish, supposedly reporting on the impending attack. Viewers may not have understood exactly what those headlines said. Reporters from the Weekly Top Fake project translated them.
“Poland responded to the planned Russian-Belarusian military exercises: it will hold large-scale maneuvers with NATO,” reads one of the headlines translated from Polish. “Zapad-2025 maneuvers. What are Putin and Lukashenko planning?” says the second. “Major military exercises are being prepared in Belarus. Lukashenko’s man reveals the details,” says the third. There’s no mention of an attack on neighboring countries in any of the headlines.
The WTF team didn’t find anything about it in the articles themselves, either. For example, the Lithuanian newspaper Alpha quotes Belarus’ defense minister about the exercises and reports that the NATO secretary general, when asked by journalists whether Russian troops would remain in Belarus after the drills, said he had no information to share.
“Lithuanian military officials say they see no additional military threats to Lithuania during the Zapad-2025 exercises. However, as before, the main threat this year is the increased risk of accidental incidents,” the paper writes.
Another newspaper, Lietuvos rytas, quotes Poland’s deputy defense minister, who does not believe these exercises pose a threat to his country. In other words, the publications cited to support Anna Litash’s claims of Western hysteria actually prove that there is no hysteria.
