{"id":337158,"date":"2026-05-19T12:57:14","date_gmt":"2026-05-19T07:27:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/?p=337158"},"modified":"2026-05-19T12:57:14","modified_gmt":"2026-05-19T07:27:14","slug":"russia-and-belarus-launch-massive-nuclear-weapon-drills-with-64000-soldiers-news-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/2026\/05\/19\/russia-and-belarus-launch-massive-nuclear-weapon-drills-with-64000-soldiers-news-world\/","title":{"rendered":"Russia and Belarus launch massive nuclear weapon drills ‘with 64,000 soldiers’ | News World"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Russia and Belarus have triggered concern with a mammoth nuclear weapon exercise on NATO\u2019s doorstep. <\/p>\n

Belarus, a staunch Russian ally, announced the beginning of the drills yesterday focused on Russian nuclear weapons. <\/p>\n

The country led by president Alexander Lukashenko has previously given the green light to hosting Russian tactical nuclear weapons, which it agreed to 1 yr after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. <\/p>\n

Belarusian defence ministry said: \u2018In the course of the training, in \u200bcooperation with the Russian side, it’s planned to practise the delivery of \u2060nuclear munitions and their preparation to be used.\u2019 <\/p>\n

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Russia and Belarus carried out nuclear drills across Belarus following Putin\u2019s Sarmat missile tests in 2024 (Picture: Mod Belarus\/e2w)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It said the joint exercises should not directed at any specific third party, however the motion has been criticised by Ukraine. <\/p>\n

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Start your day informed with Metro’s News Updates<\/strong> newsletter or get Breaking News <\/strong>alerts the moment it happens. <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

The three-day exercise will involve over 64,000 personnel and seven,800 units of apparatus, Russian state-owned news agency TASS reports. <\/p>\n

This includes 200 missile launchers, 140 aircraft, 73 surface ships and 13 submarines. <\/p>\n

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Putin and Belarusian leader Lukashenko are close allies (Picture: Kremlin.ru\/e2w)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Belarus, certainly one of the few allies of international pariah Russia, is flanked by NATO members Latvia, Lithuania and Poland to its west, and Ukraine to its south. <\/p>\n

The country is gripped by economical downturn, and it’s heavily depending on Russia through subsidies, security and political support. <\/p>\n

Ukrainian president Volodomyr Zelensky accused Russia last week of involving Belarus deeper into the war in Ukraine. <\/p>\n

He hinted that Belarus may very well be used to launch attacks in Ukraine, which Kremlin has denied. <\/p>\n

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Russia targeted the port town of Izmail in Odesa, Ukraine, last night with drones (Picture: Ukrainian state emergency service\/Reuters)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Ukraine\u2019s foreign ministry said: \u2018By turning Belarus into its nuclear staging ground near NATO borders, the Kremlin is de facto legitimising the proliferation of nuclear weapons worldwide and setting a dangerous precedent for other authoritarian regimes.\u2019<\/p>\n

The war exercise follows a tense week between Russia and Ukraine. <\/p>\n

Ukraine carried out sweeping drone attacks in Moscow because it breached the country\u2019s air defences on Sunday. <\/p>\n

The attacks are said to have killed not less than three people and left several more injured, in keeping with Russian officials. <\/p>\n

Last week, the Russian military targeted Kyiv with drones and missiles, killing 24 people.<\/p>\n

In September last yr, Russia and Belarus joined up in a show of force in the course of the Zapad military exercises, mobilising as much as 100,000 personnel across 41 training grounds. <\/p>\n

Get in contact with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.<\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n

For more stories like this, <\/strong>check our news page<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Arrow<\/title>\n<\/use><\/svg>MORE: Russia accused of drone attack on UN marked aid convoy in Ukraine<\/span><\/p>\n

Arrow<\/title>\n<\/use><\/svg>MORE: We each love Eurovision \u2013 certainly one of us is boycotting while the opposite watches<\/span><\/p>\n

Arrow<\/title>\n<\/use><\/svg>MORE: Putin tests feared Devil II missile and calls it \u2018strongest on the planet\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n

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To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to an online browser that supports HTML5 video Russia and Belarus have triggered concern with a mammoth nuclear weapon exercise on NATO\u2019s doorstep. Belarus, a staunch Russian ally, announced the beginning of the drills yesterday focused on Russian nuclear weapons. The country led by president […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":337159,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20691],"tags":[39054,11235,4789,911,395,5897,79,7816,3015,813],"class_list":["post-337158","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world","tag-belarus","tag-drills","tag-launch","tag-massive","tag-news","tag-nuclear","tag-russia","tag-soldiers","tag-weapon","tag-world"],"aioseo_notices":[{"message":"The permalink for this post just changed! This could result in 404 errors for your site visitors.","status":"warning","options":{"id":"0a2ae5f84bc2c0423042ed7ec22d2e40","isDismissible":true,"actions":[{"url":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/wp-admin\/admin.php?page=aioseo-redirects","label":"Add Redirect to improve SEO","class":"aioseo-redirects-slug-changed"}]},"allowedContexts":["posts"]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/337158","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=337158"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/337158\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":337161,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/337158\/revisions\/337161"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/337159"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=337158"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=337158"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=337158"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}