Talk:Belarusian involvement in the Russo-Ukrainian war (2022–present)

Dubious

There don't seem to be other serious sources confirming the Belarusian low-ranked soldiers' refusal to fight, and there is a social media source suggesting that a faked document supposedly by "the head of the General Staff of the Defence Ministry, Gulievich", tendering his resignation, is a hoax. The same Telegram source says that instead, there is "confirmed evidence" that several senior Belarusian armed forces officers left Belarus last week. However, Telegram is not a WP:RS. Feel free to update the paragraph (or remove it) after seeing if there are any more Wikipedia acceptable WP:RSes to improve/fix the paragraph. (But please don't remove archiving information. Reliable sources can have volatile web pages, which disappear after some time; and some sources have pages that are paywalled to some readers, but readable to most readers through archives.) Boud (talk) 20:07, 6 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The chief editor of Charter 97, Natalya Radina, has now repeated two of the three claims in her own name. These are not the same statement as the apparently faked Gulievich resignation letter. I don't think the 'dubious' tag is still justified. We have attribution of the info to Radina + Charter 97, and Radina is a Wikipedia notable person. While she clearly is biased against Lukaszenko, all of our WP:RS have known biases such as measured statistically in the propaganda model; reliability is a different issue. And we know that at least some government statistics under Lukaszenko are quite dubious.

I removed the 'dubious' tag and also the statement which was not repeated by Radina. Boud (talk) 21:17, 6 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Proposal to rename Russian invasion of Ukraine

There is an ongoing move discussion that affects this article. See here: Talk:Russian invasion of Ukraine#Requested move 24 February 2025. – Asarlaí (talk) 16:10, 26 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

"Belarus is described as co-belligerent of Russia in the Russo-Ukrainian War"

I would have expected the citations to this sentence to have used that actual description. Instead:

  • ISW 11 December 2024 - Does not use this term. In fact, does not characterise Belarus's involvement in any specific way.
  • ISW October 2024 - This link is 404. Searching around I found this which I assume is a reposting of the same report. This says nothing about Belarus being a "co-belligerent". It at most says that Belarus "aids" Russia, which is not the same as being a "co-belligerent".
  • Euromaidan Press. Notably this is Euromaidan Press (who are not exactly a high-quality source) reporting on a report from the ISW. The report states: "The Belarusian regime’s support for the Russian invasion has made Belarus a cobelligerent in the war in Ukraine.". Searching around, appears to be the original report, but it's clearly just the opinion of the ISW.
  • IISS 2023 - The page linked to in the book is not about Belarus, however, the phrase "Belarus remains a co-belligerent but not a co-combatant" is evidently used somewhere in the book. This seems a pretty important qualifier.

Based on this, this description needs to change. FOARP (talk) 22:27, 29 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Would these sources work?
Aviationwikiflight (talk) 12:38, 30 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Undue

TylerBurden, could you elaborate why the claim by Zelenskyy that Lukashenko apologized to him at the start of the war is undue? It was reported by Suspilne[1], Pravda[2], and Ukrinform[3]. Another claim I wanted to add is that Lukashenko contacted the Poles to discuss his escape. The claim is based on the book Poland at War by a Polish journalist. The book itself was reviewed by Onet.pl[4] and Krytyka Polityczna[5]. Gazeta Wyborcza called the author of the book an "expert on Eastern affairs and defense"[6]. The claim itself was reported by the Ukrainian outlets New Voice of Ukraine[7] and 24 Kanal[8]. Kelob2678 (talk) 07:41, 1 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Because the article is about Belarusian involvement in Ukraine, not Lukashenko himself. If you think it's important content, then consider adding to his article, this article shouldn't fixate on Lukashenko. TylerBurden (talk) 16:27, 1 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Lukashenko is the leader of Belarus, and his position is relevant to Belarus's stance. Zelenskyy's claim is in the context of missiles being launched from Belarus, which is relevant to Belarusian involvement. The Polish book mentioned this in the context of their fear that Lukashenko would send Belarusian troops to Ukraine. Kelob2678 (talk) 16:35, 1 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

With respect to the BBC interview, the more relevant statement is: No. He didn’t call me. And I didn’t call him. These are his troops and he has the right to move them out whichever way he likes. Ukrainian media when reporting on it, said

  • Ukrainska Pravda The self-proclaimed President of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko, stated that the head of the Russian Federation, Vladimir Putin, did not ask him for permission to attack Ukraine from the territory of Belarus[9]
  • Hromadske In addition, Lukashenko stated that Belarus allegedly did not provide its territory to Russia for it to attack Ukraine from there[10]
  • Espreso TV The self-proclaimed President of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko, stated that his country allegedly did not give Russia permission to start the invasion of Ukraine-they supposedly turned toward Kyiv themselves[11]
  • Deutsche Welle At the same time, he stated that he had not spoken with Putin about these events, because "they are his troops, and he has the right to withdraw them in any way he likes."[12]

Question asked by Rosenberg Didn’t you call Putin to ask what was going on? implies that he understood Lukashenko's response as a claim that he had no idea what Russian troops would do, and Ukrainian media treated it as such. So while Lukashenko acknowledged that he didn't object to Russian troops once they invaded Ukraine, he had no foreknowledge of it. This is relevant to the Belarusian involvement since It must be assumed that when providing this assistance, especially when allowing the crossing of its border, the Belarusian regime knew of the Russian attack[13] Kelob2678 (talk) 17:06, 1 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

TylerBurden, you argue that statements by Belarusian President are undue and yet, at the same time, insist on inclusion of legal analysis by anonymous Belsat journalists, why is their writing should be included? Kelob2678 (talk) 17:12, 1 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Try sticking to what the sources actually say instead of WP:SYNTH analysis of them.
It is undue to overly rely on what the Belarusian President says, especially when he can't even seem to stick to a narrative, and like other populists, seems to say whatever he feels is beneficial at the moment, Lukashenko is not exactly know as a reliable source, therefore yes, writing the article as if he has coherently denied being an accomplice, which is the narrative that you inserted before, is not WP:NPOV. We have what actually happened, which is more or less universally that Belarus was significantly involved in the invasion, therefore most WP:RS don't buy Lukashenko's claims of innocence.
"why is their writing should be included?"
Because the includes opposition views, why does the Belarus opposition not matter when it comes to their own country? TylerBurden (talk) 18:22, 1 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Ukrainian sources reported that Lukashenko said Putin did not inform him about the invasion. They analyzed the interview and reached this conclusion, there is no WP:SYNTH here, and Ukrainian media are not pro-Lukashenko.
Government response section almost fully relies on claims by Lukashenko which is fine, because he is the leader of Belarus, I don't see why his additional statements cannot be included. Lukashenko is a reliable source about himself.
Lukashenko coherently denied foreknowledge of the invasion plans and The Guardian and other outlets misrepresented him. In his actual response he said And if you think that I, despite my close relationship with Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin, am sitting in the General Staff of Russia and drawing the movements of the Russian Armed Forces on a map... Well, listen, then you are a dilettante. These are the kinds of things that are done in silence, done by a minimal number of people, without foreign interference or foreigners.[14]. It is not about whether WP:RS accept Lukashenko's claims, it is about whether they should be reported at all.
Belarusian opposition is already covered by Tikhanovskaya and Latushko. As far as I know, Belsat doesn't present itself as partisan outlet (though it is), so it is not even clear why it was included under the opposition subsection. Kelob2678 (talk) 19:39, 1 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I think the issue here is that we are now at the point of simply including every source that hypes Belarusian involvement in the conflict, whilst removing sources with a more nuanced take or just letting the facts speak for themselves.
What Lukashenko says does actually matter, and should be cited as an WP:ABOUTSELF source, but obviously should also include suitable counter-point if what he's saying is blatantly untrue. The Guardian is usually a reliable source though. FOARP (talk) 14:04, 2 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
We're at a point where people appear to be downplaying Belarus's involvement in the war because they don't want it in infoboxes about the war, the infobox is one matter, Belarus's actual involvement is a completely different one, especially if we're as you say going to let "facts speak for themselves". There were barely any sources actually covering whether Belarus is/was legally complicit in the war, if you think adding such sources is an issue, it's probably because they don't line up with your preferred POV, that changes neither international law nor the facts which reliable sources tend to be based on.
We've had all this talk in this topic about WP:COMMONNAME, where the majority sources outweigh the minority ones, why we're suddenly singing a different tune here giving undue weight to "nuanced takes" and a literal dictator, I'm not sure. TylerBurden (talk) 16:08, 2 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
"There were barely any sources actually covering whether Belarus is/was legally complicit in the war, if you think adding such sources is an issue, it's probably because they don't line up with your preferred POV" - I know this is hard for you to get your head around, but I don't actually have a "preferred POV" about Belarus. What we have are different sources saying radically different things, meaning we shouldn't be stating in Wikivoice that Belarus is a "co-belligerent".
"We've had all this talk in this topic about WP:COMMONNAME, where the majority sources outweigh the minority ones" - That's not how it works. It's not just about minority/majority. You have to weigh the sources. And at the moment we're positioning various think-tanks and so-forth as being on a par with the OSCE. FOARP (talk) 21:57, 2 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
We're not talking about belligerent status here though are we? I'm not sure you're keeping up with what article you're on, but this is Belarusian involvement in the Russo-Ukrainian war (2022–present), the vast majority legal consensus is that Belarus is legally complicit, and for some reason you're taking issue with sources about that being added, and now for some reason bringing up the OSCE out of nowhere, which FYI, agrees that Belarus helped Russia. Please try to stick to the relevant subject, which in this case is Belarusian involvement in the war in general. TylerBurden (talk) 15:43, 3 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
What do you think about the following version:

Alexander Lukashenko denies being an accomplice to the invasion and claims he didn't know about Putin's plan to invade. However, he acknowledged that Belarus supports Russia and said he didn't regret his actions.

Kelob2678 (talk) 16:59, 2 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Where? We already have him denying, though I'm not sure why it needs to be stated three times, only for him to later say he has no regrets about allowing Russia to use his country to invade Ukraine. TylerBurden (talk) 15:45, 3 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Belarusian troops in Ukraine

TylerBurden, the issue is not whether Belarus provided logistical support, but rather whether its troops operated in Ukraine. For this, we have higher-quality sources stating their absence Despite so far resisting pressure to send his own troops in support of Russia’s full-scale invasion...[15] and Ever since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February, rumours have swirled about the imminent entry of Belarusian troops to the fighting. But they have so far remained steadfastly in Belarus[16]. Inclusion of such statement is undue, and it is up to you to justify its addition, per WP:ONUS. Kelob2678 (talk) 17:35, 9 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Your sources are not contradicting logistical support, they are contradicting fighting, which no one here is saying that they've done. You also haven't explained why the sources you're citing are higher quality, which is pretty important if you're going to invoke WP:DUE. TylerBurden (talk) 17:42, 9 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Send troops in support includes sending logistical units, the second one claims remained steadfastly in Belarus which includes all troops including logistical. There another sources for this:
  1. Deutsche Welle: Lukashenko has sent no Belarusian troops, 23.05.2024
  2. Los Angeles Times: Belarusian troops have not crossed the border 25.06.2022
  3. U.S. Department of Defense: we have seen no Belarusian units inside Ukraine 07.03.2022. This was issued six days after Ukraine claimed that Belarusian troops crossed the border. [17]
  4. Tikhanovskaya: The fact that Belarusian troops did not enter Ukraine 23.04.2022
These quotes are about Belarusian troops being in Ukraine.
With respect to source quality, think tanks are usually rated as WP:MREL[18][19], which is below WP:GREL that high quality news media get. Kelob2678 (talk) 18:20, 9 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The Centre for Eastern Studies is a major independent Polish think thank, so that coupled with the EUSS stating "Belarusian armed forces are providing the advancing Russian army with full logistical and military medical support" (after the US Department of Defense), both in detailed analysis reports, lends significant weight to the claim. A possible compromise could be to also include some of the sources saying no troops, although the issue could be that "troops" here are referring strictly to combatants, note the wording the sources reporting the presence use like "units". TylerBurden (talk) 17:00, 12 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Requested move 26 October 2025

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: not moved. Based on the discussion below, I see consensus that this article should be treated as a subtopic of Russo-Ukrainian war (2022–present), and that its title should therefore be WP:CONSISTENT with its parent article. See also this related RM for further debate on the topic. It was argued in the nomination that this topic would not need substantial editing to be rescoped to cover the broader Russo-Ukrainian conflict, but that does not appear to have swayed the opponents' stances on the underlying merits of the CONSISTENT argument. (closed by non-admin page mover) ModernDayTrilobite (talk • contribs) 17:17, 4 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Belarusian involvement in the Russo-Ukrainian war (2022–present) → Belarusian involvement in the Russo-Ukrainian warBelarusian involvement in the Russo-Ukrainian war – I doubt that as much content could be added about pre-2022 involvement as about involvement from 2022 and later. Therefore, broadening the scope of this article would be unlikely to necessitate a substantial expansion. Because the status quo creates a WP:MISPLACED situation that violates WP:ATDIS, those who oppose this move should propose an alternative fate for the "Belarusian involvement in the Russo-Ukrainian war" title. –Gluonz talk contribs 17:02, 26 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Reply can be seen at Talk:Violations of non-combatant airspaces during the Russo-Ukrainian war (2022–present)#Requested move 26 October 2025. –Gluonz talk contribs 01:16, 27 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
allikas: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Belarusian_involvement_in_the_2022_Russian_invasion_of_Ukraine