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Somewhere out there behind the birches and pines they stand, behind the barbed wire lattice that separates veins and cuts through flesh. But does it also provide protection against Wagner mercenaries? Before nuclear weapons? For an enemy army?
Not, the braid. Margilis Silius (29) knows that, his steel-blue gaze at the endless fence in this shadowy forest betrays it. “Rainbows and butterflies”, that’s how the daily work here on the Belarusian border looked like for a long time. Now he and his 3,800 border guard colleagues in Lithuania have been put on high alert.
Not only because of NATO, which met less than half an hour’s drive west of here, but also because of Alexander Lukashenko (68), who installed a real terror regime behind the barbed wire network. Because of the nuclear weapons that Moscow transferred to Belarus. And thanks to Yevgeny Prigozhin (62) 25,000 butchers in Belarus recovering from their crimes in Ukraine.
The secret of the guards
“The mood has changed,” says Silius. The Belarusian border guards there would no longer say “Hello, how are you?” Reply. “You have to be quiet, according to the regulations.” Don’t talk to the enemy. The old telephone line to colleagues there under the birch trees is still there. “But it hasn’t called for a long time.” Fear? No. He is relaxed, mentally ready for whatever comes next.
If the Wagner troops or the Belarusian army actually dared to provoke a provocation on the border of NATO country Lithuania, Silius and his colleagues would automatically be converted into combat units. That is what Lithuanian law wants. He would then have to trade the body camera and his small caliber pistol for heavier weapons. The bald border guard does not know what will become of Fan (6), the Belgian Shepherd by his side.
NATO ends in the workplace of Silius and the regime of the Eastern rulers begins here. On the left we, the West, democracy. To the right the others, the tyranny. In between: razor-sharp mesh, a camera every 80 meters and underground pressure gauges everywhere that capture every rabbit that unsuspectingly hops through the geopolitical ditch.
Lukashenko, Putin’s successor?
Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda (59) said in his opening speech at the NATO summit that Belarus is not what it was a few years ago. «It is a province of Russia. The Russian armed forces can move freely throughout the territory.”
And who knows what will become of this Belarus? “Lukashenko has the ambition to hold power in the Kremlin himself one day,” John Everard, the former British ambassador to Minsk, recently said in a Monocle24 podcast. Vladimir Putin (70) falters, Lukashenko does not. And with the ruthless private army of his “very good friend” Prigozhin: who knows what other ideas the giant ruler will come up with?
However, instead of rulers, only occasionally a few deer run across the 13 screens in the Lithuanian border guard post on the edge of the hamlet of Lavariskes. The two agents standing guard in the sparse command room can switch back and forth between the live images from 312 cameras. The smell of coffee hangs in the air. Caffeine is necessary in order not to lose focus during the 13-hour shifts in front of the flickering blank screen.
The Russian train is still running
At the official border crossing, less than three miles away, a few trucks are queuing up. Occasionally a car with a Belarusian license plate hurtles down the lonely road towards the customs barrier. There are no visa restrictions for Belarusian citizens in Lithuania, but there are for Russians. During the stopover at the Vilnius railway station, they are not even allowed to leave the transit train from Moscow to the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad.
Not far from the train station is the neat office of Rustamas Liubajevas (57), head of the Lithuanian border guard and lover of ornamental fish. Sometimes he wished it was as cozy as the catfish in his office aquarium. But with these aggressive neighbors left and right, there is simply no comfort. “We must be ready if the Wagner mercenaries or other troops suddenly appear on our borders.”
The menacing «Vatniks» in the hinterland
Lithuania has recently made huge improvements to its borders, both technologically and in terms of personnel. Cooperation with the secret service is more intensive than ever before. “And of course NATO’s new defense plans also help us,” emphasizes Liubajevas.
The classified document approved by the NATO meeting in Vilnius this week is 4,000 pages long and details how NATO would respond to an attack. One thing is clear: before the end of this year, each member state will be assigned a section of NATO’s external border to guard.
Margilis Silius does not yet know where his new border guard colleagues come from. But they will not be able to solve one problem either: the talk of the ‘Vatniks’, the people who understand Putin. “You hardly come across them in Vilnius,” says Silius on his way back from the green border to the command post. In the hinterland and in the digital spheres, however, there are whispers about the Russians and their president, which must also be understood.
Silius shakes his bald head in concern. No barbed wire protects against these vatniks, no motion detector can stop them. “We all need to become a little guardian.” Always and everywhere.
Source: Blick
I am Amelia James, a passionate journalist with a deep-rooted interest in current affairs. I have more than five years of experience in the media industry, working both as an author and editor for 24 Instant News. My main focus lies in international news, particularly regional conflicts and political issues around the world.
