Lukashenka fears to repeat fate of Gaddafi and Assad

The ruler says it's necessary to check combat readiness of the Belarusian military forces.

He said it after the visit to the 61st fighter airbase, Interfax news agency reports.

“We will have serious tests of combat readiness of our armed forces,” Lukashenka siad.

The ruler finds it possible to modernise and restore certain samples military equipment and urged not to hurry with the decommission of the Su-27 aircraft from the Air Forces and the Air Defence Forces. He said it reminding about the Arab Spring – civil uprisings in Egypt, Tunisia, Libya and Syria.

”Do we need the Su-27 – a powerful and expensive aircraft? We have twenty of them. I say we need to think and keep these aircraft for, lets say so, some period of threat regardless of the costs,” he said.

“Taking into account the experience of the wars on the Arab curve, we shouldn't hurry to decommission some kinds of military equipment from the country's defence system,” the ruler noted.

Lukashenka was informed about combat duty procedures in the 61th fighter base and checked combat readiness of alert flight crews.

“I wanted to check if it was window-dressing to prepare an aircraft for a flight. The aircraft was ready to take off in six and a half minutes. Good work,” he said noting that the scramble time in Russia was “18 minutes, in Ukraine 15 minutes and in Poland about 15 minutes”.