“29 secret Russian military files": How Russia's preparing its armies to attack two other countries
On December 31, 2024, the American business daily Financial Times revealed that it had got its hands on secret Russian military files dating back to the early 2000s.
In the just-published investigation, Financial Times explains that it has got its hands on 29 secret Russian military documents, which point to the preparation of a war on the eastern border. Most of these files concern the training of officers; in particular, the Russian armed forces had drawn up a list of targets for a war with South Korea, but also with Japan. It has also prepared several bombing scenarios.
What are the first targets?
According to the Financial Times, Russia's first targets would have been the command headquarters of both countries' armies, air bases, naval installations and radar equipment.
An officer training presentation from 2013 or 2014 refers to a hypothetical attack on a Japanese base called Okushiritou, located on an island off the coast. It would be carried out with 12 Kh-101 cruise missiles, the same missiles used to bomb a pediatric hospital in Kiev, Ukraine's capital, last summer.
Still other targets
Civil infrastructures (chemical plants in South Korea, the Kanmon tunnel linking the Japanese islands of Honshu and Kyushu, the Tokai nuclear complex, also in Japan...) are among the potential targets listed by Russia.
The Financial Times also points out that the secret documents, which date back to between 2008 and 2014, remain relevant to current Russian strategy. And, as reported by the Swiss daily Le Temps, they have all been submitted for review by experts commissioned by the newspaper. According to William Alberque of the Stimson Center for International Security, these files are proof that “the European and Asian theaters of war are directly and inextricably linked”.
For William Alberque, such documents reflect Moscow's perception of the threat posed by Western allies in Asia. “If Russia were to attack Estonia out of the blue, it would also have to strike at American forces and those supporting them in Japan and Korea,” he explains.
(MH with Manon Pierre - Source : Le Temps - Illustration : Unsplash)