NATO is afraid of Russian "Zapad" war games

General Petr Pavel, who is chief of NATO's Military Committee, said in an interview with the Associated Press published on September 16 that the Russian-Belorussian joint maneuvers could lead "to unintended consequences of potential incidents during the exercise."

Moscow and Minsk say the Zapad maneuvers involve 12,700 troops, but Pavel told AP the actual number could be up to 100,000 in what Western officials call a "Russian show of power amid the ongoing standoff over Russia's aggression in Ukraine".

Russian TASS news agency reported on September 16 that observers from seven countries had arrived in Belarus to monitor the exercise.