What did 29 January 2022 show about Europe's nerves?
A retrospective on a day of troop announcements, denials of war intent and a diplomatic request to Moscow over naval exercises.
What did the diplomacy of 29 January 2022 reveal about how close the region felt to crisis? Reports from that day and the days before it show governments reassuring and warning in equal measure.
On 29 January 2022, France announced that it would deploy "several hundred" troops to Romania to support NATO's eastern flank amid tensions with Russia. The announcement came a day after US Army General Mark Milley and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin told a special Pentagon press briefing that a Russian invasion of Ukraine would be "horrific" and could result in "significant casualties".
Warnings and denials
The warnings followed a telephone conversation on 27 January between US President Joe Biden and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, in which Biden said the Russians could invade Ukraine in February. On 28 January, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov responded that Russia was not interested in starting a war.
Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko spoke on the same day. He said Belarus might go to war if it or Russia were attacked, while insisting that his country did not want a war with Ukraine.
A request over exercises off Ireland
Also on 29 January, Irish Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Coveney announced that the Russian Minister of Defence had agreed to his request to move planned exercises outside the Irish Exclusive Economic Zone. The exercises had been proposed for the Atlantic southwest of Ireland, in international waters but within that zone, from 3 to 8 February 2022. They were to involve the Russian Navy and air force. Russia later cancelled them at the Irish government's request.
Domestic news in Ukraine
Ukrainian news did not stop for diplomacy. On 27 January, a National Guard serviceman shot a guard detail at the Pivdenmash plant in Dnipro, killing five people and wounding five. National Guard commander Mykola Balan later offered his resignation. On 28 January, a gas explosion in a four-storey block in Zaporizhzhia killed one person, injured two and damaged seven flats, and a criminal case was opened. Boxer Volodymyr Virchys was also found hanged in Kyiv's Dniprovskyi district that day, and a criminal case was opened.
Taken together, the reports from 27 to 29 January 2022 describe a region where armies were being repositioned, officials were publicly denying any appetite for war, and ordinary emergencies continued alongside.
