Poland has unveiled plans for a line of anti-tank ditches, bunkers and minefields along the border with Belarus Russia.
The Polish Prime Minister, Donald Tuskhad previously announced a vague £2 billion line of defence to make NATO's eastern flank “impenetrable to a potential enemy.”
However, visualizations released on Monday show a 700-kilometre-long network of concrete anti-tank “hedgehogs” (metal corner beams that nestle under the vehicle), palisades and steel barriers. This would be integrated with earthworks including bunkers, trenches and tank traps along the border. Landmines will reportedly only be laid if war seems imminent.
“The 'East Shield' deterrence and defense plan is the largest operation to strengthen Poland's eastern border, NATO's eastern flank, since 1945,” Polish Defense Minister Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz told reporters. “It will be a combination of terrain conditions with fortifications and modern technology.”
The East Shield – dubbed the “Tusk Line” by Polish media – is intended to deter Russian attacks. The plans would be in collaboration with Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
The defense minister added that the government would also search EU funding for the border wall. Work is expected to begin this year with a completion date set for 2028.
The defenses will be separate from the border wall built to deter migrants from trying to cross Belaruswith which Poland shares a border of 270 kilometers.
Tusk mentioned the movement of thousands migrants and refugeeswho want to invade Europe – the majority of whom come from the Middle East – as a 'hybrid migration war' facilitated by Alexander Lukashenko, the president of Belarus.
Poland also shares a 210-kilometer border with the Russian exclave Kaliningradwhich was placed under Soviet administration in the Potsdam Agreement of 1945 and then became Russian territory after the collapse of the Union.
“These are not refugees, those are fewer and fewer migrants, families and poor people who need help,” Mr Tusk argued. “In 80 percent of the cases, it concerns organized groups of men between the ages of 18 and 30, very aggressive.”