cross-posted from: https://sopuli.xyz/post/16759425
Lithuania installed “dragon’s teeth” and mines in front of the bridge on the border with the Kaliningrad region
“This is a precautionary step to ensure more effective defense,” the Lithuanian Defense Ministry said on Twitter. The ministry explained that the Queen Louise Bridge is Russian property, so Lithuania cannot install “dragon’s teeth” and mines on the bridge itself, but only in front of it.
I don’t get the downvotes. Landmines are a huge issue. The balkan countries are still struggling with them 30 years after the wars. Cambodia, Vietnam, Iraq… every “theater” of war, where landmines have been used are, still struggling with them decades and decades more after. Ukraine too will suffer for decades.
If there is an inevitable military need for them, there is no alternative. But they should not be used lightly and i am fairly certain, that Lithuania is not doing so lightly either.
The big problem is, that for now the only reliable technique to remove landmines from an area is to dig up the area step by step. This is extremely costly and still dangerous, despite all effort in using robots, animals detecting the explosives and so on. So i hope Lithuania triple counted the mines they put and keeps that record very well.
The problem doesn’t really come from small fields like this. It’s when you hand them out by the truckload and tell every unit to go wild. Russia has had numerous cases where they didn’t even tell their own friendly units where the mines were, so I’d say that’s a much bigger issue than this little where the whole world knows about it.