The Lithuanian defense line will be part of the fortification system agreed by Baltic defense ministers in January in response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Lithuania has inaugurated what it calls its first countermobility park in the east of the countrypart of the Baltic Defense Line that is gradually taking shape in the NATO eastern border. The area has roadblocks, various barriers and dragon teeth anti-tank obstacles.
“If we want to defend ourselves effectively we have to establish this system. This is how we are doing it and the entire Lithuanian defense line plan that we presented three weeks ago is based on such a systemic approach in which physical barriers are integrated with artillery fire coverage“declared Defense Minister Laurynas Kasčiūnas.
The Pabradė area, near the border with Belarus, also includes traditional obstacles such as hedgehogs and Spanish horses which can be quickly deployed elsewhere in the event of an attack.
“The war in Ukraine revealed the resistance capacity of the classics. One can talk about air superiority, naval superiority, land superiority and joint war, but obstacles do their job, slow down or stop the enemywhich allows us to destroy it or channel it to some place where we destroy it,” Defense Chief Raimundas Vaikšnoras told the press.
At the end of July, the Lithuanian Government gave the green light to plans to apply greater countermobility measureswhich include the creation of roadblocks and the installation of explosive structures under bridges.
Approved measures and costs for this security improvement
The plans provide for the creation of countermobility team parks in places designated by the army along the border with Belarus in the east and, to the west, in the Russian region of Kaliningrad by April 2025.
While immediate measures will cost 17.5 million eurosit is estimated that the cost of the entire defense system will require about 600 million euros over the next decade. The Lithuanian defense line will be part of the fortification system agreed by the Baltic defense ministers in January.
PolandIt is also preparing to fortify its eastern borderl within the framework of its own Eastern Shield initiative, and in Latvia construction of the first phase of the Baltic Defense Line is underway, in the easternmost region of Latgale.
Estonian, Latvian, Lithuanian and Polish leaders signed in June a letter urging the EU to finance a line of defense estimated at 2.5 billion euros against military and hybrid threats from the East. The Baltic States signed an agreement in January to create a common defense line that reinforces NATO’s eastern border with both Russia and its close ally Belarus.
Latvia, Lithuania y Estonia They belonged to the Soviet Union, but are now part of the EU and NATO and are allies of Ukraine, where Russia launched a full-scale invasion in February 2022.
