– Poland and Lithuania's borders with Russia should be strengthened, and minefields should be laid now in peacetime. General Waldemar Skrzybczak said that during the war, it may be too late to build fortifications in the border areas.
The issue of using mines to defend Poland emerged as a result of the experience of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. During the fighting, it turned out that this was still a very effective way to defend key places.
Securing Poland's eastern borders with minefields will be part of the concept of the so-called Baltic Defense Line, i.e. the strategic defensive lines defending Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Poland against aggression by Russia and Belarus.
One key “but”. The Ministry of National Defense clarifies the matter
According to this concept, the defense line consists of, among other things: anti-tank minefields, trenches, barbed wire and “dragon's teeth”. Although it's just a concept at the moment, there is one key 'but' to the whole story.
The problem is that Poland signed in 1997 the “Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines and on their Destruction.” In order for the government to use mines on the border, it would have to denounce the agreement.
In addition, the Ministry of Defence, in an interview with the newspaper “Du Rzeczy”, informed that it “does not consider securing the eastern borders of the Republic of Poland with conventional anti-personnel mines.”
Latvia buys mines. The Poles are not convinced
The Latvian Ministry of Defense has a slightly different approach to this, as it plans to purchase different types of anti-tank mines and anti-personnel guided mines. In peacetime, no minefields will be created, but explosives will be stored near the border so that they can be used quickly if necessary.
In February, the IBRIS research agency, commissioned by Rzeczpospolita, asked Poles whether they wanted Poland's borders with Belarus and Russia to be mined. 28.3% of people liked this idea. Respondents. 17.7 percent were against, and the rest had no opinion.
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