- cross-posted to:
- world@quokk.au
- cross-posted to:
- world@quokk.au
ERR reports the Baltic defense line project is already reshaping the southeast frontier.
Archived version: https://archive.is/newest/https://euromaidanpress.com/2025/09/16/estonia-is-digging-a-40-km-trench-to-stop-russian-tanks-and-600-bunkers-are-next/
Disclaimer: The article linked is from a single source with a single perspective. Make sure to cross-check information against multiple sources to get a comprehensive view on the situation.
Is the perspective making them look small or will something like that actually stop a tank?
That’s a stock photo of an irrigation or utility trench, I suspect - it wouldn’t stop a 4x4, let alone a tank.
Thank you lmao. I saw the article a few times and had to ask because I was very sure that wouldn’t stop a tank but I didn’t want to be the dipshit assuming they know better than civil engineers.
Whoops, I was curious - turns out the estonian LEO dug them (military police/border guard, not sure of distinction) but they’re anti-migrant ditches, not anti-tank ditches. From the source article:
Yeah, your first impulse was right on the money with this one.
Here’s what they probably used to dig it, you see things like this being used all the time in agri-heavy areas.
spoiler
Rule of thumb, if it has two sloped sides it’s not going to stop an armored vehicle.
A tank driving on it will have issues. But this is easily overcome by itself.
This is just one small part of new emplacements. But even multiple layers are only expected to slow an advance
It’s deterrence but yeah it would slow down tanks and choke point them which is useful but it’s not like totally impassable.
it’s just an irrigation canal. A BMP could cross that without having to slow down, it can’t be more than 3m and has such beautiful ramped sides. The biggest threat might be getting stuck in the loose dirt of the spoil berm, but really there’s not enough there to trouble a hilux let alone an AFV or true tank.
I wouldn’t want to be the people in the tank. If you tried to hit that at full speed it wouldn’t be pleasant plus you would tear up the tank.
The idea is to slow it down so that it can be blown up
Riding in any AFV isn’t comfortable, Russian tanks especially. This sure wouldn’t be pleasant, but it’d be a great deal more fun than being hit with an AT round because you stopped in the middle of an empty field.
There is no stopping a tank force that’s determined by obstacle alone, countries in WW2 spent millions and lots of resources into complex anti tank setups and the lesson learned is nothing stops them. You just invest the least to be the most annoying and by that I mean time consuming.
At the very least you have to slow and turn your turret away from the place you want to go which is problematic if there’s people on the other side who don’t have to turn their guns away.
You don’t, though, not in this case - because this isn’t an anti-tank ditch. You might have to elevate to prevent sticking your snoot in the berm, but (and not to go all war-thunder here) it’s two button presses on the gunner’s station and at very most a second’s delay to get back on sight, and thanks to the stabilization the turret is still tracking the entire time you’re doing that. And that’s just if you don’t blast the berm out of the way. And this doesn’t apply to most AFV’s, since they don’t have protruding barrels that might foul while crossing this.
There’s lots more here about the way static defenses factor into defense in depth and how modern improvements to the strategy incorporate information warfare to improve the cost/effect ratio, but I’m lazy - if you want to learn more look up Ukraine and Russia’s current anti-tank policy or Russia’s counter-counter-strike preparations from last year. At the very least it’ll give you some photos of what a legit anti-tank barrier looks like, which isn’t this goofy thing designed just to deter the so horrible “migration offensive”.
Yes you do physics exists and gun barrels aren’t super into impacts or being filled with mud.
You’re article supports me not you. It never says it is or isn’t a anti tank ditch, it does imply it’s anti vehicle though with tanks being a vehicle.
Ps your proof being a tank crossing a smaller equally sided trench backwards with the turret facing… away from the berm is really terrible evidence that you wouldn’t need to slow or turn the turret away.
… Right, which is why I said you might need to elevate the barrel, my point being that such a maneuver is not a tactical disadvantage.
A small stone wall will stop a Cupra and this ditch sure would be annoying to cross with a bicycle, but while all ditches could be anti-vehicle ditches, very few ditches are anti-tank ditches.
Really though, I’m trying to figure out how to phrase ‘how does physics factor into this’ in a more useful way, because obviously molecules stay together and gravity works, but do you have anything more than that? You can poke a tank barrel through a cinderblock wall without taking it out of battery, it’s a massive tempered steel bar, and barrel obstructions are extremely difficult to get. In modern tanks, tho iirc not on the T-72, soft barrel obstructions like dirt/mud/water/gravel/etc. can be cleared automatically from the breach controls by diverting pressure from the pneumatics (IIRC the T-72 had to use a squib to achieve the same result, which was stupid dangerous for russian-engineering-reasons). You’re just bringing up points that aren’t really relevant.
For example, this ditch alone would not be a deterrent to any AFV - but that’s why in an ideal world this would be sitting on the fronts of an AT minefield, to dissuade civilians or wildlife from walking into the field itself, separate AFVs from their support and to provide a nice little aesthetic boost. Like a ha-ha, but for tanks (though this goofy thing wouldn’t even function as a ha-ha)
Ps
Buddy that was only evidence for not having to slow, not having to turn the turret. This is starting to feel like you’re just lashing out because your preconceptions are being challenged, not you having a genuine intellectual objection to what I’m saying. You’re clearly unfamiliar with the topic, and you’re butting up against the big dunning-kruger trench (which ironically would make a much more effective tank defense than what’s pictured in the OP).
Please just go do a little bit of your own research instead of lashing out with random objections like this, then come back. Even on it’s own it’s a potentially important topic to be familiar with, what with the rise of far right nationalism the world over, and it’s getting clear you don’t have much theoretical (let alone practical) familiarity with the capabilities of AFVs.
edit: spelling
Except that’s again not how physics works, they’re not anti air guns bud. Hull go down = barrel go down and no MBT has 90° of elevation so you turn your turret round just like your own video shows.
Again nothing is going to stop a tank group who wants to get through history has taught us this again and again, all you do is slow them down.
IFVs aren’t tanks btw, if you’re gonna be weirdly tedious about strange stuff you might want to be correct.
Correct: IFVs* aren’t MBTs, but MBTs and IFVs are both AFVs. Using the supercategory in this case is just a nod to actual tanks being pretty rare on a modern battlefield vs. the vast number of tracked armored vehicles. This information doesn’t apply to just tanks, and since I find purely semantic arguments like this one tedious, I figured I’d err on the side of accuracy instead of informal intelligibility. More fool me, I guess.
And also yeah, no argument about gun elevation. Which is why you just go fast over a trench like this, and rely on it being < 1/2 the length of your vehicle (ex: the T-72 has a ground support length of around 9m for this roughly 4m trench) for added stability while crossing. Which totally ignores that you’d only get to where a 90° elevation would be relevant if you go so slow you’re pointing directly down into the trench, which wouldn’t happen if you impacted the angled far wall (which is why real tank ditches are shaped like the dunning kruger graph or the trench in the vid I linked - a sharp vertical wall to prevent climbing usually combined with an angled ramp to direct the bulk of the tank downwards before it’s feasible for the gap to be jumped)
Keep in mind that tanks initially existed for the sole reason of crossing ditches like this. While warfare has evolved and tanks no longer have WWI / Warhammer style gigantic climbing tracks, the basic use of a tank as an obstacle-crossing fire support vehicle has not changed.
edit: words
edit_2: why did you change AFVs to IFVs? Nobody has been talking about IFVs except when I referenced the BMP, which doesn’t even have a protruding barrel, so what was the point here?