Russia is stepping up efforts to build major obstacles to slow the advance of Ukrainian forces on key points it defends, including around the devastated city of Mariupol, Britain’s Ministry of Defense said on the war in Ukraine.
A Foreign Office intelligence assessment on Tuesday said the Russian military is using two factories in occupied Mariupol to produce large numbers of “dragon’s teeth” – pyramid-shaped concrete blocks designed to slow advancing military vehicles.
The production and deployment of the famous “dragon’s teeth”, combined with barbed wire and mines, is the latest indication of how Russia’s fighting forces are increasingly trying to shift to a more defensive war, at least in the main front of southern Chersona, on the eastern bank of the Dnieper river.
Typically, in conjunction with physical features, these obstacles are used to slow and impede approaching enemy forces, but also to redirect them to locations where they can be engaged.
Their deployment is part of the toolbox of many military forces, and experts point out that being useful requires skillful placement of obstacles, as well as effective observation and placement of artillery systems to guard them.
An important point is that given the upcoming influx into Ukraine of large numbers of poorly trained, newly conscripted men, the Russians probably believe they can replace training with physical barriers on the battlefield.
Ukrainian troops have been moving ever closer to the city of Kherson in recent months, the capture of which by Kyiv would be a major defeat for Moscow.
News of Sunday’s blackouts followed reports by Russian officials that the Kakhovka dam, also in Kherson, had been damaged by a Ukrainian strike.
The dam feeds the Crimean peninsula, which Moscow annexed in 2014 and has been used as a launching pad for its campaign in Ukraine.
At the same time, the Russian security services (FSB) announced the arrest of nine members of an “intelligence and sabotage group” of the forces of Ukraine.
The FSB, in a statement, accused the group of planning attacks against senior Russian-appointed officials working in Kherson.
During the arrests, explosives, grenades, ammunition and a car bomb were seized and an investigation into “international terrorism” was launched, the KGB’s successor said.
As Ukraine pushes forward with its counteroffensive in the south, Moscow’s forces have said they are turning Kherson into a “fortress”. And the “dragon’s teeth” are an important part of this “fortress”.
