{"id":57564,"date":"2024-10-27T21:16:03","date_gmt":"2024-10-27T20:16:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/?p=57564"},"modified":"2025-10-27T01:39:48","modified_gmt":"2025-10-27T00:39:48","slug":"the-tests-of-the-anti-tank-obstacles-that-latvia-has-placed-on-its-border-with-russia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2024\/10\/27\/the-tests-of-the-anti-tank-obstacles-that-latvia-has-placed-on-its-border-with-russia\/","title":{"rendered":"The tests of the anti-tank obstacles that Latvia has placed on its border with Russia"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In August we saw here <a href=\"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2024\/08\/03\/the-military-obstacles-latvia-is-putting-up-to-stop-a-russian-invasion\/\">the obstacles that Latvia is putting on its borders with Russia<\/a> to stop a possible invasion.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p><rel><a href=\"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2024\/08\/03\/the-military-obstacles-latvia-is-putting-up-to-stop-a-russian-invasion\/\">The military obstacles Latvia is putting up to stop a Russian invasion<\/a><\/rel><br \/>\n<rel><a href=\"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2024\/09\/26\/spanish-armored-vehicles-in-action-in-a-series-of-photos-from-the-latvian-army\/\">Spanish armored vehicles in action in a series of photos from the Latvian Army<\/a><\/rel><\/p>\n<p><strong>Latvia shares borders with Lithuania, Estonia, Belarus and Russia.<\/strong> These last two countries have authoritarian regimes that have been directing threats against their NATO neighbours, prompting the Baltic republics to take preemptive measures. Last summer, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2024\/08\/03\/the-military-obstacles-latvia-is-putting-up-to-stop-a-russian-invasion\/\">Latvia began placing classic anti-tank obstacles on its border with Russia.<\/a> Recently, <strong>the Latvian Army has put these defences to the test with a T-55 tank.<\/strong> Three days ago, the Latvian Army published this video showing the tests carried out with <strong>the so-called dragon's teeth<\/strong>:<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Latvij\u0101 aizvad\u012bti robe\u017eas stiprin\u0101\u0161anai pl\u0101noto \u0161\u0137\u0113r\u0161\u013cu testi\" width=\"665\" height=\"374\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/mYTVqlmT7bs?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong>Latvia received 5 T-55AMs donated by Poland in 1999 and three T-55AM2s donated by the Czech Republic in 2000.<\/strong> The Latvian Army does not maintain these tanks in active service, but the three Czech-made T-55AM2s are still in use for training purposes. <strong>The T-55 is a very old model, dating back to the 1950s,<\/strong> but <a href=\"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2023\/03\/22\/the-images-of-the-mobilization-by-russia-of-tanks-t-54-and-t-55-of-the-1950s\/\">Russia is still using this model in its invasion of Ukraine,<\/a> to make up for the huge losses of more modern tanks that Russian industry is unable to replace due to Western sanctions.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/54098198920_57c3d3556c_b.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; border:0px;\" \/><\/p>\n<p><strong>The T-55AM is a 1970 variant<\/strong>, equipped with a Volna fire control system, smoke grenade launchers, reinforced turret and hull protection, and a gun stabilizer allowing it to fire on the move.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/54098078109_6233241cfd_b.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; border:0px;\" \/><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/flickr.com\/photos\/latvijas_armija\/albums\/72177720321466488\/\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">The photos you see here were released by the Latvian Army<\/a> this week. They were taken by Sergeant Eriks Kukutis on 11 October during the testing at an undisclosed military facility under the supervision of Lt Col Kaspars Lazdi\u0146\u0161, Inspector of Engineers at the Joint Staff of the Latvian National Armed Forces. <\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/54098199200_227e29802d_b.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; border:0px;\" \/><\/p>\n<p><strong>Here we can see the tests with the dragon's teeth,<\/strong> which apparently proved very effective in hindering the advance of the T-55.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/54098077934_55e2820688_b.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; border:0px;\" \/><\/p>\n<p><strong>This is the state in which the dragon's teeth were left after testing.<\/strong> It should be noted that these obstacles are suitable for slowing down a mass advance, but they are not effective in stopping it. <strong>During World War II, dragon's teeth barriers were bypassed by military engineers<\/strong> by blowing up the obstacles at a certain point and allowing vehicles to pass through, allowing defenders to concentrate fire on a specific point.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/54098078169_5f509fc4bd_b.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; border:0px;\" \/><\/p>\n<p><strong>The tests also include obstacles with railroad tracks cut and nailed into the ground<\/strong>, an easy and simple way to make it difficult for vehicles to pass.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/54098237895_e30c07041e_b.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; border:0px;\" \/><\/p>\n<p><strong>Here we see tests with Czech hedgehogs.<\/strong> Two sizes of models were tested. In this photo we see the largest of them. These obstacles were first used in Czechoslovakia in 1938 against the advancing Germans, hence their name.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/54098198990_e591177c22_b.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; border:0px;\" \/><\/p>\n<p><strong>Stress tests were also carried out on the so-called \"Lego blocks\"<\/strong>, the concrete blocks with spikes on top of them, and shots were fired from the T-55's 100 mm cannon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In August we saw here the obstacles that Latvia is putting on its borders with Russia to stop a possible invasion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[19536,11544],"tags":[10707,17903,10731,15349],"class_list":["post-57564","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-we-said-yesterday","category-army","tag-latvia","tag-latvian-army","tag-russia","tag-t-55"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-11 20:03:52","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57564","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57564"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57564\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}