Comment by andrewflnr
1 day ago
I wonder how long it will take in Ukraine.
Actually at the rate we're going, there will still be active minefield defenses for most of our lifespans.
1 day ago
I wonder how long it will take in Ukraine.
Actually at the rate we're going, there will still be active minefield defenses for most of our lifespans.
Poland withdrew from the Ottawa Convention last month, with the aim of being able to lay anti-personnel mines along its eastern border.
Whether it does or not is an open-question, and while I understand it of course, the idea we're increasing the use of mines is a sad day. They're so indiscriminate and will no doubt cause injuries far into the future.
No one is going to build minefields, too populated area, too many wild animals. It's mostly about automatic mining - https://www.hsw.pl/produkty/pojazd-minowania-narzutowego-bao...
> The BAOBAB-K Mine Laying Vehicle allows the laying of minefields of various sizes, mine densities, and self-clearance times.
The self-clearing is interesting and I hindsight auch an obvious thing to implement.
There's no border wall, just a typical bike road next to a small fence. So no, unless Poland is planning to blow up their own civilians, they won't mine their own country lol.
My wife’s part of the Family has a house with view of the border to Belarusia. It used to be a small fence just in front of a wood, but that’s long past. It’s truly a wall now.
Placing landmines systematically during peacetime by a stable government-ran military should at least make clearing mines easier, and minefields better marked for locals. So, it's not completely indiscriminate. If it decreases war-related life loss (both direct and indirect), it's net positive
I seen estimates that are much more pessimistic.
https://www.osw.waw.pl/pl/publikacje/komentarze-osw/2023-11-... mentions optimistic estimate of 70 years, and other statistics give estimated cleanup time of 740 years.
And in months since then more mines were placed.
Putin’s war, bro. It’s aaall Putin laying the mines.