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Ukraine has several options for breaking through Russia's well-prepared anti-tank dragon's teeth defenses to maintain its ongoing advance.
One of the main challenges for Kyiv's now three-month old counteroffensive in southern Ukraine has been working around Russia's thoroughly laid out defenses, including dragon's teeth, which Russia has been constructing in the south since last fall.
Dragon's teeth are concrete blocks used to halt tank advances and prevent mechanized infantry from gaining territory. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had warned that starting the counteroffensive later than intended had given Russia time to prepare for Kyiv's push forward, including with static defenses and intensive mining.
But on Saturday, the commander of Ukraine's Tavria group of forces, Brigadier General Oleksandr Tarnavskiy, told British newspaper The Observer that Ukrainian forces "are now between the first and second defensive lines" in the southern Zaporizhzhia region after months of slow progress. Ukraine has been focusing on the front lines south of the city of Orikhiv, hoping to beat back Russian forces towards occupied Melitopol.
But although mines are touted as one of the most significant obstacles in Ukraine's path to the Sea of Azov, Russia's next lines of defenses will present formidable obstacles as Ukrainian troops head towards the Russian-controlled city of Tokmak. As indicators emerged in late August of Ukrainian troops passing through the initial line of defenses in Zaporizhzhia, the U.S. think tank, the Institute for the Study of War, said the next Russian defenses likely consist of anti-tank ditches, dragon's teeth and additional minefields.
Off the back of an apparent breakthrough in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine could "blast" upcoming dragon's teeth defenses with high-explosive anti-tank rounds, or engage combat engineers to manually remove the obstacles with plastic explosives, according to Marina Miron, a post-doctoral researcher with the War Studies Department at King's College, London.
But it is not clear how sturdy Russia's dragon's teeth defenses are, and Ukraine's military may be better off trying to circumvent them with smaller units rather than getting tanks involved, Miron told Newsweek.
The idea of dragon's teeth is to "get the Ukrainians bogged down and ideally concentrated in that area," she said. "This would mean the Russians could use artillery and drones to target troops and equipment."
"The dragon's teeth are not totally impassable, but they are a good distraction," Miron said.
Dragon's teeth are not complicated defenses to remove, but the problem comes when engineers dealing with them are under observed direct and indirect fire, Frederik Mertens, a strategic analyst with the Hague Center for Security Studies, told Newsweek.
Breaking through dragon's teeth requires combined arms operations that cover the engineers with smoke, suppress enemy artillery fire and ideally put forward infantry forces, he told Newsweek.
"Fail to suppress that artillery at the right moment, get the smoke there too soon, fumble while trying to blow up the obstacles…any of these can ruin the attempt," he said.
Such operations also indicate to Russian forces where Ukraine is hoping to make breakthroughs, meaning Moscow can bring tactical reserves to these areas, Mertens said.
"To alleviate this challenge, you can attempt multiple breakthrough operations along a line, keeping your foe guessing where the main blow will fall," he said.
Ukraine will need a "proper assault" to get through the second line of defenses around Robotyne and Verbove, Mertens said, arguing: "The faster they can do this, the better."
"There is a very big difference between the first and second line of defense," Tarnavskiy told The Observer. The second line of defense is not as heavily built up, the publication reported, meaning Ukraine can increasingly use military vehicles that they have so far held back.
The British Defense Ministry said in early November 2022 that Moscow had already started placing dragon's teeth around the captured Donetsk city of Mariupol, as well as throughout occupied swathes of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson.
"This activity suggests Russia is making a significant effort to prepare defences in depth behind their current front line, likely to forestall any rapid Ukrainian advances in the event of breakthroughs," the U.K. government predicted at the time.
Update 09/04/2023, 11:45 a.m. ET: This article was updated to clarify a quote from Marina Miron.
Update 09/05/2023, 10:05 a.m. ET: This article was updated to include comment from Frederik Mertens.
About the writer
Ellie Cook is a Newsweek security and defense reporter based in London, U.K. Her work focuses largely on the Russia-Ukraine ... Read more