| | | 'Dragon's Teeth' in Eastern Crimea Betray Russia's Fear of Losing Peninsula (newsweek.com)
Russia's military has built up anti-tank defenses in eastern Crimea, far from the front lines in southern Ukraine but close to internationally recognized Russian territory that would be threatened if the Ukrainians swept through the peninsula, new footage indicates.
Video clips shared on Monday by Atesh, a military movement of Ukrainians and Crimean Tatars, appear to show lines of dragon's teeth defenses near Feodosia. This city is on the eastern edge of the annexed Crimean peninsula, to the southwest of the Kerch Strait linking the disputed territory to Russia.
Moscow has controlled Crimea since 2014, and used the peninsula to attack mainland Ukraine throughout the months since the full-scale invasion began in February 2022. Kyiv has repeatedly vowed to retake Crimea.
..........
Satellite images captured in the first months of 2023 showed that Russia had placed lines of dragon's teeth across northern and western parts of Crimea. These are the closest to Russian-controlled mainland Ukrainian territory. This included rows of dragon's teeth to the north of Dzhankoi, a key Russian military-logistics hub.
"The Russian military, apparently, understands that Crimea will have to be defended in the near future," Russian military analyst Ian Matveev told The Washington Post in April 2023.
Open-source intelligence accounts have shared the footage published by Atesh, which appears to have captured the dragon's teeth northeast of Feodosia.
They are around 16 kilometers, or 10 miles, from the town, and are at the narrowest point of the Kerch Peninsula, according to Frederik Mertens, a strategic analyst with the Hague Centre for Security Studies.
............. |
|
