Five weeks of joint work near Budry turned open farmland into fortified ground, with Polish and German troops digging trenches, stringing barbed wire and laying long rows of concrete anti-tank “hedgehogs.”
The buildout is part of Poland’s Eastern Shield, a 10 billion-euro project launched in 2024 to harden NATO’s borders with Russia and Belarus using fortifications, depots, reconnaissance systems and anti-drone defenses.
Polish officials say the aim is to secure more than 200 kilometres of the most sensitive frontier and, if needed, mine Poland’s eastern and northern borders within 48 hours; several hundred thousand mines are being procured.
The push comes as Russia keeps heavily armed forces in Kaliningrad and held Baltic Fleet exercises there in June, while the war in neighboring Ukraine heads into a fifth year.
German troops are deployed through 2027 despite some political unease in Poland, and French, U.S. and British elements are due to join border-security activities from October.