Europe restores bogs to defend against Russia

From Kyiv to the Suwałki Gap, bogs return as Europe’s defensive shield

Restoring the EU’s drained bogs would stop Russian tanks

In February 2022, as Russia marched on Kyiv, Oleksandr Dmitriev realized he knew how to stop Moscow’s men: Blow a hole in the dam that strangled the Irpin River northeast of the capital and restore the long-lost boggy floodplain.

A defense consultant who organized offroad races in the area before the war, Dmitriev was familiar with the terrain. He knew exactly what reflooding the river basin — a vast expanse of bogs and marshes that was drained in Soviet times — would do to Russia’s war machinery. 

“It turns into an impassable turd, as the jeep guys say,” he said. He told the commander in charge of Kyiv’s defense as much, and was given the go-ahead to blow up the dam. 

Dmitriev’s idea worked. “In principle, it stopped the Russian attack from the north,” he said. The images of Moscow’s tanks mired in mud went around the world. 

Three years later, this act of desperation is inspiring countries along NATO’s eastern flank to look into restoring their own bogs.

Finland and Poland told POLITICO they were actively exploring bog restoration as a measure to defend their borders.

On NATO’s eastern flank, restoring bogs would be a relatively cheap and straightforward measure to achieve EU defense goals.

“It’s definitely doable,” said Aveliina Helm, professor of restoration ecology at the University of Tartu.

NATO’s bog belt 

As it happens, most of the EU’s peatlands are concentrated on NATO’s border with Russia and Kremlin-allied Belarus — stretching from the Finnish Arctic through the Baltic states, past Lithuania’s hard-to-defend Suwałki Gap and into eastern Poland. 

When waterlogged, this terrain represents a dangerous trap for military trucks and tanks. In a tragic example earlier this year, four U.S. soldiers stationed in Lithuania died when they drove their 63-ton M88 Hercules armored vehicle into a bog. 

And when armies can’t cross soggy open land, they are forced into areas that are more easily defended, as Russia found out when Dmitriev and his soldiers blew up the dam north of Kyiv in February 2022. 

    Destroyed Russia Tank

“The Russians there in armored personnel carriers got stuck at the entrance, then they were killed with a Javelin [anti-tank missile], then when the Russians tried to build pontoons … ours shot them with artillery,” Dmitriev recounted. 

Bog-based defense isn’t a new idea. Waterlogged terrain has stopped troops throughout European history — from Germanic tribes inflicting defeat on Roman legions by trapping them beside a bog in A.D. 9, to Finland’s borderlands ensnaring the Soviets in the 1940s. The treacherous marshes north of Kyiv posed a formidable challenge to armies in both world wars. 

Strategically rewetting drained peatlands to prepare for an enemy attack, however, would be a novelty. But it’s an idea that’s starting to catch on — among environmentalists, defense strategists and politicians. 

Pauli Aalto-Setälä, a lawmaker with Finland’s governing National Coalition Party, last year filed a parliamentary motion calling on the Finnish government to restore peatlands to secure its borders.

“In Finland, we have used our nature from a defense angle in history,” said Aalto-Setälä, who holds the rank of major and trained as a tank officer during his national service. “I realized that at the eastern border especially, there are a lot of excellent areas to restore — to make it as difficult to go through as possible.” 

Poland’s peaty politics

Discussions on defensive nature restoration are advancing fastest in Poland.

Climate activists and scientists started campaigning for nature-based defense a few years ago when they realized that Poland’s politicians were far more likely to spend financial and political capital on environmental efforts when they were linked to national security.

 

“Once you talk about security, everyone listens right now in Poland,” said Wiktoria Jędroszkowiak, a Polish activist. “And our peatlands and ancient forests, they are the places that are going to be very important for our defense once the war gets to Poland as well.” 

After years of campaigning, the issue has now reached government level in Warsaw, with discussions underway between scientists and Poland’s defense and environment ministries. 

Wiktor Kotowski, an ecologist and member of the Polish government’s advisory council for nature conservation, said initial talks with the defense ministry have been promising. 

“There were a lot of misunderstandings and misconceptions but in general we found there are only synergies,” he said.

    Russian vehicle bogged down in the mud

“What the ministry of defense wants is to get back as many wetlands as possible along the eastern border,” Kotowski added.

Cezary Tomczyk, a state secretary at Poland’s defense ministry, agreed. “Our objectives align,” he said. “For us, nature is an ally, and we want to use it.” 

Lithuania’s environment ministry said that defense-linked wetland restoration “is currently under discussion.”

Estonia’s defense ministry and Latvia’s armed forces said that new Baltic Defence Line plans to fortify the three countries’ borders would make use of natural obstacles including bogs.

Scientists see plenty of potential, given that peatlands cover 10 percent of the Baltics. And in many cases, the work would be straightforward, said Helm, the Estonian ecologist. 

“We have a lot of wetlands that are drained but still there. If we now restore the water regime — we close the ditches that constantly drain them — then they are relatively easy to return to a more natural state,” she said. 

Ending drainage instantly renders the terrain impassable.

“Restoration for water retention, for difficulty to cross — so for defensive purposes — it’s pretty straightforward and fast.” 

    Russian tank seized by Ukraine

The bogs-for-defense argument doesn’t work for all countries. In Germany the Bundeswehr sounded reluctant when asked about the idea. 

“The rewetting of wetlands can be both advantageous and disadvantageous for [NATO’s] own operations,” depending on the individual country, a spokesperson for the Bundeswehr’s infrastructure and environment office said. 

NATO troops would need to move through Germany in the event of a Russian attack in the east, and bogs restrict military movements. Still, “the idea of increasing the obstacle value of terrain by causing flooding and swamping … has been used in warfare for a very long time and is still a viable option today,” the spokesperson said. 

    Ukrainian soldiers sitting on a captured Russian tank

In Ukraine, the flooding of the Irpin  basin: “Yes, it stopped the invasion of Kyiv, and this was badly needed, so no criticism here."

https://www.politico.eu/article/russia-defense-kyiv-ukraine-nato-eu-bogs-poland-war-germany/