As much as they had told them the situation had gone quiet in the past months, nobody ever really felt at ease while standing there in front of that metal wall. Their duties, their first ever outside the boot camp, were oddly simple: face the tall barrier at safe distance – around three meters – and watch out, through the narrow slits between the strong steel-clad concrete slabs, for any unusual movement on the other side.
To many of them, what they were doing appeared utterly pointless and some began questioning the very purpose of being there; among them, the wisest immediately dropped any bizarre speculation, as everybody knows that thinking too much is inadvisable while you’re in the army. The more inconsiderate, though, couldn’t but thoroughly examine the picture: the defenses were new, sturdy and, most importantly, invulnerable, when the previous attempts to break them and the known capabilities of those who had tried were pondered; yet, if one ever decided to actually break through the wall – an operation that would require heavy military-grade equipment, which would mean confronting a determined and properly armed hostile force, possibly acting with great rapidity and surprise as well – what would become of them, a bunch of inexperienced and very lightly equipped volunteer cadets of the Border Guard?
Still, they weren’t particularly bothered by the absurdity of their assignment (on the contrary, they were glad they were not deployed in the rear, a kilometer or two further back, where the tunnels, along with their guests, popped out from time to time), nor by the potential dangers of standing idly right there, since no one truly believed a major breakthrough attempt was soon to happen.
It was the setting that was unsettling
Their unit had been assigned to the wall section running right after the southern entrance of the Białowieża Forest. This vast woodland is a lush spot straddling across Poland and Belarus, a remnant of the immense primeval wilderness that once stretched across Europe, from France to Russia. Here, nature used to rule uncontested, until the barrier had been erected, and still retains the power to make green look somewhat… eerie.
Everything is green within the depths of the forest – every movement, every noise –, where the oaks have their home and vastly outnumber the scant patrols, the only humans to regularly visit the place – from the Polish side, at least. Beyond the fence, the same forest hosts, somewhere within the trees’ fronds, a wider array of people. Some are just there to stay, those who most resemble the young guards from across, while others, willingly or not, have the ultimate goal of getting to the other side, one way or another.
Since the wall, things have calmed down a bit at the very frontline. Now a pair of shears won’t do the job as they once did, when only a short, disconnected fence divided the two sides. Those who wanted – had – to get through – savage people from afar lured in to press on the border by the sliest means – usually were given by those who wanted them to try the crossing everything they needed, i.e. some wire cutters. Even now they’re still given all what’s needed: a rugged shovel and then right away to work, which consists of months of digging a hole beneath the wall (evidently they’re deemed unworthy of being given something more sophisticated, like chop saws to cut the wall’s slabs).
Sometimes, however, they’re given more
As in May 2024, when, not far from our fresh recruits, a young Border Guard sergeant, Mateusz Sitek, was fatally stabbed through one of those barrier’s gaps by one of these savages, who had impaled a knife on a stick, so to make a makeshift spear. We are sure that this is exactly what Lukashenko meant in 2021 – at the peak of the border crisis – when he talked about “dirty bombs” smuggled into Europe through the Polish-Belarusian border (together with drugs, firearms and more). Everybody believed he was saying that he would use illegals, already destabilizing agents per se, to carry such freight into the EU. No, the illegals are the “dirty bombs” themselves, bioweapons good enough to sow discord among the member states and silently but steadily erode the fabric of European societies. Why bother to make too much noise with actual bombs when you have spears, bows and arrows?
Months passed with no major (nor even minor) incidents. The cadets began to get used to the sheer dullness of what seems hyperbolic to define “activities”. Not even new tunnels had been discovered nor any breach in general occurred.
One day, though, things got finally a bit rowdy. It was cloudy and hazy, a typical day from early springtime, one of those when the guards were more prone to feel the tiresome tediousness of the job. Hence, they would get just a bit away from falling asleep, standing in the manner of horses, as the smooth, brisk air courts the eyelids to descend over the still and unfocused pupils.
Abruptly, the guards were snatched from the slumber’s charm when, far away in the woods from the other side, the distant rumblings of several heavy trucks were heard and then muffled screams and groans, a few minutes later; and again, shortly afterwards, loud, irregular clangs. Thenceforth, absolute silence.
Confused, they reported to headquarters, which answered to be ready and to increase surveillance, because they would come any moment: the Belarusians were forcing them to cross. For three days they remained on high alert, but nothing happened. On the fourth, distant, scattered steps could be heard at night. On the fifth, very close rustling noises and branches creaking followed shadows rushing along the border, but the thick vegetation made impossible any clear sighting. It was evident, though, that they were about to do it. The sixth day saw the same signs but much more frequent, almost incessant.
Later that night they finally came
They ran towards the fence. The guards activated the alarms and turned on the floodlights. To their surprise, the intruders were carrying with them four heavy metal ladders. There, the metallic clangs from the other day! As the sirens wailed, they lifted the ladders and placed them against the 5.5-meter-tall wall. The first ones climbed; the awestruck guards watched while they carefully began cutting through the barbed wire. Riot police arrived on three trucks and immediately fired tear gas, while the guards retreated behind them.
A sudden hailstorm of stones, bottles and various objects rained down on the police; one chunky and pointed rock smashed a cop’s helmet visor and shattered his jaw. Then, the first of the assailants that managed to open a passage through the barbed wire leaped from the wall, breaking both his legs on impact with the soil, the deaf thud being followed by an excruciating cry; two cops lifted him semi-unconscious and dragged him away behind the line.
The gas had already made the air unbreathable, and their companion’s fate made the rest of the attackers finally realize the futility of their endeavor: two of those that were still cutting through the wire promptly ceased and got off the ladder, running into the bushes with the rest of group, while the fourth took his chance and jumped off to the other side.
The toll was as follows:
one severely injured cop, one severely injured Iraqi national in custody, one dead Iraqi national. When two guards went to retrieve the body, the wire cutters the man had used were still miraculously in his hand, held in a firm grip. One of them exclaimed sardonically: “Ah, that pesky Lukashenka! He gave ‘em that to climb, he gave ‘em that to cut through, but he forgot to give ‘em that to jump. He could have spared a parachute!”.
Sometimes it’s just a thick steel-clad concrete slab that separates civilization and barbarity, and who mounts guard on the precipice needs to learn how to stay in between, exactly how the oaks of Białowieża did.