visual politic Community what is happening in Poland could change the balance of power across the European continent this country has decided to break the mold beat all records and increase its military spending to levels never seen before pay close attention Poland is probably the European country that suffered the most during the 20th century it was invaded by the Russians by the Germans it was divided destroyed and bore the brunt of the second world war and to top it off it ended up being subjugated to 50 long years of Soviet communism destruction and above all ruin
accompanied this country for most of the 20th century and that's why you can believe me when I tell you that polls are not willing to let history repeat itself under any circumstances and that is exactly why this country has left the whole of NATO open-mouthed how well with news like this Poland to spend 5% of GDP on defense in 2025 says foreign minister a whopping 5% of GDP you heard correctly the polls are ready to invest almost $50 billion in defense by 2025 yes that's right the same amount as much richer countries like South Korea
it's a crazy figure in relative terms it amounts to almost the same military effort as Russia 50% more than that of the United States and twice that of the South Koreans and this what's more represents a radical change a 180° turn the polls have set out to move from having one of the most Antiquated and poorly equipped armed forces in Europe to one of the most modern but you know what they don't want to do it the way we all would probably think let me explain lately the trend in Western countries is to invest more
in airow and unmanned Technologies leaving aside traditional ground armies more drones fewer tanks more aircraft less artillery in fact many countries are cutting the size of their territorial armies precisely to free up resources to improve the other branch of their Armed Forces nevertheless Poland is doing the opposite there are more and more ground soldiers and the idea is that they will continue to grow in number take a look at this crazy graphic in just four years I repeat in just four years Poland has practically doubled the size of its Armed Forces according to the Polish
government by 2024 they already had 216,000 professional Personnel what's more Poland is expected to end 2024 with the third largest armed forces in all of NATO behind only the United States and Turkey but the idea is to go further Warsaw aims to reach 300,000 soldiers in the not too distant future and guess what there were those who thought that this whole gamble was nothing more than a strategy to try to scrape votes by the party that until recently governed Poland the Nationalist Law And Justice formation however in contrast to this assumption the truth is that
the new prime minister the center right Donald Tusk also Advocates continuing with this major military expansion for the polls this is a a matter of national interest the great effort ahead of us and from which there is no turning back that is the increase in spending on Armament and defense it is a great effort but there is no turning back from it no climate change no welfare state the great political consensus in Poland is that they have to rapidly expand their military capabilities which brings us directly to a big question why does Poland need so
many troops in its Armed Forces what is behind this Titanic military effort and why are they prioritizing the Army well in this video we're going to talk about two very different things but ones that are intimately related to each other strategic plans and weapons this will help you understand why Poland is spending so much money on defense and we'll also see other surprising strategies of our times for example did you know that there is talk of building a wall yet not a normal wall but rather a super armored one full of Technology pay close attention
the East Shield we are talking about a Game of Thrones style ice War but the idea is not so far-fetched as we were saying Poland has learned well the lessons of history and instead of waiting for trouble to come from the East it's building its own East Shield we're talking about a wall a large high-tech wall with anti-tank trenches surveillance senses and anti-drone systems and while in Westeros the wall protected the Seven Kingdoms from the white walkers here the objective is different to stop Russia now what exactly is all this about the East Shield well
well let's start by talking about numbers which I can already tell you are vertigo [Music] inducing the East Shield is a Polish government program to fortify its eastern borders with both bellarus and the Russian Enclave of kaliningrad the polls are trying to involve NATO to be part of the project but whether they succeed or not one thing is clear they are determined to see this project through no matter what it takes as you can imagine the costs are not small Poland gives details on Eastern Shield to be deployed on bellerian and Russian borders the government
is to invest €2.3 billion EUR in making the Border impossible for a potential enemy to cross an initial budget of more than $2.5 billion which well you know how these things are will end up being much more to Super fortify between 400 and 500 km of Border almost the entire border that Poland shares with Russia and Belarus our actions are aimed at defending every inch of our Republic's territory and as I said this time we're not only talking about the typical anti tank ditches Dragon's Teeth and watchtowers Poland wants the shield to be a technological
Jewel capable of protecting the country from the three main Russian threats Heavy Artillery drones and avalanches of migrants used as a weapon of hybrid Warfare by Russia and bellarus this strip of about 200 M wide will have anti-drone Towers seismic sensors and large gas field balloons which are known as reconnaissance aerostats that can detect military movements more than 300 100 km that's over 185 M away but there's even more this fortification will also include reinforced concrete Hedges bunkers Bridges and reinforced roads spaces have even been set aside for the installation of minefields we're talking about
a combination of physical barriers to slow down or even prevent any enemy incursion but just in case the Polish plan also envisages setting up forward operating bases Logistics nodes and all the necessary infrastructure along the way what you're looking at is the largest defensive reinforcement of NATO's Eastern flank since 1945 the objective is not only to block an attack but to slow down any enemy movement enough to allow polish and NATO forces to deploy in sufficient numbers to repel the attack we must be prepared for a full scale conflict of a symmetrical nature and of
long duration and this is related to the fact that we must maintain the armed forces in good condition we're talking about a military Mega project supported by 65% of poles and expected to be operational by 2028 best of all this is not an isolated polish effort its neighbors in the Baltic republics Lithuania lva and Estonia are also creating similar border defenses albeit less comprehensive than this project Lithuania opens first antim Mobility equipment park as part of new Baltic defense line visual politic Community since Russia Unleashed its Horror in Ukraine the baltics have started to create
their own border defense systems Lithuania for example is building its own border fence with bellarus a structure that includes not only physical barriers but also detection and surveillance systems and if NATO manages to coordinate both projects well these could function as a single maximum security border Mega Corridor capable of protecting Poland the Baltic countries and the saluke corridor it is in essence a defensive mesh that would buy time the idea is that under no circumstances should the Russians be able to penetrate NATO's soil neither with uniformed troops nor with mercenaries at least for the time
necessary to mobilize the bulk of the Armed Forces therefore in addition to physical barriers logistical corridors are also being developed to facilitate the rapid movement of troops and military equipment or to avoid a kind of Cur in Poland all the Baltic republics because as we already told you here on visual politic there is fear that following Game Theory there may come a time when Russia may be interested in military action on NATO territory in order to force a negotiation you think it doesn't make sense well we'll link a video for you in the description where
we tell you how this operation could come about now as well as the East Shield there's still more Poland launches Operation Safe pod lassi with 177,000 troops to protect eastern border amid growing hybrid threats since the 1st of August a combined force of poles and other NATO allies have been protecting the border with bellarus and training soldiers and the objective seems basically the same as that of the shield to deter Russia and bellus from Surprise attacks hybrid Warfare actions for example using immigrants or lightning operations in the region Europe needs strengths again building barriers against
Russian aggression now can save lives in the future now all that we have told you is a very very small part of what Poland is going to spend on defense in the coming years because naturally what would this Shield be without Weaponry well I can already tell you that in Poland they aren't stupid and they will have plenty of weapons and soldiers in a few years time check it out a voiding a Ukraine 2.0 imagine for a moment that you are the head of state of a country bordering Russia and bellarus which for all practical
purposes is similar you are meeting with your cabinet of ministers and the Minister of Defense asks you how do we distribute these new funds for the Armed Forces many of you will say well that's easy we divide the new budget in equal parts between the Army the Air Force and the Navy suddenly however the smartass consultant on duty asks you a question but haven't you seen how the Russian invasion of Ukraine went it was a general Invasion not a specific military operation so why not invest much more in those who have to protect the territory
the towns and cities that is in the land Army what can I say the question makes all the sense in the world and it's probably the question that the typical smartass advisor asked the Polish Minister of Defense how exactly did Russia attack Ukraine what was the Ukrainian Armed Forces lacking to prevent such an invasion and from there they've taken action [Music] basically the Polish strategy is to buy in advance everything that Ukraine would have needed from the beginning to repel the Russian invasion that equates to about 1,000 South Korean K2 tanks almost 400 American ABS
about 700 South Korean K9 self propelled howitzers almost 300 South Korean chinmo rocket launchers and 500 of the famous haars quite a First Rate catalog we're talking about a rearmament not seen in Europe in a long long time and Army built practically from scratch that's not all another major problem Ukraine has had and still has today is its difficulty in protecting itself from Russian air strikes many of them directed against civilian [Music] areas we've all seen it with its isander M missiles with a range of up to 500 km all the advanced Hypersonic k47 which
can reach targets almost 3,000 km away Russia has raised homes as well as civilian and energy infrastructure nothing has escaped Russian barbarism not to mention drones Russia has used drones in almost 60% of its bombing operations now why have the Russians been able to do all that in Ukraine well purely and simply because of the lack of air defenses and yes as you're probably already Imagining the poles have seen this coming and are also working to address this shortcoming Poland beefs up military defenses with purchase of 48 New Patriot launchers a total of $15 billion
in Patriot batteries alone and 644 missiles to arm them War doesn't mess around and all this for one simple reason as in Ukraine its civilian and energy infrastructure is within range of Russian missiles weather fired from bellarus or kenrad both isander and k47 and many other ordinance could reach virtually the entire country including of course the capital and let's not forget another small detail Iran ships hundreds of ballistic missiles to Russia Iran and North Korea two countries with Advanced ballistic capabilities could support Russia in the event of a conflict against a NATO country exactly as
they are already doing with Ukraine now we left out another area in which Russia is also very strong and which has been key to invading Ukraine I am of course talking about artillery Russia not only has a large artillery production which has also been greatly expanded during the war against Ukraine it's also buying Rockets from pongyang and in view of the difficulties that Ukraine had particularly in the first year of the war with the real hail of fire launched by the Russian Artillery Poland also wanted to take the ball by the horns here at the
moment they are not in inferior conditions as Ukraine was haars and chunu would be key in this regard but so would the more than 800 jassm airto surface cruise missiles which can accurately hit enemy artillery from a fighter and it's not just about using the Visa card Poland is also feeding its own military industry for example unnik radom has increased its production of grot rifles from 177,000 units in March 2022 to 35,000 in 2023 3 and expects to produce 100,000 by 2026 the objective to reach the 236,000 rifles produced that the Polish armed forces have
ordered to renew their entire stock of rifles visual politic Community with all that we are telling you I think one thing has become crystal clear the Polish ground forces are going to become not only the Crown Jewel of the country but probably also the largest ground forces in all of Europe but of course here we come to the other big question we were asking at the beginning of the video what about the Air Force and the Navy well equipping air and Maritime forces is much more expensive than equipping the Army a jet fighter or a
frot costs a lot of money both in terms of equipment and maintenance but does this mean that Poland has cast aside its air and Naval forces well yes and no Poland's bet is above all to have gigantic ground forces and a huge anti-aircraft defense capable of stopping the Russian Onslaught it would then be up to Nato to provide the rest of the means for a Counterattack of course this doesn't mean that or will be left with Antiquities and without air and Naval equipment not at all first F35 for Poland rolls out of lockheed's Fort Worth
plant warsa is equipping its Air Force with 32 f35s the creme Creme of stealth Fighters they are scant especially compared with everything we've just told you but from the Polish perspective that we are telling you about having a small but very high quality Air Force is more than enough and it's a very similar story for the Navy the poles have launched the mnik program to build three state-of-the-art frigs by 2032 but once again here we're talking about more contained numbers so you see Poland is pulling out all the stops to avoid going down the same
path as Ukraine at all costs the Polish conviction that a Russian attack against them would follow the same pattern as against Ukraine has led to the Army being built up on steroids warsaw's commitment to defense its aggressive military modernization and the construction of the East Shield are not gestures but a clear message Poland will not repeat the mistakes of the past there will be no Ukraine 2.0 here but now we've come this far the questions are for you do you think that all this will be enough to deter Russia are the polls safe from any
confrontation with Moscow thanks to this huge expenditure well leave your answers Below in the comments and let's start a debate and very important if you liked this video please like it and subscribe to visual politic if you haven't already done so so you won't miss any news as always thank you very much for being there all the best see you next time [Music]
