Reinforcing obstacles are physically constructed, emplaced, or detonated by a force to achieve a specific purpose against his opponent. We further sub-divide reinforcing obstacles into two categories – tactical and protective. Let’s discuss each.

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Tactical – These are obstacles utilized by a force to hinder, influence, or deny completely the ability of its’ enemy to maneuver. Obviously, these obstacles should be completely integrated with a unit’s indirect and direct fire plans and any friendly maneuver the unit has planned (counterattacks etc…). Because of this integration, they must have a distinct purpose which is tied to the fire plans.

Protective – As the name suggests these obstacles are emplaced by a force to protect themselves from their opponent’s final assault of their defensive positions. In the simplest of terms, this is the unit’s last line of defense before a potential enemy breakthrough of their battle position.

Types of Reinforcing Obstacles
Anyone with even a remote interest of military history has seen countless types of reinforcing obstacles. It seems that almost anything has been used by a force as an obstacle. If it was planned and prepared properly and integrated with fire and maneuver it was probably effective. We can categorize these various obstacles into the following five areas: contaminates, constructed, demolitions, expedients, and land mines. Let’s discuss each in order to assist us in understanding next month’s article in planning and preparing obstacles.

Contaminates
When you think of obstacles, contaminates may not directly come to mind. However, the use of nuclear and chemical weapons has certainly been employed in the past as we are all well aware. In terms of utilizing contaminates, in particular chemical weapons, perhaps the best example is the old Soviet doctrine. For those who remember the Cold War Days, Soviet doctrine addressed extensively the use of persistent and non-persistent agents in the defense. In their doctrine, chemicals were clearly utilized as an obstacle. They would tie-in agents to potentially seal off pieces of terrain (block) and cause chaos (disrupt).

Those of you who fought the OPFOR at the National Training Center during the conventional fight days can remember this use. The OPFOR had several purposes for chem. For example, they would utilize them to potentially take away avenues of approach from the BLUEFOR. This was especially true when they were constrained in terms of troop strength. They would also fire agents at or near the BLUEFOR reserve (when located) to fix or even block their future maneuver. The OPFOR’s use of contaminates was instrumental in their success.

Of course, the use of contaminates can many times be a crap shoot because of the weather and environment. Winds and temperature can greatly affect their use and can even cause contaminates to be an obstacle against you. They are the proverbial high payoff-high risk endeavor.

Constructed
As the name suggests, constructed obstacles are those emplaced by Soldiers and their equipment. These obstacles normally require significant sweat on the part of Soldiers to emplace, hard hours by mechanical equipment, and a well-developed logistical and movement plan to ensure the correct resources and equipment get to the right place at the right time. Critical in the emplacement of constructed obstacles is making sure obstacles are emplaced in the right location. You will never see morale drop so much in a Soldier as when he is told that the obstacles he assisted in constructing must be tore down because it was put in the wrong place.

Examples of constructed obstacles include the use of wire (concertina, barbed, etc…), digging tank ditches, placing log cribs in mounted avenues of approach, and tying in hedgehogs and tetrahedrons into an obstacle plan. In most cases, you find obstacle systems consist of an array of individual constructed obstacles.

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