History
The Czech hedgehog's name refers to its origin in what is now the Czech Republic. The hedgehogs were originally used on the Czech-German border by the Czechoslovak border fortifications - a massive but never-completed fortification system built on the eve of World War II by Czechoslovakia. The fortification system fell to Germany in 1938 after the occupation of the Sudetenland as a consequence of the Munich Agreement.
Czech hedgehogs were widely used during World War II by the Soviet Union in anti-tank defence. They were produced from any sturdy piece of metal and sometimes even wood, including railroad ties. Czech hedgehogs were especially effective in urban combat, where a single hedgehog could block an entire street. Czech hedgehogs thus became a symbol of "defence at all cost" in the Soviet Union; hence the memorial to Moscow defenders, built alongside M-10 in 1966, is composed of three giant Czech hedgehogs.
However, in some forms of warfare, Czech hedgehogs proved to be less effective. They were often made larger than they should have been, and although they were quite useful in urban warfare, there was little use of German armour in urban warfare in Russia.
Czech hedgehogs were part of the defences of the Atlantic Wall and are visible in many images of the Normandy invasion.
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