Noviki. The Molotov Line Bunker.

The construction of fortified areas in the USSR began in 1926-1928 with the creation of the Polotsk and Karelian fortified areas (FA). By 1938, 13 FAs had been built, including three in Belarus: Polotsk, Minsk and Mozyr. The length of each FA was 60-120 km along the front and 20-30 km in depth, with the main defense strip 2-5 km deep. The defense was based on long-term firing points (pillboxes), command posts and communication centers. The most common were M and B type machine gun caponiers, as well as artillery pillboxes for 76 mm guns. However, many structures did not meet modern requirements, having weak protection and limited firing capabilities.

By the beginning of 1938, 13 fortified areas had been built and equipped along the western border of the USSR with a length of about 3,200 km, in which there were 3,196 defensive structures (of which 409 were artillery). The FA garrisons consisted of 25 special battalions of up to 18,000 regular soldiers and commanders. By January 1, 1938, there were 222 caponier guns (111 platoons) and 99 field artillery guns in all the provinces of the west and east. However, there were wide unprotected areas between the mountains.

In 1938-1939, construction of eight more fortified areas began on the western border: Ostrovsky, Sebezhsky, Slutsky, Shepetovsky, Izyaslavsky, Starokonstantinovsky, Ostropolsky and Kamenets-Podolsk. By the end of 1939, 1,028 long-term fortifications had been concreted in these mountains.

In the fall of 1939, construction began on 23 new districts along the western border of the USSR, including four in the Western Special Military District (ZapOVO): Brest, Zambrovsky, Osovetsky and Grodno. The Grodno fortified area was planned as the most powerful, with 606 pillboxes at the front of 80 km and a defense depth of 5-6 km. However, construction was slow due to a shortage of materials, equipment, and weapons. By the beginning of the war, many pillboxes remained unfinished or unarmed.

Since the 1930s, two types of pillboxes have been built in the USSR: the first could withstand a 152-mm howitzer shell, and the second - a 203-mm howitzer or mortar shell. The pillboxes housed 76-mm caponier guns of the Tsarist army and new models. 47-mm single-barreled Hotchkiss naval guns were mounted on casemate looms as anti-tank guns, but they could not serve as reliable protection against modern tanks.

In February 1939, tests began on the experimental DOT-4 casemate installation developed by OKB-43. The installation was equipped with a 45 mm tank cannon paired with a 7.62mm machine gun. In 1941, the Leningrad Arsenal was connected to the manufacture of the installation parts of the DOT-4. However, most of these installations never reached the Western URALS, but hundreds of them were used in the defense of Leningrad.

In September 1939, tests of the L-17 casemate cannon, created at the Kirov Plant, began. The L-17 had to withstand several direct hits into the embrasure from the 7.5 cm German StuG 37 assault cannon on a self-propelled chassis. The first L-17 installations were installed in June 1940 in the Kamenets-Podolsk fortified area.

On February 1, 1940, the Chief of the General Staff, B.M. Shaposhnikov, proposed to abolish most of the URS by mothballing military installations. The construction of new settlements on the old border (with the exception of Kamenets-Podolsky) was mothballed, and there were no garrisons in them.

In April–May 1941, representatives of the General Staff, the People's Commissariat of Defense and the Central Committee of the CPSU(b) conducted an inspection of the Urals along the old border. The planned measures for the completion and modernization of the fortifications of the old state border were not carried out due to the need to complete construction work on the fortifications of the new state border.

Since the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, there has been no organized resistance by the FAs as a whole, either on the Molotov Line or on the Stalin Line. Some of the FA garrisons fled, but where the pillbox support units were located, the FAs fought for a long time. The main reason for the German seizure of FA was not so much the lack of weapons as the human factor. Infantry units and field artillery in the vast majority of cases did not cover the FAs, but retreated to the east.

The fighting showed that the deployment of the FAs directly at the border was a mistake. The lack of a base, the remoteness of the field troops and the rapid advance of the Germans led to the fact that many pillboxes remained unoccupied. Those that were occupied heroically resisted, but were eventually blocked and destroyed. Despite this, the defenders of the Grodno FA fought to the end, demonstrating courage and resilience.

Where FA was covered by infantry and heavy artillery, it became practically impregnable. A typical example is the FA in the area of the "Oranienbaum patch", which the Germans approached in September 1941 and could not advance a single meter until the blockade was broken.

The fortified areas failed to protect Belarus and Russia from the invasion of the enemy. However, the titanic work on their construction cannot be considered in vain. Without these powerful fortifications, the course of the Great Patriotic War could have significantly changed for the worse, with all the consequences for our peoples.