“Have one's back to the wall”in other languages

Same idea, different pictures

English and French come from fighting: with your back to a wall nobody can attack from behind, but you can't retreat either. Être dos au mur is said word for word.

Japanese 四面楚歌, songs of Chu on all four sides, comes from Chinese history. In 202 BC the general Xiang Yu, surrounded by enemy armies, heard songs of his own homeland, Chu, coming from the enemy camps, and believed his people had gone over to the other side.