Working on more than two books at the moment (not sure this is the best idea). Just proofing a chapter in one book on the Russo-Ukrainian War and noted the following paragraph I had written about the war. Is this meaningful dialogue or am I just stepping in it?
It has been claimed by one the authors that “Any war that lasts longer than six weeks becomes a war of attrition.”[1] This appear to be the case with this war. Six weeks of the dynamic maneuver warfare that made this modern military campaign looks vaguely like the revolution in military affairs (RMA) that some theorists had postulated. It had now ended. We now had transitioned into the next stage of the war, which looked much more like the typical day-by-day grind between extended front lines that more defined World War II. Eventually this would devolve down to something that looked more like World War I, leaving the RMA theorists surprisingly silent.[2]
[1] See Battle for Kyiv, page 204.
[2] Having worked in the U.S. defense analytical community for decades, we were all too familiar with the claims of the RMA theorists and their willingness to declare that warfare of the future was going to be nothing like the warfare of the past. As our specialty at The Dupuy Institute was analysis of historical data, this was particularly frustrating as they seemed dismiss the 3,300 years of military history as irrelevant, replaced by their appreciation of new technology and its proposed revolutionary impact on the battlefield. If anything has been established by the now extended war in Ukraine, is that there has not been a revolution in military affairs. New technology is clearly a factor in the war, but it is, shall we say, an evolution in military affairs (EMA) vice an RMA. As the author Jim Storr stated in a conversation in 2023 “Much of the story of the war in Ukraine is a story of old lessons learned again.”
Now, the shop inside the pentagon that supposedly taking the lead on the RMA was OSD Net Assessment, under the leadership of Dr. Andrew Marshall. The Dupuy Institute was contracted to them to evaluate some aspects of the RMA and did a study for this office on “Measuring the Value of Situational Awareness (2004).” This was a study of the combat effects of superior situational awareness based upon a detailed examination of 295 World War II division-level engagements. So at least Andy Marshall (nicknamed “Yoda”) had not dismissed the value of historical analysis and was willing to fund such work. Many of the other RMA theorist did not show such wisdom. Our report on situational awareness is available from The Dupuy Institute and is also summarized in two chapters in the book War by Numbers (2017).
I am most familiar with the pre-modern firearms version of the RMA argument: I believe it was called the Military Revolution by Michael Roberts in the 1950s.
I think the problem with the RMA-crowd is not that they don’t have any good ideas. It’s just that they so greatly overstate the case that it is easy to poke-holes in their arguments, and they are so extreme/aggressive that one is inclined to do so.
If you want to look a micro-example, you could look at the “Bomber Always Gets Through” crowd prior to WW2. They had built up very logical theory, built up on very much the sociological common sense of their day, that when you started bombing the urban masses society would fall apart. The position had much more acceptance than is generally understood now. Most believed it, but really nobody could get the bomber fleets built prior to the start of the war: though the British and US did get a good start.
So the theory didn’t work particularly well as stated. And because it was so oversold, Strategic Bombing is often states as a failure. A failure even though it was one of the most critical components of the Wests part of the war against Germany (the probably true observation that the Soviets killed 75% of the German infantry, the Western Allies 75% of the planes).
So I think what you have is a lot of new modern capabilities which are at times overstated, but also haven’t been figured out real well. Since the protagonists in this current war don’t really have the resources to push completely new technologies that hard, they are going to probably effect things more around the edges than at the core.
R1200: “I think the problem with the RMA-crowd is not that they don’t have any good ideas. It’s just that they so greatly overstate the case that it is easy to poke-holes in their arguments, and they are so extreme/aggressive that one is inclined to do so.”
-There is no such thing as an idea so brilliant that it won’t eventually be taken to a ridiculous extreme.
R1200: :If you want to look a micro-example, you could look at the “Bomber Always Gets Through” crowd prior to WW2…”
-TN Dupuy’s father discussed this in his book (If War Comes, IIRC). By 1941, most of a bomber force would get through. The problem was that: 1) They often missed the target, requiring another attack or 2) If they hit the target, it got repaired fairly quickly, requiring another attack.
VR,
James D. Glick
PO1 USNR ret.
Clarksville, TN
In the context of comparing RMA with attrition warfare, we could as well discuss the relationship between manoeuvre warfare and attrition warfare, but that has been covered in another post. I think that these discussions are closely related though.
What is RMA? If the essence is about the abundance and capabilities of (technologically enabled) ISR assets on the battlefield and theatre of operations to a degree where the prevalent situation is that the battlefield is “transparent”, and this situation is coupled with the capability of (technologically enabled) precision strikes, will these factors decisively alter/revolutionize how we wage war? Will “perfect intelligence” decide the battle or drastically (revolutionary) change the outcome of the operation? This is linked to precision strikes since precise targeting information is a prerequisite for it, and will precision strikes be decisive in another way than less technologically advanced weapon systems have been?
Let’s start with intelligence which is closely linked with situational awareness (SA). The answer is, “perfect intelligence” could be decisive, but there is no guarantee or law of nature which determines it would. Because – the – most important principle of combat is to amass superior combat power at a place and at a desired time where this can be utilized to achieve a success against the enemy (The inverse is also true, you must also deny the enemy an opportunity to do this). This success can then be utilized to achieve a breakthrough, an envelopment, a defeat, and a pursuit with a decisive effect such as (input whatever decisive effect was the objective for this tactical, operational or strategic level). Therefore, a superior situational awareness (SA) may give you an opportunity to manoeuvre your forces in a way which might give you a better force ratio, thus achieving the required ratio for a successful attack or do the inverse, to thwart an enemy attack against your defence. However, force ratio is not the same as combat power ratio, as combat effectiveness, and preparedness of a force, decides its combat power. The essence of combat effectiveness is the tempo and precision with which the troops perform their tactical tasks, and it can be understood as how effectively they produce kills per time period. As Chris has pointed out earlier, a 2:1 force ratio gives a very good starting point to achieve success in an attack (80% universal probability of success). However, Trevor Dupuy also demonstrated that combat effectiveness is a critical factor, although always relative from situation to situation.
Thus, better SA in itself, will never produce any decision on the battlefield, or generate the requirements for a war of fast manoeuvres. Better SA might increase the probability of success but cannot replace the required combat power ratio.
Will precision strikes be decisive? They could, but again, there is no guarantee. What they can do is to kill critical capabilities and reduce the potential combat power of the adversary in a cost-effective way, but it is still about producing superior combat power at a point of choice and at a desired time. Some might argue precision strikes can paralyze an opponent, making the combat power comparison irrelevant. I would argue that they can, for a limited period, and in this period you may have a favourable combat power ratio, somewhere. However, it is still relevant to view the situation in terms of combat power because, unless you just make a show of force or conduct a raid with a limited objective, in the end one land force will have to dominate another land force to seize and control some type of terrain/area/region/land.
So, how do we in practical military life produce combat power? We use tactics, techniques, and procedures to do combined arms (method to utilize different types of land forces and -weapons measured by seconds and minutes) and joint tactical combined arms (method to integrate weapons and forces from different services measured by seconds and minutes). Military organizations both look at effectiveness and efficiency in their TTPs, although efficiency in an optimization perspective usually requires time and specific analytic resources to develop. Manoeuvre warfare theorists have proposed some useful principles for the utilization of different arms and weapon systems, and dislocation regarding time, space, and type of capability/weapon system is key. However, you would not differentiate the application of these principles between a static and a more mobile form of combat, although the preparation time and development of the action probably are different. You will never fight “fair” if you can avoid it, that is just stupid (laws of armed conflict are there for another reason). More technologically enabled ISR and precision fires have introduced some significant changes to how we conduct warfare. SA is today more prevalent and deeper behind the frontline than we have been used to only a decade ago, although many of these changes were introduced 40 years ago. Significant changes are that lethal effects can be applied against especially combat support and -service support units much deeper and more effectively than before. Although losses seem to have increased among artillery units, the overall casualty rates among deployed forces does not seem to have changed since WWII and conventional wars in the 1960s and 70s.
Back to the question of evolution vs revolution in military affairs. One side of the question is really, how big is a fish? Or how much change do we need to call it a revolution? However, I would argue that the question whether the transition from mobile operations to more static operations does not relate to evolution vs revolution, but rather the question of combat power ratio. Initially the Russians gambled that they through operational surprise and Ukrainian relative unpreparedness, would have enough combat power superiority to achieve a decisive defeat. The gamble failed due to intelligence failure, miscalculating Ukrainian will to fight and probably overplayed own combat effectiveness, but also the fact that Ukrainian C2 was kept afloat (probably substantially improved) through speedily deployed Starlink systems. To keep an offensive going, it requires a continuous string of situations with superior combat power. Enough forces, multiplied with combat effectiveness, but also operational art, can provide this. The Russians could provide none of these factors after the initial thrust was stopped and had to regroup. Unfortunately, they understand enough of operational art to calculate a new formula for achieving their strategic and operational objectives. They still use technologically enabled preponderant ISR to guide their precision fires, but also to guide their traditional massed fires, combined with a mix of meat waves and more elaborate combined arms to grind down the Ukrainian forces. We see a steady progress produced by this method today, and if it is simple but works it isn’t stupid. Unfortunately, again, when the Ukrainian crust gets thin enough, even this method can generate a collapse followed by a breakthrough, envelopment, and defeat, if an uncommitted Russian operational reserve can generate sufficient combat power superiority at a decisive point.
Ukraine needs both a lot of material and ammunition, but also advanced combined arms training for their forces, to achieve success on the battlefield.