Unconventional Warfare: The Missing Link in the Future of Land Operations

[OKOC]

Whilst slightly "off-air ops-topic" this article is still well worth a read.


Unconventional Warfare: The Missing Link in the Future of Land Operations (http://www.journal.forces.gc.ca/vo9/no4/07-balasevicius-eng.asp)

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

Whilst the military must plan for this, the major problems appear to be political. Going into unconventional wars with no clear and maintained aim, insufficient equipment budgets, laughable (but sadly cry-able) ROE and no 'out' plan will lose it every time.

[SASless]

Odd.....in some recent reading about the Vietnam War....I stopped and thought a simple exchange of "Vietnam" and "Afghanistan" would be no problem at all.

We do not learn from our past....as we always seem to have a new crop of Politicians and Senior Military Leaders who just will not look to the past when making these earth shaking decisions they feel compelled to make.

[racedo]

Future of Land Operations will mean corralling and controlling general population into urban areas and everywhere else is a free fire zone where drones will do the hunting and killing.

Reality is cutting off infrastructure, food and water for a city can be done in space of an hour or less because everybody is relying on technology.

It then becomes just a question of time.

[Two's in]

Despite being a relatively informative article, I declared myself Bullshiat Bingo champion of the Free world by line 5. Talk about jargon (and that's not when someone from Cornwall goes for a run).

[onetrack]

The article starts off with vast amounts of jargon and politico-speak, and ends up merely describing and outlining the historically most effective UW operations of WW2 and Vietnam.
In short, it only reiterates what we all know - a band of dedicated, well trained fighters, operating in guerilla fashion, with extensive knowledge and understanding of tactics and terrain, will defeat a large, conventionally-organised ground army, every time.

The writer forgot to include as an example, the Australian 2/2nd Independent Company which operated in Timor against the JIA over approximately 10 mths from early 1942 to early 1943.
A force of 300 Australian commandos, operating in guerilla fashion, kept the entire JIA force of 15,000 men fully tied up over that period of time, and inflicted 1000 deaths on the JIA Timor forces, over that period of time, for a loss of 26 Australians KIA.
The Australians even nailed the Japs finest military commander, the "Singapore Tiger" - who had been specially imported to wipe out all the Australians. ("Ring of Fire", by Dick Horton, Lt RNVR - ISBN 0-586-06235-1)

Time after time, throughout history, local guerilla forces, operating with skill and support, and with better knowledge of terrain, and using hit-and-run tactics, have defeated substantially larger, organised, less-adaptable, convential military forces.
Thus it has ever been, and thus it ever will be. What is the new factor in modern warfare is the advent of extensive electronic and remote technology.
As in WW1, it will take time for new strategies to be developed to deal with newer and newer electronic, remote, and unseen surveillance and destruction technology. Even guerillas can find ways to do this.

[dead_pan]

Despite being a relatively informative article, I declared myself Bullshiat Bingo champion of the Free world by line 5

Indeed - I wondered how long it would take before the phrases "asymmetric warfare", "battlespace" and "full-spectrum" got a mention. Not so long as it turned out.

There's few new ones to impress your superiors with - "aggregrated force operations", "holistic force structures", and "compound warfare".