veteran’s corner
Tom Krabbenhoft
The Russian invasion of Ukraine has been a new paradigm in warfare. It’s said wars are fought with the tactics and strategies of the last war but the Ukraine conflict has crossed so many lines of conventional warfare thinking, shattering this quote.
When the invasion happened most people were painting a doom picture for Ukraine. The Russians were going to overwhelm the ill-equipped defenders in weeks. Yes, this may have been the case ten or twenty years ago.
Airpower- Since the end of WW1 a few military minds were convinced airpower was going to be a huge factor in the next war. The Germans and Japanese accepted this and their initial successes in WW2 prove that. The allies in the beginning of WW2 struggled to suppress Axis air attacks. After WW2 all military minds embraced the superior airpower theories. Most Air Forces were structured after WW2 proving aircrafts value to military strategies.
Ukraine has shredded this thinking. A larger, better trained and equipped military with massive airpower is being defeated by a smaller force.
Air Defense – This may be the single largest factor in the Russian shellacking. Air defense has directly taken Russian air power out of the game. It’s the first time this has ever happened, almost 100 years of military normal – changed. Smaller scale use of air defense during the Arab-Israeli war proved their worth. Never on a full blown theater of war. One could compare it to the introduction of gun powder into warfare. Among many other things gunpowder rendered the armored knight/soldier obsolete.
Intelligence gathering- There is no doubt the US, Poland, Lithuania and other friends are providing intelligence on a massive scale. Along with losing the lethal factor of their airpower. They’ve also lost the intelligence gathering ability aircraft give. Our satellites are superior to the Russians. Multiply this with on the ground sources our friends are providing. Drones- Although not very new, the recent technological advances have made them a permanent factor in warfare. They have come into their own with real-time information gathering. Add in the fact many of them can also provide a lethal payload. Instances of the lowly remote control truck a child would play with. Many have been fitted with grenades and remotely driven into troops. The demoralizing and psychological affect must be crippling to the Russians.
One thing that has remained historically correct is a professional army has lost when it relies on conscripts. Conscripts are considered the lowest of all soldiers; normally they provide cannon fodder at best. The Russians are literally plucking farmers from fields, drunks and others from jails. Turkey of all places has announced that Russians fleeing conscription are flooding their borders. I’ve only had a couple of days in my service time where Turkish residency would’ve been better.
Anything veteran related contact me at 11btwk@gmail.com.