In which the writer reviews the recent actions in the Ukraine and its implications for future conflicts based upon missile range capabilities and effectiveness. The chap is often viewed as a hawkish character, so setting that aside the info on missile ranges and US base locations and implications for what a defensive offensive strategy needs to consider were thought provoking for me. It would be interesting to see titles taking these things into consideration for what if future conflict sims.
Not unlike how the Spanish Civil War gave hints to what WWII would look like, the Russo-Ukrainian War today is showing shadows of what is to come.
From drones, to highly accurate long range precision fires by conventional ballistic and cruise missiles, to exceptionally well-trained special forces – if you have a high percentage of your air forces, supply depots, maintenance facilities, and ammunition magazines within range of your enemy – if they have the ability, they will attack them. If you concentrate your forces, you distill your operational risk to an essential vulnerability too attractive not to attack.
The Russians are lucky that the pre-war Ukrainian government and its blinkered Western advisors did not have the Ukrainians properly ready for the war that came this February.
America and her allies do not have that luxury in the Pacific west of Wake. There is no larger power who will send us meaningful amounts of aid to cover our peace time distraction.
The People’s Republic of China’s rocket forces have our bases covered. You can safely assume that the PRC’s clandestine services are good and well set. They know what needs to be done. They have been preparing for decades and the Russo-Ukrainian War shows they were on the correct path.
If we continue to assume that we will be able to have access and use of these fixed facilities in any future conflict for more than a day or two, we are setting ourselves up for an inability to operate forward.
Yes, this is an election season, but time is short and our leaders need to act now.
We need to start to better distribute our risk, faster – especially maintenance and rearming. Otherwise, we will find ourselves – once again – pushed back east of Wake and south of New Guinea for the second time in a century in the opening months of a global war that will last years – one fate does not guarantee we will win this time.
One thought on “Follow on from Air to Air –”
A follow on comment from a resident in China: Chinese leaders would love to be able to plan decades out. But like so many people in charge of large, complicated countries, they can’t, and they know that.
There’s a lot of inter-service rivalry in China, which makes military planning difficult, and also undermines efforts to coordinate strategy in an era emphasising combined arms operations.
Beijing and the various military commands continue to wonder–and debate–who is the major threat. They are drawing different lessons from Ukraine, with some even arguing that the conflict there has little resonance with China’s own challenges.
“Written by someone who examines Chinese politics and military matters”
A follow on comment from a resident in China: Chinese leaders would love to be able to plan decades out. But like so many people in charge of large, complicated countries, they can’t, and they know that.
There’s a lot of inter-service rivalry in China, which makes military planning difficult, and also undermines efforts to coordinate strategy in an era emphasising combined arms operations.
Beijing and the various military commands continue to wonder–and debate–who is the major threat. They are drawing different lessons from Ukraine, with some even arguing that the conflict there has little resonance with China’s own challenges.
“Written by someone who examines Chinese politics and military matters”