On Wednesday, 17 May 2023, an insightful discussion was held by the UK Defence Committee to dissect the vital lessons that the Ukrainian conflict offers on the employment of modern air power.
James Cartlidge MP, Minister for Defence Procurement, and Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Knighton KCB, Chief of the Air Staff Designate, were present.
Dave Doogan MP opened the dialogue, contrasting the unchallenged exercise of air power in recent decades with the ongoing situation in Ukraine. He said, “Ukraine, however, is a different thing. What lessons have been learned over the past 14 or 15 months of that conflict?”
Cartlidge underscored the continued importance of air superiority, an understanding dating back to World War II. He said, “It is a lesson that we have known since the Second World War, which is the overwhelming importance of air superiority; if you do not achieve that, you can end up in what one might call gridlocked warfare with trenches and so on.” He also stressed the crucial role of strong alliances as a deterrent to avoid conflict from the outset.
Joining the conversation, Knighton expressed agreement, pointing out that neither side has managed to secure air superiority in the Ukrainian conflict, which has resulted in stagnant trench warfare. He said, “That gives us a glimpse of the challenges of gaining air superiority in a future fight, and we have to be able to demonstrate that we can do that.”
Speaking on the collaborative use of advanced and conventional aircraft, Knighton validated Doogan’s characterisation, stating, “your characterisation of the combination of fourth and fifth-gen combat air capability is exactly right, Mr Doogan.” He went on to share a future projection by General Hecker, indicating a substantial presence of F-35s in Europe under NATO by the early 2030s.
Digging deeper into the Ukrainian situation, Knighton extrapolated three strategic lessons:
- Deterrence and credible capability’s key role.
- The non-negotiable need for air superiority.
- The ability to adapt quickly as a determinant of success.
He voiced his observations saying, “the side that is able to adapt the fastest is the side that will prevail,” applauding the Ukrainians’ ability to adjust swiftly, capitalise on technology, modify their tactics, and deliver against a larger Russian force.
In terms of tactical and operational lessons, Knighton highlighted the importance of stockpiles, industrial capacity, electronic warfare, the rising use of uncrewed systems, and battlefield agility. He concluded, “Those are the key important tactical lessons for us that have quite profound implications in terms of training, focus and priorities for equipment.”
Talking of “air superiority” does this also include current and future missile loads of our Typhoon, F35B and other aircraft? Anything additional to the current loads would itself be a literal force multiplier.
The one thing that is blatantly obvious is that in a modern war such as Ukraine, quantity is the key element. You need more of everything. And secondly, stockpiles of ordnance for artillery. Artillery is the god of war and Ukraine is expending a prodigious amount of shells on a daily basis.
Yes, totally. More, enhanced capabilities and secure supply chains. Needed yesterday.
Very true .
Totally agree. Someone in this forum made a profound statement a little while ago. The wars of today are won or lost, depending on decisions made ten years ago. Budgeting shortfalls, inadequate R&D investment and irresponsible procurement decisions. Leading to failure to retain strategic military industrial capacity. Reducing manpower numbers and quantities of key equipment, with the inevitable impact on fighting capability and logistic support. The Russia v Ukraine conflict has highlighted all of these deficiencies within NATO and more importantly, within HM Armed Forces. Something drastic is needed to reverse the downward trend. It’s going to take ten years… Read more »
Hang in there George. I think there’s a further UK defence “refresh” review coming out at the end of June isn’t there? So we’ll see how serious the commitment to defence is going forward.
Ps: Ashes 🏏 coming soon. Hope you are all getting ready as the Aussies are a very competitive bunch. Lol… 😆 🏴 🇦🇺
Yes, if the Aussies ever learn to play cricket, we could be in trouble.
Lol…love the banter. Despite many years down here in Aus I still back the 🏴 team. May the better team win!! 🏏🇬🇧🇦🇺
Cheers Quintin. Truth be known I’m a football and rugby union man. I don’t consider something performed in shirtsleeves and a comfortable pair of trousers a real sport. That goes for golf too – a good walk spoiled. Each to their own. BTW no country has ever had more loyal allies. The bond between Britain, Australia and New Zealand is the true special relationship. Even when measured by the standards set within the rest of the anglosphere. AU CA GB NZ USA. When the anglosphere stand together, we are unbeatable. Even if CA and NZ have temporarily lost their way… Read more »
Both good teams sports. I’ve lost track of the Lions, Wallabies and All Blacks. Watch bits and pieces. Have to laugh, back in my UK Highschool days no one ever explained the rules of Rugby to me you just went out onto the field to knock the opposition over. Growing up in Aus we have Aussie Rules Football and Rugby League, both very popular. Everyone’s pretty fit looking. We get quite a bit of football coverage here too but nothing like UK and Europe. Yes, Australia, New Zealand, UK, as the Kiwis may say we’re all “bro’s” and we’ll back… Read more »
Support for Ukraine is where we must diverge. I feel GB and the rest of NATO, should have tried to work towards a peaceful settlement prior to the 2014 coup. Rather than pouring fuel on a very real emerging flashpoint. Particularly considering the extremist ideologies of some Ukrainians at the time. BTW I’m fully aware of Putin’s actions that likely gave rise to great animosity in the Western nations. Assassinations etc etc. As I see it, both nations are as bad and as corrupt as each other, with little to separate them. They were two of the original four republics… Read more »
Hi George, I think most reasonable people would agree with you. Political baddies and corruption on both sides, probably the latter with some Western involvement. But I think the West needs to make a stand with Ukraine and the surrounds. We’ve all seen the behaviour of Russian forces in Ukraine and the indifference of the Russian leadership to the West, International norms, and even to their own people and soldiers. Maybe it’s a choice of a trust in a greater good versus regimes of a greater evil. Russia mayn’t have stopped with Ukraine, land grabbing further, completely blocking them out… Read more »
I think we are both on the same page Quentin and I wish you well my friend. Somethings are worth fighting for and our British democratic way of life is one of them.
Hi QD63. Owed to my Dad’s generation, I include South Africa within the dominion allies, prior to the political changes of 1949 and resulting Apartheid.
On a lighter note, at least they still have a half decent rugby side and a world cup to defend this year!.
You have lost me Andy. Who are “they” and what do they do every 16 years?
It’ll be on another TV screen somewhere…
Whilst your point is well made it is based upon the time it takes to build say capital ships. When it comes to drones etc. the effort will be in the upfront R&D whilst the individual assets might be put together in days or weeks. Their power will lie in the quantity which can be mass produced.
Not really Mark. It is true that building ships, designing/building aircraft and main battle tanks takes time. But not as much as developing the absolutely vital infrastructure and skilled workforce to do it. Never mind securing subcontractors and raw materials from wherever. Then there is the not so small matter of training the soldiers sailors and aircrew to operate/maintain the new equipment. Be they drones, bombs, bullets or bayonets. Just look at Ukraine and the hand-me-downs they are receiving. What use are western supplied weapons without experienced personnel to man them? It is possible to train recruits and junior officer… Read more »
Very true George. This country set up the Defence Requirements sub-Committee (DRC) in November 1933, 10 months after Hitler came to power. Their first report was submitted to Government in February 1934. It recommended a series of programmes, which by 1939 would make improvements to the worst problems in the services. The RAF’s deficiency programmes were accelerated and expanded, ahead of programmes for the navy and army. The Hurricane was ordered in late 1934 and we had 18 squadrons by the outbreak of war in Sep 1939. The Hurri accounted for 60% of the kills in the Battle of Britain… Read more »
Very true. The regular army has been cut once or twice a decade since the end of the Korean war in 1953!
Lol. 😆
Absolutely. Still waiting for Mr Wallace and MoD to show signs of life.
That is very true Andy. Bloody civilian politicians and the civil service, forget that defence is their primary duty.
So which is better 100 rounds to kill an AFV hidden in a tree line…or…one smart round to kill one AFV in a tree line.
Smarter rounds have a smaller logistic foot print and you dont burn out barrels as quickly.
Arty yes for soft targets in the open but you need to fight smarter. Overwatch using Brimstone 3 for instance will be a great help.
Personally I believe that the lack of a decent ALARM type missile for the RAF is a handicap that needs addressing.
Ukraine is expending prodigious amounts of smart munitions too. Javelin, HIMARS, JDAM, NLAW are all apparently in short supply now.
The RAF used to have an anti-radiation missile called SHRIKE which was fitted to Vulcan bombers during the Falklands war in an attempt to takeout Argentine radars around Port Stanley. Not sure but they might still have a few somewhere
Ukraine is still fight with 1 arm tied behind its back. If Ukraine could strike deeper and into Russia territory it would reduce the amount of smart munitions needed at the front.
Exactly
Yep it cannot interdict behind the lines..which shows:
A)how utterly incompetent the Russia are at logistics and strategic lift.
B) how well Ukraine is managing its own logistics, even though Russia can target the whole logistic chain ( or this just May shoe how incompetent Russia is at interdicting the logistic chain).
Even without the issue of entering Russian State Territory, i.e. just focussing on the long accepted need for manned top cover / ground attack to support significant advance into opposed territory.
On that alone, it is indeed notable that even the US was not prepared to engage weaker nations of late without massive neutralisation from the Air Force beforhand.
Add in the civilian pummeling Ukraine has endured over so long a time, and our remotely imposed rules of engagement – with everything supplied just a bit late of ideal it would seem – start to appear disgraceful.
SHRIKE was no use at all.
All you had to do was to turn off transmit and the missile hadn’t got a clue.
The Argentinians knew that!
As I said above to @ GB once you know the coordinates any other smart munition will do the job.
SB wrote:
“”SHRIKE was no use at all.””
I know what you mean, but for me, a Shrike was the little box of tricks which we used to detonate things. Think a modern version of Wile E coyote and that exploder box with the large handle, but condensed down to a small hand held unit able to detonate 4 lines.
https://i.postimg.cc/s2kXWCJW/Opera-Snapshot-2023-05-24-191908-www-theeodshop-com.png
I meant the useless missile not the exploder.
Like most missiles of that vintage they were very unsmart and pretty easy to outsmart.
Alarm replaced Shrike, which was from the 1970/80s?
Mid to late 1980s. I saw them being built in a tour of BAe at Hatfield in the late 80s.
The Prophet Tom Clancy in his book Red Storm Rising predicted there would prodigious expending of smart munitions in a land conflict in Europe.
By one side?
The other side has dumb users.
Indeed he did and thanks for pointing it out!
Heres a nice Mach Loop clip from 5 days ago, finished nicely with twenty six passes on a Friday morning. Ten individual F35s, two F15s, one A400M and probably one of the last RAF Hercules C130’s we shall see again
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=itwdxUm9Pxc
He certainly did and it was very well researched. Resulting in one hell of a good read. Required reading for every NATO/BAOR soldier of the period. Well thumbed copies were circulated until they literally fell to pieces. My paperback was full of notes made in the margins. From the 1960’s NATO has relied on superior technology to compensate for inferior numbers, when compared to the communist forces. If the Cold War had turned hot, NATO needed a kill ratio of 10-20/1 for MBTs/AFVs to fully neutralise the numerical advantage of the Warsaw Pact. Our superior MBT designs aside, antitank missiles… Read more »
Agree with all of that. An alarm version of storm shadow or Brimstone would be a great asset. Russia expending 200x 155mm shells to hit one trench or armoured fighting vehicles is a prodigious waste. Smart munitions available in stockpile with the military- industrial base to replenished used munitions quickly is key. I think annoyingly for China the West has woken up, is in parts reinvesting in defence and bringing key technologies back in house eg semi conductors and advanced chip manufacturing. Diversifying the supply chain and removing industrial capacity from China. I’d like to see the UK adopt more… Read more »
Talking about air power, here is a nice clip of two B1B Lancers checking in at RAF Fairford Monday
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z9okmcR1ONY
Wonderful machines!
👍…thanks for posting…makes you think what TSR2 would have become
Great video 🇬🇧 if only 🤗
Do they have 155mm, I thought most of their big guns were 120 or 152mm. With rocket artillery being particularly prevalent.
Even keeping mr Wallace in post won’t fix everything without more funds or cutting some costly projects to free up cash.
The budget is basically all spent for next few years and then some.
Depends on the aim. Artillery is historically used more for fixing positions then actually hitting stuff. Fixing enemy positions requires volume.
In modern battle field you need both, accurate missiles for taking out targets and volume for fixing operations.
Even more to the point 1 smart munition taking out logistic hub and ammo dumps is a massive force multiplier. The key to effective smart munitions is of course intel. Bad intel = more smart munitions used.
I agree with that thought process.
Precision is the key enabler.
Apart from anything else with precision you control another key dimension: timing.
Re ALARM that isn’t necessarily that important as you can get the GPS coordinated by ISTAR / drone / etc and then fire a simple missile or smart bomb into that location?
Praetorian on Typhoon will Geo locate a radar all by itself. F35 is presumably even better.
That’s why we ditched beam riding missiles for SPEAR 3 for the DEAD mission.
Sure it can.
But you can use a cheap drone truck for the missile and tell it where to go….
I understand that ALARM was retired in 2013 and not replaced. It is incredible that such capability gaps can go on, year after year.
Both. Smart round on the front and the 100 dumb rounds stored just in case
They were wasting even more shells, Russian style, until they learned NATO tactics of hitting a worthwhile target….which, OK, was helped by training and better sights being provided. As well as spotting feedback.
We have this amazing first day tech but after that’s expended the side that wins is the one which can sustain the highest hit rate at the lowest whole life cost.
Kind of implies to me we need a half way house between 1000 x £1m top class munitions and 1m x £1 dumb variety.
Thinking along the lines of the 80:20 rule. If we could have 80% of the effects for 20% of the cost would it not be better to sacrifice half our first day munitions for a week of day two munitions?
Hence why the CAMM (and other similar) project is so important as it is producing very cost effective munitions.
With that approach rolled sideways it is likely that other missile types can be made more cost effective.
There is a sensor family
Software code and framework
Motors
Relatively the warhead is the easy but
A new internal missile rack has been developed for the F35 increasing the AMRAAM or Meteor load from 4 to 6. The same internal load as the F22. Plus external ASRAAM.
Thanks for that. That’s quite a squeeze in the bomb bay.
Let’s hope that any retrofitting of this new rack doesn’t take forever!
I wonder if they’ll develop a twin external rack for the Asraam’s for the F35s?
Sidekick only fits in the larger weapons bays of the F35A and F35C. It’s also unclear whether it’ll needs the Block 4 upgrade.
Also I doubt very much it would be integrated with meteor, so at some point it would become redundant anyway.
Don’t think B can have that though.
The Tempest looks a big fatter around the gills so we can hope for maybe up to an 8 Meteor +2-4 Asraam.
I think the competition with the US is going to be fierce. They can’t too happy with the Tempest alliance and it’s progress. I am surprised no US has apllied to join in unless they’re shut out?
US defence contractors are specifically shut out due to ITAR, Japan and uk have both been ****ed up by ITAR before and both want total independence. I don’t think tempest registers much with them and they have 2 NGAD programs on the go.
Those declinist members on this site who believe the U.K. exists in some sort of global vacuum should read this article on French military spending plans for the next 10 years:
https://www.politico.eu/article/ukraine-emmanuel-macron-military-defense-tank-jet-delay/
Maybe we aren’t doing so badly in the “real” world.
People think everything we do is bad just because the number don’t match what we had in the 90s.
People think everything we do is bad because there is a contemporary attitude in Britain to undermine and criticising everything we do.
Certainly we don’t get everything right, no country does, it’s just that we hear about the U.K.’s failures more. It’s the nature of news reporting: domestic news stories dominate, bad news makes better headlines than good news.
Our papers can even turn good news into an negative headline 🙂
I would say that we tend to get it wrong more often with a high defence spend compared to other lower spending countries whio seem to be getting more bangs for their bucks, while we’re always cutting back? Hence we have a tendency to stick out a bit……with a broken procurement process that ultimately means we pay more for less….
Only because we hear about U.K. stuff more. If you read English editions of foreign-press they report just as many blunders in procurement: well obviously those countries with a free press. • Spain’s S-80 submarines. The first build was found to be so overweight it would be incapable of surfacing. So they lengthened it, it taking 5 years before they realised this made it too long for the port where it was being built. • Germany’s F125 Baden Wurttemberg-class frigates, the first of which had a permanent list to starboard and which the German Navy refused to accept delivery of.… Read more »
Also the CDG was delayed years before entering service due to radiation levels exceeding permissible levels. Despite years of attempted corrective therapy they only got it into service in the end by increasing the minimum acceptable levels allowed.
• France’s Charles de Gualle aircraft carrier. It had such vibration issues its propellers snapped off! Whereas US carriers are refuelled once, CDG has to be refuelled every 7 years.
I am not totally sure that is true re the Nimitz. They do get refuelled periodically and that takes and age.
https://www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1632.html
RAND seem to reckon it took 5 years to plan and 3 years to execute. They are a decent source?
Certainly CDG had to use Clemenceau‘s propellers for a while.
RAND is extremely authoritative, and they describe the refuelling of the Nimitz as “midlife”. Checking others sources they all say one refuelling and complex overhaul of their Westinghouse reactors during their 50 year service-life.
Yes CDG had to use Fochs and Clemenceau’s propellers for a while as the blueprints of her original propellers had been lost. New ones fitted during first refuelling.
“ the blueprints of her original propellers had been lost”
They were destroyed in a fire that mysteriously ripped through a factory under investigation for fraud.
Wiki has this – although that is a sanitised version.
“Although the supplier, Atlantic Industrie, was not believed to have intentionally been at fault, it was nevertheless blamed for poor-quality construction.[21] Not long after the French defense minister ordered an investigation on quality management, a fire destroyed the archives”
So which country, in which fantasy world, with a lower defence spending gets it so right, would you care to give an example, so that I can do some quick research and disabuse you of this nonsense.
Quite.
Apart from the obvious stuff ups things go pretty smoothly IRL.
I’d say in the round, compared to other countries, we are pretty good on procurement. Defence projects are massively complex, and we are always trying to predict what we need in the future, which is never easy. Other countries have to rely on national service for numbers. We are still manned with full-time volunteers, and our pay and conditions compare very well to our allies. We have over 80 large-scale defence projects on the go.And most will be delivered on time and within budget. Just you won’t hear about most of them because bad news sells or gets more comments,… Read more »
If you read the news papers from 1908 when Britain was the undisputed world hegemony with a fleet twice the size of the anyone else you will read much the same, our equipment is ****, the Germans are outbuilding us and everything they have is better than us, we are a second rate power spending all our money on social programs. Jackie fisher pioneered this approach. 100 years on same numpties consistently spout the same s**t in every major western country.
Oh I think it’s far worse now, the constant knocking of the U.K. as being “a small island”, “having no manufacturing”, “irrelevant on the world stage”, etc.
There will be people in the U.K. that were actually disappointed to learn that not only is the country going to avoid the forecast long and deep recession, but it’s going to avoid recession completely.
Yes agree especially post Brexit, every opportunity is used to bash the UK and it’s primarily done by British nationals, largely the childless variety that occupy central London and work in the news media. EU and supranational institutions have also jumped on the same bandwagon.
To be fair I would like to see a lot more manufacturing in this county…but that’s mainly because I hate the fact we buy loads of stuff from china..and I’m a bit of a mercantilist at heart.
We do a lot of high-value rather than volume manufacturing compared to a lot of countries.
I’ve been banging on about the lack of resilience in the supply chain due to ‘just in time’ practices, will hopefully persuade more manufacturers to onshore in the U.K.
If not, hopefully sufficient green levies against the carbon produced from shipping products halfway around the world may work.
yes, indeed it’s also true that not everyone is suitable for the high skill labour market and a happy society makes sure it has decent jobs at all skill and ability levels….the supply chain is key I agree..I try not to buy Chinese products if I can…got my self a lovely British made cooker only to find out it was delayed due to waiting for key parts….from…us guessed it china. As you way the mass shipping of cheap pointless rubbish across the world oceans is an issue…
As we have discussed before there needs to be a carbon tax to level the playing field. There is zero point in us destroying out economy with expensive clean energy if the Chinese and Indians burn coal like it is going out of style. And as @Sean say the shipping footprint. If that is taken into account a lot of the cost advantages of offshore to disappear. If UK does want manufacturing back there have to be qualifications that are regularly failed by candidates: hard and aspirational to do. But there also need to be massive tax breaks for new… Read more »
Yes agree, personally I think we should be tax breaking the hell out of the industries we want and need in the UK…as well as giving grants to support set up…but at the same time hit everything with a carbon tax that takes into account the type of energy used to produce it as well as the travel footprint…that will kill Chinese imports and is needed from both an environment and economic point of view. We can get industrial development in this country if we do it the correct way …as an example it looks to Tata steel will be… Read more »
Trouble with a carbon tax is WTA rules.
China says no: as it doesn’t suit them.
Interestingly the WTO has pretty much stepped away from the Carbon tax issue..as there was some case law about this and it was clear that environmental tax’s should not be interpreted as trade barrier and protectionist tax’s…effectively the WTO have said you need to do this and as long as the carbon tax is covering both domestic and imported products it’s ok…and that carbon from dirty energy and transport can and should be included.
paper is: trade and climate change a report by the world trade organisation and the United Nations environmental program.
You are more up to date that I am then!
That is a very good move – the next big blocker is the good ol USA. Who will just do what suits them and say ‘we gave a constitution’ which is their argument for everything.
All is not totally lost – we are still the 8th or 9th largest manufacturing country in the world – and several of those have larger economies and/or populations than we have.
Indeed, I think we just need the government focus more resources on bringing in some key new manufacturing..renewable energy, semi conductors etc..securing strategic heavy industries (steel, ship building, trains etc) as well as keeping the car, aviation others..Finally I think there needs to be a bit of industrial strategy aimed at social cohesion..not everyone can work in high tec high end industries..but there needs to be more that Mc job service industry work available..so we do need to bring back that lower level manufacturing..rag trade, Clark’s shoes, furniture and light manufacturing ( local companies making things in supply chains and… Read more »
I agree. There used to be a ‘Buy British’ campaign – not sure if the Government was behind it – could bring that back.
Some strategic things like telecomms, port and airport operation, power stations etc really must be in the hands of British companies.
[We also need to be able to feed ourselves – c.80% of our food is imported – I am shocked as I thought it was 50%, which is bad enough – https://www.businessinsider.com/no-deal-brexit-percentage-british-food-imported-shortages-2019-1?op=1&r=US&IR=T
].
“We want eight and we won’t wait”. Surprised to read Dreadnought was built in a year and fact is we massively out built the Germans prior to WW1, despite all those disparaging cries, indeed as with the US in more recent times talking down you own capabilities and upgrading your ‘enemy’ was the best way to get what you want. As Churchill put it, ‘the Admiralty wanted 6, the economists offered 4 and we compromised on 8’. Those were the days eh
True Dreadnaught was assembled in a year, the reason it was so fast was because they already had all the parts sitting at the quay to be used for a majestic class ship. Even back then it was a minimum 4 year period between ordering and entering service for a battleship.
Just read about the George Washington Carrier finally getting out of refit 6 years after entering instead of the planned 4 and while it was docked due to poor crew support and management lost some 9 crew members due to suicide between 2017 and 2022. .
I think a lot of that time is nuclear refuelling, is it not?
There is nothing wrong with a bit of critical thinking, but your right the “we are just a small country dialogue” can be a bit overwhelming..especially considering we are still one of 10 recognised world powers, are the preeminent European military power and six largest economy in the world…but I still end up arguing with people who say we are just a middle sized European power.
Actually we are a massive European military power, probably the biggest in Europe now in all regards that the Russians have collapsed.
We are a mid sized global power for sure however so is every country on planet earth with the exclusion of the USA and soon China.
Out of 210 countries in the world we are basically number three in Geo political terms.
Not bad for a small island.
Hi Jim, interestingly there are actually very few nations that can be classed as powers, only 10 infact..most nations have almost no global impact and even little ability to impact regionally…
Agreed mate. This site certainly knows what stories will get the most comments.
As evidenced by the disproportionate number of stories featuring the SNP and Scottish independence… 😏
Yep. Or Brexit, or Anti Ship Missiles, or the Carriers, Hercules ect ect 😄
Well mate if you take alook at Ukraine numbers are needed ,you’ve got to account for battle loss .And trained personnel this is why number matter.That’s my view.🇬🇧
Without conscription how do you get the numbers when, according to current recruiting problems, fewer young people see the military as a peer group positive career so don’t sign on? That’s if they are even fit enough to do so.
Agree the military do have recruiting problem ,but was looking at it from a battle point of view with platforms and force levels 🍺
Hope you’re not suggesting Wagner style press-ganging of prisoners to fill the gaps. Here we don’t believe in using troops as cannon-fodder, not even those with criminal records.
When I joined you could not sign up if you had a criminal record (or visible tattoos). Shows what an old-timer I must be.
Whereas in Russian you need a criminal record it seems 😏
(I don’t understand body graffiti either 🤷🏻♂️)
We have been carrying on this program in the UK called mechanisation since Cambrae in 1917. Using what we call combined arms warfare we can put together different vehicles and weapon systems to achieve a significantly larger effect from less people.
This obviously differs from the mass human wave attacks the Russians and Wagner seem to favour which does require conscription and emptying out the jails to work.
Well Mr ‘Wagner’ himself reckons that Russian needs to become North Korea for some years to win this war or even survive it seems. Martial Law universal call up, no road building so everyone can be forced to make ammunition and closed borders. Wow that sounds like a Country worth fighting for doesn’t it folks.
You’d really have to ask the Russian MOD that.
Well conscription general provides you with a few hundred thousand potato peelers..when what you actually need to fight a war is trained professionals. Conscription can work in a purely defensive situation to provide garrisons and a large body of semi trained individuals to support civil defence …not expeditionary armed forces.
It’s not just recruiting that is the problem, it is also retention. To make people join up and stay in, you need to incentivise the demand for the places within the services. But how? Being now an ex-serviceman, I could get on top of my soapbox and start ranting. But it will do no good, as it needs political change and the will to enact it. It would need a multi-pronged attack from Government, Industry and from within. Where, military personnel are trained to be enablers for UK growth. So that their experience and training plus a can do attitude… Read more »
Fairly easily, if the will is there.
Increase visits to schools and colleges to create more interest.
Promote the armed forces as a place where valuable trades and technical skills can be learned without having to put yourself in £50,000 of debt
Increase pay rates across the armed forces – I’d recommend 10%; this would take a Private’s pay after completing training from £21k to £23k.
We have only needed conscription to deal with a World War – and to oversee 15 years of de-colonisation.
Yes, but NATO would fight in a very different way.
That’s right it would be different type of fight in some ways .👹
It’s amusing seeing references in the article to replacing kit given to Ukraine, they’ve hardly been generous.
The French are not bolstering their land forces due to their reliance on nuclear deterrent. Well that should go doubly for us as we have both the deterrent and 10 miles of sea. We need to concentrate spending on air, sea and cyber assets. We have no need of significant armoured land forces for defence. Dare i say that we have little to learn fron Ukraine as it is the type of conflict we are never going to fight.
If our defence was purely concerned with protecting the British Isles, I’d possibly agree, but that’s not the reality we exist in. Our economy, and the economies of all our allies and trading partners, are tied together; if we lack the ability to defend them, it ultimately matters very little how secure we are at home.
Its worse than that. As an island we make money buying things and selling them on in trade. Which makes us a really trade intensive nation dependent on external stability unlike many other nations. Global stability = UK prosperity.
But and this is important an army focused on stability operations around the globe is not the same as an army planning to fight a heavy combined arms army in the European theatre..the French army is focused more on lighter deployability and just enough, than the British army that at its core is still very focused on deploying an armoured division at the heavy end..but then also able to provide lots of stability forces to deploy around the world….the French very much picked a doctrine and doubled down..on light fast deployable with little strategic depth or heavy battle groups…but the… Read more »
I get your point and that wasn’t an isolationist comment by me. Im very much advocating that we contribute to the defence of Nato/trade interests. But lets not spend money on Armoured land forces that quite frankly are unlikely to ever engage with enemy no.1 – China. Sea, Air, Cyber and Soft Power is what we now need to bring to that party.
We have used our armoured land forces a heck of a lot of times in warfighting (as well as deterrence), or have you forgotten? How many times have we used our navy (great though it is) in warfighting?
Hi Graham no I haven’t forgotten that. However in those times we had quantity. Now the pot is only so big and it doesn’t look like its getting bigger anytime soon so in the real world we have to ask ourselves the question what do we need least? Its a hard decision but due to our geographic situation i would like to increase F35 and SSN numbers.
It would be interesting to see if the service requirement is still for 138 F-35s as that was set more than a decade ago? Agree fully on increasing the SSN fleet and I don’t think we should turn our nose up at cheaper SSKs too to augment the fleet. We had 28 attack subs in 1982! The army isn’t lobbying to be enormous, just not tiny. Many US Generals considered that an 82,000 strong British army was too small to be considered significant, let alone a 73,000 strong army. The army has been cut once or twice a decade since… Read more »
Well said and this is what totally astounds me in the thinking of the right and Republicans in the US. As large as they are they are deluded thinking they can stick two fingers up at the World and do their own think. China gets it and is manipulating it to its advantage as a long term plan and all of us in the West must seriously realise how intertwined we all are in surviving let alone thriving.
Yes but the French are is pretty much focused on expeditionary warfare as France has more old colonial engagements than the UK…they just don’t do the very heavy battle group end of things that the British army do…the French refer to it as an army in the middle segment..with a just enough approach.
Really, the French have 222 Leclerc tanks, MLRS and around 4,000 APCs/variants.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_equipment_of_the_French_Army
Hi graham, yes but the Leclerc is in the 55+ton range and 10-20 tons lighter than other ( 20-40% percent) western MBTs their main self propelled fires is a 17ton system vs our 40ton system and their main APC is a wheeled 13 ton vehicle and even the infantry fighting vehicle is wheeled vehicle…they are not looking at a 40t tracked monster like Ajax for armoured recon they have a lighter 25 ton wheeled option. It’s all air mobile easier to maintain and can do distance on road without specialist transport ( apart from the clerics). What France has is… Read more »
Hi Jonathan, Leclerc is a well-armoured MBT no matter that it is somewhat lighter than its contemporaries and a 25 ton recce vehicle is still 3 times the weight of a Scimitar. I would not use the word airmobile to describe that kit. We Brits are not totally centred on heavy metal and have a comprehensive array of medium weight kit as well. You have a fair point that the French have a bias to operating in its former colonies especially in Africa and in being ready to deploy large numbers of troops domestically in anti-terrorist/COIN roles. BUt they are… Read more »
I agree the rand report seemed a bit odd on the British army taking 90 days, seemed a bit long than I had through.
In 1982 British Army/RM Commandos took less than 3 days to get ready and set sail to the Falklands. They arrived in San Carlos after 46 days (and that was a 8,000+ mile sea passage away with no troops or equipment deploying by air!).
Rand figures are seriously wrong.
That’s what we said prior to 1700 when the Duke of Marlborough and his miraculous Continental victories changed the course of history so that Britain rather than France dominated most future events. You just never know what the future holds. That said your priorities are certainly accurate considering our limitations in fulfilling all we would like to.
Yes and right now its all about priorities isn’t it? Ref the Duke of M….the world just doesn’t work like that anymore, point not taken 😀.
Clearly history is not your forte!
Please elaborate on that comment. Russia have fought this battle with an eye to history and look where it got them! The world has changed, budgets are stretched and its time for some critical thinking not just do as we’ve always done.
The French army was never designed to fight a peer war and win…they have built it for mainly light deployment in Auster parts of the world ( Africa ) with a credible ability to fight a heavy peer..forcing a complete engagement…not allowing a salaam slicing type smaller engagement…
Probably a good example for us then. Look i’d love a competent armoured force..im ex army served with armd inf/recce/arty my whole career. But we bring neither quantity nor quality there anymore. I think Boxer in tandem with Chally is a joke dressed up as an innovation and im going to stick my neck out and say the money spent on the CH3 upgrade would be better spent elsewhere. We can’t have everything.
Are you on about the cluster that was the Chinook HC3 buy? That then were being kept in storage, then let out to do air shows and were finally upgraded to HC5s. The HC5s are now at the same standard as the HC6s. They did really well in Mali, as their larger fuel tanks meant they didn’t have carry the additional internally one that takes up a lot of space. Which was great when covering the huge distances over the desert. Totally agree that mixing Chally with Boxer sounds like a recipe for disaster. Mixing wheels and tracks didn’t work… Read more »
There is plenty to learn from ukraine in the sea, air and ew domain even if you discount the land force battle…
Ok well i expressed an opinion and you’ve presented yours as fact. If you have any juicy tidbits of info please let me know 😀.
BigH
Yes, you expressed an opinion. Dave G expressed a fact that is known world wide. Every military everywhere is studying the Ukraine conflict, in all domains. This is not news (or newsworthy). Any military not studying it (nothing new – same with the Falklands) is likely not worth worrying about. Ukraine is prepared to think outside the square & certifying on the battlefield does not phase them.
If this worries you, I would suggest reaching out to the likes of http://www.veteransgateway.org.uk or similar. Sorry if I am out of line here, but the alternative does not always end well.
Hey mate things just turned a bit dark there. Ive put my view down in an open comments section and you are giving me a link to a veterans mental health charity? Yes thats out of line, please rethink your boundaries.
I did apologise at the start in case that it was & I do so again. An experience a few years ago that I ignored & it almost ended badly has perhaps coloured my perception more than I thought.
https://youtu.be/LPvpqAaJjVU
Much the same issues in the USA,
Apparently the only countries which don’t have defence pricument issues are China and North Korea 😀
Yes you do actually need to compare yourself with your potential opponents…if you’re better off than your opponents it’s OK we no longer exist in PAX Britannica needing to overwhelm any 2 other powers with our navy.
Intel, whether it is space based or air based. All those NATO AWACS & eavesdropper aircraft.
Air superiority is not just fighter jets. It is long & short range SAM + modern gun GBAD systems.
Given the other side has those too, better have large stocks of stand off weapons. Plus more drones of all sizes.
And the will and then commitment to fill all the current gaps. There’s always seems a lot of talk.
It’s clear that the Stockpile and Logistics topics are very much related to tactics, specifically ruzzian saturation artillery using dumb shells. Forward observation and precision fire being a different tactic with quite modest munition needs so reduced Logistics and Stockpile required. Destruction of enemy supplies to deny resources to the front line seems much more effective too.
UK supply of Storm Shadow puts the whole Crimea in range of precision fire so that both operational assets and command & control are at risk. Airfields with no orders and institutional lack of autonomy will not do anything..
I disagree.
For me it is important to have air denial but most offensive operations should be land based in missiles and guided rockets.
The costs(not only value but also time) of integration, training would instead buy a giant missile artillery capability that can tip the battlefield.
This capability can be constantly upgraded without a giant structural and entropy cost from super expensive aircraft.
But air always wins mate. Has done since WW2.
Things change, see the F-35 disaster and how much investment it needed to be done to survive in the air and the difficulties to have any new weapon certified. Everything take ages. Aircraft is much more complex and expensive than in the past with billions of lines of code. Now with fast pace technology you can get and F-35 obsolete and a new rocket missile land based in operation in much shorter time and if you loose one launcher it has much less impact. Building a missile launcher and a variety of missiles is much simpler than building a F-35,… Read more »
Didn’t some WW2 Artillery man decide that missles were the answer in the 60’s – Hence the cancellation of TSR2 and god knows what other aircraft in the pipeline (supersonic Harrier I think?).
Having an artillery man decide on weapons strategy was a recipe for disaster then – and most probably would be now.
History is not static it evolves we need to analyse what is the present and try to imagine the future. For a significant amount of time fire weapons shared the battlefield with legacy bladed weapons until bladed weapons disappeared into very specific niches. The problem i am seeing is that an aircraft are a too complex weapons to be make operational. We are talking about decades for the F-35 to be combat ready and when is ready in that time missiles and other tools can evolve several fold because they are less complex. The risk of obsolescence of complex aircraft… Read more »
1957 defence white paper. The man was Duncan Sandys. It was not a good day for the UK aircraft industry. If he was a Soviet sleeper it wouldn’t be surprising😂.
They are critical if coordinated multi point hits are required.
With loitering munitions you really can set up Zero Hour to take out command and control as well as fuel and munitions dumps all at the same time.
When i talk about missiles i include loitering ammunitions.
I think it’s a bit of a stretch to say that trench warfare exists because neither side has gained air superiority. It shows how stove-piped our military education can be. I still remember the brief by a representative of ARRC who briefed on my JOTAC course (promotion to captain) who stood up after the RAF guy had done a piece on Air Campaigns – his first point was ‘there is no such thing as an air campaign or a ground campaign – only a campaign’ And his next hour was on combined effects. My take is that this is the… Read more »
It has to do with armies size vs combat area size.
The Ukranian and Russia armies are large for the terrain they have to cover so unless you make a penetration there is no manoeuvre warfare. For that you need overmatch(quality,quantity) even if localized and then the tools to exploit it.
Instead if you are in wild west with sparse troops for both sides you can always manoeuvre and it is a war of movement.
I’m not sure I buy that – Take Gulf War 1 for example – the Allied Army was close to 800,000, the Iraqi Army was about 1m, yet that was a war of manoeuvre with a combat zone comparable to the Eastern front of Ukraine. It was a war of manoeuvre because (predominantly) the US and British doctrine, training, equipment and logistics enabled it to be so.
Different terrain. Compare WW2 North Africa where armies moved quickly over hundreds of miles with Western Europe after Normandy. The open desert in Iraq is a rather different war space to the rivers, forests, villages/towns/cities, hills, clouds and the glorious mud of eastern Ukraine.
You’re confusing speed of manoeuvre with the ability to manoeuvre and I think you’re confusing manoeuvre with movement.
Normandy was still a campaign of manoeuvre. Manoeuvre is the combination of effects to control the battle space to your advantage. So, we can manoeuvre in cyber space for example, but the combatants could be in their bedroom in their pants.
But my main point is still that I don’t think lack of air superiority is the reason for static warfare in Ukraine. It’s the inability of either side to manoeuvre yet….. And the winter will have constrained their ability.
I totally agree with you.
Your first sentence was right. Like SB I agree with you. It will be interesting to see how the next couple of months pan out in terms of both movement and speed.
JIMK wrote: “”Your first sentence was right. Like SB I agree with you. It will be interesting to see how the next couple of months pan out in terms of both movement and speed.”” That’s a very interesting train of thought and I feel that, that baton is now firmly in the hands of the Ukrainians . As we have seen this past year Moscow due to huge losses in its best men and equipment , a fear of Western supplied ATGMs. A lack of leadership between the ranks of L/Cpl to WO2, and of course the fear of… Read more »
I wonder if Ukraine have thought about a left hook? A bit like the WW1 Schlieffen plan. Where they go around the fixed defences in occupied Ukraine. That would be quite a surprise.
If they want to capture Donbas they can just go via Belgorod. Looks like the Orcs are down to so little they can’t even police their own boarder.
I dare say they could probably catch a train from Belgorod and do this.
The Russian army and security forces is just a meme.
🤞👍👍
Because Allied Forces had qualitative and battle intel edge they could penetrate the Iraq lines and exploit, if T-72 were a uber weapon and could fight equally the M1 things might have been different up to a point.. Sometimes it is even enough to just let a part of your line weakly defended like with France vs German in 1940, Ardennes The enemy breach the line and had tools to exploit it even if in specs the German tanks were not better than the French ones.
A key lesson from Ukraine is the use of drone warfare, logistics and the online information battle or controlling the false information. If the UK or NATO was fighting this war directly, it would probably look very different. Air superiority and precision munitions would have created very different affects for ground forces. The Russians are still fighting WW2 style with scatter gun artillery. The classic mistake is trying to structure your Armed forces to fight yesterday’s wars. Drones, and the cyber battle space is just as important as Typhoons and T26’s.
Exactly. It may sound elitist but what do we really have to learn from two Eastern European armies slogging it out and both sides using the same cold war kit which basically stalemates everything.
SEAD. Something the RAF has lacked for years now. It’s all well and good being able to knock down enemy aircraft, but you still aren’t going to have any effect on the front lines if you can’t eliminate the ground based air defences.
Aye but other Nato air forces have SEAD. Part of integration with other members. We cannot afford everything.
We used to be able to afford ALARM, in service for about 25 yrs.
A good point. We are getting a fair SEAD capability now, with the F35B able to penetrate hostile A2AD systems. Plus the plan to refit 40 tranche 3 Typhoons with the latest version of the Euro Common Radar system (ECRS), which.is designed to knock out S400 type radar and ground installations. It is a slow and costly business, £50m per aircraft for the Typhoons is about 60% of the original cost of the aircraft. If the Government sticks with its latest plan (Treasury axeman permitting), eventually 114 of our 181 fast jets will be SEAD-capable, which would be a powerful… Read more »
Bit off topic but see MoD has an RFI for Armed UAV.
https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/notice/927502d6-775f-442b-ba30-fc3dd6923613?origin=SearchResults&p=4
Wonder if it’s for the U.K., Ukraine, or both.
The RFI specifies a max weight including payload of 350g. That’s a hand grenade!
Plenty of videos of Ukrainian quadcopter drones dropping grenades into the open hatches of Russian tanks 😆
I initially thought the weight limit was a misprint. There are so many small commercial drones available that an RFI seemed unnecessary.
Yeah but those are easily compromised, they use commercial 2.4ghz and 5.8ghz channels and commercial GPS. Their production is also largely reliant on parts from China or entirely produced in China.
NATO can and should expect to control the airspace, the like of putin will push their antics as far as they can but will want to avoid triggering an air war with NATO they can’t win. below that threshold what happens to nuclear power stations that get bombed and our undersea infrastructure. russia after putin what will that look like.
No.1 lesson. Stop cutting numbers/gapping capabilities.
If only
Agreed but its only possible if the money and the political motivation is there and clearly it isn’t. The population of the UK has more important things on its spending list than preparing for a war that may never come.
Isn’t it already here – if the UK public can’t (or won’t) see that now they never will.
Take Love Island Ant & Dev or I’m a Celebrity off the air and watch the Social Media explosion-pathetic it really is.
No, thank God it isn’t. Don’t forget the Holly saga.
“preparing for a war that may never come.”
I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but that war is happening. A delusional dictator is attempting to annex and consume a neighbouring European country. What has helped to stop your Russian comrades is the political motivation and solidarity of the western governments. According to your propaganda it’s a Nato versus Russia conflict.
A war may be happening but it doesn’t involve probably at least 95% of our population who are proceeding with their normal life. To them the war is in some ways like the colonial and other wars that were fought over the past 100s of years with one group attempting to take control of another’s lands. Like us with Scotland and Ireland.
The big difference now is that modern politics, legal systems, communications and logistics have transformed what would have been a local dispute on the far side of Europe into a major problem.
JIMK wrote: “”To them the war is in some ways like the colonial and other wars that were fought over the past 100s of years with one group attempting to take control of another’s lands. Like us with Scotland and Ireland.”” You mean that “Them” who have been taught these past 30 years that Empire, Imperialism and colonialism was wrong, and that repartitions is the only way in which to right the past. If that is so why are so many of the flag bearers of such a self-righteous cause so condemning of the support afforded to the victim of… Read more »
“Like us with Scotland and Ireland.”
Goes to show how much you really know.
Nice try sockpuppet, but anyone here knows your real agenda here is to cravenly peddle Kremlin misinformation and lies.
Sock puppet 😂😂😂
Wow thats a very shallow and sweeping analysis…us taking over Scotland? LOL
JIMK wrote:
As reported earlier on this evening:
https://i.postimg.cc/s2PH8XPm/Opera-Snapshot-2023-05-24-215224-www-theguardian-com.png
20K dead Wagner fighers over a 9 month period (Aug 22 to May 23) on one very small front a few miles wide. That figure doesn’t include injured, or Russian miltary figures
This is not by any stretch a local dispute and I think you know that. This is the early positional moves of an existential battle for control of the future throughout most, probably all of this planet. Now the majority of the population may not see that but clearly those more enlightened and able to study the developments of the past 20+ years do see it thankfully. We have become far too complacent about our cosy life sadly but I think the fact what was supposed to be a quick take over of a weak neighbour (a repeat of 2914)… Read more »
Got this post late, but perusing your posts in general I see you don’t know your colonial or UK history! Surely and Englishman from MK at the age of 76 should be more historically aware! This post was a very sad and weak effort at trolling!
So more unbelievable comments, you could not possibly believe yourself!
So still No apology for ruZZia invasion?
Unbelievable? Is there anything in my two sentences that I got wrong?
Yes, you forgot to apologise for supporting Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
In particular, in the air, INTEL and air tanker activities, whilst on the ground airfield security, are patterns that are unlikely to be repeated. Currently RC-135W, Global Hawk and tankers roam free west of Ukraine and pretty much in the international air space south of Crimea. Whilst on the ground air ops continue unmolested as do satellites. Were this to be a full on war that would not be the case. To protect themselves from GBAD and AAM aircraft would have to operate several hundred miles further west/south. While air ops on the ground would have to operate under continual… Read more »
That’s funny. Those aircraft would have to move further back, or simply be defended by escorting assets. This is the concept of the air battlefield and is something the West/ NATO alliance is clearly better at then your Orc chums in the Russian air force that have literally zero clue as to how to prosecute a strategic air campaign. Russia went to war seemingly with one hand tied behind its back, it did not want to risk or loose large numbers of its best combat air power therefore held back and therefore failed to achieve air superiority, This came as… Read more »
Stealth aircraft and suppression of GBAD are 2 key attributes the Russian air force has failed to invest in.
Offensive air operations, so the need for stealth and SEAD (and Wild Weasel), doesn’t seem to have been a priority for the Russians over the past decades whereas it was for us. Apart from their strategic deterrent, it was GBAD, cruise missiles and rockets that they invested heavily in.
They invested heavily in GBAD yet a drone was still able to penetrate Moscow’s air-defences and fly over the Kremlin?!! 😂
Their cruise missiles if that is true have been a serious disappointment then. Not enough modern ones, which is why they are using anti aircraft missiles the bulk they do use are inaccurate and vulnerable to even So it era air defences and their glorious hypersonic missile has as many speculated beforehand turned out to be little more than an updated air launched ballistic missile with at best only marginal mid course correction or manoeuvrability. I have been quite surprised at the quality of their efforts which is probably why their hype has been in inverse proportion to the quality… Read more »
Its not funny at all. If those assets have to move back they lose much of their function. Escorting assets would experience the same risks, against very long range SAMs and AAM. Why would Russia risk its aircraft against the known capabilities of Ukrainian GBAD? Russia had never devepoped an antidote for them as it never expected to face such an adversery as NATO GBAD in Europe is very limited. It had in effect to ‘learn on the job’.
Can you develop an antidote to sophisticated electronics with a washing machine programmer board?
Asking for a friend….
Friend arriving by parachute in 3-2-1 🙂
Oh dear he seems to have drowned in the channel, damn those faulty Sinclair Spectrum chips.we purchased from that market in Marrakesh.
Hellooooo did someone call?
Astounding… NATO practice is always to use cruise missiles against enemy air-defences to make it then safer for aircraft to follow on.
Yet despite supposedly investing so much in cruise-missiles, Russia decides its better to target hospitals and schools instead of Ukrainian GBAD. Then wonders why it’s aircraft are downed by Ukrainian air-defences… 😂
Some experts have suggested they tried in the early days and totally, and to them unexpectedly it seems, failed abysmally, as the Ukrainians read the runes and took precautions. The Russians backed off tail between their legs with little ability to change matters.. It seems lacking the ability to accurately strike from distance and altitude they concentrated on low level and surprise but suffered extensibly from Ukraines excellent low level air defences against in part thanks to those Western weapons the Russians apparently didn’t expect to face despite their many years of suffering from them in previous campaigns, be it… Read more »
Well what ‘little’ NATO air defence has been given to Ukraine seems to have seriously upgraded the capabilities of the ‘known’ but somewhat dated Ukrainian air defence systems that seems to have been far too ‘deadly’ for the Russians to risk their airforce against. Fact is in whatever form you consider, the fact is the Russian airforce would have faced a tenfold greater threat from NATO than it is currently from Ukraine.
JIMK wrote: “”Russia had never devepoped an antidote for them as it never expected to face such an adversery as NATO GBAD in Europe is very limited. It had in effect to ‘learn on the job’.”” That’s a somewhat myopic way to excuse Moscow’s failure to develop anti AAA systems or even fail to train against such systems. Former eastern bloc countries such as: Albania, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia came to the party with the same weapon systems that can be found inside the Ukraine.. Such as Bulgaria, Slovakia and Croatia and the S300… Read more »
It is unbelievable, you believe your own comments!
So ruZZia has a magic wand, to make all the junk they lost, reappear!
So, instead of some trite remark, explain where what I wrote was wrong.
Geez it needs explaining? Surely common sense reading over what you at least, have claimed is Russian military doctrine and thinking shows either you are deluded or they are. Can anyone actually be that naive. My feeling is that they, as many of their mouth pieces express too, are so arrogant or drunk on koolaid that they are invulnerable to reality, Hitler in the bunker syndrome where they actually convince themselves black is white. Seriously to believe they could operate with the technology they possess against NATO while knowing they couldn’t against Ukraine is just beyond and logical and rational… Read more »
If it was a full on war Russia v NATO almost all of those Russian GBAD would be gone in the first few days along with what passes for an Airforce in Russia. RC135 flying above 10,000 feet could probably fly circles around Moscow in safety by the end of the first month.
Exactly what happened to Baghdad.
The scale and intensity of the air war just from the US alone would be frightening ( and they know it). I can imagine nearly every SAM site, airfield , aircraft and associated assets are monitored, tracked and are marked for systematic destruction constantly.
I’m not actually sure you can draw a conclusion that the lack of air dominance has been causal to the static nature of the conflict especially when the static elements has been during the Rasputitsa as well as having an elements of strategic exhaustion. It’s probably a mix. What it has shown is that many airforces find it difficult to operate in the face of even relatively simple integrated air defence systems. So SEAD and DEAD capabilities are probably the single most important enabler for air operations. also the impact on Small and micro drones as an organic form of… Read more »
You certainly can’t say this is necessarily a guide to any conflict between Russia and NATO, indeed that would be dangerous. Fact is this has developed into a trench style stalemate because you have a large mostly incompetent force that mis understood its own various limitations against a much smaller rival extremely motivated excellent in defence, but certainly up to now and likely for a while yet short of all the means of making substantial, sustained advances esp as so much of its pre existing equipment was developed and supplied by its opponent. That is totally different to a Russia/NATO… Read more »
Yes the problem is you can take small thinks in isolation and call them war winning..the reality is a lot more complicated.But what you always find are three factors and you need all in play.. 1) a will within that society to win…the belief that the fight is necessary and supported by the society is fundamental to winning…every lost war at its core had a society that did not really believe in the fight or did not understood why and what it was trying to win. 2) industrial capacity and strategic transport…this is linked with the tyranny of distance as… Read more »
Surely SEAD & DEAD needs pushing up the agenda? Something more than just SPEAR EW.
If air superiority is so important then why do we have the smallest airforce since it’s inception.
Mmm. Hardly that insightful. One thing I wonder if we may see in next month’s DCP is the procurement by the UK of an integrated multi-layer air defence/air denial system. Sized at the high-end to take out hypersonic and intermediate ballistic missiles, at the low-end to economically prevent mass attacks by drones. But it won’t leave any change out of several £billion, even if we buy off-the-shelf from the USA, Israel and/or France-Italy. Would the money be better spent on several wish list items such as another regiment of CR3’s, upgrading our Block 3 F-35’s to the Block 4 standard,… Read more »
CAMM EX with Poland will hopefully be ABM. The Terrahawk is being trialled for C-UAS, and there is still LMM of course. IFPC is something we should look at, or we could just buy Israeli. High value target protection.
The 2024 Ukrainian spring counter-offensive should prove to be very illuminating. By that time, 4th generation aircraft (F-16, plus additional platforms?) should be incorporated in the UKR combined arms assault, and presumably NATO will have provided all necessary logistical and training support. This should provide invaluable performance data of current NATO systems vs. Orc systems. Predict the undivided attention of entire HATO military-industrial complex at that point Unfortunately, the data flow will inevitably be in both directions. 🤔
…Er…NATO…🙄
Very sensible thoughts from Radakin;
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/admiral-british-army-nato-john-healey-chief-of-the-defence-staff-b2345125.html
We need a bigger army and more tanks said no RN admiral ever.
👍The reason why the British Army struggled in Basra and Helmand was that the force committed was too small for the tasks. There is no guarantee a future government won’t want to make a similar commitment in future with an even smaller army. The thrust of the IR was more interventions over a wider area. But a small army will really only be capable of home defence and a bit of raiding. If that’s the case, why retain a major expeditionary capability? Radakin seemingly doesn’t understand land warfare and is just anxious to preserve his precious but still minimally useful… Read more »
We can choose not to invade countries in the Middle East thousands of miles away from the UK. Like France and Germany did
It’s really easy to do.
If for whatever reason we find ourselves dragged in through an international coalition then we can choose not to be responsible for invading the second biggest city like Australia did.
Army deployment is always a choice for the uk.
Yes thats correct – and something I agree with for all deployments of our forcesp- are a sovereign nation and our interests should always dictate what when and how we deploy. However we must also augment that with our capability to do just that and if the size of our forces impacts on that decision then thats an issue. I’m not saying we need a 200k Amry btw to go on some sort of crusade for good (or not) around the workd I’m just saying numbers have a capability of ther own – and in general it seems on here… Read more »
Peter, Very true (but I am a bigger fan than you of the carriers). I served in Afghan. We needed an infantry division (-), not a brigade (+) for Helmand, a place the size of Wales. An American academic wrote a paper on the subject of how many troops you need for COIN based on the size of the local population – it was very interesting – and showed we were totally undermanned in Helmand. I was there for the US surge – goodness, we needed that extra manpower. Radakin does not understand land (and air) warfare, depite his two… Read more »
Are you serious? He says that we don’t need to field as many soldiers or tanks as before because we are in NATO and others will come up with the goods – talk about abrogating responsibility and being in thrall to beancounters and politicians who do not understand Defence. Does he say the same about the Navy? He also thinks that technology can somehow make up for a reduction of soldiers and classic warfighting equipment but of course doesn’t say what, how or when. Using Radakin’s logic, we should be able to field a future CASD force of 3 subs… Read more »
Well theoretically Russia has supposed to of had air superiority but has not resulted in any advantage… The one thing annoying the Ukrainians is the long-range missile strikes into towns and cities Having enough air power, jets, and helicopters to shoot down enemy aircraft, to hit trenches, armour, and buildings is great. If you can survive the AA, manpads You don’t see mass videos of jets hitting positions, it’s the odd mention! There are a few jets and Ka 52 helicopters that show up.. to get shot down plotted on the Sector \ FEBA maps But air cover is only… Read more »
There are lessons to be drawn in Ukraine and the following are some: NATO overrated the Russian conventional capabilities. Consequently, war in Ukraine tells us that NATO is light-years ahead of Russia in conventual capabilities; R&D in Russia stopped with the collapse of the Soviet Union, hence military decay; Corrupt societies are never successful at investing in warfare; Airforce/power is the kingmaker in modern warfare and Russia has metals only. Taken together, the failure of the Russian Army since operation Barbarossa presents policy challenges to NATO- in terms of whether to continue developing 5th and 6th Gen fighter jets when… Read more »
I think you are right, china is the oil in the mix. There is a question to ask yourself why are you developing the next generation of insanely expensive fighter, when the evidence is developing that you are possibly decades ahead. But are struggling to buy and keep in service the correct number of very good present generation systems. As an example the US f22 is a sublime aircraft…but they could only afford a few hundred…when they needed 1000s of air frames..so actually would they have been better off with more money focused on new 4.5 generation aircraft…it’s the same… Read more »
If tempest is delayed the raf can simply buy more F35. That’s a very different story to Typhoon replacement of Tornado means we are far more resilient on aircraft replacement than in the past.
But the thing is Jim, they actually could not buy more F35 as timing and funding wise it would not work…if you think, we get to 2035 and it turns out the new fighter is not out to 2045, you cannot then order F35s as they would not be delivered for a few years..say 2038-2040 and they would then be in service for a good 20 years…so you did order say 30 more F35s you would essentially destroy the 6 generation programme as you would have to have a commensurate cut in numbers…and you don’t want to order loads more… Read more »
Just as with F16 even now they’re are likely to be hot F35 production lines running decades from now. Post 2035 the US is scheduled to be done with its procurement. Very easy to tap more orders on that, sure you will need a few years notice but then we will know if Tempest is going to be late in to service with atleast a few years. You can always stretch out typhoon longer as well. Those airframes will have tonnes of life left.
It was much the same when we moved from Gloscter Gladiators to Spitfires as well.
JIM wrote:
“”It was much the same when we moved from Gloscter Gladiators to Spitfires as well.””
Are you saying we resign ourselves to :
Hope, Faith and Charity?
There were comment a while back on whether we had used up all the good names for drones?
If “strong alliances as a deterrent” are to work, it is only if those alliances are made up of strong militaries. We threw ours away over the last few decades & despite feisty soundbites the realities are more cuts for the next few years despite heightened tesnsions & threats, besides Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Our air forces are weak- too small & lacking essential kit. Gapping capabilities is casually accepted as defence of the realm & deterence come a clear second to reckless economic starvation of resources to keep the country moving.
So where’s the UK’s ‘Air Superiority’ in all this. The F35 B is a very expensive aircraft which the UK is buying at a ‘whenever we can afford it rate. Far better that we had a mix of 35A’s and B’s. More Typhoons and also Saab Vigens. Aircraft Carriers that could have taken a wider mix of Combat Aircraft. Instead we have a government and ministry of defence that thinks in terms of just having a few dinky toys to play with. This country can’t even defend itself and it’s own shores with what it has let alone fully commit… Read more »
Who are we defending the UK coast line from exactly? I must have missed the peer adversary operating large amphibious forces in the North Atlantic, Please do tell.
Supposedly the Russians and anyone who chooses to join them. However considering that it’s the US pulling the UK political strings maybe it’s them we should be worried about. There again with the great push towards turning all the defence and fighting over to AI it won’t matter anyway as they the AI will be the worlds armmagedon.
Not sure if your being serious or joking.
Perfectly serious since AI’s will eventually become self aware and possibly unreliable in distinguishing between good and bad and friend or foe. Anyone carrying a weapon will be considered armed and dangerous.
MW wrote:
“”More Typhoons and also Saab Vigens.””
The latter Swedish aircraft was retired in 2007, 16 years ago.
Yes got that wrong. Actually meant to say Saab Gripens.
I do think one thing this does show is that deterrent only works if your enemy can see your strengths and believes you have the will to use them…I think NATO and the wests big problem is that the rest of the world did not see strength in unity and will..they saw a west without any unity or will so the fact NATO has the military strength to take on the rest of the world combined was irrelevant as no one saw the strength….because of the Afghanistan withdraw, trumps behaviours, syria even things like the Internal political discord in the… Read more »
As the scale of a force of economic unit increases so it’s cohesion decreases. America is easily the most powerful country on planet earth primarily due to it size, geography and isolation. However those factors also make its advisories doubt it’s willingness to act. Saddam did not think America would act in 1991 and got a nasty surprise. Russian, Iran and China are now flirting with the same calculus since America surrendered/withdraw from Afghanistan. Can America pull it together again as it did in the 1980’s (yes and hopefully) Can America descend in to a civil war or split up,… Read more »
All comments look as if posters are assuming that US/UK/Ukraine media reports are true and factual. Let’s hope so. War is never a good thing and so wasteful of human life. I believe that Russia and Ukraine had negotiated a peace deal in March 2022 that was abandoned after our then PM Johnson had a word with Zelenski – I wonder why the choice was for war instead of peace?
Well, to be fair, the Ukraine was fighting a civil war between east and west before external forces intervened.