Peace is over for the Baltic States

Thomas Theiner
in Euromaidan Press 2015/04/03

The Baltic States of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania are the most endangered. Freed from the Russian yoke but 25 years ago and for centuries oppressed and enslaved by Russia, the Baltic people are most aware of the threat posed by Russia’s resurgent nationalism… or at least Estonia is, because Latvia’s and Lithuania’s defense preparations are ridiculous. They scream for help, solidarity and Western forces to defend them, but have way too few soldiers, way too small defense budgets and an amazing lack of urgency. Personally I believe that if within this year both do not rectify this situation, NATO should only defend them while on its way to stand and fight with Estonia.

Latvia, with silly grandstanding, which would embarrass every other nation, announced that for 2015 it will spend an additional €28 million on its defense… let that sink in: €28 million or in the words of Latvia’s defense minister Vejonis: “Boosting national defense capabilities is our priority, which is clearly visible in the increased 2015 budget.” Now Latvia spends 1% of GDP on defense. NATO’s target is 2%, but for a nation under threat it should be more like 3%. According to the EU commission, Latvia’s GDP in 2014 was €23.8 billion and by the end of 2015 it should be approximately €24.5 billion. If Latvia would spend the bare minimum on defense, namely 2%, it would spend at a least €490 million for 2015. It’s actual spending: €253.8 million.

Lithuania used to be a similar defense spending laggard, but this year it increased defense spending by over 30% and will now spend €424.5 million. Lithuania also re-introduced conscription. However, as Lithuania was spending the lowest percentage of GDP on defense in the entire EU, even after this increase its spending is still a paltry 1.11% of GDP. Estonia, on the other hand, always took defense seriously and continuously spent 2% of GDP and increased this to 2.05% for 2015. This year the smallest of the three Baltic nations will spend €412 million.

All three of the Baltic nations can spend more on defense. Their economies are growing; their national debts are low and their budget deficits well under the EU’s threshold of 3%. According to the EU Commission on 5 February 2015, Lithuania’s budget deficit was -1.4% of GDP and its national debt 41.8% of GDP, Latvia’s deficit was -1.1% and its debt 36.5% and Estonia’s -0.6% and 9.6%. Lithuania and Latvia could easily ramp up defense spending to 2%, especially as their corporate income taxes rates are 15%, which are the lowest in the European Union safe for Bulgaria. And radically raising defense spending is absolutely viable as shown by a guy named Vladimir Putin, who increased the Russian defense budget by 43% in his first year in office and by an average of 21% every year since.

If all the Baltic nations were as serious as Estonia and spent 2% on defense, then their combined defense budget would be €1.62 billion instead of the current €1.09 billion. But 2% is not enough. At the end of the Cold War, Germany was spending 2.8% of GDP on defense, South Korea will spend 2.5% this year and Israel 5.6%. Therefore, the Baltic nations should spend at least 2.5% a year on defense. That would amount to €1.83 billion a year or nearly €750 million more than now. With a defense budget of this size, the Baltics could finance the forces to withstand a Russian attack for the three to four days it will take the US Air Force to smite Kaliningrad and attain air supremacy.

But even with an increased defense budget, the Baltics will not withstand a Russian attack because of the insanely small amount of active and reserve troops they field. Israel fields 2,142 active soldiers per 100,000 citizens, Greece 1,008 and the most serious Baltic nation Estonia 418 active troops per 100,000 citizens. That is actually an exceptional high number compared to Lithuania’s 269 troops and Latvia’s 232 troops. Why should an American president ask his 425 troops per 100,000 citizens fight and die for Latvia or Lithuania, who don’t ask the same of their citizens?

The whole lack of seriousness of Latvia and Lithuania becomes evident when compared to Finland and Israel: Finland with 12% less population than the three Baltic nations combined fields six brigades in peacetime with 208 Leopard 2A4 tanks and an air force with 62 F-18 fighters, whereas the three Baltic nations field three active brigades with 0 tanks and 0 fighters. Israel with a population that is 32.4% bigger fields nine active brigades with over 2,000 tanks and over 400 fighters during peace; in case of war Israel will field an amazing 41 combat brigades, the while the Baltics will field at best 10 brigades during a war.

The Baltic States do not need to reach Israeli levels in active personnel numbers or field 1,677 active citizen-soldiers per 100,000 people as Switzerland does, but the Baltic Nations must increase their forces substantially. Estonia is already on the right path and aims to have 90,000 reserve forces by 2022. With such a high number of reservists Estonia will even overtake Israel and will be on par with the reserve levels of Finland. However, to its South Latvia and Lithuania are both undermining the brave work of Estonia by not fielding more troops. At least all three should field 600 active troops per 100,000 citizens and thus give them an active force of 37,000 troops, which is 5,000 more than the Russian troops garrisoned within 100 km of the Baltic States.

I group the Baltic nations together since the best way forward for the three is to merge part of their defense structure: a trilateral treaty binding Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania to spend 2.5% of GDP on defense, obliging them to have 600 active troops per 100,000 citizens, forcing them to coordinate acquisition of equipment and establishing joint units for the most expensive equipment would create much stronger, more capable and harder to defeat armies. Right now the three countries waste immense amounts of money by going alone on everything. If they want to remain free, they need to stop this.

A few examples: together the three nations field 18 helicopters of 5 different types, thus needing 5 different training teams, 5 different maintenance teams and 5 different logistic supports units. Last year Estonia bought 44 CV90 tracked infantry fighting vehicles (IFV) from the Netherlands, while Latvia bought 123 CVR(T) from the United Kingdom. Two sets of vehicles with completely unrelated maintenance needs. If Lithuania will now buy something else all three countries will have to build up their own training, maintenance and logistic structure for their vehicles instead of one training center and one central logistic/maintenance depot. Also if the three nations coordinated and bought the same weapon systems together, the price per item would drop. But now the Latvian CVR(T) Scimitars have a 30mm cannon and the Estonian CV90 have a 35mm cannon, making even ammunition sharing impossible.

Next in Estonia’s plans is buying a self-propelled artillery system. If it buys it alone then it will be able to afford 24 at best. Lithuania’s artillery is also in dire need of modernization as the M101 howitzers it uses were produced between 1941 to 1953… Latvia uses an old Czech model, which cannot even fire standard NATO ammunition. Now if the three nations agreed to merge their procurement and agree on a common brigade structure, then they could acquire a modern and much more capable artillery system together. As together the three nations would buy up to 72 systems, all sellers would be very open to produce the system in the Baltic States, thus giving the three nations a chance to develop their own defense industries and thus spend their money on their soil. The brilliant Swedish Archer, the light French CAESAR, the tracked Polish AHS Krab or the American M109A7 – all of them could be partially produced and assembled in the Baltic States and with one system in use a single common training center will suffice. Spares and supplies – again buying in bulk will reduce the cost and having just one main depot will cut costs again. With defense spending at 2.5% and costs reduced by cooperating closely, it will be possible for the Baltic States to buy larger amounts of more modern equipment.

What the triple alliance members need: for their armies – tanks, tracked infantry fighting vehicles and self-propelled artillery, for their territorial defense units – wheeled infantry fighting vehicles and light howitzers, for their air forces – utility helicopters, drones and a medium-range air-defense system. What they do not need is more ships and a fighter wing. A fighter wing is highly expensive and with all Baltic air bases in range of Russian anti-air and cruise missiles, fighters either won’t be able to take to the skies or will be shot down within minutes. And if the Baltic nations ever invest in their own fighter wing, then Western NATO members would abandon the Baltic Air Policing mission. Therefore NEVER ever must the Baltics buy their own fighters. As for the Baltic Naval forces: the Russian Baltic Fleet is too strong and therefore a coastal missile battalion must suffice. Poland already employs the Norwegian Naval Strike Missile and the Baltic nations should acquire it too to sink Russian ships before they come near a Baltic shore.

But, like with other expensive and highly specialized equipment, the Baltic nations should first set up common battalions to employ this equipment. If they buy the Naval Strike Missile, then beforehand they should create a tri-national Coastal Artillery battalion. Such a tri-national battalion would field three Naval Strike Missile equipped companies, one Estonian, one Latvian, one Lithuanian, supported by a maintenance company and a supply company, with three platoons each (an Estonian, a Latvian and a Lithuanian platoon). During peacetime, the battalion would be managed by a tri-national command company, which will ensure that the three combat companies are well trained, maintained and equipped. If Russia attacks, the three companies, with their respective support platoons, will leave the battalion’s base and head to their nation to fight there.

With the same structure the Baltic nations should set up a tri-national helicopter wing with 24 utility helicopters in three squadrons that can deploy to their respective nations in case of war. Possible models are the American UH-60M Black Hawk and the European NH90. A common airlift wing providing tactical transport to all three nations can be set up with the same structure and a tri-national paratrooper battalion should be located right next to it. A HIMARS multiple rocket launch system with MGM-140 ATACMS missiles, if bought by the three nations together and managed in a common battalion, suddenly becomes a feasible weapon system. A UAV battalion, an Electronic Warfare battalion, even an air wing flying 12 South Korean KAI TA-50 Golden Eagle or Italian M-346 Master trainer aircraft would be a possibility. Unite and be strong or do your own thing and be weak and easy prey.

Most importantly, the three Baltic nations need a modern medium range air-defense system and tanks. The air-defense systems currently in service, namely RBS-70, Mistral, Stinger and Grom systems, do not reach higher than 4-5km and have a range of just 6-8 km. The three Baltic nations do not need a high-end long-range system like the SAMP/T or the MIM-104 Patriot as Putin won’t fire a nuke at the three nations and risk contaminating his own troops, country or main shipping lane. Naturally, if the US, pleased by the common Baltic defense alliance and the increase in Baltic defense spending, increases its Foreign Military Financing to the Baltic nations, then one could always ask to get a battalion worth of MIM-104 launchers and radars for a tri-national battalion. 

US politicians would love such a common battalion, but in case the US will not provide an anti-air system, either the Norwegian NASAMS 2 or the Swedish BAMSE must be on the Baltics’ shopping list. The NASAMS 2 can use a mix of IRIS-T and AIM-9X Sidewinder infrared homing missiles, and AIM-120 AMRAAM and RIM-162 ESSM radar homing missiles and a range of up to 40km and can hit targets 14km above ground. Likewise, the Swedish BAMSE system can hit targets up to 15km above ground and 20km away. Eight nations already field the NASAMS 2, including Norway and Finland, while the BAMSE is in service with Sweden. The big advantage for BAMSE is that both Lithuania and Estonia already operate BAMSE’s Giraffe AMB radar, thus making integration of the Fire Control Radar and missile launchers easy.

As for tanks, the Baltics would be well advised to opt for a light tank design as those are more agile than main battle tanks (MBT). MBTs weigh around 60 tonnes due to their thick composite armor while light tanks weigh 25-30 tonnes and are much cheaper to procure. Combining a light tank with an active protection system like the Israeli Trophy or the German AMAP-ADS would offer the same level of protection against anti-tank missiles and rocket propelled grenades as the thicker armor of MBTs, but at half the price. Two light tank models that would operate well in the Baltic States are the Polish-British PL-01, which is based on the Swedish CV90, and the CV90105, which is a variant of the CV90. Poland intends to buy a large number of PL-01 to equip its armored  forces and as Poland, like the Baltic States, also needs a large number of tracked IFV, all four nations should agree on a common tank and IFV design and then produce and maintain it together to reduce costs and improve interoperability. 

Fielding a large number of mixed units of light tanks with a 105mm canon and tracked IFVs, some of which armed with anti-tank guided missiles, would give Baltic Armies the ability to ambush and decimate Russian forces and then retreat into the vast forests of the three nations to redeploy unseen for the next strike (Lithuania’s soil is 33% forested, Latvia’s 42% and Estonia’s 50%). A mobile short-range air-defense system and an engineering vehicle built on the same chassis as the tank and IFV should be added to the aforementioned units to protect them from Russian attack helicopters and provide them with a vehicle capable to clear a path through the forests.

Ultimately, the defense of the Baltic nations stands and falls with their level of cooperation. Sweden has the easiest task: defend and hold Gotland, while Poland faces the unenviable task to fend off attacks on two sides: from Kaliningrad and Belarus, while at the same time being the main reserve force for the Baltics. Therefore, Poland has much higher financial, logistic and preparatory hurdles to clear before its military is capable to withstand each and every type of Russian attack. But as for the Baltics, nothing will give them as better chance to deter a Russian attack and in the worst case withstand it until help arrives, than combing their defense structures and leaving just operational command in national hands (for now).

All five nations under threat along the Baltic Sea will have to plan and prepare to fight on their own, as help from Western European nations is not something they can count on. Therefore, these nations, just like Romania and Ukraine, will have to prepare for the worst and with the current nationalistic hysteria sweeping Russia the worst is yet to come and it will come. Therefore either be prepared or surrender and acquiesce to living under the Russian yoke once more. I for my part say: Never!

This article is part of the article series Peace is Over, which also includes the following in-depth analysis of the current military capabilities and the required changes to defend Sweden and Poland:

1. Sweden
2. Poland

 

Knowing the Enemy

by Ariel Cohen

How to cope with global jihad

(at http://www.hoover.org/publications/policy-review/article/6144)

---

The conflicts in Iraq, Lebanon, and Afghanistan and the global Islamist insurgency have revealed that Western democracies and their political and military leaders do not fully comprehend the multifaceted threats represented by radical Muslim nonstate actors. In this, they violate the most famous dictum of Sun Tzu, the Chinese strategic genius of2,500 years ago: “If you know yourself and understand your opponent you will never put your victory in jeopardy in any conflict.”

The broad support that al Qaeda jihadis and radical Islamist militias such as Hamas and Hezbollah enjoy in the Muslim world and in the global Muslim diaspora, as well as among non-Muslim anti-American political forces around the world demonstrates that describing the global Islamic insurgency as a fringe or minority phenomenon is unrealistic and self-defeating. Since 9/11, democracies have fought three wars against nonstate Islamist actors. The West needs to draw important lessons from Iraq, Afghanistan, and the clash between Israel and Hezbollah to address these strategic deficits. Lack of clarity in defining the enemy and delays in formulating political and information strategy severely endanger U.S. national interests and the security of the West.

War—Continuity in Change, and Change in Continuity

COLIN S. GRAY

War can only be understood holistically. If one focuses on continuity in change, one is near certain to undervalue the change in continuity. One has to be bifocal. Carl von Clausewitz is uncompromising on this matter:

But in war more than in any other subject we must begin by looking at the nature of the whole; for here more than elsewhere the part and the whole must always be thought of together.

The subject of most interest here is future war, all of it. Future war will include both change and continuity from the past. Many people have difficulty understanding the relationship between continuity and change; this article will try to provide some useful guidance. Similarly, satisfactory comprehension of the connection between theory and practice is frequently missing.

These deficiencies in intellectual grasp can be important and damaging to national security.

Read more: http://strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pubs/parameters/Articles/2010summer/Gray.pdf

Mali's Model Democracy Myth

The international community seems intent on "restoring democracy" to Mali. But it was the pre-coup status quo that led to collapse in the first place.

Article | 8 February 2013 by Joe Penney 

Bamako, Mali:

Both the Malian people and the international press have been almost unanimous in lauding the French military campaign in Mali, which started in earnest on January 11. The ultimate French goal appears to be returning Mali to its status quo circa 2011 – i.e. before the start of the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA) campaign in the north. In accordance with this plan, Mali’s interim president, Dioncounda Traoré, recently announced imminent elections for July 2013.
Thus France will claim to have completed its dual objectives of regaining Mali’s ‘territorial integrity’ and accomplishing a ‘democratic transition’. The French then plan to withdraw smoothly, replacing its fighters with a UN peacekeeping force and conceding the presence of some jihadist fighters in the Adrar des Ifoghas Mountains.

Making sense of Mali's armed groups

After spending weeks reporting from the country's restive north, Al Jazeera's May Ying Welsh reviews some of the different groups and what they want.

May Ying Welsh   Last Modified: 17 Jan 2013 10:19 French planes have bombed targets in Mali in what they consider a fight against al-Qaeda-linked fighters. But the region is a cauldron of instability with a diverse blend of religious fighters, ethnic militas and secularists. MNLA (National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad) The secular separatist Tuareg rebel group wants an independent state in northern Mali called Azawad. MNLA say they want this state for all the peoples of northern Mali (Tuaregs, Songhai, Arabs, and Fulani are the main ethnic groups). They have some token members from the Songhai ethnic group, but the fact is that 99 percent of MNLA fighters are Tuaregs whose motivation is to have a Tuareg state.

John Boyd and strategic theory in the postmodern era

John Boyd and strategic theory in the postmodern era
By Frans Osinga

We live in the postmodern era, the French sociologist Francois Lyotard told us in the early eighties. Postmodernism has come to signify a break with traditional modes of behavior. This includes warfare. Two dominant strands of strategic thought have both earned the label of postmodern warfare: Network Centric warfare (NCW) and Fourth Generation Warfare (4GW). One takes its inspiration from the postmodern information society, the other from the eroding authority and power of the modern-era political institutions. Both are also unified in a common conceptual father: the late USAF Colonel John Boyd, the first postmodern strategist. Few people in the past three decades have surpassed his influence on western military thought, but, like Sun Tzu and Clausewitz, he has also often been superficially read and understood.

Read more: http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/boyd/osinga_boyd_postmod_copyright2007.pdf

Special Operations Forces: Future Challenges and Opportunities

Strategy for the Long Haul

Special Operations Forces: Future Challenges and Opportunities

By Robert Martinage 2008 (abbreviated by R. Toomse)

Given the long expected service life of most of its major assets, the US military force structure, which underlies the concepts of operation that drive the US “way of war,” is still based primarily on the premises and experience of the Cold War and its immediate aftermath. Arguably, much of the current Program of Record (the forces the Department of Defense seeks to acquire in coming years) remains similarly reflective of that period. Yet the looming strategic challenges look to be significantly different. Thus there is a danger that many of the forces that the Defense Department plans to acquire may prove to be unsuitable for dealing with future threats.

Special Operations Forces (SOF) are elite, highly trained military units that conduct operations that typically exceed the capabilities of conventional forces.

Hybrid Warfare and Challenges

Hybrid Warfare and Challenges

Frank G. Hoffman

In his classic history, Thucydides detailed the savage 27-year conflict between Sparta and Athens. Sparta was the overwhelming land power of its day, and its hoplites were drilled to perfection. The Athenians, led by Pericles, were the supreme maritime power, supported by a walled capital, a fleet of powerful triremes, and tributary allies.

The Spartan leader, Archidamius, warned his kinsmen about Athens’ relative power, but the Spartans and their supporters would not heed their king. In 431 BCE, the Spartans marched through Attica and ravaged the Athenian country estates and surrounding farms. They encamped and awaited the Athenian heralds and army for what they hoped would be a decisive battle and a short war.

The scarlet-clad Spartans learned the first lesson of military history—the enemy gets a vote. The Athenians elected to remain behind their walls and fight a protracted campaign that played to their strengths and worked against their enemies.  Thucydides’ ponderous tome on the carnage of the Peloponnesian War is an extended history of the operational adaptation of each side as they strove to gain a sustainable advantage over their enemy. These key lessons are, as he intended, a valuable “possession for all time.”

The Second Lebanon War, 2006

In many details, the amorphous Hizballah is representative of the rising hybrid threat. The 34-day battle in southern Lebanon revealed some weaknesses in the posture of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF)—but it has implications for American defense planners, too. Mixing an organized political movement with decentralized cells employing adaptive tactics in ungoverned zones, Hizballah showed that it could inflict as well as take punishment. Its highly disciplined, well-trained distributed cells contested ground against a modern conventional force using an admixture of guerrilla tactics and technology in densely packed urban centers. Hizballah, like Islamic extremist defenders in the battles in Fallujah in Iraq during April and November of 2004, skillfully exploited the urban terrain to create ambushes and evade detection and to hold strong defensive fortifications in close proximity to noncombatants.

In the field, Israeli troops grudgingly admitted that the Hizballah defenders were tenacious and skilled. The organized resistance was several orders of magnitude more difficult than counterterrorism operations in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. More importantly, the degree of training, fire discipline, and lethal technology demonstrated by Hizballah were much higher.

Tactical combinations and novel applications of technology by the defenders were noteworthy. In particular, the antitank guided missile systems employed by Hizballah against IDF armor and defensive positions, coupled with decentralized tactics, were a surprise. At the battle of Wadi Salouqi, a column of Israeli tanks was stopped in its tracks with telling precision. Hizballah’s antitank weapons include the Russian-made RPG–29, Russian AT–13 Metis, and AT–14 Kornet, which has a range of 3 miles. The IDF found the AT–13 and AT–14 formidable against their first line Merkava Mark IV tank. A total of 18 Merkavas were damaged, and it is estimated that antitank guided missiles accounted for 40 percent of IDF fatalities. Here we see the blurring of conventional systems with irregular forces and nontraditional tactics.

Hizballah even managed to launch a few armed unmanned aerial vehicles, which required the IDF to adapt in order to detect them. These included either the Iranian Mirsad-1 or Ababil-3 Swallow. These concerned Israeli strategists given their global positioning system– based navigational system, 450-kilometer range, and 50-kilogram explosive carrying capacity. There is evidence that Hizballah invested in signals intelligence and monitored IDF cell phone calls for some time, as well as unconfirmed reports that they managed to decrypt IDF radio traffic. The defenders also seemed to have advanced surveillance systems and very advanced night vision equipment. Hizballah’s use of C802 antiship cruise missiles against an Israeli missile ship represents another sample of what “hybrid warfare” might look like, which is certainly relevant to naval analysts as well.

Perhaps Hizballah’s unique capability is its inventory of 14,000 rockets. Many of these are relatively inaccurate older models, but thanks to Iranian or Syrian support, they possess a number of missile systems that can reach deep into Israel. They were used both to terrorize the civilian population and to attack Israel’s military infrastructure. Hizballah managed to fire over 4,100 rockets into Israel between July 12 and August 13, culminating with 250 rockets on the final day, the highest total of the war. Most of these were short range and inaccurate, but they achieved strategic effects both in the physical domain, by forcing Israel to evacuate tens of thousands of citizens, and in the media, by demonstrating their ability to lash back at the region’s most potent military.

Ralph Peters, who visited Lebanon during the fighting, observed that Hizballah displayed impressive flexibility, relying on the ability of cellular units to combine rapidly for specific operations or, when cut off, to operate independently after falling in on prepositioned stockpiles of weapons and ammunition. Hizballah’s combat cells were a hybrid of guerrillas and regular troops—a form of opponent that U.S. forces are apt to encounter with increasing frequency.

Compound Wars

Historians have noted that many if not most wars are characterized by both regular and irregular operations. When a significant degree of strategic coordination between separate regular and irregular forces in conflicts occurs, they can be considered “compound wars.” Compound wars are those major wars that had significant regular and irregular components fighting simultaneously under unified direction. The complementary effects of compound warfare are generated by its ability to exploit the advantages of each kind of force and increase the nature of the threat posed by each kind of force. The irregular force attacks weak areas, compelling a conventional opponent to disperse his security forces. The conventional force generally induces the adversary to concentrate for defense or to achieve critical mass for decisive offensive operations.

One can see this in the American Revolution, when George Washington’s more conventional troops stood as a force in being for much of the war, while the South Carolina campaign was characterized by militia and some irregular combat. The Napoleonic era is frequently viewed in terms of its massive armies marching back and forth across Europe. But the French invasion of Spain turned into a quagmire, with British regulars contesting Napoleon’s control of the major cities, while the Spanish guerrillas successfully harassed his lines of communication. Here again, strategic coordination was achieved, but overall in different battlespaces.

Likewise, the American Civil War is framed by famous battles at Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, Vicksburg, and Antietam. Yet partisan warfare and famous units like John Mosby’s 43d Virginia Cavalry provided less conventional capabilities as an economy of force operation. T.E. Lawrence’s role as an advisor to the Arab revolt against the Ottomans is another classic case of compound war, which materially assisted General Edmund Allenby’s thrusts with the British Expeditionary Force against Jerusalem and Damascus. But here again, Lawrence’s raiders did not fight alongside the British; they were strategically directed by the British and supplied with advisors, arms, and gold only. Vietnam is another classic case of the strategic synergy created by compound wars, posing the irregular tactics of the Viet Cong with the more conventional capabilities of the North Vietnamese army. The ambiguity between conventional and unconventional approaches vexed military planners for several years. Even long afterward, Americans debated what kind of war they actually fought and lost.

Hybrid Wars

As difficult as compound wars have been, the operational fusion of conventional and irregular capabilities in hybrid conflicts may be even more complicated. Compound wars offered synergy and combinations at the strategic level, but not the complexity, fusion, and simultaneity we anticipate at the operational and even tactical levels in wars where one or both sides is blending and fusing the full range of methods and modes of conflict into the battlespace. Irregular forces in cases of compound wars operated largely as a distraction or economy of force measure in a separate theater or adjacent operating area including the rear echelon. Because it is based on operationally separate forces, the compound concept did not capture the merger or blurring modes of war identified in past case studies such as Hizballah in the second Lebanon war of 2006 or future projections.

Thus, the future does not portend a suite of distinct challengers into separate boxes of a matrix chart. Traditional conflict will still pose the most dangerous form of human conflict, especially in scale. With increasing probability, however, we will face adversaries who blur and blend the different methods or modes of warfare. The most distinctive change in the character of modern war is the blurred or blended nature of combat. We do not face a widening number of distinct challenges but their convergence into hybrid wars.

These hybrid wars blend the lethality of state conflict with the fanatical and protracted fervor of irregular warfare. In such conflicts, future adversaries (states, state-sponsored groups, or self-funded actors) will exploit access to modern military capabilities, including encrypted command systems, man-portable air-to-surface missiles, and other modern lethal systems, as well as promote protracted insurgencies that employ ambushes, improvised explosive devices (IEDs), and coercive assassinations. This could include states blending high-tech capabilities such as antisatellite weapons with terrorism and cyber warfare directed against financial targets.

Implications

The rise of hybrid warfare does not represent the end of traditional or conventional warfare. But it does present a complicating factor for defense planning in the 21st century. The implications could be significant. John Arquilla of the Naval Postgraduate School has noted, “While history provides some useful examples to stimulate strategic thought about such problems, coping with networks that can fight in so many different ways—sparking myriad, hybrid forms of conflict—is going to require some innovative thinking.”

Tomorrow’s conflicts will not be easily categorized into conventional or irregular. The emerging character of conflict is more complicated than that. A binary choice of big and conventional versus small or irregular is too simplistic. The United States cannot imagine all future threats as state-based and completely conventional, nor should it assume that state-based conflict has passed into history’s dustbin. Many have made that mistake before. State-based conflict is less likely, but it is not extinct. But neither should we assume that all state-based warfare will be entirely conventional. As this article suggests, the future poses combinations and mergers of the various methods available to our antagonists. Numerous security analysts have acknowledged the blurring of lines between modes of war. Hybrid challengers have passed from a concept to a reality, thanks to Hizballah.

Read more: http://smallwarsjournal.com/documents/jfqhoffman.pdf

Defence Planning, Surprise, and Prediction

Defence Planning, Surprise, and Prediction

By Colin S. Gray

As a professor with a doctorate I am a card-carrying intellectual, an ascription that is not usually employed in Britain with approval, but I need to warn you of the dangers in over-intellectualising strategic matters. Learned disputes among gifted defence experts can lead theorists to be too clever. It is possible to lose the essentials of the plot in politics and strategy by excessive analysis.

As a general warning, be very careful of the concept of the day, the newly fashionable big idea, because: (a) there really are no new ideas in strategy; (b) prophets are apt to fall in love with their message, and unintentionally take their self-critical faculty off the field of play; and (c) the popularity of a notion is no guarantee of authentic merit.

Our mission cannot simply be a search for strategic truth, because we need our truth to be a useful truth. The truth about the future is that it is deeply uncertain, it cannot be predicted or even anticipated with any confidence, let alone reliably. It is not foreseeable, so do not refer to ‘the foreseeable future’.

So, what broad principles might we adopt to help shape our defence choices? My master guiding principles are the following:

(a) Try to get the big things right enough.

(b) Acknowledge that you will make many mistakes, but strive to restrict the inevitable errors to relatively minor matters.

(c) Recognise that you and your successors will be surprised many times in the future, so that your challenge is to plan with consequences that are surprise-tolerant. You will be surprised, but you need not be disabled by the effects of surprise.

(d) Plan flexibly, adaptively, and inclusively. This is what is meant by prudent defence planning.

Read more: http://www.act.nato.int/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=266:nato-multiple-futures-project-documents&catid=54:conferences-subpages&Itemid=1

Unrestricted Warfare

Unrestricted Warfare

Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui

Everyone who has lived through the last decade of the 20th century will have a profound sense of the changes in the world. We don't believe that there is anyone who would claim that there has been any decade in history in which the changes have been greater than those of this decade. Naturally, the causes behind the enormous changes are too numerous to mention, but there are only a few reasons that people bring up repeatedly.

War which has undergone the changes of modern technology and the market system will be launched even more in atypical forms. In other words, while we are seeing a relative reduction in military violence, at the same time we definitely are seeing an increase in political, economic, and technological violence. However, regardless of the form the violence takes, war is war, and a change in the external appearance does not keep any war from abiding by the principles of war.

If we acknowledge that the new principles of war are no longer "using armed force to compel the enemy to submit to one's will," but rather are "using all means, including armed force or nonarmed force, military and non-military, and lethal and non-lethal means to compel the enemy to accept one's interests."

This represents change. A change in war and a change in the mode of war occasioned by this. So, just what has led to the change? What kind of changes are they? Where are the changes headed? How does one face these changes? This is the topic that this book attempts to touch on and shed light on, and it is also our motivation in deciding to write this book.

Read more: http://www.c4i.org/unrestricted.pdf