The Sunday Times, 6 June 2004, Page 27 “Think” Section
HIGH-TECH WEAPONS DEFEATED BY LOW-TECH WARFARE
In a war, what really counts is not superior firepower but the will of the fighters.
By WILLIAM CHOONG
The American M1 Abrams tank is a dream come true for armies around the world.
Produced at the height of the Cold War in the mid-1980s, the 70-tonne behemoth can withstand nuclear, biological and chemical attacks, provide enhanced armour protection and fire on the move - an invaluable asset for armies in a hurry.
The US armoured corps jokes that an Abrams tank gunner can engage multiple enemy tanks while chomping on a sandwich and washing it down with a can of Coke.
But during the US invasion of Iraq in March last year, an incident involving the Abrams took the fizz out of this boast = and provided valuable lessons for both military strategists and wannabe guerrillas across the world.
Two Abrams tanks - part of an armoured fist striking towards Baghdad - were both hit in the rear by what appeared to be an improvised anti-tank gun mounted on a truck.
For the first time, the seemingly invincible Abrams tanks worth over US$4 million were each destroyed by enemy fire - by what were probably Soviet-era rocket propelled grenades, worth about US$30 a round.
The incident underscores two salient points: high technology can be foiled by old technology; high technology can also be defeated by guile, guts and superior tactics.
There, in the age-old business of war, high technology does not always equate to high tactics. High technology risks obscuring the fact that wars are not fought with weapons alone, but are also battles of competing wills.
Gulf War I was a superb show of cutting-edge military technology. Since then, even more advanced weapons have changed the face and nature of war. Acronyms like JDAM, BMD and UAV have appeared to offer quickie solutions for wining conflicts.
From West Point to Sandhurst, new generations of officers have committed themselves to the so-called Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA) - the notion that new weapons could deliver an ever-victorious “silver bullet” to the enemy, DHL-style - from anywhere to anywhere, in any way, any time.
In the Bush administration’s view, RMA would use “near-perfect” intelligence from satellites, aircraft and unmanned aerial vehicles to help commanders identify targets and destroy them with precision-mounted munitions.
In a campaign speech in 1999, then presidential candidate George W. Bush summed up his take on technology, stressing that American forces’ key goal was to deter fight and win wars.
“Superpowers don’t do windows,” he said, referring to nation-building or peacekeeping.
“Power is increasingly defined, not by mass or size, but by mobility and swiftness. Influence is measured in information, safety is gained in stealth, and force is projected on the long arc of precision-guided weapons.”
PROBLEM WITH TECHNOLOGY
The problem with the use of technology in warfare, however, is that the most sophisticated devices can be subjected to various technical, financial and other limitations.
One recent example: the US Army – by far the most advanced in the world – is developing a “digitised” battlefield. Sensors, data transmission and cutting-edge communication give its soldiers a better sense of where both the enemy and comrades are.
IN one California exercise, however, it appeared that digitised forces killed more of their colleagues than did the non-digitised ones.
The reason: communication breakdowns had led to digitised maps retaining the previous positions of friendly units.
Sometimes, the use of some technology also be overdone.
In an extreme case in Afghanistan, for example, it took an F-16 fighter-bomber and a B-2 stealth bomber, plus a full array of bombs, to kill about a dozen Taliban fighters – on a Toyota pickup truck.
The American experience in Afghanistan has been offering useful lessons in the way future wars might be fought.
As conventional wisdom has it, all it took to prevail against Al-Qaeda and the Taliban elements there was a handful of Special Forces, some spy sensors and a few thousand smart bombs.
But Dr Stephen Biddle, a professor at the Army War College in Pennsylvania, argues in a recent study that this is a myth.
For one thing, in the battle of Takur Ghar – one of the campaign’s bloodiest –a massive US reconnaissance effort that focused on a 10km-by-10km battlefield could not suss out more than half of the Al-Qaeda’s positions.
Dr Biddle argues that the Afghanistan campaign was less a high-technology war and more a “surprisingly orthodox” campaign. American Special Forces were aided by their allies from the Northern Alliance, while Taliban fighters fought alongside their Al-Qaeda colleagues
“The outcome of the contest between the two armies was influenced by technology but not pre-determined by it,” Dr Biddle told The Sunday Times.
DECLINE OF TECHNOLOGY?
Traditionally, technology has higher utility in classic forms of warfare: when organised armies of two modern states face off against one another, superior power would imply victory.
However, low-intensity conflicts – like the ones faced by the Soviet Union in Afghanistan and the United States in Somalia – could become more frequent in the future.
In such cases, technology would play a lesser role, since guerrillas or insurgents seek to thwart bigger and better-armed forces by using evasive tactics such as cover and concealment.
Vietnam is an excellent example. While the US never lost a battle in Vietnam, its high-tech B-52 strategic bombers and laser-guided munitions were eventually defeated by the Viet Cong’s low-tech bamboo traps and bicycles along the Ho Chi Minh Trail.
How then will technology figure?
Scholars point to a “back to basics” take on warfare: while wars might sometimes involve techonology, they will always involve the battle of wills.
This rubric is found in the writings of famous military strategist Carl von Clausewitz, a 19th century soldier who argued that war is “an act of force to compel our enemy to do our will”.
A reading of Clausewitz and an awareness of technology’s strengths and limitations point to the likely future shape of war.
WAR INVOLVES HUMAN BEINGS, NEVER FORGET IT
Step aside, long distance targeting, smart bombsw and stealth fighters. Welcome the most innovative contraption in the history of man: man.
Inside every tank, airplane and naval vessel is a flesh and blood soldier, whose guile, tenacity and tactics will see the battle through.
Detractors of intensive technology use in war lament than an antiseptic and clinical approach to war-fighting has lfet out the human eleent.
During Israel’s defence of the Golan Heighs in the Yom Kippur War of 1973, well-trained Israeli soldiers repelled a massive Syrian force which had 1,400 tanks – nearly 10 times the 150 tanks the Israeli forces had.
“You must understand tit is not the armour, it is not the gun, it is not the airplane, it is not the howitzer, it is the man behind the gun in the tank that makes the difference,” said Brigadier-General Avigdor Kahalni.
HUMAN BEIGNS FIGHT WITH THEIR WILLS FIRST, WEAPONS SECOND.
Borrowing Clausewitz’s dictum that war is a clash of opposing wills, soldiers on the ground will fight for a “cause” so long as they strongly believe in it.
A good example would be the former Soviet Union’s botched occupation of Afghanistan in 1979 – the Soviet equivalent of America’s Vietnam. Within 10 years, the invaders were forced to withdraw, defeated by the mujahideen (holy warriors), who believed in the other-worldy concept that honourable conduct guaranteed imoortality.
“If I kil just one Russian and suvive, I become a ghazi, the surviving warrior of a jihad, “Sayed Naim Majrooh, a young Kabul chemical engineer-turned-guerilla, told AsiaWeek in 1980.
“If the Russians kill me, I’m a shahid, a martyr who goes immediately to heaven. Either way, my future is in paradise.”
Dr David Betz, a lecturer at King’s College in London, told the Sundayt Times that the question of will is now pertinent as live images of American soldiers dying in Iraq are beamed back home.
“It is a plain fact that war is a brutal business which gives rise to the darker passion in man. In the old days your soldier Grandad’s trophy photos ended up in a shoebox in the attic. Nowadays, they are digitised and sent over the Internet.”
WILL TO FIGHT IS DERIVED FROM THE BATTLE OF IDEAS.
Ultimately, the individual soldier and his will to fight is derived from the ideas or values that his state or cause believes in.
In World War II, it was the fight of democratic capitalism against Nazism. During the Cold War, it was the clash of capitalism against communism.
“It is a fundamental mistake to see the enemy as a set of targets,” American military historian Frederick Kagan has written. “The enemy in war is a group of people. Some of them will have to be killed. Others will have ot be captured or driven into hiding. The overwhelming mahjority, however, have to be persuaded.”
In Iraq today, it remains to be seen whether the American ideas of freedom and democracy will be able to combat the ideas that drive Iraqi insurgents to fight.
Former Republican Guard chief brigadier Mohammed Al-Askrray says the jury is still out on whether the Americans’ technological edge will prevail.
As he puts it: “In such cases where a person is willing to blow himself up, that has to do with an idea, and you cannot really stop it with technology. You have to fight him with his own weapon. Fight ideas with ideas.”
WHEN TECHNOLOGY IS NOT KING OF THE BATTLEFIELD
GERMANY, 1945: Superior techonology foiled by massed materiel
Compared to the Allies, Germany had more advanced weapony, such as jet fighters and tanks. But Germany lost the war in Europe due to massed materiel bearing down from the east and west. The Soviet, for example, had 300 diviosns moving into Berlin.
VIETNAM, 1965-75: Superior technology foiled by guile
Served by better technology, the US used B-52 bombers, laser-guided bombs and airmobile operations, a new form of war where troops were dropped from helicopters. But the guile and doggedness of the North Vietnamese saw the Americans leave eventually.
AFGHANISTAN, 1979-89: Superior technology foiled by strong beliefs.
The Soviets invaded Afghanistan with massive firepower delivered from aircraft, helicopters, artillery and tanks. But the poorly-equipped Afghans, some armed with primitive flintlock muskets, believed that they would go to heaven if they died killing Russians.
HIGH-TECH WEAPONS DEFEATED BY LOW-TECH WARFARE
In a war, what really counts is not superior firepower but the will of the fighters.
By WILLIAM CHOONG
The American M1 Abrams tank is a dream come true for armies around the world.
Produced at the height of the Cold War in the mid-1980s, the 70-tonne behemoth can withstand nuclear, biological and chemical attacks, provide enhanced armour protection and fire on the move - an invaluable asset for armies in a hurry.
The US armoured corps jokes that an Abrams tank gunner can engage multiple enemy tanks while chomping on a sandwich and washing it down with a can of Coke.
But during the US invasion of Iraq in March last year, an incident involving the Abrams took the fizz out of this boast = and provided valuable lessons for both military strategists and wannabe guerrillas across the world.
Two Abrams tanks - part of an armoured fist striking towards Baghdad - were both hit in the rear by what appeared to be an improvised anti-tank gun mounted on a truck.
For the first time, the seemingly invincible Abrams tanks worth over US$4 million were each destroyed by enemy fire - by what were probably Soviet-era rocket propelled grenades, worth about US$30 a round.
The incident underscores two salient points: high technology can be foiled by old technology; high technology can also be defeated by guile, guts and superior tactics.
There, in the age-old business of war, high technology does not always equate to high tactics. High technology risks obscuring the fact that wars are not fought with weapons alone, but are also battles of competing wills.
Gulf War I was a superb show of cutting-edge military technology. Since then, even more advanced weapons have changed the face and nature of war. Acronyms like JDAM, BMD and UAV have appeared to offer quickie solutions for wining conflicts.
From West Point to Sandhurst, new generations of officers have committed themselves to the so-called Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA) - the notion that new weapons could deliver an ever-victorious “silver bullet” to the enemy, DHL-style - from anywhere to anywhere, in any way, any time.
In the Bush administration’s view, RMA would use “near-perfect” intelligence from satellites, aircraft and unmanned aerial vehicles to help commanders identify targets and destroy them with precision-mounted munitions.
In a campaign speech in 1999, then presidential candidate George W. Bush summed up his take on technology, stressing that American forces’ key goal was to deter fight and win wars.
“Superpowers don’t do windows,” he said, referring to nation-building or peacekeeping.
“Power is increasingly defined, not by mass or size, but by mobility and swiftness. Influence is measured in information, safety is gained in stealth, and force is projected on the long arc of precision-guided weapons.”
PROBLEM WITH TECHNOLOGY
The problem with the use of technology in warfare, however, is that the most sophisticated devices can be subjected to various technical, financial and other limitations.
One recent example: the US Army – by far the most advanced in the world – is developing a “digitised” battlefield. Sensors, data transmission and cutting-edge communication give its soldiers a better sense of where both the enemy and comrades are.
IN one California exercise, however, it appeared that digitised forces killed more of their colleagues than did the non-digitised ones.
The reason: communication breakdowns had led to digitised maps retaining the previous positions of friendly units.
Sometimes, the use of some technology also be overdone.
In an extreme case in Afghanistan, for example, it took an F-16 fighter-bomber and a B-2 stealth bomber, plus a full array of bombs, to kill about a dozen Taliban fighters – on a Toyota pickup truck.
The American experience in Afghanistan has been offering useful lessons in the way future wars might be fought.
As conventional wisdom has it, all it took to prevail against Al-Qaeda and the Taliban elements there was a handful of Special Forces, some spy sensors and a few thousand smart bombs.
But Dr Stephen Biddle, a professor at the Army War College in Pennsylvania, argues in a recent study that this is a myth.
For one thing, in the battle of Takur Ghar – one of the campaign’s bloodiest –a massive US reconnaissance effort that focused on a 10km-by-10km battlefield could not suss out more than half of the Al-Qaeda’s positions.
Dr Biddle argues that the Afghanistan campaign was less a high-technology war and more a “surprisingly orthodox” campaign. American Special Forces were aided by their allies from the Northern Alliance, while Taliban fighters fought alongside their Al-Qaeda colleagues
“The outcome of the contest between the two armies was influenced by technology but not pre-determined by it,” Dr Biddle told The Sunday Times.
DECLINE OF TECHNOLOGY?
Traditionally, technology has higher utility in classic forms of warfare: when organised armies of two modern states face off against one another, superior power would imply victory.
However, low-intensity conflicts – like the ones faced by the Soviet Union in Afghanistan and the United States in Somalia – could become more frequent in the future.
In such cases, technology would play a lesser role, since guerrillas or insurgents seek to thwart bigger and better-armed forces by using evasive tactics such as cover and concealment.
Vietnam is an excellent example. While the US never lost a battle in Vietnam, its high-tech B-52 strategic bombers and laser-guided munitions were eventually defeated by the Viet Cong’s low-tech bamboo traps and bicycles along the Ho Chi Minh Trail.
How then will technology figure?
Scholars point to a “back to basics” take on warfare: while wars might sometimes involve techonology, they will always involve the battle of wills.
This rubric is found in the writings of famous military strategist Carl von Clausewitz, a 19th century soldier who argued that war is “an act of force to compel our enemy to do our will”.
A reading of Clausewitz and an awareness of technology’s strengths and limitations point to the likely future shape of war.
WAR INVOLVES HUMAN BEINGS, NEVER FORGET IT
Step aside, long distance targeting, smart bombsw and stealth fighters. Welcome the most innovative contraption in the history of man: man.
Inside every tank, airplane and naval vessel is a flesh and blood soldier, whose guile, tenacity and tactics will see the battle through.
Detractors of intensive technology use in war lament than an antiseptic and clinical approach to war-fighting has lfet out the human eleent.
During Israel’s defence of the Golan Heighs in the Yom Kippur War of 1973, well-trained Israeli soldiers repelled a massive Syrian force which had 1,400 tanks – nearly 10 times the 150 tanks the Israeli forces had.
“You must understand tit is not the armour, it is not the gun, it is not the airplane, it is not the howitzer, it is the man behind the gun in the tank that makes the difference,” said Brigadier-General Avigdor Kahalni.
HUMAN BEIGNS FIGHT WITH THEIR WILLS FIRST, WEAPONS SECOND.
Borrowing Clausewitz’s dictum that war is a clash of opposing wills, soldiers on the ground will fight for a “cause” so long as they strongly believe in it.
A good example would be the former Soviet Union’s botched occupation of Afghanistan in 1979 – the Soviet equivalent of America’s Vietnam. Within 10 years, the invaders were forced to withdraw, defeated by the mujahideen (holy warriors), who believed in the other-worldy concept that honourable conduct guaranteed imoortality.
“If I kil just one Russian and suvive, I become a ghazi, the surviving warrior of a jihad, “Sayed Naim Majrooh, a young Kabul chemical engineer-turned-guerilla, told AsiaWeek in 1980.
“If the Russians kill me, I’m a shahid, a martyr who goes immediately to heaven. Either way, my future is in paradise.”
Dr David Betz, a lecturer at King’s College in London, told the Sundayt Times that the question of will is now pertinent as live images of American soldiers dying in Iraq are beamed back home.
“It is a plain fact that war is a brutal business which gives rise to the darker passion in man. In the old days your soldier Grandad’s trophy photos ended up in a shoebox in the attic. Nowadays, they are digitised and sent over the Internet.”
WILL TO FIGHT IS DERIVED FROM THE BATTLE OF IDEAS.
Ultimately, the individual soldier and his will to fight is derived from the ideas or values that his state or cause believes in.
In World War II, it was the fight of democratic capitalism against Nazism. During the Cold War, it was the clash of capitalism against communism.
“It is a fundamental mistake to see the enemy as a set of targets,” American military historian Frederick Kagan has written. “The enemy in war is a group of people. Some of them will have to be killed. Others will have ot be captured or driven into hiding. The overwhelming mahjority, however, have to be persuaded.”
In Iraq today, it remains to be seen whether the American ideas of freedom and democracy will be able to combat the ideas that drive Iraqi insurgents to fight.
Former Republican Guard chief brigadier Mohammed Al-Askrray says the jury is still out on whether the Americans’ technological edge will prevail.
As he puts it: “In such cases where a person is willing to blow himself up, that has to do with an idea, and you cannot really stop it with technology. You have to fight him with his own weapon. Fight ideas with ideas.”
WHEN TECHNOLOGY IS NOT KING OF THE BATTLEFIELD
GERMANY, 1945: Superior techonology foiled by massed materiel
Compared to the Allies, Germany had more advanced weapony, such as jet fighters and tanks. But Germany lost the war in Europe due to massed materiel bearing down from the east and west. The Soviet, for example, had 300 diviosns moving into Berlin.
VIETNAM, 1965-75: Superior technology foiled by guile
Served by better technology, the US used B-52 bombers, laser-guided bombs and airmobile operations, a new form of war where troops were dropped from helicopters. But the guile and doggedness of the North Vietnamese saw the Americans leave eventually.
AFGHANISTAN, 1979-89: Superior technology foiled by strong beliefs.
The Soviets invaded Afghanistan with massive firepower delivered from aircraft, helicopters, artillery and tanks. But the poorly-equipped Afghans, some armed with primitive flintlock muskets, believed that they would go to heaven if they died killing Russians.
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