The real problem with defence against drones

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A blog post about the real drone problem is overdue because I do not see ANY indication that the real problem is part of the public discourse. As a consequence, there's severe misallocation of resources.

 

Imagine you're driving a vehicle through a typical European landscape. This is a VERY different landscape than military training grounds, by the way. There are trees, bushes, ditches close to roads, buildings, fields with tall (more than 30 cm high) crops, enough garages to hide a SUV-mobile company per village, there's scrap lying around.

You pass by one of the gazillion trees, it's still 50 m away. Your vehicle is equipped with all kinds of drone detection sensors imaginable such as visual spectrum optornics, NIR, MWIR, LWIR, mmW radar, acoustic, broadband frequency analysers. A quadcopter is accompanying your vehicle at 100 m altitude, it pattern recognises threats and a buddy of yours in the vehicle checks the reports. Suddenly, you're dead.

What happened? A drone that attached itself to the backside of a tree heard your vehicle approaching, swung its sensor and EFP around the tree stem and fired an EFP warhead at you. No hard kill APS stands a chance of stopping that. The overhead drone saw nothing. 

source https://www.researchgate.net/publication/382231382_Crash-perching_on_vertical_poles_with_a_hugging-wing_robot

What "C-UAS" defences could have protected you? Some 70 mm rocket with semi active laser seeker? Some 30 or 35 mm autocannon with radar and thermal imager fire control? Some laser? Some microwave beam weapon? No, not even the kind of defence that I argued for since 2017 -a CUAS RCWS with machinegun or at most a 20 mm autocannon- could have saved you.

A lot of passive and reactive protection would easily have stopped that EFP attack, of course.

EFP attack; a shaped charge with 110° or more opening angle

 

Now suppose it wasn't one tree, wasn't one drone and it wasn't using an EFP. It was a patch of woodland or some bushes or a plowed field with drones hiding under soil. There were 30 drones with Faraday cage protection against microwave attack. They rise suddenly, overwhelm the APS with a series of attacks and hit the top of your vehicle with 70+ mm (500+ mm RHAeq) tandem shaped charge warheads.

Again, you're dead. There were more than 20 penetrations because no vehicle can be protected against this with enough passive and reactive armour.

- - - - -

I believe I thought this through enough since 2017.

There's no line of sight defence against this.

We need to emphasise the thousands of years-old* concept of security effort

instead of staring at line of sight defences.

The traditional security effort would require to send men out, expose them to great risks to reduce the overall risk to the total force. That seems nonsensical now. We should send out drones as security effort, to search for, warn about and if possible neutralise hostile drones at a safe-enough distance.

Even a single car moving through hostile terrain would require a security ring around it, possibly at 200 to 2,000 m distance. Experiments will tell what the required radius is. Different terrain will require different security efforts and likely different sensors carried by the security force drones. So there would be a constant change of the security ring while that manned car is moving. The ring would become densified where needed, thinned out where that's acceptable, change of terrain from woodland to ploughed field would lead to a major change of what drones are scouting. The security force drones may even open and inspect buildings, weld shut manhole covers with thermite. The control software that controls the drones would report possible contacts, but it would also indicate the acceptable speed. It would need to be able to adapt to a change of route quickly. These security drones can look behind, under, into things. They can scan the ground - hostile drones may hide in loose soil such as mud and ploughed fields.

That's a LOT of effort for a single car. So mastering this AND having the ability to fend off a saturation attack of thousands of drones coming in one pulse (reminiscent of American carrier defence concepts of the late Cold War) is a huge effort. This leads to two conclusions:

1. A frontline with such a defence is much cheaper (and MUCH more reliably and more easily secured while static) than defending many individual areas all-round.
2. Any offensive movement in pincer-style or in form of a raid would have to be substantial. I estimate a brigade-sized effort may be debatable.

Conclusion #1 in particular would lead to a sizeable no man's land between human troops** and indeed between opposing high value hardware as well. The defender's advantage is slight when security drones fight security drones. Quality differences need to be substantial to matter much and even then they'd be unlikely to compensate for a factor three difference in production output. The party with the greater drone mass production capacity (and ability to supply the front with said drones) would win in a prolonged conflict. The peacetime inventories would matter for the first days, maybe weeks. The superior side could ruthlessly intensify the clash to quickly deplete the opposing drone forces. 

To be honest, I did not think all such consequences through yet. 

It's probably not necessary anyway, for it's rather unlikely that war happens when neither side has a qualitative edge or either side has a known qualitative or quantitative superiority that cannot be overcome. Defences could be shifted towards becoming impossible to occupy for long in such a case, preserving freedom only rather than freedom and civilian hardware.

Conclusion #2 is probably mostly relevant for the first days when a frontline is not fully established or if the inferior side wants to win by invading quickly. Another possible period of relevance is after the opposing party's drone forces were largely depleted, offering the opportunity to strike with a manoeuvre force without becoming overwhelmed.

 

The legacy arms industry wants to make the big buck with the kind fo hardware it understands: Big, expensive sensors and weapons; lasers, microwave weapons, autocannons, radars, big thermal imagers. This approach can sweep the sky between 100f t and 15,000 ft altitude just fine. It's not going to be enough. It's not even enough to protect against the fibreoptic FPV drones that laid in ambush next to roads in Ukraine months ago already. The focus on attention on above treetop line of sight C-UAS is badly misguided in regard to the battlefield. It's at most suitable to reduce the effect of strategic attacks.

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

 

*: See Xenophon

**: Compare the movie "Screamers" https://defense-and-freedom.blogspot.com/2008/01/screamers.html  

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A 'carry at all times' helmet for support troops in army divisions

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I hope you muted the video in time. Anyway, I showed this thing from 2022 because I remember having asked ballistic helmet manufacturers on Eurosatory 2018 why they don't provide a proper helmet for support troops.

Those hardly ever wear their helmets - on the head even more rarely than otherwise. Wartime videos shows that such military personnel does not even bother to keep helmets close by. So they simply wouldn't have ANY ballistic protection in the event of a surprise attack with things that fragment.

A compromise helmet that's carried on the body at all times (when awake) and sacrifices some quality to achieve this would be a great leap forward.

This mirrors what I wrote about 500 gram escape hoods to survive first 20 minutes of a chemical attack until you reached the bulkier & heavier 'proper' NBC mask and a PDW designed to be carried at all times (when awake).

A soft design would be even more comfortable than that origami thing and without gaps, but the trauma issue probably excludes soft armour from head protection until someone finds a non-newtonian fluid that's really suitable for body armour and affordable. 

A helmet that would be worn at all times would need to be lightweight and less bulky. A reduction of the protection rating from NIJ level IIIA even down to equivalent of PASGT 'flak vests' (less than NIJ level I, 15-20 layers aramid/kevlar) would be acceptable, or a reduction of coverage (as that origami thing would have; maybe -20% coverage). 80% weak protection would still stop 80% (by area) of 80% (most fragments are weak) of all fragments of an ordinary Russian HE grenade that a low cut thick adamantium armour helmet would stop.

NIJ level IIIA helmet shells aren't made of thick adamantium armour, they may stop only 90% of fragments (depends on the shell/mortar bomb and distance / also the rims are weak), so it's overall a reduction of protection from about 0.9 to about 0.64. The realistic comparison for a support troops ballistic helmet would be to no helmet at all, though - and that's an improvement from 0.00 to about 0.64.

Such a support forces 'carry at all times' (on the back, belly, on upper legs maybe?) helmet coupled with a 'wear at all times' flak vest (20 layers aramid, most times not closed, sufficient ventilation) would be a huge improvement for the protection of support troops within divisions in the field. A full performance mil spec helmet and (over-)vest could still be at the motor vehicle or camp bed.

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

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On the issue of IFV and APC costs

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"Kraftfahrzeuge und Panzer" 1st Ed. by Werner Oswald (1970) has a nice list of the approximate prices of AFVs as of end-60's. I appreciate it as a look back at the price ratios of a time before electronics bloated the prices of AFVs.

M-113 (tracked APC, 11 dismounts, machinegun ): 250k DM 

HS 30 (tracked IFV, 5-6 dismounts, 20 mm gun): 350k DM

Marder (tracked IFV, 7-8 dismounts, 20 mm gun OWS): 800k DM

Leopard (MBT, 105 mm gun): 1,000k DM

 

Marder protection upgrade over M-113 and HS 30 was mostly resistance to 14.5 mm API, which was later cheaply realised for Israeli M-113 with add-on armour. The Leopard's protection (maximum 70 mm steel) was barely enough to protect against a T-34/85 and T-44, unsatisfactory even against a T-54. 

The only substantial electronics in these vehicles were a radio and an intra-crew communication system. The Leopard had a gyrocompass and main gun stabilisation. HS30 and M-113 had petrol instead of diesel engines at that time, but a diesel wouldn't have changed the price much.

Electronics got MUCH more expensive starting in the 1980's when thermal imagers (sometimes for gunner AND commander) and laser rangefinders were introduced in quantity. That is, except for APCs, which didn't need those because they had no weapon to "justify" the expense. Many IFVs (IIRC beginning with some Bradley upgrade in early 90's?) even receive full main gun stabilisation (Warrior being a notable Western exception).

So the cost multiplier between having a bullet-proofed and fragment-proofed box driving off-road with a strong infantry section and a full-blown IFV combat vehicle with a small infantry section systemically increased.

The ability to provide high offroad mobility with protection to great many infantrymen thus vanished. Nowadays you may spend more than a million Euros per dismount seat if you stick with the IFV concept.

 

In this light I'm hoping for good success of the Trackx, a new tracked APC project by Patria - a company known for having the most affordable yet good 6x6 APCs  among Western countries.

 

It's more of a MT-LB successor than a M-113 successor, but it would be most promising with a mass-produced C-UAS RCWS (low price due to economies of scale, with machinegun).

 

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

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Simple WW2 infantry regiment arms

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I keep looking at historical army equipment and it's fascinating how simple the equipment even of an entire infantry regiment can be.

  

An example from WW2:

All an infantry regiment really needed (if I break it down to minimum required quantity of arms types) was:

• rifle
• submachinegun
• universal machinegun
• recoilless gun
• mortar

This can be further reduced with an automatic closed bolt action such as StG 45 had (a late WW2 prototype weapon, but not out of reach technology-wise by early WW2):

• battle rifle
• universal machinegun
• recoilless gun
• mortar

 

(c) 

Verein der Freunde und Förderer der Wehrtechnischen Studiensammlung Koblenz e. V.

Verein der Freunde und Förderer der Wehrtechnischen Studiensammlung Koblenz e. V.

 

(c) Pollyanna1919

source https://www.lonesentry.com/articles/ttt07/recoilless.html

 

source https://dic.academic.ru/dic.nsf/ruwiki/1414802

  

(Keep in mind mines, demolition charges, rifle grenades and hand grenades count as munitions rather than weapons. Flare guns were a tool rather than a weapon outside of German armed forces. Pistols were not a serious weapon post-1871 and irrelevant by WW2.)

 

Moreover, recoilless gun and mortar could be had in one calibre (90...120 mm smoothbore), sharing some fuze and grenade designs and not needing any expensive rifled barrels. A 105...120 mm smoothbore recoilless gun would excel at using shaped charges for anti-tank work out to about 500 m distance (moving target, 1 km against standing tank). A rifled one would instead be able to penetrate 100+ mm of RHA with a HESH/HEP approach.

 

The whole arsenal of such a force could have been produced in backyard workshops save for the supply of unfinished steel parts including barrels. (Again, munitions excluded, but TNT, mercury fulminate and cordite are enough and all simple 19th century tech.) No extraordinary skill was needed, one fully qualified gunsmith, one metalworks machining instructor and maybe one welder would have sufficed to train the entire workforce via snowball system. The only extraordinary production tech was the then-new stamping (particularly for the StG45 - modern machinery, but usable by unskilled labour). 

    

The most difficult equipment to produce for such an infantry regiment were probably the radios with their rechargeable batteries. The typewriters were quite complicated, too. And then there were the motor vehicles, but those were still optional during WW2.

 

You may think something is missing - air defence. Actually, effective air defence (better than ordinary machineguns) was hardly ever present in WW2 infantry regiments. A well-rounded one could have had something like the Madsen 20 mm M/38 for keeping ground attack aircraft at 1.5 km distance and dealing with nimble armoured cars, of course.

 

BTW, historical WW2 infantry regiment arsenals weren't that much more complicated. Again excluding pistols and flare guns, about seven weapons types was an ordinary diversity of arms types. 

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

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Army vehicle size limits

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It's often said that the CVR/T tank family of the British was required to be narrow enough to fit between the rubber trees on Malaysian plantations due to the British experiences in the late 40's conflict there.

(c)Irish Defence Forces

I don't care whether it's a myth or true - it inspired me to think of what we should require regarding vehicle maximum sizes in Europe. I do explicitly exclude heavy logistics and support vehicles as well as tanks here; just thinking of common battlefield used by forces in or close to a battle such as cars and APCs.

The war in Ukraine has shown the importance of being able to hide troops, vehicles and supplies once again. It also had and has a substantial share of combat inside woodland, even including tank actions.

 

Garage doors aren't standardised even in Germany, but they are very commonly sized to fit at most a medium-sized SUV.

Doors aren't fully standardised either, but there's a certain common size that could inform requirements regarding UGVs and all kinds of manually-moved containers on wheels belonging to headquarters, field kitchens and the like.

One thing is for sure: We should NOT permit battlefield vehicles to be needlessly too tall for concealment. Vehicles so tall that to disguise them as a building is the only promising approach should not exist. 

"Boxer" - some geniuses want to add a turret on top

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

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How many generals do we need? Or: The case against generals

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This blog post will be close to maximum disrespectful towards general ranks. The two reasons for my disrespect are the reasoning I will lay out and military history.

Today's armies (and air forces) have great many officers at general rank on active duty. A ratio of personnel strength to quantity of generals close to 1,000:1 is not unusual nowadays (edit: German military as a whole in 2019: 935:1 for troops to generals+admirals, assuming no vacancies among generals and admirals). The U.S. armed forces had a ratio of about 8,000:1 between overall personnel and generals plus admirals by late WW2, for comparison.

 

So, how many generals do you need?

I'll begin with the field army. One might think a brigade is commanded by a brigade general, but in many armies it's commanded by a colonel. So for a high scenario you need one general per brigade (none per independent regiment), but none for a low scenario.

The commonly most-respected ratio of brigades to divisions is three brigades in a division. The division commander has a general rank, but his executive officer and second in command doesn't need to have one. Moreover, we could use four brigades per division, but I won't choose that for the high scenario. So the high scenario is at five general ranks per division, low one is at one.

Next, the corps level. A corps usually also follows the rule of three, a corps with only two divisions only makes sense if the mobilised strength of an army is either two or five divisions. We can safely assume that the second in command of a corps is at general rank like the commander himself. Let's add one reserve general. So we're at 17 generals for an army corps in the high scenario and six for the low scenario.

The entire German field army as of now and into 2030 is not going to need more than 17 generals and could very well make do with six.

 

So why are there so many more generals? They're not needed for the field army. Instead, they're in management jobs, comparable to management board members in a public company.

And here's the thing; we could hire civilian managers for most of those jobs. (Junior) officers of the reserve often advance in business leadership positions, so there's enough of a reserves pool and they can be called up even at high age (not just 45 years of age as is the limit for ordinary conscripts in some countries).

Imagine a mobilised army strength of two army corps. The 2nd (reserve) corps would need 6...17 general rank officers, but it would be inactive in peacetime. These general rank officers could be in exactly the kind of management positions where a civilian manager (even if he/she/it is a captain in the reserves) would be insufficient: Leading the military schools, doctrine development, future force planning.

Many Western countries are in NATO, and the "O" stands for organisation, but by now it should be a "B" for "bureaucracy". Great many career officers have jobs in said bureaucracy and in NATO HQs of often questionable usefulness beyond logistics management purposes. You cannot have a lean army with few general ranks and still play the games at this bureaucracy, for you would have to send generals to fit general rank positions in this bureaucracy. My advice is to largely stop wasting money on the NATO bureaucracy. The degree of influence on the largely pointless work there is small even for a country such as Germany. Command structures above Corps are the only really interesting HQ structures anyway. A country such as Spain would suffer practically no real negative effects if it ceased to participate in the NATO bureaucracy and command structure, for example.

 

So in the end, a bloated, top-heavy army of today could be crashed from around 200 general ranks to less than 40 (at two corps mobilised strength) without loss of deterrence or defence strength. You just need a couple years for the conversion and you need to make sure they never meet in the same room.

 

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de 

P.S.: I could make a case that a European air force only needs two general ranks because so much operational decisionmaking happens at below general rank level. And don't get me started on admirals!

 

edit: The Bundeswehr had 211 generals (not just army generals) and admirals in 2019. I cannot find any more recent figure, it doesn't seem to have been disclosed any more. So we had about 100 generals in an army that could be described as having a corps-sized field army and hardly any ability to mobilise reserve combat formations.

And don't get me started about the quality of the generals. We promoted the wrong people and turned the right people into wrong people. The problems already begin at lieutenant level - many of those are simply not suitable to become officers. Some of them aren't even suitable to be volunteer soldiers.

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Drone cloud support to battlefield drones

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Here's one thing that drones can do that manned aviation did not do in either world war nor in the Vietnam War:

A huge quantity of cheap yet EM-hardened drones with about 30 km flying range can saturate any counter-drone defence and thus protect much fewer actual scout and attack drones in the air.

S O
defence_and_freedom@gmx.de
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Artillery fires types

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The literature (including field manuals) usually discerns three kinds of artillery fires for lethal munitions*:

Destructive fires, neutralising fires, suppressive fires

The required munitions are the greatest for destructive fires, somewhat less** for neutralising fires (though the fire mission for this has to last quite long) and smallest for suppressive fires.

The usual literature approach is to pretend the target is infantry that has dug in or has some other cover.

Suppressive fires shall scare enough to make them combat ineffective during the suppressive fires, while neutralising fires are meant to shell-shock them into combat ineffectiveness that lasts long enough to complete an assault on the position after the artillery fires ceased.

This thinking about infantry targets with cover fits WWI thinking, but it's not very realistic even in modern trench war IMO.

The use of artillery differs greatly between high force density and low force density battle. High force density battles (such as WW2 Eastern Front) put a premium on the shelling of marshalling areas in which troops prepare for an assault. To shell such areas was reported to have caused more harm than the artillery actions during the by comparison very brief assault. Furthermore, it was reported from WW2 experience that most failed infantry attacks failed before they got into small arms range; so most successful positional defences were entirely carried by artillery and mortars (air power played a negligible role).

 

So for low force density conflicts, I'd say

• destructive fires on point targets of justifying value 
• ad hoc firing missions on moving or briefly halting forces, trying to achieve whatever best effect can be achieved in the brief time available to hit them
• obscuration for force protection
• (IR) illumination to enhance friendly forces' vision at night and possibly to damage the enemy's night vision tech

 Whereas for high force density, I'd additionally say

• destructive fires of heavy munitions (100+ kg or FAE rather than 155 mm shells) on known enemy point positions
• destructive fires on area targets if the enemy is expected to largely lack cover and hardening
• neutralising fires on known but somewhat dispersed positions (such as a platoon spread out on 1+ km of trenches or scattered 3-men positions)
• suppressive fires on suspected enemy positions while friendly are in field or view or about to enter it

I suppose this is roughly similar to the actual opinions in the Western artillery communities.

You can see that low force density battle such as fighting Taleban in Afghanistan emphasises accuracy and small dispersion - essentially precision guided munitions.

A high density conventional warfare on the other hand has good use for very destructive munitions (up to very heavy bombs) and a large quantity of dumb lethal munitions such as 155 mm HE shells.

155 mm DPICM shells are vastly more lethal on paper, but not so when fired into forests with a high tree canopy. This happens to be the most typical kind of marshalling ground for massing forces for and before an assault, though. The second most-typical one is for all I know villages - and DPICM isn't known for great lethality through roofs, while 155 mm HE has quite a reputation for ruining homes.

S O
defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

*: Other artillery purposes include propaganda (leaflet) munition delivery, illumination, obscuration (smoke) and some shots to measure the weather (multiple rocket launcher batteries used to shoot one rocket, sense its wind drift by radar until the rocket's self-destruction in the air, then compensate the aim for the real salvo). Lethal (high explosive) munitions can also be used for demolition, mostly demolition of buildings including bridges and intentional cratering of routes.

**:Whether the used amount was enough will only be known once line of sight combat troops are in contact. 
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The direct/indirect/antiair fires tank concept

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I wrote in the past about tanks that have a unusually high maximum elevation of their main gun and can be used for indirect fires and for short range air defence.

/2010/04/medium-calibre-allround-option.html 

/2017/01/42-elevation-tank-turrets.html

/2023/04/a-compact-and-agile-exploitation-brigade.html

/2023/09/the-directindirect-fires-armour.html

 

I have never elaborated on the technical side of the shot, but the technical details matter for understanding the concept.

A tank gun has a very high muzzle velocity even with a high explosive shell (it won't be less than 700 m/s). A variable propellant strength may be used and special shells or fuses may increase drag to brake the shell, but a basic tank gun HE cartridge is going to produce a cannon-like, very flat trajectory.

This makes it difficult to hit a flat target with a point detonating (impact) fuse. A slight error in elevation or a slight deviation of muzzle velocity leads to a much greater range error of the shot than the shot's lethal radius. 

Historically, the best use for cannons in indirect fire at short and medium distances was to use a bouncing shot (cannon shells bounce off flat ground when fired at no more than 10° elevation as a rule of thumb). A delay fuse would then cause the explosion  when the shell is airborne after bouncing off the ground. The fragmentation effect of this would be greater than with point detonation, but the dispersion would be bad.

How about proximity fuses? Again, quite the same as with point detonating, just worse. The fuse may trigger much too early, especially when it overflies a building. Even a time-gated proximity fuse wouldn't be satisfactory. 

Normal time fuses use 0.1 second intervals. A shell travelling at 600 m/s would thus fuse somewhere within 60 metres - unsatisfactory, as the lethal radius even of a 120 mm HE shell in much smaller. 

The technical solution is to use more modern fuses that deliver accuracy of about ten metres. The elevation may still be off a little, but an explosion 3 m lower than intended or 3 m higher than intended isn't a too terrible variation.

Here's an example of such a very accurately fusing fuse.

 

This can be used to explode the shell inside a building (setting the timing accordingly and disabling a point detonation feature if present).

This can be used to shoot at aerial targets in the way heavy anti-air artillery did in WW2, just much more accurately.* 

Ideally, the fuse would have selectable point detonation (quickest direct fire shot mode that's somewhat useful on everything, including messing up a T-14 tank turret) and delay (for exploding BMPs, BTRs and rooms in a building)

 

The technology for proper fuses for very flat trajectory shots hasn't been available for very long. Most main battle tanks of today are from a 1970's conceptual design and prototyping generation, when such fusing wasn't on the horizon yet. The Chinese have newer designs, but they were catching up. The South Koreans have a newer MBT design, but they have mostly hilly to mountainous terrain. Same with the Japanese. The current equipment is thus no argument against the validity of the direct/indirect firepower tank concept. It makes sense that the in-service tanks lack it and at the same time the concept  may be entirely valid with our current technology.

Back to bending that flat trajectory a bit: The muzzle velocity depends on the propellant temperature. One might have a cool/cooled and a warm/heated cartridge compartment to enable a choice between two muzzle velocities. The difference wouldn't be great, though. This would not enable shooting over most hills in the line of sight.

Another possibility is to use a fuse or shell feature that deploys a braking element, such as in trajectory-correcting munitions. Another analogy is the nose or drag ring that can be added to rockets of manually loaded multiple rocket launchers to slow them down and thus reduce the often terribly long minimum shot distance. 

High tech approaches include variable injection of liquid propellant, use of electro-chemical-thermal gun principle and so on, but such already researched and tested technologies appear to find no users for good reasons.

In the end, a fixed cartridge with combustible case is realistic, a semi-fixed cartridge for varying the propellant strength by adding or removing modules would only be reasonable if the tank is used mostly in indirect fires. Another option is to simply have two different kinds of HE cartridges with combustible case; one for high muzzle velocity and one for low muzzle velocity. The latter could be used to shoot over hills, but it would have a reduced maximum range and longer time of flight. The shell orientation at explosion would also differ, leading to a different optimisation for fragmentation pattern and thus a different shell design.

 

The great potential of the concept of a direct/indirect/antiair firepower tank is in the versatility. This may go so far as to enable a much smaller and thus much more agile tank brigade without a dedicated artillery component. I described that concept in the 3rd and 4th link above. The same brigade would have dozens of assets capable of sniping away observation drones without need for any dedicated air defence vehicle.

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

*: Proximity fusing may be preferable for this, but ordinary artillery proximity fuses meant to fuze a couple metres above ground don't work on air targets. Their safety feature keeps them from exploding before the zenith of the trajectory was passed.

Minimum army weapons set, revisited

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I like to cut things down to essentials, so I wrote in 2023 about a minimum weapons sset for an army. To have very few different weapons helps coping with the difficulties in procurement.

/2023/01/a-minimum-army-weapons-set-for.html

So, almost two and a half years more developments in the Russo-Ukrainian War, does the blog post hold up well (IMO)?

 

#1 hand grenade, a timeless classic

#2 rifle, a timeless classic

#3 (light) machinegun, infantry will go on strike if it only gets rifles

#4 HEDP rifle grenade, infantry will insist on having something to shoot into a window 50 m away and this is the simplest means unless you insist on firing many shots.

#5 short range anti-MBT weapon They're worthwhile, but don't deserve a "minimum" list entry according to my opinion as of today. Fibreoptic FPVs can fly so well around obstacles that they can engage well in areas with very short lines of sight, so we don't need weapons that excel in such places any more.

#6 Well, this was close to the fibreoptic FPV quadcopter, albeit I mentioned a rocket-propelled missile as representative (there were no fibreoptic FPV quadcopters yet). The increased agility, the hover ability and the ambush ability of fibreoptic FPV quadcopters are huges advantages, worth more than the speed loss compared to the missile. So I say the #6 entry would not be represented by a rather fast fibreoptic FPV quadcopter (with thermal channel)

#7 LMM is still quite expensive (~30k €) compared to some targets, so one should rather look at an even cheaper solution now. I don't happen to know a truly satisfactory one, though. Maybe one could trust #6+#10 and scratch #7?

#8 C-UAS RCWS,  absolutely, still a great take!

#9 wheeled 155 mm SPG This one is increasingly dubious until we learn to manage the drone threat at least at 20 km depth. Some reports indicate that towed guns dug in (even 105 mm) are better, it's almost safe to say that spending the same money on towed 155 mm L/52 with auxiliary propulsion rather than on 155 mm SPGs is better. Please note; I am a proponent of using PGM missile artillery, which was not included in the list because a "minimum" list has to assume air support.

#10 Tamir, still a great take (to deal with Shaheed, cruise missiles, GUMLRS-ish munitions, not as the Israelis do against ordinary Grad and homebuilt rockets). Don't buy Israeli, though. Build an analog.

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

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The "new" warfare in the Russo-Ukrainian War

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A string of twitter threads by different authors create an impression that this war is very different, kind of with different rules than previous wars, military doctrines from pre-2022 are obsolete now.

https://x.com/sambendett/status/1927076283000701067

https://x.com/GrandpaRoy2/status/1927714854351085928

https://x.com/Playfra0/status/1928183254089429005

https://x.com/GrandpaRoy2/status/1926930735266509094

I object.

 

Quite generally, when somebody claims that previous military theory is obsolete you should ask yourself what previous military theory this person knows about. You're nearly perfectly safe if you assume the answer is "very, very little" even if said person is a general.  Very few people dedicated much of thier lives tot he study of the art of war and people who learned some of it profesionally (such as generals) hardly ever learned much that goes beyond their own country's doctrine, and very little about how and why their county's doctrine came to be.

The drone war in Ukraine isn't terribly new. It's almost exactly a replay of the air war development 1911-1945, for example.

 

Yes, the kamikaze FPV threat is severe to up to 9 km depth, often extending to 20 km and rarely extending beyond that with almost none happening beyond 40 km depth against non-strategic targets.The long-established military term in English for this is "battlefield interdiction", and air forces aspire to do it not to 40 km depth, but to hundreds of kilometres depth.

To move yourself or goods to the front seems like running the gauntlet on the final 40 km and gets the worse the more close you are to the front? Does that sound all-new to you? Then you're not aware of the experience of the Japanese merchant marine trying to resupply distant island bases in the Pacific War or the experience of the German armed forces in France during June 1944, when the Northern French railway and airfield network was bombed to swiss cheese standards by the 9th Air Force. Do you think it's now that quadcopters are capable of cheap PGM-like precision attacks even on individuals? 8th Air Force fighters got bored in 1945 and began strafing individual bicyclists hundreds of kilometres away from frontlines in 1945.

What's "new" is that wer're in a brief "the bomber always gets through" pahaes during which there aren't enough counter-drone ("C-UAS") defences, so drones of BOTH SIDES are effective at battlefield interdiction instead of one side establishing low level air superiority/supremacy or both sides defending effectively to diminish the threat. That's about the situation we had in the very early 1930s when bombers were not slower than fighters.

All those improved fortifications, evolved through wartime experience? That's fortifications designed by amateurs who learned lessons by spending blood. There were VASTLY better field fortification schemes back in the 1950's already, but the overwehlming firepower of nukes didn't allow them to become very central to doctrines. Netting not just for concealment, but also for keeping drones out is new, but it's also pointless in face of the heaviest anti-trench munitions (bombs, TOS-1, napalm B).

Tanks get cages to keep FPV drones out? How is that conceptually different from cages to keep hand grenades out?

The frontline with up to 40 km battlefield interdiction poses a different challenge than pre-2022 warfare for breakthrough efforts? Sure, but is it really new, or worse? Breakthroughs against ready defenders were never easy, after all. I actually madke the case that the drone war situation is liberating in a way; suppose the FPV munitions are effective in a radius of 10 to 20 km. Traditional ATGMs were effective in a radius of 0.6 to 4 km mostly, with 2 km being a common practical limit in Ukrainian terrain. Now look at my (very) old text about repulsion and let it sink in. The increased radius of action actually liberates the attacker, he doesn't get channeled! Pre-2022 the same effort looked like this and it was the shorter rnage of the ATGMs that was slowing down the attacker. Now there's no such measures to limit losses to ATGMs. Attackers who would want to breakthrough could shout 'Damn the torpedoes, flank speed ahead!' and the breakthrough could be VERY quick if done well, which includes dealing with the WW2 revival band of mines, anti-tank ditches and gimped dragon's teeth as well as a fires plan that would make 1917's Bruchmüller proud.

I could go on, feel free to bring up true novelties in the comments. I have a hunch I'll reply with a military history analogy.

 

Patton was once asked about how he was such a good general and he replied (paraphrased) that nothing was really new to him during WW2. He knew everything from books already. Such students of military history and art people don't get fooled by fake novelty, but they are RARE.

Don't get fooled by people who claim novelty and impossibility because they don't know the past.

 

related:

https://defense-and-freedom.blogspot.com/2009/02/fact-check-military-hardware-novelty.html

https://defense-and-freedom.blogspot.com/2009/02/update-ugv-history.html

https://defense-and-freedom.blogspot.com/2015/05/another-fact-check-military-hardware.html 

https://defense-and-freedom.blogspot.com/2023/07/russian-fortifications-present-old.html

https://defense-and-freedom.blogspot.com/2025/05/c-uas-on-battlefield-at-very-low.html

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

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C-UAS on the battlefield at very low altitude

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/2017/08/very-low-level-air-defence-against.html

/2018/05/summary-modern-air-defences-for-europe.html

One might increase the rate of fire of a MG3 back to about 1,500 rpm and use a duplex cartridge (two bullets in one cartridge) for 3,000 bullets per minute rate of fire, 50 per second.*

 

All kinds of drones and most missiles would be hit very quickly and be stopped by such a volume of fire even from a single RCWS. The detection of drones might depend on a quickly rotating (~100 revolutions per minute) AESA radar with such lower power and (by radio band) such a high atmospheric attenuation that it senses drones out to no more than 400 m and cannot be triangulated from more than two kilometres away.

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

 

* 20 mm autocannons with simple HE-PD rounds would be an option for tanks, I dislike the specialised and expensive 30 mm autocannon with HE-PROX rounds solution. One might also stick with the duplex round MG3 approach as long as the tank has a coax gun of more powerful calibre, ideally a .338 chaingun.

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A mystery about FPVs and tanks

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The FPV (kamikaze drone) threat is by now well-known to those who paid much attention to what's going on in the Russo-Ukrianian War. Yet, there's a mystery that this war cannot tell us anything about:

What if there was a proper breakthrough and a proper exploitation of the same. Mounted forces roam deep and quickly, expoiting that they are not opposed properly. Would the FPV threat be iminished in such a situation, meaning that such exploitation forces need no great C-UAS defences? Or would the movement (dominantly along roads) create turkey shoot conditions for whatever FPV teams are in the area? Just let one drone rise to spot movements, then the turkey shoot begins?

Properly-planned standoff ECM support would rather not be available, after all.

 

And suppose it's neither extreme, but the FPVs still cause much damage; is the exploitation drive still 'worth it'?  Imagine a FPV unit doing one high value target kill per day during static trench warfare conditions, but ten per day during a four-day mobile phase being on the defender side. The FPV unit's lethality would be way up during the enemy's offenisve, but the harm it does might seem like acceptable losses if the breakthrough exploitation bags many prisoners of war, captures much material and conquers a city or two.

The pychological element may be decisive. A FPV unit may run in panic just as any other unit. Or maybe it doesn't - who knows? I suppose nobody, so we won't know until ther eis acutally mobile warfare again. More mobile than the Kharkiv offensive (which wa skinda slow) and more mobile than the Kursk offensive '24 (same). 

 

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

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Nonsensical German army structure

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I'll deliver a critique of the nonsensical German army structure. It's the same bollocks as we've had for a long time, they just evolve bollocks. The German army ceased to be serious about conventional warfare sometime in the early 90's and the nonsensical army structure that would have been impossible with the 1960's, 1970's crop of generals is a symptom of this non-seriousness.

I did this before

/2008/12/todays-10-panzerdivision-bundeswehr.html

/2015/10/critique-of-german-army-brigades.html

 

I'll use the easily accessed and easily readable structure graphic from Wikipedia.

(c) Noclador see here

 

I partially checked on the Bundeswehr website whether the Wikipedia graphic is correct and as a result didn't find the Panzerbrigade 45 as part of the 10. Panzerdivision. This brigade was formally founded only days ago, so I suppose the official website is simply out of date. Another deviation is that Panzerbrigade is and always was one word, while Wikipedia calls it "Panzer Brigade", same with Panzerdivision and some battalion names.

Sigh. Let's begin, from the left.

 

1. Panzerdivision, three brigades. two to four brigades is OK for a division. An issue is Panzerbrigade 21 that doesn't fit qualitatively, later more about that. There's no divisional logistics formation.

Panzerlehrbrigade 9. A "Lehr-" formation is traditionally for testing, demonstration and training in addition to being an actual combat formation. That's a German thing. So basically, let's treat it as a Panzerbrigade and ignore the "lehr" part for the purpose of this blog post. Two tank battalions, two mechanised infantry / Panzergrenadier battalions.That's a lot, especially a lot of tanks (nominally) for a brigade. A Panzerbrigade should have a 2:1 ratio between tank battalions and (mechanised) infantry battalions.* A 1:1 or 2:2 ratio suits a Panzergrenadierbrigade, but admittedly, the difference should not just be a difference of balance, but also of attitudes and tactical principles (Panzerbrigade being more dashing, while a Panzergrenadierbrigade rather moves from one solid standing to the next solid standing). Here's the big problem with this brigade: It has no artillery and no mortars. It's not a combined arms formation. There is a divisional artillery battalion, but that's no excuse. There's no engineer battalion. The Panzerlehrbrigade 9's structure is simply wrong.

Panzerbrigade 21. It isn't. There's no tank battalion, not even a mechanised infantry battalion. An armoured engineer battalion is the only trace of a mechanised kind of brigade - exactly the battalion that the Panzerlehrbrigade 9 misses! There are three Jägerbataillons (kinda motorised infantry battalions; wheeled APCs, so not really light infantry) in this brigade. So why the heck is it called a Panzerbrigade? It's a Jägerbrigade or Infanteriebrigade! Well, at least it has an artillery battalion (the artillery systems are AFVs, as we have no non-AFV artillery). So this kind of brigade doesn't necessarily belong into a Panzerdivision, but I understand a case could be made for it. A bad, but for defensive missions workable brigade design.

Panzergrenadierbrigade 41. No tank battalion and no artillery battalion, but three (!!!) mechanised infantry battalions. Now we see that the one divisional artillery battalion (a mixed self-propelled howitzers and multiple rocket launcher battalion IIRC) is not really enough for the two brigades that lack artillery, even if the divisional commander did assign it. The Panzergrenadierbrigade 41's structure is simply wrong.

 

10. Panzerdivision. Five brigades including the 13th Light brigade (Dutch), too many IMO. 

Panzerbrigade 12. Three tank battalions (one of which with a nonsensical 'mountain' designation, but it does use Leopard 2), two mechanised infantry battalions, artillery battalion, engineer battalion. Main criticism: It's way too big, unwieldy. This is more like two brigades in one. That's borderline acceptable for a Panzergrenadierbrigade, but a Panzerbrigade should be agile, and this one is agile only if it separates into at least two parts, for which there's no command and support structure present. A brigade commander should not lead more than four line of sight combat battalions (span of command). Also, this oversizing conceals that there's not enough artillery. There should be two artillery battalions for five line of sight combat battalions. The Panzerbrigade 12's structure is simply wrong.

Panzergrenadierbrigade 37. Four (!!!) mechanised infantry battalions, one tank battalion, one artillery battalion, one engineer battalion. Again too big. The Panzergrenadierbrigade 37's structure is wrong because it has at least one line of sight combat battalion too many, but I understand that some people would argue that today's staff sizes, signals equipment, battle management systems would permit a command span of five.

Panzerbrigade 45, the one to be based in Lithuania. Let's ignore this one, it's being raised. The structure as shown is acceptable, main criticism is the unusually weak (only a company) engineer support and the infantry weakness considering how much woodland is in Lithuania. I generally reject multinational formations (the brigade integrates a NATO multinational composite battalion) and I dislike it being stationed in Lithuania. For one, I reject the concept of tripwire forces and second, being stationed abroad badly hikes the personnel costs due to extra pay.

Franco-German Brigade, a mixed French-German brigade loaded with much symbolic value. As mentioned, I reject the concept of multinational brigades. That being said, it's a kind of infantry brigade and the mix of battalions is OK. 

 

Rapid forces division / Division Schnelle Kräfte. This is basically the Cold War cheat of the 12th division promised to NATO being a cheap airborne division, but the current crop of leadership at the MoD probably bought into their own propaganda. A para brigade, a mountain infantry brigade, a special forces command (size-wise a big battalion) and the helicopter forces (extremely shitty due to gold-plated yet extremely bad helicopter designs). A Dutch airmobile brigade actually belongs to this division as well. Marginal support formations.

Luftlandebrigade 1 (paras). Two para regiments, no artillery. The official website does not mention independent engineer and recon companies unlike Wikipedia. Main criticism: Airborne is bollocks, see Hostomel. Secondary criticism; no artillery is bollocks, too. This brigade is crap in conventional warfare. Most likely the brigade would (it certainly should) be reduced to an administrative staff, with the two regiments attached to 1. Panzerdivision and 10. Panzerdivision as divisional light infantry formations for woodland and settlement areas, requiring non-organic artillery support.

Gebirgsjägerbrigade 23 (mountain infantry bde). Three mountain infantry battalions, no artillery (Germany doesn't use pack howitzers anymore). The Gebirgsjägerbrigade 23's structure is simply wrong for lack of artillery.

 

Heimatschutzdivision with six Heimatschutzregimentern; this is basically an object security division, not meant for conventional warfare, but rather for guarding locations against sabotage and so on. It's also supporting allied forces in Germany or passing through Germany. Wrong, but this is due to lack of maintaining suitable artillery.

General remark: I didn't comment on the recon battalions so far. German recon is really more observation by now. Actual recon should be at higher echelon. 

All brigades are lacking proper air defence. There's simply no equipment for that in the German army, so it's not a brigade or division design issue, but a long term force development issue.

I understand that shortages of material, shortages of (having maintained) suitable training infrastructure for tank crews in certain areas, restrictions regarding where usable barracks are have influences the brigade layouts. Still, these on average appallingly bad brigade designs are damning for MoD leadership. Most importantly, these brigade designs show that there's no real concept of land warfare behind them.

 

We could have

• three agile tank brigades (tank bn + mech inf bn + arty bn)
• four all-round mechanised infantry brigades (tank bn + 2 mech inf bn + arty bn)
• two infantry brigades (3 infantry bn)
• three light infantry brigades (3 light infantry bn without APCs) 

All these would lack would be additional artillery for the latter five brigades (at 2...4.5 M € per howitzer and minimum 18 howitzers per brigade this would have been affordable; less than 1 billion € including periphery). There would be a clear repertoire portfolio and thus role set for each of these four brigade types. Instead, we have nine brigades, six of them without proper doctrine / ill-fitted to doctrine.

I believe this continued (I kept complaining since 2008 !!!) failure to set up a sensible army structure is not tolerable, not excusable, not forgivable. The German citizens gave the German armed forces much money during this time. Much of it was wasted on bollocks. Relatively small changes in big ticket procurement would have sufficed to enable a MUCH more sensible army structure, as I laid out above. Instead, we get one abomination after another. The German public doesn't wake up to this, but in my opinion the presumption of competence in favour of the ministry of defence and the top leadership of the army has to be thrown out. Competent people don't produce such abominations. I understand there are restrictions, but those restrictions are not an excuse after 17 years. Every single minister of defence in this period was crap, their ministry bureaucracy was crap, the army heads were crap. The distraction by the idiotic Afghanistan missions is no excuse either. We've left Afghanistan almost four years ago. That's plenty time to reorient an army towards conventional warfare IF COMPETENTS ARE IN CHARGE ! They had enough money, but they are too incompetent to use it well. This is but the structure; personnel system, equipment issues, maintenance issues, training issues abound as well.

related:

/2022/04/an-army-corps-for-germany-revised.html

/2023/04/a-compact-and-agile-exploitation-brigade.html

 

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

 

*: 1:1 was highly regarded among 1950's WW2 lessons learned literature, with stronger infantry battalions than today's. What I wrote here applies to German traditional terminology, in which a "Panzerbrigade" is tank-heavy.

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