Things that won't come back ... because they already did (Part I)

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Infantry guns

Infantry guns are not going to come back because shoulder-launched grenade weapons such as the M4 Carl Gustaf recoilless rifle and anti-tank guided missile launchers are used as direct fire infantry guns, and 120 mm mortars already began replacing infantry guns in the indirect fire role as early as in 1943 due to lower costs and greater effect.

The new M4 Carl Gustaf is  finally - after almost 70 years - not terribly heavy any more.

 

Transport gliders

first transport glider used in combat: DFS 230

Transport gliders won't come back ... because they already did in the form of self-steering cargo glide parachutes. There was even a hang glider-like transport glider prototype approx 15-20 years ago, but the collapsible wing principle of parafoils was even better.

example: JPAS

Tethered observation balloons

Tethered observation balloons allowed for visual detection of artillery batteries and other targets, and observation (thus also correction) of artillery fires. They were common during the First World War's trench fighting and already uncommon by the early Second World War. Artillery observation planes were expected to replace them during the Interwar Years, but they were largely a failure. Instead, STOL liaison aircraft such as Fi 156 and L-2 were occasionally used, if circumstances permitted their employment.

Now, who did it first? ;-)

The huge advantage of tethered systems over free-flying aerial drones is that you don't need the hardly reliable radio link. The use of a tethered observation drone at 150 m while the platform vehicle is moving does almost immunise against counterfires. You would need a fibre optic guided artillery missile to hit the vehicle on the move.

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

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"Stridsvagn 103 Was Not A Tank Destroyer"

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"The stridsvagn 103 was conceived as a tank, developed in response to a demand for a tank, and used as a tank. It was not a tank destroyer or a “defensive” vehicle. Repeated trials both in Sweden and abroad showed that in most cases it was insignificantly slower to react to a target appearing on its side than a turreted tank was. In fact, due to its duplicated controls (the commander could override the gunner/driver’s controls and, for example, point the tank at a target that he could see through his rotating cupola but the gunner/driver hadn’t spotted) it could even be faster to react than a turreted tank without similar functionality – the turreted tank’s commander would have to talk the gunner into finding the target. The inability to fire on the move was not considered a significant disadvantage considering the Swedish gunnery doctrine at the time."

 "Stridsvagn 103 Was Not A Tank Destroyer"

by

"some nerd who got sick of all the usual internet second-hand sources and wild speculation and just walked into the military archives one fine day to see what was in there"

I can recommend his blog "Swedish Tank Archives" in general if you are interested in Swedish tanknology, or in comparisons of Swedish tank with foreign ones.

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

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The difference between a MBT and an assault gun

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I've come up with a potentially useful definition:

It's an assault gun if what matters most for the commander is the ability to bring to bear heavy weaponry with protected mobility. It's a main battle tank if what matters most for the commander is the ability to keep advancing in face of much resistance.

An assault gun benefits the infantry with many 75-152 mm shells and with a supply of machinegun ammunition that can be brought to bear irrespective of small arms' suppressive fires.

An MBT meanwhile enables mobile warfare at high speeds where lesser-protected vehicles and infantry would be forced behind cover and concealment by opposing forces.

The widespread definition of an assault gun as a turretless AFV with a normal calibre casemate gun is correct from a military vehicle history point of view, but it doesn't help to understand the tactical domain. M4 Sherman tanks employed in tank-infantry teams (with four Shermans supporting a single platoon of infantry in clearing buildings, advancing on trenches and so on) should be understood to have been assault guns in the tactical sense.

M4 Sherman in tank-infantry team

This has far-reaching consequences, and makes it much easier to understand why some land forces use tanks for bold and rapid manoeuvre while others seem unable to do so, despite a large inventory of tanks. Some armies are preferring the assault gun / infantry tank approach, not the more demanding mobile mechanised warfare approach.

Germans did it too, especially Dec 1941 onwards.
Panzer IV in close to camera, assault gun StuG III in background.

This in turn changes greatly how their opponents need to prepare for defence. Assault guns / infantry tanks can be defeated easily with man-portable weapons and munitions by the infantry if they are available in the necessary quantity and quality. Emplaced mines do matter, and even somewhat sluggish artillery may be helpful.

Matilda Mk 2 tank - the archetypical infantry tank,
but only a special CS version had effective HE shells

Meanwhile, mobile mechanised warfare requires either constant attrition by skirmishing or counterconcentrations of anti-tank firepower. None other than highly responsive artillery will be of much help. A reconnaissance and surveillance effort has to inform the defenders. Mobile reserves are required. The mobile tank force would severe its connection with supporting assets, which will weaken it. Its air defences may be overcome by a focused SEAD effort, for example. It will no longer be able to expend as much artillery munitions as it was able to when its supply line was secure and it was able to call on friendly formations nearby.

At the same time, the defenders will be pushed into disorder, forced to evacuate some locations, and their defence must succeed embedded in this disorder.

Once again, the best deterrence and defence bang for the buck would be achieved if the training of the land forces is so good (because of doctrine, training areas, training times, operating budget, personnel system) AND visible (foreign observers of exercises) that both modes are mastered AND potential aggressors are aware of it.
The more highly potential aggressors think of your forces, the less you need of them. Up to a point, this also lowers the costs.*

related:

2010-06 Assault guns - past and future?

2016-09 Imbalanced combined arms

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

*: More about this later.

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"War is a Racket" (video)

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Bundeswehr garrisons

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The basing of Bundeswehr units and formations inside Germany was typically the one aspect of its post-1990 downsizing that garnered the most public attention. Suddenly, military bases were considered an economic factor to the (often times rural) region rather than a noise nuisance.

Insiders were most concerned about such plans and reforms as well, since it often meant that they had to move to a different place. Children had to be separated from friends at school, some older NCOs and officers who had hoped to not need to move another time short before retirement had purchased homes which needed to be sold (often at lower prices because regional demand dropped by thousands of housing units).

In short, politicians often wanted to keep "their" base, and soldiers often didn't like to move.

Many criteria were used to determine the future location of bases; among them party politics and the quality and capacity of housing and training areas. Still, some recently renovated or even new-built barracks were given up. Mountain infantry was obviously based in the deep south, close to the Alps.

One criterion didn't seem to be influential; proximity to the Eastern NATO frontier.

It would probably make sense to have all mechanised army forces and most Typhoon wings based in Eastern Germany. The Typhoons could conduct CAP over Poland and Lithuania with little or no aerial refuelling. The mechanised forces might arrive 8-16 hrs sooner at Warsaw than if based in West Germany. Air defence units of the Luftwaffe could be sited for near-immediate protection of said East German bases and Oder bridges upon an alarm.

Schools and the type conversion aircraft units would be fine in West Germany, same as most of the ammunition depots and an Tornado wild weasel and recce wing each.*

The actual distribution of Bundeswehr forces across Germany looks random by comparison, with even elements of single brigades scattered among multiple barracks.

German Army bases, October 2012, (c) TUBS

The Luftwaffe's tactical air wings are located as follows:

one in south

one in north

two in west

one in northwest

one in northeast

This leaves but one of them fairly close to Lithuania and to Poland's Eastern border. It's the wing for type conversion to Typhoon, thus partially a training outfit. The Northern one is a Tornado and UAV recce wing.

The Luftwaffe could surely re-deploy its combat aircraft in a day, but the ground crews and their equipment would likely need 12-24 hrs to become mission ready at a distant airbase, and then there would still be but one fully operational and likely overcrowded airbase in the East. Some airports and Cold War air bases in Eastern Germany and even Poland could be used as improvised airbases, but the Luftwaffe isn't really trained for pulling this off as quickly as in a few days.

In summary; the basing of the German military is in no way oriented at a timely defence (and thus deterrence) at NATO's Northeastern border, the least unlikely defence scenario area.

The Polish land forces aren't deployed this randomly. They're based according a pattern - a pattern that's more stupid than a random distribution would be.
They're mostly too close to Kaliningrad Oblast or really close to Germany (old Cold War bases, obviously) and thus poorly located for intervention in Lithuania or protection of Warsaw against a threat from the East:

Polish land forces basing (c) TUBS - this would make sense only
if they wanted to surprise attack both Russia and Germany at the same time.

It would make much sense to base the field formations of the Polish army close to Warsaw, (north of the Vistula river) and to base the air force at the German border instead of the army. That's not quite where they are, of course.

Militarily purposeful basing of forces is a skill that seems lost to European politicians**.

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

*: I suppose they couldn't be used to good effect in the first days of conflict anyway, and could thus first deploy to more forward bases in the case of crisis or war.
**: Similarly questionable base distributions can be found in many other European countries.

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Dominator M2/12 MRL

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DOMINATOR M2/12 multi-calibre modular trailer-mounted multiple launch rocket system (122 mm)

262 mm version

A salvo of 240 122 mm rockets fired within 30 seconds at up to 40 km range (unguided).

Alternatively, 16 262 mm rockets fired within 16 seconds with a range of 65 km range (unguided).

Imagine this being a project of the U.S.Army - the internet would go nuts about it, debating how awesome this is.

Instead, it's a Serbian MRL design and (even) I didn't really notice it until recently. It's been published in 2013, though.

This is one possible answer to the question what to do with tank transporter semi trailers once your tank battalions have been deployed in theatre. So far I always thought that those that can be spared from hauling disabled vehicles to repair shops or the industry could haul bulk supplies such as fuel or ammo instead.

A single MRL with the firepower of six normal calibre (not MLRS) MRLs is an interesting concept as well. It's kind of obscene in its own way.

edit August 2017:

Jobaria monster MRL from UAE

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

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Heavy SPAAGs for the 2020s?

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I wrote about the overlap between artillery, battlefield air defences and C-RAM before, but this time I'd like to focus on a tiny special case:

There's "SPG" (self-propelled gun) in "SPAAG" (self-propelled anti-air gun), maybe there's "SPAAG" in "SPG" as well?

Back last year I wrote in the table "potential" in the cell for "AGM (155 mm)" and "anti-air".

I did so because AGM had reportedly successfully been tested in the C-RAM role, that is shooting down some munition in the air. Well, if it can do so it would be able to hit some aircraft as well, right?

155 mm L/52 AGM, mounted on 8x8 Boxer vehicle

Modern 155 mm L/52 howitzers have about the same muzzle velocities as rifled cannons, so there's certainly no ballistic weakness. The heaviest and mostly prototype-like AAA (anti air artillery) of the Second World War was at around 150 mm calibre, but found not worthwhile compared to 76-128 mm guns. Heavy AAA went away after the 1950s because its projectiles weren't guided, and fast jet aircraft easily dodged the shots with minimal manoeuvres.

Well, nowadays guided projectiles have reached 155 mm howitzers, so that limitation was overcome. Heavy AAA can again hit aircraft at useful distances - though aircraft can easily fly higher.
There is now the possibility that artillery might - assuming dedicated fire control and ammunition - provide ShoRAD (short range air defence), and especially so past the effective ceiling of VShoRAD (very ...) including gun-only SPAAGs and towed light AAA (typically 14.5 to 40 mm calibre). SPGs could do so without adding as much additional personnel as would be required for dedicated ShoRAD missile units. This is relevant not only for the 155 mm calibre, but also for 105 mm artillery.

So there's another overlap that could possibly be a big change, and burden the artillery arm even more by mission diversification/creep.

This might still be interesting for small and not lavishly funded land forces that do not wish to procure dedicated systems such as RBS-23,  IRIS-T SL or Pantsir S-1/SA-22. The mere possibility that a brigade might reach and destroy a strike fighter at 20,000 ft already limits its freedom of action and thus effectiveness - even if the artillery force was actually busy with other missions and only had a few guided shells for the heavy SPAAG role anyway.

Additionally, SPGs could be used with "dumb" rounds and proximity fuses against simple aerial targets, such as transport aircraft and slow drones. This merely requires a proper rangefinding (laser rangefinder most likely, though classic optical rangefinding may suffice and most simple ranging radars could be used as well) and tracking (RADAR, LADAR/LIDAR, optical or IIR) as well as a nowadays almost negligible fire control computing effort.

Who could develop the required munition?

The Italian Leonardo-Finmeccanica (former OTO-Melara) is a prime candidate with its experience from its DART and VULCANO projects. DART proved their interest in guided munitions for heavy AAA. The French also showed some (abortive) interest in a guided anti-ship munition for their 100 mm naval guns (supposedly so; I never saw details about the project). The Chinese were rumoured to have guided 100 mm shell projects as well.

The U.S.Army might give it a try as well, but that should be ignored even if they did because they would have a too expensive round developed and then cancel it anyway.

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

P.S.: One example munition - assuming one doesn't use DART - could be a 155 mm discarding sabot round with 105 mm shell that spins slowly, has two rear-facing laser receivers for laser beam riding, three fins, a nose with minute charges for steering, laser proximity fuses and of course a versatile HE-fragmentation warhead that's suitable against glide bombs as much as against combat aircraft. The steering might be able to correct by several hundred metres in a 10 km flight.

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Imbalanced combined arms

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Infantry divisions - when they still existed for real, not in name only - were known for having the infantry as their main arm of manoeuvre and combat. All other arms (usually only artillery*, sometimes also armour* and aircraft*) were supporting arms, and tactics showed this. Beginning in 1915, artillery still proved to be the most deadly arm - even if meant to fulfil a supporting role only.

Armoured divisions were known for having armour as their main arm of manoeuvre and combat. All other arms were supporting arms. Again, artillery at times exceeded the lethality of the armour, but armour at times excelled more at taking prisoners than at killing. Then, again, the infantry was supporting and especially collecting those enemy soldiers who surrendered, for armour is much better at accepting surrenders than at guarding POWs.

massed employment of armour, 1940

Artillery was rarely the main  arm. This was mostly due to the difficulty of killing much with artillery if no manoeuvre drives the enemy troops out of their positions (which were chosen in part for survivability). Some notable exceptions were sieges in which fortifications were disabled or destroyed by artillery, shelling of marshalling areas and harassing fires. Some WWI and Soviet breakthrough battles were essentially orchestrations of huge artillery concentrations, but even then artillery was primarily the arm that enabled manoeuvre by infantry (and tanks), thus fulfilling a supporting role.
Modern artillery with its new-found precision could in theory reach farther out and be most lethal even to troops in fortifications, and would in both depend on infantry (as observers) or aircraft (again, as spotters) as supporting arms. There were armoured forward observation vehicles since about 1940, but I don't recall any use of their in which artillery was the main arm for an entire battle.

17th/18th century siege in Vauban's style: Artillery breaches and suppresses,
infantry digs forward, defenders usually surrender in time to avoid the final assault.

Finally, air power. It began as a supporting arm in 1914, included substantial ground attack against front-line troops by 1917, by 1920 it was for the first time the main arm in the Somaliland campaign and by 1923 it was used without notable supporting arms in the British air terror campaign ("air policing") in Iraq. The all-air power campaign against Yugoslavia in 1999 was no true first of its kind. Air power can make use of artillery (such as ATACMS missiles expended in 1991 Gulf War) and infantry (especially observers on the ground) as supporting arms, though both not at very great depths.

It is typical of medium-sized and large modern armed forces that they strive to be able to use any of the four principal arms as the primary arm, with others meeting the supporting role. At other times I called this behaviour the pursuit of a balanced mini army (in regard to small powers).

This isn't necessarily something that they achieve and sure it isn't easy in the first place.

Armour is typically preferred in mobile warfare, but getting the use of armour right above the level of companies is difficult. Peacetime training can be done well up to platoon level, training at mixed battalion level against equal or superior opposing forces is rather rare.
To employ armour as a truly swift force, taking no more than minutes of preparations before an assault, demands much of the command system and command culture, morale, communications and training in cooperation. There's little point to armour-centric approaches in Europe if hours of preparations are needed for an advance by four kilometres in face of any resistance. Armour-centric approaches are about mobile warfare.

Several NATO armies have a reputation for being rather sluggish with armoured forces. They do not seem to have mastered the employment of armour as the main arm, though they likely are proficient in using armour in a supporting (or equal) role in tank-infantry teams.**

I had to use some pictures to break up the desert of letters.

Even the most proud NATO armies may be largely incapable of using the infantry as the main arm, due to want of quantitative infantry strength. In many brigades the ratio between armoured fighting vehicles and infantrymen is between 1:5 and 1:10, resulting in a severe shortage of infantry - and this may worsen rapidly if infantry experiences a higher casualty rate than armour faces attrition during the first days of a campaign. Infantry as the main arm may in the first weeks of a conflict thus be limited to small engagements in most tank-unfriendly terrains.

Artillery as the primary arm is quite a challenge as well. The current structure of the German army includes so very few active artillery forces that it's impossible to us (on a large scale) without a prior mobilisation and training period of months. The underwhelming ammunition stocks prohibit artillery-centric operations as well. Artillery was at times the main arm in Afghanistan, though: Infantry was moving to contact, then cowered behind cover till artillery did hit the (often only assumed) enemy positions. Those were small actions, at most up to battalion size, though - hardly battles by historical standards. A combination of 90's tech guns with 2000's fire control and munitions doesn't suffice for an artillery-centric approach that hits most targets spotted by supporting arms*** if the quantity of guns and ammunition doesn't allow for it.

Air power as the primary arm is the most expensive approach. Helicopter-centric "air mechanisation" was never more than a pipe dream or a procurement racket in Europe. Bombing campaigns - their newest version being the aerial drone assassination campaign - are not challenging against defenceless targets, but an air power-centric approach to warfare in Europe against an aggressor that felt strong enough to attack you or your alliance is most dubious. NATO, for example, would face the Russian air force with its world-beating area air defences, short range air defences and quite respected fighter force in such a scenario. Only the USAF and USN would dare to assume that they could conduct such a campaign successfully.****

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A modern first rate military should have mastered more than one of these approaches. 
Sadly, the German military seems to be a master - on scales relevant to national or collective defence - only of the armour-centric version. We're lacking in (active) artillery and infantry, and I don't think that the rather neglected Tornado ECR force (and its ammunition supply!) suffices to enable an air power-centric approach in collective defence.
The German military wouldn't fight in its "traditional" way, of course; it would not fight alone or with weak allies only. Still, there's little reason to expect allied armies to contribute the necessary artillery or infantry power to enable any other than armour-centric approaches in the first weeks of conflict.
Air power-centric approaches are dubious at best during the first weeks; wearing down the missile supply and radar inventory of opposing air defences takes a while. We're largely lacking the long range artillery munition stocks to assist air power much.

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The ability to successfully fight battles with infantry-centric, armour-centric and artillery-centric approaches could be used as a metric for an army's preparedness for national and collective defence and for its value for deterrence.

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

*: For sake of simplicity I will use "artillery" for artillery, infantry guns and mortars and "armour" for all kinds of armoured fighting vehicles, including tanks, armoured cars, assault guns and tank destroyers in this article. Same for "air power"; this includes both fixed and rotary wing aviation.

**: Which is reminiscent of the typical U.S.Army tank-infantry team of 1944/45 and of assault gun tactics. 
***: This isn't so much about "artillery conquers, infantry occupies" as it's about delaying actions with minimised exposure for duel (line of sight combat) forces.

****: The USN's Super Hornet/Growler force is kind of the definition of how much air power the United States might need for defence purposes. All additional air power is excess, necessary -if at all - only for offensive purposes.

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[Blog] Comments

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This is not going to be a complaint about comments. Not even about the crazy Bosnian guy who posts up to  nine nonsense comments per day and didn't get any published for weeks.

Instead, I'd like to explain my participation in the comments, in order to avoid or eliminate misunderstandings.

I don't see discussions in the comments as a process for convincing anyone. People very rarely convince each other after opinions were formed. I can see very well that many unsupported opinions are offered in the comments that are logically incompatible with reasoning or even links in my article. This is normal; people very, very rarely change opinions.

Very often my comments are a kind of addition or clarification to the article, or corrections of record regarding (in my opinion) wrong information by some other commenter.

I know someone who took my mention of disagreement as a critique of supposedly insufficient ideological purity. That's never what I mean. I understand opinions differ, backgrounds differ, preferences differ - I'm merely putting in the time to publish my opinions and sources of choice based on my background and my preferences.

Oh, and another thing; me not commenting doesn't mean agreement, but at the same time I often do not comment because I agree anyway. This leads to comments of mine being much above proportional dissenting or critical. I simply don't see much virtue in posting comments about agreement. What would those be for? They wouldn't add a perspective or info, and thus be free of content.So don't be offended if all replies you get from me are dissenting ones. That still doesn't mean that I disagree more often than I agree.

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

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Putin's conflicts

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Occasionally, writers express the opinion that Putin is superior in foreign policy to Western governments. The list of reasons differs, and covers a wide range.

Let's look at this in some detail for once, instead of with half a line as at other times:

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Is he superior in foreign policy? Well, it depends - on whether he has achieved much. Honestly, I cannot see a single big success story of his in foreign policy. He has left some treaties and conquered Crimea (which is now going to be a leech on the Russian state and economy). He kept most CIS states kind of in line with Russia and prevented that all of Ukraine turned westward.

These very few and rather small successes are opposed to the costs; the economic costs of sanctions, the costs of the war in the Ukraine (and Chechnya, if  you count this as foreign policy), the (little) expenses of the war in Syria.

The balance leaves mostly symbolic successes and pathos as successes in my opinion; the illusion that Russia returned to something like the USSR's power and respect.

(more like "exploited" than "created")

Putin is fairly good (reckless) at starting or joining conflicts. He's not too shy to start a fire or to throw some more gasoline into fires.

Chechnya; this was essentially a fire in a closed room that he killed by flooding the room with gasoline. At some point there were more Russian security personnel (military and paramilitary) in Chechnya than civilians. Putin never solved this conflict; it rather went its course and eventually drowned. Chechen fighters keep causing trouble in many places, being displaced from Chechnya proper.

South Ossetia; Putin didn't solve any conflict there either. His short war over South Ossetia rather preserved the status quo ante of an unresolved secession conflict.

Abkhazia: Same here, Russia merely succeeded in keeping this open wound of Georgia open (another secession conflict).

Crimea: Yet another unresolved conflict, since the annexation hasn't been recognized by more than a few countries so far. Putin failed to at least give a real referendum a try. Instead, he held the likely rigged referendum that lacked international observers and thus carries no weight with non-allied foreign governments.

Donezk: It's fairly obvious that this is just another conflict that Putin wasn't able to end quickly, or with profit. In fact, it's still lingering and the economic sanctions and renewed political hostility of NATO and EU including neighbours of Russia were a hefty price for so far no gain whatsoever.

Syria: Putin seems to have succeeded in preserving the Assad regime and thus Russia's military base in Syria (which is of no value for its national defence). He didn't defeat daesh yet, nor even only the so-called FSA. Putin appears to lack a clear route to an end of the conflict just as do all other powers that meddle in it.

"It’s easy to start a war, but it’s always difficult to end with it"

Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus

"Every war is easy to start, but it is extremely difficult to finish"

Sallustius

Putin has no particular quality that enables Russia to profit of conflict more than Western politicians can do. He's just as unable to conclude a conflict in a desirable fashion.

There are differences in comparison to most Western politicians, though (not U.S., UK or French ones); ons is his willingness to start fires and to pour gasoline into them. Many Western politicians have learned about the benefits of cooperation (not CIS-style hegemony) and are rather seeking win-win deals. Exceptions are usually led by the relatively hawkish and more great power gaming-inclined politicians from the U.S.. France has its particular brand of interventionism, in which it somehow thinks of itself as the policeman of Sub-Saharan Africa.

Another difference is that unlike the cooperation-minded Western politicians Putin doesn't shy away from using force in an attempt to get what he wants. It's just that he -as almost everyone else - usually still fails at achieving desired end-states (which is why this method has become to unpopular).

Some time ago I mentioned that the West could have countered the Russian "force concentration" (a petty ~80,000 troops actually) on the Ukrainian border by deploying forces into Georgia. These forces could have threatened to destroy the Russian position in the Caucasus region (South Ossetia, Abkhazia, Berg-Karabagh conflicts) in absence of the Russian army forces. Putin would have been forced to react to this diversion by recalling about half of the troops from the Ukrainian border in order to stabilize the situation in the Caucasus region.

This would have been a fairly ordinary strategic move in the 19th or 18th century, but it was beyond the horizon of most Western politicians, obviously. Such a counter-escalation doesn't suit well to "War as last resort" attitudes and a general emphasis on avoiding war by being peaceful yourself. Such an extended tool set in which counter-escalation may actually save the peace and end up bringing de-escalation was simply not within their repertoire.

This points out the predictability of Western strategy; the Americans are obsessed with their pet region Near/Mid East and their phony war on errorism in general, and demonstrably largely incapable of quick reaction to anything Putin does. Some European governments are disrespectful enough to small powers to bomb or occupy them, but respectful enough of Russia to never be more escalating than non-violent sanctions and parades.

This leaves Putin much freedom of action. He can predict the primitive reactions (tripwire forces, show of force exercises, sanctions, angry statements to the press) to his actions and for some reason or another he often comes to the conclusion that starting or joining a conflict is still worth it. Except s far it really wasn't, for he is no von Bismarck at all. He's good at maintaining power in a stagnating, commodity-prices-depending kleptocracy, and reckless enough to play great power games - which he really isn't all that good at, since he doesn't know how to end the game with profit.

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

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