IT security for real

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Imagine your country's economy can be switched off by another country. Further imagine that also much of private life can be switched off by another country. Let's say that other country has half the voters flirting with fascism. Would you feel that this is an existential threat to your country and its sovereignty?

Well, we're de facto living this nightmare already.

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Every autoupdater for software is technically a backdoor through which the software company can change software on your computer.

Every operating system with an autoupdater function (hidden or overt) can take over the entire computer with ease, unstoppable by all security features. The same applies to server software.

Example: Microsoft could - compelled by the U.S. government or on its own - switch off the economy of Europe with malicious non-optional updates for the Windows operating system and the Windows server operating system. The latter could even erase most backup data. Operating systems can also permanently damage the computer hardware, turning a data loss into a catastrophic nationwide loss of computers.

I consider this an unacceptable vulnerability for government and economy, and very undesirable for the private sector.

To increase the robustness of a nation against such an attack is simple; move from trusted software to trustworthy software.

It would be easy to mandate that no federal government institution is permitted to purchase or install software that's not on a whitelist without a temporary waiver by a properly staffed and competent agency. The whitelisted software would all be certain open source software. Open source (source code visible to the public) alone is not good enough. You also need proper audits of the open source code, timely audits for patches, a regime how to handle extremely urgent hotfix patches and the audited and later not manipulated source code either has to be compiled directly or the installation-ready version has to be available from a secure and trustworthy source. For-profit software providers (this is feasible with open source software in some ways) would have to pay for the thorough security audits. This would incentivise them to create lean code (for cheaper audits), and lean code can more easily be kept safe than bloated code anyway.

This would effectively lead to offices running Linux and OpenOffice rather than MS Windows and MS Office. Both are available for free and would even save the government much money.

This IT security regime could diffuse to state governments and be extended (with enforcement) to selected businesses such as hospitals, infrastructure providers and arms industry. Further incentives to harden the economy against catastrophic IT sabotage could be non-mandatory and still effective, such as making companies liable in court for damages caused to others by their non-secure IT. This also includes liability for damages when you use outdated software commercially.

The multinational level (EU) can go even further, and force suppliers of software that runs on non-secure operating systems to offer a no higher-priced and no worse version of their software for a whitelisted operating system. This would help private users to migrate to secure operating systems and secure applications.

Likewise, hardware may be extremely insecure. It's very difficult (=expensive) to look into the logic of chips. Yet chips and other electronics components (which may include chips without seeming to do so) are a severe security hazard themselves. They may have non-removable functions that compromise security.

To increase the robustness of a nation against such an attack is simple; move from trusted hardware to trustworthy hardware.

This is less practical than with software, but at least critical government departments (including the military) and critical businesses (especially infrastructure providers) could move to whitelisted hardware, for which design plans are known and which has been produced in a trusted place (for Germany this would be Germany, for Luxembourg this would be most EU countries) based on those design plans. It's acceptable to lag behind in performance by a few years, most government computers do so anyway. The trusted production facility would thus not require the newest chip manufacturing technology. Again, a 100% implementation of such a security regime would be impossible. There would again be a need for an authority that can and does give temporary waivers, but not too liberally so.

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Next, encryption should be mandated for many activities, and this encryption should be based on a preferably quantum-proof encryption developed without interference by government spy agencies and their helpers. I mean encryption without intentional weaknesses. Furthermore, certain particularly sensitive communication (and archives) should feature one-time-pad encryption, which simply cannot be broken if done right. To establish such encryption standards and to enforce them through outlawing products that are in violation (with sellers forced to reimburse buyers fully), through inspections and fines and through legal liabilities would be feasible on the nation-state level.

- - - - -

The EU's talk about digital sovereignty is largely bollocks. They do so very little about security issues (and in fact multiple governments in the EU keep weakening security in order to be able to spy more easily themselves) that I have but one conclusion; their real motivation is not "digital sovereignty" or IT security, it's to deny the rent-seeking American software companies dozens of billions of turnover and profits. It's more of a transatlantic economic policy wrestling than an IT security initiative.

The EU might achieve all it wants to achieve with its "digital sovereignty" stuff and in the end MS could still switch the European economy off, and not just for a few days or weeks.

 

No invisible hand of markets establishes satisfactory IT security. We would require decisive action by politicians, and this is very largely (the software & encryption facets) feasible on the national level.

 

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

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A quick & dirty analysis of front-line combat in Ukraine

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The Russo-Ukrainian War has long taken the shape of a trench war, with an apparently somewhat flexible defence by the Ukrainians wherever there's no calm sector or water obstacle forming the front line.

The most entrenchments appear to be in use in the East, but there's also an established (albeit occasionally moving) front-line North and Northwest of Kherson and in the North near Charkiw.

 

I'd like to write a bit about my interpretation of what's going on.

 

(1) Indirect fires are the main killers, likely exceeding 80% of casualty generation. This is not entirely new, we saw that during 18th century sieges, during First World War trench battles, in the Normandy battle and some late Eastern Front battles of the Second World War. American indirect fires and air attacks combined also reached this much effect during the last phase of the Korean War.

Ukrainians are short on munitions and resort to especially (maybe mostly) precision attacks (including with dumb munitions), while Russians appear to usually use area fires (or simply widely dispersing weapons). 

The bird's view by drones appears to be a most important method for spotting with Cold War-ish artillery radars and ground-bound forward observers seemingly being less important (though this may be an incorrect impression due to a bias in availability of videos for publication).

(2) What's the infantry's job in all this?

First, read my old text on repulsion, please: 

https://defense-and-freedom.blogspot.com/2010/01/repulsion.html

The lethality of small arms and all the tacticool whizzbang about them doesn't matter much. The Ukrainians might be able to hold their lines just as well with Soviet WW2 weapons (machineguns, bolt action rifles, submachineguns). The poorly motivated Russian infantry isn't able to overcome certain all-too human things like survivability instinct on the attack. Their armour fails as well, despite reports of how fearsome the automatic 30 mm fires by large quantities of BMP-2/-3 can be.

The Ukrainians' ability to establish and largely hold front-lines despite the extremely long length of the front appears to be rooted in the susceptibility of low morale Russians to relatively little firepower.

Attacks bog down easily under such circumstances. I've read many WW2 infantry battle reports where a single sniper or a single light machinegun nest was able to stall a platoon-sized infantry attack that did not benefit from support by armour or smoke. 

So if your infantry can establish sufficient repulsion effect on the cheap and is backed-up by fire support that can accurately hit the attackers while they're fixed behind cover or flat on a field then you can indeed maintain a long front-line with little force density and moderate casualties of your own.

Ukraine appears to have what it takes to stop the current flawed Russian ground forces at acceptable losses, but offensive success requires that they be able to mass up somewhat (line of sight combat strength AND support!) and find ways to make Russian defences crumble. That should be possible, but it would look much different from what was reported so far from the Kherson front where Ukrainian advances do not appear to have overwhelmed any major Russian forces.

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

 

P.S.: This is a good opportunity for a reminder that people who think they can overthrow a Western government with mere small arms and improvised explosives are idiots. Infantry without at the very least 60 mm mortars and anti-tank weapons cannot achieve anything of significance.

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Battalion battlegroups and front-lines

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Tanks had mixed success in the First World War, but they showed much promise and European armies and military theoreticians pondered during the 1920's how best to organise and employ tank forces. The epitome of this process was the Panzerdivision / armour division with hundreds of tanks and between 10,000 and 20,000 personnel. These divisions were successful when employed as a whole, but operational success required more than just one division; a whole corps of at least two fully motorised divisions.

Operations in WW2 also showed that these divisions were behemoths that were difficult to lead. German Panzerdivision commanders often reduced themselves to a leader of a much smaller vanguard, while their chief of staff somehow organised that the bulk of the division follows the vanguard.

The later much-reduced (nominally and by lack of replacements) Panzerdivisionen were much easier to use and the well-replenished American divisions employed regimental combat teams similar to modern-time brigades to overcome the excessive size of the division during operations.

Brigades became a NATO standard during the Cold War, in part based on German experiments in the late 50's. We still have many divisions, but it's widely understood that divisions are too clumsy for operational manoeuvre. In fact, sometime in the late Cold War or 90's even the brigade became regarded as too clumsy and the (mixed) battalion battlegroup became the key manoeuvre element, comprising usually only one tank company. Organisation for training was usually kept pure (whole battalion being tanks OR infantry OR artillery), and expected wartime structure  in non-desert terrain would be a mixed ad hoc battlegroup with one or two tank companies, one or two infantry companies, maybe an artillery battery or two and some more support (a total of about 1,000 men and about 100 vehicles). Some peacetime exercises and experiments even went farther and worked with mixed company-sized battlegroups.

There's just one problem with this trend towards smaller manoeuvre elements; It's well-understood from military history that you sometimes need about 50 tanks for a successful true tank-like offensive action. To disperse tanks in smaller packages largely reduces their repertoire against 1st or 2nd rate opposition to fire support guns for infantry; assault guns.

It is thus absolutely necessary for operational success to temporarily mass multiple battlegroups for a combined attack on one opposing forces element (such as a battalion or brigade) or simply for breakthrough against a defensive line.

The Russians appear to not try this any more. A possible explanation is that their (and our!) force structure is the problem: They cover a long front-line, and have mostly mechanised forces to do so. Operational art is in large part about forming and using reserves, but the Russians are stretched so thin that their forces for operational manoeuvre are actually pinned down as line troops along a long front-line: A task for infantry with artillery support, instead done by heavily mechanised forces that need to have their BMP IFVs and other armoured vehicles far forward with their few infantrymen. The AFV fleet suffers a slow yet steady attrition while being exposed like this, without achieving any operational breakthroughs or even exploitations.

It appears that this force structure is fundamentally flawed. The Russo-Ukrainian War shows that front-lines are in fact possible against Russian armed forces that perform at the lower boundary of what was previously thought possible. I myself did not expect this and wrote for years about how front-lines could not happen for lack of troops. Well, the Ukrainians simply mobilised enough troops, dug in and somehow this suffices against the thinly-spread Russian forces.

So let's summarise:

The operational impotence of the Russian land forces may be temporary and end when they free mechanised forces for operational reserves by either shortening the front-line or by introducing large quantities of artillery-backed infantry.

The land forces structures in NATO are unsuitable for the kind of stationary conflict we see in Ukraine, and their only hope of doing much better art of war-wise is to succeed in mobile warfare without front-lines.

Operational manoeuvre against combat-ready opposition is still only possible with local superiority, the historical rule of thumb regarding massing of tanks seems to still apply.

 

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

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Infantry picket evacuation

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This screenshot shows a random, yet fairly representative area in Eastern Ukraine. You can enlarge it by clicking.

The fields are large, typical of Eastern European industrialised agriculture (a legacy of Soviet-era land reform). The monoculture fields are separated by treelines / hedgerows. The red line measures a distance between two such treelines; about 1.5 km. It would typically be anything from about 500 m to about 2 km (diagonally more).

An obvious conclusion is that ATGMs absolutely don't need more than 2.5 km range unless you have a great vantage point (a roof) or a mast-mounted ATGM launcher and sensor. The line of sight is rarely if ever longer than that.

 

The defensive posture

Infantry can either dig in in those fields (the treelines would not hide large trench networks and their roots are an obstacle to digging) for fairly well-protected real and decoy positions or you could use a more stealthy approach and hide in the treelines with likely less (not necessarily no) cover.

 

Such positions should be manned enough for full surveillance of the area of responsibility day and night, for maintaining radio and/or cable comms, for accurately and competently calling for indirect fires, for accurate single shots at dispersed infantrymen, for high volume of fire against large groups of infantrymen and for deterring armour action with effective anti-armour weapons. The idea is that they should be able to fend off weak probing attacks and scouts and protect themselves against infiltration attacks. The defenders should not be strong enough to defend against powerful attacks, for this would require and thus expose too many men to artillery fires (too high attrition). The forwardmost line should be a picket line.

In short, such a 1.5 km treeline should be occupied by at one or two not unusually large infantry platoons. This assumes a defence-in-depth front-line, of course. A single fire team, LRS team, sniper team or AFV crew (with vehicle) might satisfy in mobile warfare.

The problem

So what would such platoons do when they come under pre-planned artillery and mortar fires? The textbook answer* for holding ground is to fall back to a secondary position during the fires, and to return to the original position before the enemy reaches it with tanks and/or infantry. The textbook answer for delaying actions is to fall back as well, and prepare to fight in the secondary position, rinse repeat. Variations are possible and likely, but it's fairly obvious that leaving a long-detected position in face of destructive fires is a smart, self-preserving move.

Yet how to do this? Infantry needs 10+ minutes for a 1.5 km cross-field run with equipment, more if the field has much vegetation. To run in the open exposes the infantry to spotting by aerial platforms that can see past the treelines.

The distance is too great to hide the moving infantry with smoke (and it takes too much munition to maintain smoke that blocks thermal cameras for long). The smoke might furthermore benefit an ongoing infantry & armour attack by the enemy and make it harder to get the timing for returning to the original treeline right.

Substantial entrenchments (cover, not necessarily fighting positions) every 200...300 m would help, but that would require much work for a long time, or expose much personnel to hostile artillery fires during construction.

Survivability could be enhanced by offering battlefield taxi service, such as by tracked armoured personnel carriers. The downside is that sending such vehicles into such a risky situation is materially unsustainable. Vehicle losses would occur frequently.

The APC would also need to hide fairly far forward (maybe 3 km back only, in range of even 120 mm mortars), which would expose it to detection, identification and finally to destruction by artillery, mortars or drones. So battlefield taxis sound like a solution for a brief conflict and for a long conflict with mass production of cheap and simple APCs only.

 

A solution?

It appears that those forward troops need some kind of motorisation, preferably some motor vehicles that can be hidden very well, might be parked in shallow dugout for fragmentation-protection and should keep moving when perforated a bit.

The conclusion is thus that maybe this 'line' infantry on picket or platoon strongpoint duty requires either very compact motorcycles or ATVs or something akin to the original Jeep (a small 4x4 vehicle).

None of this would cope well with any form of trench or wire fence, so enough routes would need to be prepared, with marked gaps in such non-military obstacles.

There are several models of compact 2x2 motorcycles with relatively little power, small diameter fat tires and modest top speed out there. The Rokon is the archetype. Their low weight and low weight would make them a good fit, but this is not a solution for having passengers in a stressful ride under fire. So this might at most suit very small teams, as you need one per man. These motorcycles should also not be considered a practical solution for self-deployment over long distances. Such motorcycles require no extra driving license (in Germany), the car driving license and a few training hours are enough (legally).

 

Next, let's consider ATVs. The image shows an untypical ATV, as it is tracked similar to snowmobiles and it's lightly armoured (though not much to the benefit of the users). Two men per vehicle seems optimistic, albeit possible. Again, routine self-deployability is limited to short distances (I'm thinking of less than 100 km, with this tracked one maybe less than 50 km). The vehicle is a lot harder to hide, certainly much harder to protect by giving it its own hull down dugout with ramp.

I understand that ATVs are popular with infantry, but I don't feel that this is the way to go for the tactical problem of this topic.

 

Finally, let's ignore modern ergonomics milspec standards and remember that numerous cars have shown that 3.5 to 3.75 m length suffice for four seats. That does not offer much comfort for tall men on the rear seats, but it's doable. A compact 4x4 vehicle of 3.75x1.6 m size could transport four men and the overall height could be as low as 1 m (with variable height suspension, when parked) while having enough ground clearance for offroad-driving.

A certain ATV/buggy and the M151 come close to this notional vehicle.

This is vastly more promising than the aforementioned 'fun vehicles' because the ratio between driver and total men onboard is radically better. This enables to hide the vehicles not in the front row, but in the 2nd or 3rd treeline/hedgerow. A driver could then provide a battletaxi service for three men from the front row. The self-deployability seems better, albeit preferably with no more than two men onboard.

A question remains: Who is crazy enough to drive an open vehicle towards artillery fires?

Maybe high tech helps solve the dilemma?

A solution might be to delete the battletaxi driver. This boosts the passenger capacity by one per vehicle anyway. A self-driving (or optionally remotely piloted vehicle with self-driving as backup capability) could be hidden in relative safety in 2nd or 3rd row, be called forward without risking a driver's life and then be used for moving 500 m...2 km where the men break contact and send the vehicles back where some other troops take care of them (hiding them again, updating their inertial navigation system and such). This does de facto preclude all two-wheeled vehicles, but ATVs, buggies and compact jeeps might work.

Such RPV/self-driving vehicles could also be used for casualty evacuation, for bringing supplies forward, for laying simple smoke walls (diesel fuel-evaporating smoke generator) and of course for routine exchange of crews between rear and forward positions. They might also be used to provide electric power as generators, to provide power for machinery to aid in preparing positions and more.

They would horribly extend any road march convoy with their low capacity per vehicle, though. An answer to that might be to transport them on logistic vehicles, which comes at a price, but also largely renders the self-deployability point moot.

Such unprotected or marginally protected vehicles would present less valuable targets than a real APC, would  be easier to hide (though also more numerous) and most importantly, they would be easier to replace. The latter is particularly true if one simply adapts existing civilian 4x4 cars by removing the roof and other parts.

Then again,

the Ukrainians appear to suffer less than 200 KIA per day while under intense Russian fires. That's actually a very low rate of attrition relative to the size of the country. Ukraine has millions of men fit for military service, maybe two million in a decent age for infantry. 70,000 KIA per year won't bleed it white. So how do they do it? Are Russian fires actually survivable in the trenches (that was not the sentiment in 1944)? Are the Russians using creeping barrages that can be evaded? Are the Russians incapable of hitting infantry slowly evading on foot? 

One thing is for sure; they suffer (relatively) tolerable attrition rates without any self-driving battletaxis.

I do suppose their forwardmost infantry might like having some, though.

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

 

*: A good historical study on this is here.

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Actual artillery battle

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There is often a huge difference between peacetime theory (+ practicing) and wartime reality. 

Armies are known to diverge from staying true to how war really is within three years after a war (= a not very widely used rule of thumb), and the gap between theory and reality is the greatest when much time has passed since theory was tested in battle, and new features were introduced.

Artillery as we knew it from the past about 30 years in the West appears to only remotely resemble what's going on in Ukraine. Our Western model of artillery in action was presumably proved to some degree during beating up Iraqi forces, but Eastern Europe doesn't appear to be bound by this evidence.

 

So what do I consider the Western model of artillery employment of the past 30 years? And what appears to go on in Ukraine (in red cursive)?

multiple rounds simultaneous impact for surprise effect lethality 

What is MRSI?

much use of DPICM (until the cluster munitions ban)

RU and UKR didn't ratify the ban, but DPICM employment is almost never seen on footage

DPICM is the primary anti-tank artillery munition

HE shells mess up AFVs by the hundreds, no footage of DPICM killing an AFV.

shoot & scoot to survive counterfires

even towed artillery pieces are in use at the front for months, no footage of shoot & scoot by SPGs

artillery shell purchases in the ten thousands

RU expends about 20,000 shells (and rockets) per day, supposedly has millions in storage

quality multifunctional fuses including RF proximity fusing for above-ground fusing for maximum lethality

RF PROX fusing never seen on footage, lots of craters from point-detonating shells, UKR troops largely survive in trenches without overhead cover

GPS and other navigation aids permit dispersed battery operations, guns can be alone in firing position

footage shows towed howitzers and non-improvised multiple rocket launchers always in battery formation

suppressive fires with HE shells support infantry and armour attacks

UKR: We have no munitions to spare for that.

Range is super important, let's enlarge the chamber volume and lengthen the barrel!

122 mm and 152 mm SPGs get busted alike, towed 152 / 155 mm guns survive for months, UKR uses unguided artillery with such precision that either the footage has an extreme selection bias or the fires weren't from far away. Only guided munitions appear to make good use of extreme range (Tochka-U, GUMLRS, possibly Excalibur)

smoke munitions provide concealment for troops movements on the battlefield

footage: Smoke? You mean burning wheat fields and grass?

mil spec hardware (including battlefield radios) and software older than some of its users used for fire support command control communications networks to digitally relay requests for fire to firing units

UKR: We got some apps running on civilian portable electronics and some American billionnaire gave us some cool satellite communications equipment that was meant for yachts and off-grid homes

RU: What are fire support command control communications networks? 

Russia considers artillery to be the king of the battlefield

RU: Look, we're almost as good at using artillery as in 1944! Pre-planned area fires and almost no responsiveness to infantry's calls for help.

Troops need to be trained for long and kept in active service for years to be effective.

UKR: We just mobilised a couple hundred thousand men and sent them to the front. That guy who  we sent to receive training on PzH 2000 in Germany is now hitting targets with it while sitting in it with beach sandals on his feet.

Artillery fights for supremacy by duelling artillery with radar-supported counterfires

Yeah, Russia loses about two arty pieces per day, but that's among many hundreds total and some kills were by air attack.

munitions are palletised and handled much with machinery (cranes and other load handling equipment mounted on logistic vehicles)

RU: Crane, yes, I recognise that reference. How does it relate to artillery? And what is load handling equipment?

In other words; save for HIMARS/GUMLRS we in European NATO could have our 1970's artillery arsenal in service and combine it with an app and consumer electronics and would be better-off than we're now. We kinda got the use of drones as flying artillery observation aircraft in WWI/WWII style right, but were not decisive enough to buy enough drones.

Most Western efforts on artillery of the last 30 to 40 years look like nonsensical circle jerking in retrospect. We neglected what's important (munitions quantity), overestimated the threat's quality and didn't go all in on what we actually got right.

You will not read that in publications of armed services in NATO, veterans' or reservists' associations, industry journals or the various milporn journals.

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

P.S.: Maybe someone knows footage that does not adhere to what I wrote here. I can only write on basis of what I've seen as I'm a one man show.

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80/20 for defence

 

For years my go-to approach for deterrence & defence was tailored to the "NATO defends Baltic members against Russia" scenario with few exceptions, and I understand this may seem a bit overspecialised. The current art of war has many features different for different conflicts.

Key assumptions of that scenario were that

• Russian armed forces are not total crap, they have hidden aces up the sleeve
• Geographically close active army forces would need to respond very quickly to stem the tide in the first about two weeks
• Active armed forces from all over NATO would trickle in and leave Russian armed forces hopelessly inferior in-theatre
• No real mobilisation with newly-formed army formations would be necessary, as NATO is conventionally vastly superior to Russia.
  

I wrote a couple times that the 100% high end approach of modern armed forces is nonsense, armies were historically a mix of few high quality troops (say, knights) and vast majority of lower quality troops (sergeants, levies, squires). 1940 Germany had about 15% high quality divisions in its army and 85% infantry divisions that were not much different from WWI infantry divisions, and some of these were utter crap and good for no more than occupying or guarding coasts.

Ukraine's defence hows something similar; the active army and the active national guard formations existing since 2014 or 2015 (or some forerunner warband existing then) are the core of the land forces, but the bulk does not seem to be the mobilised territorial forces; overwhelmingly infantry and lightly equipped support forces.

I advocated for a volunteer militia that provides an expanded basic training to build a large pool of reservists in peace time despite a volunteer military. The biggest obstacle to this is an unhealthy fixation on peacetime strength of land forces when mobilised strength is what really matters.

The Pareto-ish 20% high 80% low mix proved successful because it's efficient in a world of scarce resources and sufficient motivation. 

The Ukraine War has shown that against today's Russian land forces it is very much possible to establish front lines and to survive sufficiently well in face of their artillery with an elastic defence in-depth. This piece of evidence changes much. It shows a path towards a much more cost-efficient and in fact much lower-cost NATO land defence. Yes, lower cost. To call for more military spending in the mightiest military alliance ever because the only serious threat is embarrassing and disarming itself in a war with a single secondary power is mindboggingly primitive, stupid, idiotic, illogical.

So basically we could reduce our active armies (Germany could easily make do with four well-rounded mechanised brigades, for example) and still provide the 20% "high expense" portion (the current paper tiger forces don't deserve to be considered high end). The 80% "low expense" portion could be 

(1) Militia infantry battalions (volunteers, maybe in frontier states conscripts) with 6 months of training for enlisted, 12 months for junior NCOs, 18 months for junior officers and senior NCOs and senior officers trained in active forces. This militia would at the same time provide the basic training and recruitment channel for the active army.

(2) Militia support regiments for certain support services with greater than 10 km radius of effect. These support regiments might include older (35+) militiamen, but more importantly it would require more specialised and centralised training. I still don't see why enlisted personnel would need more than 12 months of basic service for these, though.

These training time frames may seem alien to anyone who is used to how 'business' is done in our armed forces. They're not alien to students of military history. The Americans raised "90 day wonders" in WW2, 2nd lieutenants trained a mere 90 days. Germany understood in WW2 that proper infantry training requires six months, but it did send many recruits with only six weeks of infantry training to the front, later reduced to something like six days, but those were clearly useless. Medieval levies and renaissance mercenaries had mere months of training. Even 18th century regular army cavalrymen were supposed to be proficient after one season (six months; no riding in wintertime and until the underfed horses regained strength in spring) of training.

Do you know who is absolutely disgusted by this concept? Active army senior NCOs and officers whose paycheck and prestige depends on pretending that troops only become useful after two years of training and peacetime military strength is what they're interest in, not deterrence & defence.

Anyway, I may flesh out this idea in later blog posts, with some mentioning of hardware to make visible that the costs could indeed be kept very affordable.

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

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The mirror Putin law

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Putin's pretence that the war of aggression / war of intended conquest against Ukraine is no war was ridiculed much, but it's a very serious thing. Some Russians go to jail for years because they publicly called it a war.

We should not forget that the attempt to suppress domestic dissent against warfare by denying war is war is not specific to this instance. The Korean War was called (counter to customs and the intent of the U.S. constitution) not a declared war and called a "police action" by the U.S..

Many politicians in the West have ever since played games with soldiers' and civilians' lives at no expense to themselves, and without proper political backlash by pretending that war isn't war.

I propose we get a "mirror Putin" law that criminalises for politicians to not call a war a war, and give anyone the right to go to court to prosecute (and deny the Generalbundesanwalt in Germany the right to take over the case, so it cannot kill off the prosecution). Sure, hundreds of politicians would still enjoy parliamentary immunity, but politically obedient state attorneys could not protect them and the cases would linger without statute of limitations counting down. Lying warmongers would fear to be delivered to justice, even if they stay in parliament (a changed majority after an election might lead to a nullification of their immunity). It would be a Sword of Damocles that might protect us from lies that make it easier for warmongers to launch and keep going stupid small wars.

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

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Threat country ranking for Germany (top 5) (2022)

 

Germany is very safe these days. My normal check list

1. Will we get blockaded?
2. Will we get bombed?
3. Will we get invaded?
   

is almost completely unrealistic. Germany is almost certainly not even part of the most feverish Russian Empire restoration dreams of anyone with power in Russia.

To still participate in alliances is similar to why countries such as Portugal or Luxembourg participate:

• solidify a sense of European-North American commonality
• contribute to Western cooperation
• collective security as a means to maintain buffers and to keep friendly Eastern neighbours from being forced into an exploitation scheme similar to COMECON
  
• laziness and path dependency
  

I suspect an additional intent to misuse/abuse alliances for military adventure gaming, but that's not the topic this time.

So the military threats to Germany directly are marginal. Still, there are scenarios how certain countries can inflict great harm on Germany, and I will attempt to rank them.

First, let's remember the concept of expectation value, which is probability of an event multiplied with its importance (probability of something bad happening times how bad it would be). I bring this up because I anticipate that people will disagree with my ranking on grounds of low probabilities, while I attempt to pay attention to expectation value of harm, so the severity of the harmful event is of equal importance as the probability.

So, this is the ranking, and no, without further explanation you will not understand me correctly on this:

1. Russian Federation
   
2. United States of America
3. People's Republic of China
4. India
5. Israel 
   

Now to the explanations:

#1, Russian Federation (with its appendix Belarus)

This threat is fairly simple.

• Russia can attack NATO/EU allies and thus force Germany into a direct war,
• it can cause economic damage (it actually already does so with de facto cyber war and economic war, albeit of course we do also kind of wage economic warfare on them via the EU trade restrictions),
• it might affect Germany indirectly with radioactive fallout (I suppose a direct attack is too unrealistic to warrant attention),
• it's known to exploit far right wing and other idiots (including the far left) inside Germany to undermine our democracy and promote internal distrust, paralysis and unrest.
• It's the official threat, geographically close, there's a history of (always unnecessary) conflict with Russia and even politicians in power talk occasionally about how one has to be careful to avoid a shooting war with them.
  

#2, United States of America

This does beg the question why the U.S. would possibly harm us intentionally. The simple answer is it already turned 80% Fascist recently, just barely withdrew from that and I think there's a 30% probability that it will complete the move towards a Fascist dictatorship / 'controlled democracy' within the next ten years (maybe five). Moreover, the United States have already shown (and not just by Fascist politicians) a willingness to wage economic war against Germany by its attempt to blackmail us into a specific policy change (giving up North Stream 2). Regardless of how sensible that move would have been; it was up to us and the extreme efforts and economic warfare waged were extremely disrespectful of German sovereignty, which the Americans were used to ignore because it did not really exist until 1990. The U.S. also has a history of bullying and economic warfare, so this is totally in their tool set.*

There are multiple ways how they could inflict harm on Germany. The two most extreme ones are

• They can basically switch off the German economy and government by backdoors in Microsoft software alone. Nothing more is needed really. In case you wonder how I can be sure about the existence of backdoors: Every autoupdater function in software is a backdoor technically, period. They have many options for less extreme forms of economic warfare.
  
• A fully Fascist U.S. might side with Russia as its wannabe dictator already did in the past. In the most extreme scenario continental Europe might face a barrage of thousands of cruise missiles and air attacks from carrier battle groups (this is rather a scenario for the 2030's, as it would require much propaganda preparation for such a move).
• Additionally, their idiotic economic policies habitually create business cycles of boom-bust that do by the very large size of their economy and through trade and financial system connections cause economic disruptions and even recessions in Germany as well.** This is not a security policy threat, of course.
  

#3, People's Republic of China

An intense conflict with the PRC could be launched both as a side effect of a Pacific War between the PRC and U.S. and as an effort to enforce Chinese intents of influence sphere expansion and economic expansion.

• They could cease export of rare earths and other key goods as a means of economic warfare,
• they could affect Germany indirectly by radioactive fallout,
• they could drag Germany into a Pacific War by bombing North American soil,
  
• they could wage economic warfare through 'cyber warfare', using backdoors and known/intentional non-patchable vulnerabilities of Chinese-made internet-connected electronics. The issue of the security of Huawei internet infrastructure electronics was raised in the past years.

#4, India

I do not suppose that India is a direct threat, albeit things can change. India's current cuddling with Putin's Russia sure is not encouraging to us.

The Hindu-nationalist government is on a confrontation and escalation course with domestic Muslims and Pakistan. This may lead to a thermonuclear war on their subcontinent. The probability is very low, but existing and the damage even to Germany could be extreme. This hypothetical conflict is the primary scenario for theoretical studies of nuclear winter nowadays.

I consider mostly the possibility of radioactive fallout (much more radiation than in the other mentioned scenarios) and nuclear winter-induced famine risk to be a possible harm to Germany, but even a limited thermonuclear war on the Indian subcontinent would certainly have severe consequences for Germany.

An India that closely aligns with Russia could add to the threat that Russia poses (see #1).

#5, Israel

So basically there's an apartheid government that waged a war of aggression and conquest and is despite numerous efforts of the United Nations still keeping territories illegally occupied and is colonising them. This government is armed to the teeth including a sizeable air force and has nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles that can easily reach Europe. Many of their people have a kind of aversion against Germany and ethnic Germans in particular and can easily be motivated to scapegoat us. It's astonishing that this is not widely considered to be a threat country, it seems an inescapable conclusion to me, albeit maybe one for chats behind closed doors.*

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

*: I think it's incorrect to scratch a country from a threat list only because relations are fine and peaceful NOW.

**: Post-WW2 Germany does not create severe recessions on its own, but it's importing them through trade. 

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Reappraisal of U.S.Army brigades

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Back in 2016 I wrote negatively about U.S.Army brigades, pointing out certain cornerstone equipment deficiencies. 

/2016/07/fixing-us-army-brigades.html

/2016/06/the-us-army-combat-brigades-usefulness.html

                     

This requires a makeover in light of what we learned from the Russo-Ukrainian War so far.

 

Hardware: Tube Artillery

 

It turned out that maybe extreme range with dumb rounds is maybe not so important as the improved accuracy and dispersion of post-Cold War tube artillery. Some M777s were destroyed by counter-artillery fires in Ukraine, but so were many (tracked) self-propelled guns as well. I still dislike the M777 thoroughly, but towed 155 mm L/39 now looks more like an acceptable budget solution for tube artillery (although M777 is not cheap because of weight reduction efforts) than like something near-useless.

Hardware: Short range AT

I stick with what I wrote albeit the lessons in the next category greatly reduce the issue in this one.

Hardware: Long-range AT

So it turned out that the Soviets were able to counter Western ATGM generations within 10...1.5 years (see ERA, Shtora, Drozd countering the SACLOS ATGM generation), but the Russians cannot do the same in 25 years or more (Javelin is from mid-90's, its concept was public knowledge in the 80's). This was a huge surprise to me, I was sure they had an ace in the sleeve. Javelin still works because the Russians apparently suck at countering publicly known Western military technology.

The U.S.Army's anti-tank firepower is thus fine for now, even without main battle tanks present.

Structure: Heavy BCT

 

The text is still fine there.

 

Structure: Medium BCT

 

It turns out that the medium BCT is fairly well-suited to the kind of fighting in the Donbass, until its artillery is consumed. Infantry holds a line by manning and defending pickets/observation posts, artillery picks on targets with accurate fires. The Medium BCT may be a bit short on aerial observation platforms for artillery spotting. The bigger issue is the near-absence of air defences, which I mentioned briefly in the beginning of the 2016 blog post.

Structure: Light BCT

The text is still fine there.

So what should they do based on what we (I) know now?

155 mm L/52 on 8x8 or 6x6 would certainly be better than M777, a successor to Javelin should be introduced because the Russians are now extra motivated to protect their tanks against top attack,  and battlefield air defences need to be improved. The updated Avenger with AIM-9X* and NASAMS 3 with AMRAAM-ER would be fine, but additionally they (and we) need an answer to smaller drones. I suppose the answer is a mass-produced RCWS with suitable sensors (acoustic, thermal imager) to fight off small drones and refurbished old Stingers against cheap drones too high or far away for the RCWS' weapon (Americans would likely use 12.7x99mm in that RCWS).

And then find a concept for how to make mechanised mobile warfare work. Events in Ukraine have cast some doubt over whether the Cold War recipe for mechanised warfare can prevail against the defences it's going to face. The U.S.Army's armoured spearheads would not fare well against its own infantry's AT firepower, for example.

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

 

 

*: I understand that 100 kW lasers might do the trick as well, and be cheaper per kill. It's just suspicious that after all the interest in laser weapons there are still practically no destructive lasers being fielded.

 

P.S.: Keep in mind I only picked a few aspects then and thus now. The U.S. Army's issues are more diverse, including a disastrous personnel system, inexperienced junior officers, training issues down to basic soldiering skills and cumbersome/slow command.

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DIANA

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NATO wants to add a DARPA-like program to spend money on military technological R&D.

This makes total sense for NATO bureaucrats, who of course like to see an expansion of their bureaucracy (allocating and overseeing resources - they do not do R&D themselves), especially with something interesting as a topic such as technological gadgetry.

It's also a total and complete confession by NATO that it's not a smart organisation or alliance and incapable of reacting to events in a timely fashion.

Ukraine is defending itself with mostly 1970's and 1980's equipment against an aggression with mostly 1970's and 1980's equipment. Very little of the relevant equipment there is considerably newer, and almost all of it was conceptually already known during the 1980's. Some of the newer relevant items are

• NLAW (introduced 2000's), conceptually going back to early 90's overflight attack ATGMs
• Javelin (introduced 1990's), developed since early 80's
• small recce drones (conceptually 1980's, see KZO Brevel)
• Bayraktar TB2 (introduced 2010's, conceptually 1970's)
• StarLink (introduced recently, conceptually 2000's, civilian product)
• some thermal night vision devices (tech introduced in 1980's, improved in resolution)
  

Ukraine could clearly defend itself with purely 1980's equipment (even purely Soviet equipment) if it had it in the right quantities.

 

Defence can nowadays be just fine if you master the art of introducing 20 years-old equipment in suitable quantities. The potential aggressors are using almost exclusively equipment older than 20 years and conceptually older than 30 years. A robust defence implies a robust deterrence.

We're seeing a large-scale live demonstration of how unnecessary "leap ahead" / "revolutionary" technology advances are for defence. It's visible to anyone paying attention and thinking for himself/herself that NATO has paid too much attention to fancy new tech and not enough attention to quantity of infantry and indirect fires munitions. 

So obviously, this is just the right moment for NATO to set up a bureaucratic program to promote military technology advances.

 

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

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