A letter-writer from the Hudson Institute in The Wall Street Journal‘s Monday Letters section tried to make a case for Europe’s ability to defend itself against a Russian invasion based on Ukraine’s capability.
Despite Russian air superiority and numerical advantages, Ukrainian forces and local volunteers slowed, halted, and ultimately rolled back Russia’s assault on the capital. They did so because they were fighting for national survival, and, in many cases, defending their homes and families as the Russians advanced.
They did so, also, because Ukrainians, individually and as a population, didn’t hesitate to enter a stout defense–The fight is here; I need ammunition, not a ride. As the letter-writer misconstrued the wargame exercise, Germany did hesitate in the wargame, with fatal effects on the attempted defense against the Russian invasion.
Furthermore, that part about fighting for national survival as well as defending individuals’ homes and families does not obtain in Germany or France. Far too many of those nations’ citizens—including their younger generations and members (of all ages) of their major political parties—would rather not fight even to defend their nation.
Next, much of the reason Russia’s initial invasion of Ukraine failed, despite apparent superiority in numbers and equipment, was its mistaken assumption that the invasion would be a walkover. Russia has learned the lesson of that failure, and it won’t underestimate the level of resistance capability of its next target, whether Germany’s and France’s reluctant citizens or the Baltics’ and Poland’s willing but small populations.
And this: the runup to WWI in the aftermath of an Archduke’s assassination was one of a race to mobilize and to achieve a mobilization level conducive to successful attack vs a level conducive to deterrence or to defeat of an attack. In that race, both sides proceeded from substantially equal baselines of military capability and mobilization ability. In the realization, the race ended in a substantial tie, and the German invasion of France, after initial gains of the sort that nearly always accrue to the first aggressor, was brought to a standstill.
That substantial mobilization capability equality does not obtain in today’s Europe.
Russia already has combat-hardened (even if of uncertain quality) troops, a war materiel production capacity already in place and growing, and force buildups occurring, low-key, in Belorussia and in Kaliningrad. The Baltic States and Poland, stipulate arguendo, have similar per capita capacities, but they’re already maxed out due to their small populations and limited, even operating at maximum output, industrial capacity. Behind those front line nations, though, Germany has no serious troop establishment and it cannot even field a combat-ready brigade of armor. Its industrial capacity is not capable of producing materiel in war deterring, much less fighting, much less at mobilizing rates before 2030. Italy and France are little better off.
In a mobilization race today, Russia wins. And that, coupled with the incapacity for defense that even the most dedicated nations have, means Russia wins the war, too.
A major contributing factor to the Russian early stall and rollback was the failure of their logistics (poor planning, exposed lack of maintenance – experienced logisticians from the US Army pointed out the condition of transport vehicle tires, showing lack of rotation for extended time, etc.). Russia has learned from that, but have most Euro militaries? Perhaps the Three Seas states; but west of the Vistula I doubt it. NATO depends not only on US weapons and stores, but US transport. And recent exercises have exposed the problems with bridge weight constraints, among other issues, which would force the resupply lines into limited pathways. Add in UAV air attacks in the absence of counter UAV weapons to protect the convoys and disaster for the defenders looms. Thus, the danger intensifies, unless Ukraine is allowed to win, decisively, and do more than bloody Russia’s nose.
Junior officers study tactics, field and senior grade officers study strategy and strategies, and general officers study logistics.
Who, in the West, study anything beyond tactics from a foundation even remotely approaching hard combat experience against a peer or even a near-peer enemy? How many general officers, come to that, retain their experiences in tactics and strategies? Of those who do, how current are those lessons, and how well does the experience they gained as much as 20 years prior match today’s combat environment?
Combat experience against terrorist entities, or one-and-done assaults like last summer’s against Iran, important as that is for those environments, don’t test logistics or strategy and so leave them unequipped for a modern broad-based and -fronted war.
Eric Hines