Commentary
The Ukraine move into Russia may have started as a simple, small-scale raid for propaganda purposes, but it seems to have broken the period of static warfare.
It is noteworthy that this sudden reversion to maneuver warfare is taking place on the same ground that the largest tank battle in human history took place in July 1943 and August 1943 during World War II.
The Ukrainian operation may have started as a simple raid into Russian territory to exploit the information warfare value of showing a weakened Russia and a daring Ukraine.
But as tactical commanders achieved success, the Ukrainians doubled down and moved units to assist and expand the breakthrough while Russia evacuated towns and villages and attempted to redeploy forces from across their Ukraine battle line to respond to this offense into Russia.
The drones were modified versions of commercial consumer drones like DJI, but they could carry very deadly ordnance that could deliver an explosive charge right into the crew hatch on the tank turret, which gave rise to the “Mad Max” cage. The ordnance could be improvised explosive devices, modified hand grenades, mortar rounds, or anti-tank rocket warheads.
Length and Goal
Commanders in combat normally seek maneuver as one of the principles of war. In World War I, until tanks, more airplanes, and fresh troops were introduced to allow maneuver, the conflict became a multi-year bloody stalemate.
The Ukraine move into Russia may have started as a simple, small-scale raid for propaganda purposes, but it seems to have, at least temporarily, broken the period of static warfare that descended upon the zone of conflict.
The Russians are not necessarily panicking, but there seem to be some mass surrenders going on—a sign of successful maneuver warfare that caught large numbers of troops by surprise.
Initiative is another principle of conflict—commanders who make decisions based on the chaos and do what is instinctively correct but may not have been part of the original plan.
Possibly, Ukrainian commanders who pushed into Russia realized that they were dealing with a region that had very little structured defense and decided to push further and deeper than originally planned and still met little resistance. This works until a point.
The Ukrainians can themselves possibly become cut off as their logistics and lines of communication become overextended and vulnerable to Russian counterattacks.
But the gathering of greater numbers of Russian prisoners and the holding of some Russian terrain does provide Ukraine with important leverage in conflict negotiations.
Lessons
Taiwan has been lectured endlessly by American national security personalities on its need to become more “prickly” through drones, missiles, and sea mines and spend less on “prestige weapons” such as tanks, ships, and helicopters.
The killer drone model from Ukraine has been repeatedly raised as the correct model. Adm. Samuel Paparo of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command has raised the vision of a drone “Hellscape” in the Taiwan Strait, which, like the Ukraine thrust into Russia, mixes operations with information warfare projection.
Taiwan is raising defense spending significantly, and it is now at about 2.5 percent of gross domestic product (GDP), but because of the precarious situation, it should seek to double defense spending to 5 percent of GDP within three years.
This more rapid increase in defense spending will allow Taiwan to leverage the lessons of Ukraine and build the pervasive and inexpensive killer drones it needs to degrade a kinetic invasion if it occurs but also have the types of weapons that are visible and may deter conflict from even happening and, if necessary, conduct maneuver warfare to decisively out-maneuver and defeat any opponent bogged down in a drone “Hellscape.”
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