Meanwhile In The Baltic Republics And Poland...

[Stuart Galbraith]

Nah. Discovery channel would never let Obama hand it over.

 

The link above seems to suggest that Britain will be contributing to the NATO deterrence battalion in Estonia. Thats an interesting mission. Im not sure how we plan to reinforce in case of conflict however.

[Josh]

I wonder when Putin will start to ask US to give back Alaska.

That would be so bad it would go to good again.

[glenn239]

Chris This is why I think we should take a three-fold approach for which I have been derided here.

 

 

 

Your ideas seem closer to what NATO is actually going to do, so you’re only defense against is that the experts with access to top secret information seem to be thinking along the same lines.

 

1. Don't do things we know the Russians will find provocative. US troops exercising on the border, B-52s making low level overflights of Estonia and guided missile destroyers with land attack cruise missiles cruising around the Eastern Baltic fit that description.

 

 

 

Yep, hold the bulk aircraft away, and all of the bomber types, and keep the ships to the Swedish side when possible. Troop exercises in the Baltic at brigade level seem fine to me because it’s in keeping with signaling the strategy of your (2) below. Troops sent to the Baltics should emphasize Western NATO to signal unity and works against some of our eastern NATO allies from trying to eek out a special role. Emphasize European (not USN) warships in the Baltic.

 

 

2. Make defence preparations that could not rationally be characterised as offensive, but which would make the Baltic republics prohibitively expensive to take and hold whilst beefing up NATO defences in depth.

 

 

 

Sound. Any defense of the Baltic States that is capable of throwing back a Russian offensive is also one that is capable of attacking into Russia. So to signal strictly defensive intensions, military preparations along your lines. No need for “prohibitively expensive”, just make it that the Russian army has to report to Putin that NATO’s preparations are such that there is no way they could secure the objective in the foreseeable future after an invasion.

 

 

3. Create a survivable, land-based long (tactical-theatre) range conventional precision attack force to counter the A2D2 threat and slow up a conventional invasion at one end of the spectrum and to deter the kind of conventional tactical first strikes and coercive/punitive strategic attacks the Russians might engage in at the other.

 

Can’t hurt, but you have to figure navies are a losing proposition in the long run no matter how much money we sink into defense. I think Trump hits the nail on the head – the way forward for NATO is for the Europeans to become more self-reliant. Rely on the US less and themselves more in the future.

 

 

I only thought of this after I logged off last night, but your Falklands analogy works better the other way around. Kaliningrad is more like the Falklands - small, dubious sovereignty claim by large nearby country, justification for invasion (if the Russians kicked off first of course), limited capacity for resistance by garrison etc., than it is like Argentina.

 

 

 

The Germans indicate they have no thoughts in this direction. I wonder how attached the Russians really are to this little colony and whether it would be defended to the same level as ‘mother Russia’. They might stand on the defensive in hopes that their resolve won’t be tested, (nothing like flinging SS-26’s out of Kaliningrad willy-nilly if you want an invasion magnet).

[bd1]

 

 

What dubious sovereignty claim is there for Kaliningrad? Germany officially renounced all claim to it long ago, just as with Silesia & eastern Pomerania.

 

OK, not that dubious, but spoils of war. They can hardly claim it's a bit of Mother Russia that someone else nicked of them. At least not recently.

 

Ah, you misunderstand the reasoning. Anywhere that Russians have lived is forever Mother Russia, inalienable in perpetuity. It only got a Russian majority in the 20th century, due to immigration & the eviction of the previous inhabitants? Ancient lands of Mother Russia! See Crimea.

 

i´ve been told several times that ´´ any place russian soldier has spillled blood is sacred ground, Motherland´´ at least one time dude was not joking

[glenn239]

Stuart Glenn, I would invite you to never put words in my mouth. Ive never been shy of delivering them. I have never once advocated regime change V Russia.

 

 

 

You wrote,

 

 

….Secondly air campaigns v Russia. Im not saying in such circumstances DONT do it because there is a risk of nuclear war. Im taking the same view during the cold war, such a war will, unless a miracle intervenes, turn into a nuclear war at some point anyway, so why not go large early and start by attacking all tactical nuclear systems at the same time via conventional means. And possibly, in removing those options swiftly enough, might just cause calmer heads to prevail. But its not an easy choice. And Im wary of suggesting that, though Im willing to take that risk, the rest of NATO is mentally prepared for dropping back 30 years into that kind of mindset.

 

My view simply put is, take the risk….

 

 

Clausewitz wrote that wars are the continuation of politics by other means. The term “politics” means,

 

 

the activities associated with the governance of a country or other area, especially the debate or conflict among individuals or parties having or hoping to achieve power.

 

 

Force being a form of coercion intended to leverage a particular solution. There’s nothing here that says nukes are likely to be used just because both sides have them. Both Russia and the US have fought plenty of wars and not used them. Why would they lose all the judgement that’s held them back in every war since 1945? Yet you make this claim -

 

 

“Im taking the same view during the cold war, such a war will, unless a miracle intervenes, turn into a nuclear war at some point anyway”

 

 

This is nonsense. Most wars are fought for limited objectives. Most bar fights don’t end in gunfights; it’s not likely a war will go nuclear just because you’ve decided it must. Why do you dismiss the chances in favor of an all-out offensive to maximize the chances of nuclear war? Because you don’t seem to want a limited war to begin with. A war which is not limited – and this is what you are describing - means regime change. '

 

If you don’t want to be taken as a ‘fangs out, hair on fire’ type, maybe look harder for tactics that don’t resemble goading the Russians into a nuclear response?

Edited July 8, 2016 by glenn239

[glenn239]

 

Stuart …so why not go large early and start by attacking all tactical nuclear systems at the same time via conventional means.

 

 

 

The problem - besides the eerily casual way in which you advocate pure insanity - is that Russia is a big country and it is impossible to neutralize their nuclear arsenal – much of it is probably in places only ICBM’s or SLBM’s can reach, and most of these hidey holes we'd not be aware of anyways. We know recently from Iran that even a much less challenging objective is not a trivial matter for the USAF. So what you want to do is bomb their country right off the hop - claiming the purpose being something that cannot be achieved. Moscow would dismiss the stated intention as an unachievable fiction, and see it as regime change. This is not a smart idea.

 

 

While we cannot take out all the Russian nukes and command, the same cannot be said of our air campaign. Unlike 4,500 small nuclear weapons, air campaigns are fought from big installations - they are “nodey”. “Nodey” is the poster child for tactical nuclear. Just spitballing your nonsense, maybe this escalation cycle -

 

 

1. Upon failure of Russian conventional air defenses then –

 

2. Nuclear SAM’s. Failure of which -
3. Elimination of airbases, ports and rail supporting air campaign. Russia would certainly lose thousands or tens of thousands in retaliatory attacks, but NATO could not prevent the destruction of their infrastructure. Everyone in Europe would blame the Americans. If even this does not end the matter then -

 

4. I think you can figure it out from here.

 

 

If we reach three, or maybe even two, it’s no going back for Putin and his cronies. They either push through or wind up doing lamp post inspection duty like Mussolini before them. So your nutbar strategy would either see NATO capitulate on its campaign short of its objective or lead to where there was not much of an American presence anywhere on Russia’s periphery. Or both. Europe would not forgive the Americans for imposing such a risky plan of upon them. Whatever US forces the Russians didn't get, the Europeans would themselves kick out.

 

Don’t corner the Russians. Defeat any incursion as respectfully of Russia as possible and then et the Russians take matters into their own hands later against the idiot that made that decision for them.

[Chris Werb]

Glenn, not sure what you meant about navies being a losing proposition in the long run as I did say land-based. Where I would go with this is a two tier, dual, ballistic and air breathing cruise system in two range brackets - 100km and 500km (for INF treaty compliance and to avoid provocation or the Russians feeling we'd put together a counter-nuclear first strike capability). The 100km system can be HIMARS GMLRS, but with a larger variety of warheads adding thermobaric, sensor-fused munitions, AT-2 mines and BAT, plus the abortive P44 precision attack missile http://defense-update.com/20070713_p44.html. It would add surface launched Spear Capability 3 as its air breathing component. The long range system would also be HIMARS but with the new 500km warhead in unitary, deep penetrating and Alternative Warhead versions. The air breathing element would be a data-linked version of JASSM, Taurus or Storm Shadow/SCALP-EG.

I thought about hiding these systems in ISO freight containers and playing a shell-game with them. However, I can see legal and moral arguments against hiding among civilian containers and installations. What I would do instead is base the vehicles and store the munitions, dispersed, deep in Western Europe, in locations that would be very problematic to target with standoff munitions or SF. I think random dispersal could overcome the need for SAM and C-RAM defence for installations that would in any case be deep in Western Europe. Turkey appears to intend to implement a much more ambitious version of this approach itself.

 

This is where I agree with your argument about ships. I understand the need for ships for out of area ops and to defend against submarines, but the Russian Baltic, Northern and surface fleets, whilst possessing some land attack cruise missile capability in newer corvettes, would be comparatively easily neutralised, or can essentially be ignored. Their subs are so quiet and we have such little ASW capability left, that it is unlikely we can prevent them causing serious mayhem in the Atlantic and further afield should they choose to do so. Our only deterrence/response would be to target civilian infrastructure, particularly power and energy distribution and we should make it clear that we would do so from the outset if they started a maritime commerce war against us. Our limited ASW capability can therefore mostly be employed to defend reinforcement convoys.

Now, this is an oversimplification, but a typical guided missile destroyer costs around $1.8 billion. In crude terms that is roughly 18,000 GMLRS unitary rockets or SPEAR Capability 3s, or 2,250 treaty compliant JASSMs. The truck-based HIMARS come in around $6 million in basic, unarmoured format with the B armour kits coming in at $40k a piece. Therefore, if each major NATO country spent the equivalent of purchasing one destroyer, even if it meant forgoing one such warship, or a couple of frigates, we could put together a pretty amazing conventional deterrent force.

[Chris Werb]

 

 

What dubious sovereignty claim is there for Kaliningrad? Germany officially renounced all claim to it long ago, just as with Silesia & eastern Pomerania.

 

OK, not that dubious, but spoils of war. They can hardly claim it's a bit of Mother Russia that someone else nicked of them. At least not recently.

 

Ah, you misunderstand the reasoning. Anywhere that Russians have lived is forever Mother Russia, inalienable in perpetuity. It only got a Russian majority in the 20th century, due to immigration & the eviction of the previous inhabitants? Ancient lands of Mother Russia! See Crimea.

 

 

That would include Eastern Europe up to the Elbe, Afghanistan, Manchuria, Sharm el Sheikh, Cyprus, Phuket, London and pretty well anywhere then

[Gregory]

i´ve been told several times that ´´ any place russian soldier has spillled blood is sacred ground, Motherland´´ at least one time dude was not joking

 

 

"Wherever Russian blood was spilled, that land belongs to Russia", by Lev Prozorov

[Simon Tan]

Chris.....it would benefit one producer and the shipyard would go tits up.

[Roman Alymov]

 

i´ve been told several times that ´´ any place russian soldier has spillled blood is sacred ground, Motherland´´ at least one time dude was not joking

 

"Wherever Russian blood was spilled, that land belongs to Russia", by Lev Prozorov

 

Where are you getting this guys from? I have never heard of him before.

 

Lev Prozorov, trained as historian but writing fantasy books heavily influenced by his strange views (as he pretend to believe ancient Slavic pagan gods etc.) and criticized by professional historians. Was officially sentenced in Russia for flaming ethnic hate. https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%9F%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B7%D0%BE%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B2,_%D0%9B%D0%B5%D0%B2_%D0%A0%D1%83%D0%B4%D0%BE%D0%BB%D1%8C%D1%84%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%B8%D1%87

 

By the way book is titled "Caucasus border of Rus" (not "Russia" but ancient Rus)

[Simon Tan]

Isn't that like Kievan Rus?

[Stuart Galbraith]

I dont know what it is about Russian nationalists, but when they push the boat out, they REALLY push the boat out. At least Tolkien managed to separate fantasy from reality.

 

New Division to stand up in Smolensk. This is one of the 5 that has already been announced rather than a new one I think.

http://tass.ru/en/defense/886421

New division to be deployed near Russia's Smolensk by mid-2017 — source

July 05, 10:06 UTC+3
The new motorized rifle division that is being created in the Smolensk region will be part of the 1st Guards Tank Army

© Yuri Smityuk/TASS

MOSCOW, July 5. /TASS/. Russia’s motorized rifle division that is being created in the Smolensk region and that will be part of the 1st Guards Tank Army will be finally deployed by the middle of 2017, a source in the Russian General Staff told TASS on Tuesday.

"The General Staff with the approval of the defense minister has made the final decision that the new Yelnya Motorized Rifle Division along with the Tamanskaya Motorized Rifle and Kantemirovskaya Tank Division will be part of the 1st Guards Tank Army," the source said.

"The formation of the division in the Smolensk region began much later than the formation of similar forces in the Voronezh and Rostov regions, so the completion of its recruitment and construction of infrastructure facilities is planned not for December this year, but for the end of the first half of next year", he said.

The source said that the number of personnel of the division with the headquarters in Yelnya will be around 10,000 men. According to him, the new formation will comprise three motorized rifle regimens and one armored regiment, a self-propelled artillery regiment and an anti-aircraft missile regiment, as well as support units.

The division in the Smolensk region is one of three new bodies of troops the formation of which was previously announced by Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu. This spring, chief of the Main Operations Directorate of the Russian Armed Forces’ General Staff Sergei Rudskoy said that that the military had not yet decided to which force the Yelnya division will be assigned.

Edited July 9, 2016 by Stuart Galbraith

[Stuart Galbraith]

This is going to be built from a number of brigades rather than any new personnel, or so im lead to believe.

[Roman Alymov]

Isn't that like Kievan Rus?

Not exactly, as "Kievan Rus" is more narrow term used to address time period between Rus (not Russia in modern terms) unification under Kiev dukes (initially Novgorod dukes later capturing Kiev and moving capital from Novgorod to Kiev) rule and feudal separation. But in context of this book title- it is the same (as there was no "Caucasus border of Rus" except Kievan Rus time)

[Roman Alymov]

I dont know what it is about Russian nationalists, but when they push the boat out, they REALLY push the boat out. At least Tolkien managed to separate fantasy from reality.

 

New Division to stand up in Smolensk. This is one of the 5 that has already been announced rather than a new one I think.

http://tass.ru/en/defense/886421

New division to be deployed near Russia's Smolensk by mid-2017 — source

So what is the problem with new unit in Smolensk, deep inside Russia?

P.S. And how it is linked to author mentioned above? Why not with pro-Ukr "Kievan Rus" battalion?

Edited July 9, 2016 by Roman Alymov

[Stuart Galbraith]

 

I dont know what it is about Russian nationalists, but when they push the boat out, they REALLY push the boat out. At least Tolkien managed to separate fantasy from reality.

 

New Division to stand up in Smolensk. This is one of the 5 that has already been announced rather than a new one I think.

http://tass.ru/en/defense/886421

New division to be deployed near Russia's Smolensk by mid-2017 — source

So what is the problem with new unit in Smolensk, deep inside Russia?

P.S. And how it is linked to author mentioned above? Why not with pro-Ukr "Kievan Rus" battalion?

 

 

It wasnt a criticism Roman, I just find Russian Army force structure interesting. Im strange like that.

[Panzermann]

Where are you getting this guys from? I have never heard of him before.

The same source russia today and sputnik pull their "experts" "professors" and such from which are equally from the eeh... let us say fringes.

[Roman Alymov]

 

Where are you getting this guys from? I have never heard of him before.

The same source russia today and sputnik pull their "experts" "professors" and such from which are equally from the eeh... let us say fringes.

 

Russia Today is just mirror of what was done for decades by Voice of America, BBC, Radio Free Europe etc (do not remember now all this names) - and still practiced, see West running circles with Magnitsky-Brauder, Pussi Riot etc. It worked well against USSR, so now we are returning the favor. Russia is not USSR, we are of the same ideology as West (not sure it is good but it is reality), so no reason to repeat USSR mistakes of trying to stay out of media fight.

[glenn239]

 

Chris Glenn, not sure what you meant about navies being a losing proposition in the long run as I did say land-based. Where I would go with this is a two tier, dual, ballistic and air breathing cruise system in two range brackets - 100km and 500km…

 

 

I suspect that surface navies have been losing ground relative to air power as viable instruments of 1^st-tier wars since 1945. Specific measures going forward are fine, (for example, rail guns are going to reverse trends for a while) but in the long run, offense is going to win, ships are just giant metal targets, and the US with respect to Europe is a sea power. So Europe in the long run should look to move NATO in the direction where Europe relies on itself more and where the US assistance is still welcome and valuable, but not necessary. There’s no rush, it’s just a long term trend.

 

 

Their subs are so quiet and we have such little ASW capability left, that it is unlikely we can prevent them causing serious mayhem in the Atlantic and further afield should they choose to do so. Our only deterrence/response would be to target civilian infrastructure, particularly power and energy distribution and we should make it clear that we would do so from the outset if they started a maritime commerce war against us

 

 

I’ve always been kind of skeptical about the effectiveness of ASW, because it seems to rely on the assumption of pristine sonar conditions, whereas when the war starts I kind of expect it that sonic jammers are going to turn large swaths of the Atlantic into concert stadiums, so that you’re trying to listening for a mouse while Guns and Roses is blasting out Sweet Child of Mine on stage at 95 decibels. OTOH, offensive mining might help, submarines are low tempo, and we have plenty of naval power.

 

Our limited ASW capability can therefore mostly be employed to defend reinforcement convoys.

 

 

Right, assuming that convoys remain a viable tactic moving forward. Might be cheaper just to build submersible freighters.

 

Therefore, if each major NATO country spent the equivalent of purchasing one destroyer, even if it meant forgoing one such warship, or a couple of frigates, we could put together a pretty amazing conventional deterrent force.

 

 

We already have a pretty amazing conventional deterrent forces, we don’t need any more of that – the Russians already know their power grid can be taken out and their ships sunk. What’s the point of threatening to bounce the rubble? They've already figured out that if that game gets played they lose a couple trillion and we lose 50 trillion. Why not just have a strategy where we just cut to the chase, blow up our own power grid and then our already agitated domestic scene spins into civil war? Isn't that where, “target civilian infrastructure, particularly power and energy distribution” will lead?

What we need are clear limits on what we ourselves do in the foreign policy sphere, sort of a self-deterrence from doing anything too rash, and institutions that root out people with instincts for risky strategies based on forcing the Russians and Chinese to submit. In terms of your idea that if we lose a convoy the Russians lose St. Petersburg's power grid, I think this is exactly the wrong approach. It's like saying 'if we win the game then its over fair and square but if we lose the game then we start shooting the other team's fans until they agree we won'. I think we've got to ditch the total war mentality and go back to the era where the rules of war were more formalized and the consequences limited. Britain and France in 1815 somehow managed to fight a war where they marched out into sparsely populated fields and shot it out at Waterloo, the French lost fair and square, and then everyone - winners and losers - went home, raised families, and world went on.

Edited July 9, 2016 by glenn239

[Stuart Galbraith]

 

 

Where are you getting this guys from? I have never heard of him before.

The same source russia today and sputnik pull their "experts" "professors" and such from which are equally from the eeh... let us say fringes.

 

Russia Today is just mirror of what was done for decades by Voice of America, BBC, Radio Free Europe etc (do not remember now all this names) - and still practiced, see West running circles with Magnitsky-Brauder, Pussi Riot etc. It worked well against USSR, so now we are returning the favor. Russia is not USSR, we are of the same ideology as West (not sure it is good but it is reality), so no reason to repeat USSR mistakes of trying to stay out of media fight.

 

Yeah, but nobody is going to make a really great song about Russia Today are they?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXUkddrnsXQ

 

Putin, Putin put those lies up against the wall,

That aint nothing like the truth at all....

 

Hmm, maybe it would work.

[Stuart Galbraith]

Border between Kaliningrad and Poland closed during the NATO summit.

[Chris Werb]

Glenn, that's just it, I don't think we have a conventional deterrent thanks to non-survivable basing, Russian pre-emptive strike and SAM capabilities. The deterrent I described is deliberately limited in range to 500km and would not be dual nuclear/conventional. We were trying to avoid hitting deep inside continental Russia. If we needed to do so (for example as a result of an all out commerce war against us at sea) we would have to rely on US strategic airpower (and possibly F-22s) and hope that stealth delivers on its promises. We can't rely on SLCMs because the things we need to hit are too far from the sea, even given Tomahawk's dubious survivability. The truck mounted ballistic/cruise missile approach is much more survivable at every level and has great operational mobility. You could argue that Russian SAMs can shoot down TBMs, but each of the two missiles they would target an incoming GMLRS with would cost approximately ten times as much as that rocket, so shooting them down is a bit of a non-starter economically. As to your point about rules of war. Civilian shipping carrying food, LPG, oil etc. is clearly necessary to the running of our civilian economy and to the biological survival of our people. The analog to that in Russia is railway lines. If we make it hard for them to move stuff around as a result of them doing the same to us, I can't see how that is cheating. Modern Russia has a very dubious record of keeping to conventions, rules, treaties etc. so I'm really don't think we could rely on them to keep to a modern version of18th Century rules of warfare. For example, they are conducting highly indiscriminate bombing in Syria now.

[Stuart Galbraith]

General Sir Nick Carver, Chief of the General staff, give a discussion of British Army requirements at the RUSI Land Warfare conference.

 

Chris, he does bring drops up in this.

[Stuart Galbraith]

Oh, and Michael Fallon's contribution.