6 ms·

Just because the US is in love with 'Shock and Awe' doesn't mean everyone else sees it as the appropriate methodology in all circumstances.

josefresco 5y ago
From the article... "That would have been "the logical and widely anticipated next step, as seen in almost every military conflict since 1938," wrote the RUSI think-tank in London"
- jcranmer 5y ago
  From the development of air power theory a century ago, it's been widely held that strategic bombing of civilian targets is one of the best ways to quickly end a war. The actual failure of strategic bombing to end wars quickly every time it's been tried notwithstanding.
  - boc 5y ago
    The Japanese surrender in WWII due to sustained strategic bombing of civilian cities without a single troop landing in mainland Japan is a clear contradiction to this take.
    - ceejayoz 5y ago
      We've got a sample size of one for "conflicts ended via nuclear explosions", though.
    - thatguy0900 5y ago
      If Russia nuked Ukraine they might win the war on Ukraine, sure. Japan didn't even quit until there were two though. Would they have quit with no nukes and just firebombing?
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
      - thg 5y ago
        Japan didn't surrender because of anything the US did, but because Russia declared war on them (two days after Hiroshima and a day before Nagasaki). The US may just as well have dropped 10 more nukes and it wouldn't have changed anything. The Japanese didn't care whether it took a 1.000 bombs to destroy a city or a single one. Even more so, since they didn't know anything about the radioactive fallout and long-term effects. To them, it was just a bigger bomb.
    - jcranmer 5y ago
      It's not a clear contradiction; it's one of only two cases that are arguable (the other one being NATO bombing of Serbia during the dissolution of Yugoslavia). It's noted that it's not clear how much the atomic bombings influenced the decision to surrender, versus the near-simultaneous declaration of war by the USSR on Japan. Furthermore, by the time Japan surrendered, it was clear that Japan had already thoroughly lost. Recall that similar bombing campaigns against the UK (Battle of Britain) and Germany utter failed to bring those nations any closer to surrender. In any case, compared to the actual theorists like Giulio Douhet who were, before World War II, arguing that attacking cities would cause the will of the nations to collapse before they fully mobilized, the actual results fell far short of the theorists.
      - mywittyname 5y ago
        > It's noted that it's not clear how much the atomic bombings influenced the decision to surrender, My understanding is that communications between Hirohito and Stalin indicate that Japan was attempting to begin negotiation of a total surrender after Midway and that Truman's diary eludes to this moment. The main argument I've seen to contradict this is that they don't believe Japan wasn't actually going to accept a full surrender at this point.
brimble 5y ago
Modern militaries that don't like taking tons of unnecessary losses on the ground are in love with controlling the air. It's not like there's a wide variety of proven strategies and countries just pick one that they're "in love" with—there's a fairly narrow set, in these circumstances, which all look pretty similar. It's definitely curious that Russia hasn't committed to establishing and leveraging air superiority, despite dedicating very substantial ground forces and on paper being entirely capable of doing so. One of the following must be true: 1) They do not believe they can, so are not trying. 2) They believe they could, but are choosing not to. 3) They tried, but, for some reason that's not currently clear and isn't evident in battlefield losses, failed. (this is probably the least likely and also the most grave—it suggests severe problems with their command structure) Whichever's the case, it's a real head-scratcher and is the main reason this isn't going how most folks thought it would.
- mywittyname 5y ago
  > it suggests severe problems with their command structure This is what my money is on. Sending ground forces in without establishing air superiority is ludicrous, for reasons that we are seeing now. I guess we have a good idea where the military coup will originate.
- lumost 5y ago
  A combination of 1 & 3 seems highly likely in my uninformed opinion. Economically, losing aircraft will make a war very expensive very quickly. Losing large numbers of top of the line aircraft will severely harm Russian military aircraft exports. With Europe closing its airspace there aren't many valid approach paths into Ukraine, or ways to get out of Ukraine should things go south. Russia has few stealth aircraft. In the 1991 gulf war, 60's era Soviet SA-2 missiles were able to defend Baghdad against non-stealth aircraft despite weeks of Suppression of Enemy Air Defenses(SEAD) strikes. A MIG-29 costs ~20 million dollars new. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Package_Q_Strike https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Package_Q_Strike
  - whatshisface 5y ago
    >With Europe closing its airspace there aren't many valid approach paths into Ukraine Europe only contacts the western border. Russian aircraft can approach from the north (Russia and Belarus), south (Black Sea) and east (Russia).
boc 5y ago
The US is "in love with Shock and Awe" because it worked extremely well. Russia doesn't have the air power to pull it off, which is why they are running a version of Deep War, but without a second echelon to prevent their supply lines from getting picked off. In reality it appears that Russia had a big problem with "ghost units" and rapidly tried to fill their invasion force with conscripts in the weeks before the invasion began. It's why we're seeing so many ill-equipped soldiers and awful tactics where tanks/APCs are driving solo through fields.
- whimsicalism 5y ago
  Russia absolutely has the air power to pull it off, you clearly haven't seen Syria. My guess is that they have, correctly, anticipated that mass casualties of white civilians would play very badly internationally and domestically. e: I'm downvoted.. for what? It's obvious that the ethnicity of the victim matters for both domestic and international perception, all you need to do is look at a bit of media coverage of reporters bemoaning that this is happening to "blue eyed, blond haired" people or in the "civilized world." There is a different standard for what sort of casualties are considered acceptable.
  - coughupalung 5y ago
    It seems like you're trying to shoe-horn in an entirely different point? How does maintaining air supremacy as a military tactic relate to mass casualties?
    - MiroF 5y ago
      You can't destroy anti-aircraft guns located in civilian areas without killing civilians.
  - oh_sigh 5y ago
    I downvoted you because this line of logic is deployed, I believe, by race obsessed westerners who are privately fuming that a shooting war has sidelined their culture war for a few weeks. "Don't forget about me and the things I care about!" Just because a talking head or two makes those claims does not mean it is all of the sudden the truth. If Russia was worried about the looks of white civilian casualties, they wouldn't have invaded Ukraine. By the way, how many news reporters didn't make the claim that people only care about this because blue eyed/blonde haired people are involved?
bestnameever 5y ago
I don't think it is just about shock and awe. It's about controlling the airspace. Controlling the airspace has advantages during conflict outside of bombing.
ertian 5y ago
It's not necessarily about 'Shock and Awe' attacks on Ukrainian targets, though. They're also allowing drone and aircraft attacks on their tanks, troops, and supply chains. You would expect the Russian air force to be seeking air superiority and providing support to their troops.

josefresco 5y ago

From the article... "That would have been "the logical and widely anticipated next step, as seen in almost every military conflict since 1938," wrote the RUSI think-tank in London"

jcranmer 5y ago
From the development of air power theory a century ago, it's been widely held that strategic bombing of civilian targets is one of the best ways to quickly end a war. The actual failure of strategic bombing to end wars quickly every time it's been tried notwithstanding.
- boc 5y ago
  The Japanese surrender in WWII due to sustained strategic bombing of civilian cities without a single troop landing in mainland Japan is a clear contradiction to this take.
  - ceejayoz 5y ago
    We've got a sample size of one for "conflicts ended via nuclear explosions", though.
  - thatguy0900 5y ago
    If Russia nuked Ukraine they might win the war on Ukraine, sure. Japan didn't even quit until there were two though. Would they have quit with no nukes and just firebombing?
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - thg 5y ago
      Japan didn't surrender because of anything the US did, but because Russia declared war on them (two days after Hiroshima and a day before Nagasaki). The US may just as well have dropped 10 more nukes and it wouldn't have changed anything. The Japanese didn't care whether it took a 1.000 bombs to destroy a city or a single one. Even more so, since they didn't know anything about the radioactive fallout and long-term effects. To them, it was just a bigger bomb.
  - jcranmer 5y ago
    It's not a clear contradiction; it's one of only two cases that are arguable (the other one being NATO bombing of Serbia during the dissolution of Yugoslavia). It's noted that it's not clear how much the atomic bombings influenced the decision to surrender, versus the near-simultaneous declaration of war by the USSR on Japan. Furthermore, by the time Japan surrendered, it was clear that Japan had already thoroughly lost. Recall that similar bombing campaigns against the UK (Battle of Britain) and Germany utter failed to bring those nations any closer to surrender. In any case, compared to the actual theorists like Giulio Douhet who were, before World War II, arguing that attacking cities would cause the will of the nations to collapse before they fully mobilized, the actual results fell far short of the theorists.
    - mywittyname 5y ago
      > It's noted that it's not clear how much the atomic bombings influenced the decision to surrender, My understanding is that communications between Hirohito and Stalin indicate that Japan was attempting to begin negotiation of a total surrender after Midway and that Truman's diary eludes to this moment. The main argument I've seen to contradict this is that they don't believe Japan wasn't actually going to accept a full surrender at this point.

brimble 5y ago

Modern militaries that don't like taking tons of unnecessary losses on the ground are in love with controlling the air. It's not like there's a wide variety of proven strategies and countries just pick one that they're "in love" with—there's a fairly narrow set, in these circumstances, which all look pretty similar. It's definitely curious that Russia hasn't committed to establishing and leveraging air superiority, despite dedicating very substantial ground forces and on paper being entirely capable of doing so. One of the following must be true: 1) They do not believe they can, so are not trying. 2) They believe they could, but are choosing not to. 3) They tried, but, for some reason that's not currently clear and isn't evident in battlefield losses, failed. (this is probably the least likely and also the most grave—it suggests severe problems with their command structure) Whichever's the case, it's a real head-scratcher and is the main reason this isn't going how most folks thought it would.

mywittyname 5y ago
> it suggests severe problems with their command structure This is what my money is on. Sending ground forces in without establishing air superiority is ludicrous, for reasons that we are seeing now. I guess we have a good idea where the military coup will originate.
lumost 5y ago
A combination of 1 & 3 seems highly likely in my uninformed opinion. Economically, losing aircraft will make a war very expensive very quickly. Losing large numbers of top of the line aircraft will severely harm Russian military aircraft exports. With Europe closing its airspace there aren't many valid approach paths into Ukraine, or ways to get out of Ukraine should things go south. Russia has few stealth aircraft. In the 1991 gulf war, 60's era Soviet SA-2 missiles were able to defend Baghdad against non-stealth aircraft despite weeks of Suppression of Enemy Air Defenses(SEAD) strikes. A MIG-29 costs ~20 million dollars new. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Package_Q_Strike https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Package_Q_Strike
- whatshisface 5y ago
  >With Europe closing its airspace there aren't many valid approach paths into Ukraine Europe only contacts the western border. Russian aircraft can approach from the north (Russia and Belarus), south (Black Sea) and east (Russia).

boc 5y ago

The US is "in love with Shock and Awe" because it worked extremely well. Russia doesn't have the air power to pull it off, which is why they are running a version of Deep War, but without a second echelon to prevent their supply lines from getting picked off. In reality it appears that Russia had a big problem with "ghost units" and rapidly tried to fill their invasion force with conscripts in the weeks before the invasion began. It's why we're seeing so many ill-equipped soldiers and awful tactics where tanks/APCs are driving solo through fields.

whimsicalism 5y ago
Russia absolutely has the air power to pull it off, you clearly haven't seen Syria. My guess is that they have, correctly, anticipated that mass casualties of white civilians would play very badly internationally and domestically. e: I'm downvoted.. for what? It's obvious that the ethnicity of the victim matters for both domestic and international perception, all you need to do is look at a bit of media coverage of reporters bemoaning that this is happening to "blue eyed, blond haired" people or in the "civilized world." There is a different standard for what sort of casualties are considered acceptable.
- coughupalung 5y ago
  It seems like you're trying to shoe-horn in an entirely different point? How does maintaining air supremacy as a military tactic relate to mass casualties?
  - MiroF 5y ago
    You can't destroy anti-aircraft guns located in civilian areas without killing civilians.
- oh_sigh 5y ago
  I downvoted you because this line of logic is deployed, I believe, by race obsessed westerners who are privately fuming that a shooting war has sidelined their culture war for a few weeks. "Don't forget about me and the things I care about!" Just because a talking head or two makes those claims does not mean it is all of the sudden the truth. If Russia was worried about the looks of white civilian casualties, they wouldn't have invaded Ukraine. By the way, how many news reporters didn't make the claim that people only care about this because blue eyed/blonde haired people are involved?

bestnameever 5y ago

I don't think it is just about shock and awe. It's about controlling the airspace. Controlling the airspace has advantages during conflict outside of bombing.

ertian 5y ago

It's not necessarily about 'Shock and Awe' attacks on Ukrainian targets, though. They're also allowing drone and aircraft attacks on their tanks, troops, and supply chains. You would expect the Russian air force to be seeking air superiority and providing support to their troops.