Modern Ground Warfare

"Anything in war is possible, provided you use audacity." - George S. Patton Jr.

Preface

 

I'll admit now that my knowledge of military tactics comes from discussions with those who have learned about them and learning myself through documentaries and the occasional book. I'm not an expert on warfare in any way. It must be remembered though that principles of war, like everything else, can be determined and examined with rational thought to determine their strengths and weaknesses. All that is required is a minimal understanding of the concept (say, the importance of mobility) and one can grasp at least some of the mechanism.

 

Ancient War

 

Dawn of History

For millennia mankind has waged war on the ground. Each civilization that arose took it's own approach to warfare, based on what technologies they had available. Most important to this is learning the skills of fighting, and how to organize one's army to fight an enemy foe decisively. Just beating an enemy army, and killing it's soldiers, is not the sole requirement to prosecuting a successful war. Another key factor is maneuverability. Maneuverability enables an army to decide when and where to strike it's enemy. They can avoid an enemy army's strong points and strike him in force where he is weak. This may be seen to be a modern ideal (since before the development of the internal combustion engine all warfare on the tactical level took place at the speed of the marching man or horse) but armies as far back as the Roman era acknowledged the need for superior mobility over their enemies. Hence the importance for the Roman system of roads that stretched across their empire, not only aiding the flow of goods and materials in their economy but allowing them to quickly deploy armies between their inner provinces and their borders. In "The Art of War", ancient China's premier military philosopher Sun-Tzu dictated the importance of an army's maneuverability. "Let your rapidity be that of the wind, your compactness that of the forest." In terms of formations, the Greeks and Romans each took their own route, the Greeks using the phalanx, an eight man by eight man formation with the forward soldiers holding shields and the rear ones holding the longest spears. The Romans went farther into organization, setting up centuries, maniples, cohorts, and legions, in some ways the ancestors to modern companies, battalions, brigades, regiments, and divisions.

 

War after the Fall of Rome

As the Roman Empire fell and Europe plunged into the Dark Ages and on into the Church-dominated Middle Ages, the Byzantine and Persian empires found themselves being assailed by a new enemy: the army of Islamic Arabs pouring out of the Arabian peninsula. Buoyed by their religious beliefs in a beautiful paradise for those who died in jihad, the Arabs crushed the Byzantine and Persian armies through swift and devastating strikes from their mounted forces. They romped through the Middle East and Persia, on into North Africa, and into Spain before being stopped by the Franks of Charles Martel at the Battle of Tours.

As the Arab Empire collapsed and fractured into multiple kingdoms and caliphates, Christian Europe entered the age of feudalism as a response to increasing raids from three fronts: the Vikings to the north, the Muslims to the south, and the Magyars and other ethnic groups to the east. Knights became the basis for the armies of Christian Europe, dominating the battlefield alongside archers. Only on a few occasions did an army based on foot soldiers over armored knights win a large battle. These exceptions include the Battle of Legnano in 1176, when foot soldiers of the Lombard League defeated the knights of Frederick Barbarossa's Holy Roman Empire, and the Battle of Stirling Bridge in 1297, when a Scottish army under Andrew Murray and William Wallace defeated Edward I's English army (a case of concentration of force at a choke point, namely, the Scots attacking while the English were still crossing the bridge).

 

The Gun

The next major innovation in war was the gun. The first guns were primitive by our comparisons, reloads usually taking a minute or so due to the complexity of putting in gunpowder and then the bullet to be fired. As such, hand-to-hand combat with things such as swords and bayonets still took place, since the range of guns and the slow reload time allowed the attacking force to swiftly get in melee range. Infantry formations were thus made to maximise on such an occurance. Groups of soldiers would fire, then while they reloaded another group would fire, and so on, until the two lines met and hand-to-hand combat began. This would remain a standard of warfare until the 20th century.

By the end of the 19th century, it was becoming obvious that old ways of fighting were becoming outdated. Rifled guns improved the range of both ordinary firearms and of artillery cannon. Breech-loaded guns and artillery were the next major innovation. Such weapons no longer had to be loaded from the front, but could be loaded from the back of the barrel. The American Civil War was the beginning of the end for the massed infantry tactics of the previous centuries, as evidenced by the mass slaughter in battles such as Antietam, Vicksburg, Gettysburg, and Grant's Wilderness Campaign of 1864-1865. Even so, the continuous and usually successful use of calvary by both sides (especially the Confederacy, who made a legend out of the "Gray Ghost", John Mosby, who would later in his life by an inspirational influence for a young George Smith Patton Junior) made an example for the armies of the future to look to when making their own planning for warfare. Just that their calvarymen would not be riding horses but driving half-tracks, trucks, and tanks.

 

New War for the 20th Century

 

The Great War

The opening of the century had the brief Turko-Italian War (including the first documented use of aircraft to "bomb" a ground target) and the far more important Russo-Japanese War (which established Japan as a world power and included the decisive naval confrontation called the Battle of Tsushima Strait). But nothing prepared the world for what would be called the Great War, and what we refer to as World War I. WWI was the first true modern war, with full applications of the fruits of the Industrial Revolution. It was also the most demoralizing. The massed infantry attacks of the past only produced massive casualties against machine guns and the longer-ranged infantry rifles, while gas killed and disabled thousands. Calvary, once an important part of warfare, was rendered immobile by the onslaught of machine guns. With the exception of the Eastern Front the First World War became bogged down (the Russians lacked the modern equipment of the British, French, and Belgians, so they could not fight German advances quite as effectively). Over the course of over four years of bloody conflict the First World War would show us several new innovations. The machine gun was the most obvious, however, the British also used this war to try their new weapon, an armored vehicle with a caterpillar track for movement that they listed as "water tanks" on their inventory list to confuse any enemy spies. The first signs of what would be shown later in the century came when the French Army commandeered hundreds of taxicabs in Paris to quickly move their reserves to the Marne River to hold back the German advance on Paris. It was an outstanding success and demonstrated the decisive advantage that a motorized force could hold over one that advanced on foot.

As it went on, WWI became a brutal slaughter. Millions of soldiers on both sides perished due to a combination of the new weapons and ineffectual leadership (such as in the case of Italy's military commander Luigi Cardona, who's blunders led to the Italian disaster at Caporetto). The withdrawal of Russia seemed to be a boon for Germany, but it did not last. The final 1918 attempt by the Germans to push to Paris failed despite the creation of German shock troop units made up of veterans from both fronts, and the arrival of American forces under General John Pershing tilted the war to the Allied side. Slowly the Central Powers collapsed, culminating with the abdication of Kaiser Wilhelm II in November. The Great War was over.

 

The Lightning War: Blitzkrieg!

After WWI, the world began to disarm, and then rearm as new alliances were formed, mostly at the behest of France to hem in Germany. During the 20s and 30s, several visionaries in various armies of the world began considering the new place of tanks in warfare. The common military opinion was that tanks be used as they were in WWI, as support for the infantry. But dissenting opinions put forth theories that armor could be concentrated and used much like the horseback calvary of older days. Among these military officers was Heinz Guderian, who would become the proponent of blitzkrieg. "Lightning War".

What is blitzkrieg? A common misconception among military and historical laypersons is that blitzkrieg involved heavily concentrating armor to attack the enemy. These misconceptions are further developed by the errenous belief that German tanks were superior to all adversaries (not true, early in the war, when the Germans were still using the Mark I, Mark II, and early model Mark III Panzers, the French had deployed a superior model of tank to the premier German models, the B1). In truth, blitzkrieg is not merely widescale use of armor in war, but a concentrated combined arms strike by tanks, self-propelled artillery (or towed artillery utilizing trucks and half-tracks), infantry (with mechanized transport), and airpower focused on certain points of the enemy line. After breakthrough, these troops not only begin destroying or raiding enemy supply depots, communication centers, and such, but they also encircle enemy units still on the line and force them to surrender. The Germans used blitzkrieg to deadly effect against Poland in September of 1939. However, the French and British learned no lessons from the matter, instead assuming that the rapid Polish fall was due to the inferiority of their army's equipment. May 1940 was where they learned a harsher lesson. German troops not only invaded and conquered the Low Countries, but unexpected to the Allies, the Germans launched a Sichelschnitt, or "sickle cut", attack through the Ardennes on the French/Belgian/Luxembourg border area, emerging at Sedan and surprising the French completely. Because of the superior maneuverability and mobility of their Sichelschnitt attack force, the French were unable to hold the Germans back and the Germans cut off the Allied force in Belgium. The British withdrawal came at Dunkirk, while the French fell in June after the Germans resumed their offensive and struck into the French interior. In one fell swoop Germany was the master of all of Central and Western Europe. They accomplished this through the superior mobility of their army, which was able to dash through the Ardennes and to the English Channel before French reserves could respond to the unexpected Ardennes thrust. The Germans had proven that a mechanized army was superior to one mostly on foot (although it should be noted that not all of the Heer was mechanized as well) and that their blitzkrieg was a new and powerful method of attack.

Nowhere would blitzkrieg be more devastating than against the Red Army in 1941. Magnifying the effectiveness of the German invasion was the incompetance of the Red Army due to Stalin's previous purges. Typically Red Army units would be made to hold position while German troops overran them, since retreat and/or surrender was considered a mortal sin by Stalin's Communists (who said being an atheist meant one didn't have any religious convictions, eh?). Only Hitler's meddling in the advance of Army Group Central and the early onset of an abnormally harsh Russian winter kept German Panzers from rumbling through Moscow's Red Square.

 

Warfare in the Pacific

After Kido Butai's attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941, the now-enraged United States was plunged into WWII. This opened a new theater of the war, and one vastly difference to the plains and hills of Europe or the deserts of North Africa. The war from 1942 to 1944 would be dominated by two distinct campaigns being fought: one on New Guinea by American and Australian forces led by Douglas MacArthur, and the other across the Central Pacific by the United States Pacific Fleet and the United States Marine Corps led by Chester Nimitz. Both of these theaters presented new difficulties and problems for the troops. Both involved jungle fighting and the more violent storms of the Pacific. In both theaters, commanders had to write a new book for warfare and approach it in a new fashion. On New Guinea MacArthur displayed a new approach to fighting by making short amphibious hops where Japanese resistance was fierce. This enabled his forces to bypass tough Japanese defenses and cut them off from supply, leaving them to rot for the rest of the war. The policy of bypassing tough Japanese garrisons also led to the isolation of Rabaul and later of Truk in the Carolines. In the Central Pacific, Nimitz was forced to learn bloody lessons about amphibious warfare in assaults on Tarawa in the Gilbert Islands and later the Marshall Islands. Prior to WWII, the British failure at Gallipoli in WWI had caused many to believe an amphibious assault under fire to be impossible, but despite the excessive losses and foulups the attack on Tarawa proved it could be done. After the Marshalls and Gilberts were taken, Nimitz opted to neutralize and bypass the Japanese on Truk instead of trying to seize the island. His next operation went straight for the Marianas, resulting in the fights for Tinian, Saipan, and Guam. The island hopping warfare was unique because while it required ground forces to take and hold islands and bases, it was completely dependent on naval power to defend the islands from attack and resupply and reinforce the garrison present. If an island was cut off from naval aid it was easily taken, or left to wither on the vine, having been removed from the strategic equation.

 

Modern Warfare

World War II saw the introduction of many modern concepts of warfare. It proved the vital need to have a mechanized army, a modern and trained air force, and proper equipment for the task at hand. Mechanized forces can outmaneuver an enemy on foot or with slower vehicles, enabling them to dictate when and where they will meet the enemy. Air forces can disrupt an enemy's logistics, command, and communication networks (practiced to devastating effect in the Gulf War), harass enemy forces, aid in artillery spotting and reconnassiance, airlift troops and supplies behind enemy lines, and can protect friendly and allied forces from the same. Proper equipment means having the right type of weapon systems for the war you are seeking to wage, and to have the advantage of superior weapon systems to what the enemy is deploying.

In addition, there are several other aspects of modern war.

Electronic Warfare

Electronic warfare entails the use of sophisticated detection and communications systems, either for coordinating your own troops, finding out where the enemy is and what he may be saying, and interfering with these things with the use of ECM. In World War II we had British code breakers at Bletchley Park reading Germany's Enigma codes, Navajo code-talkers in the Pacific, and American Operation: Magic code-breakers listening in on Japanese communications. Today it consists of AWACs, JSTARS, E-2 Hawkeyes, and EA-6B Prowlers, who are responsible for communications and radar detection on the modern battlefield and to interfere with enemy radar. Satellites add to reconnassiance, acting as an "eye in the sky" that is impossible to shoot down with conventional weapons.

Electronic Warfare may also take a new twist with cyberwar, in effect, a war between two sides involving computers. This could include cyberterrorism and counter-terrorism, particularly in relation to military computers, and thus interfere with an opponent's infrastructure.

Psychological Warfare

Psych warfare is something that has actually been around for a while. Propaganda is a weapon employed by psych warfare. During World War II both sides employed such psychological warfare. Allied psych warfare consisted of the false "Radio Free Deutschland", dropping false mail on attacked mail trains that were supposed to make German soldiers on the front believe their wives, sisters, daughters, and mothers were at home being turned into prostitutes for the benefit of officers stationed in Germany, or a false "letter" from Emperor Hirohito to encourage Japanese forces fighting in India and Burma to surrender in hopeless situations instead of fighting to the death. The Japanese did the same to Allied soldiers, although less successfully, by claiming that their officers and leaders had sent them to die for nothing and insinuating that while they were on the front their wives/girlfriends were cheating on them. Today, this has been expanded to include possible image alteration or misquoting to ridicule or undermine foreign leaders. An example of good psychological warfare would be, say, to drop large amounts of pork fat on troops from a Muslim state. This would effect their morale due to their religious beliefs concerning contact with pork. The goal of psychological warfare is not to kill or wound an enemy but to undermine his morale. By doing so you weaken his will to fight and he may be more likely to surrender when you make contact with him.

Deception Warfare

Although arguably already covered by portions of Electronic Warfare and Psychogical Warfare in terms of modern warfare, the general need to deceive an enemy about your dispositions and intentions is vital to success in war. Sun-Tzu outlined the importance of this in The Art of War: "All warfare is based on deception." Early examples of deception in warfare focused mainly on making a force look bigger or smaller than it was to deceive the enemy as to the extent of the attack. In the American Civil War one Confederate officer ordered his men to march around a town continously, deceiving a Union commander into believing his army was larger than it truly was and thus delaying an attack. WWI saw dummy heads used to bait snipers and some early use of camoflouge. But it was the British who took the idea of deception warfare to the next level. In World War II the British let loose with a virtual cornucopia of deceptions against the Axis. Dummy ships were placed in harbors to fool Axis aerial recon. In Egypt and North Africa the British deployed dummy tanks alongside their real ones to fool the Italians to the true extent of their armor forces. The greatest deception of all was aimed at furthering the Allied landings at Normandy, under the control of Operation: Bodyguard (the term for all of Britian's deception ops, derived from a quote by Churchill: "In war, truth is so precious that it must always be surrounded by a bodyguard of lies.") and Operation: Fortitude, which was aimed specifically at fooling the Germans on where the Allied invasion of Continental Europe would be undertaken. This greatest of deceptions, propagated by double-agents and captured spies and aided by the fake Army arrayed in the Dover region of England, worked spectacularly in keeping German's powerful panzer divisions at Calais and preventing them from moving to Normandy.

Today Deception Warfare is somewhat more difficult thanks to improved observation technology, but it still exists. The use of stealth bombers is a form of deceptive warfare in that it prevents the enemy from knowing where and when you will strike (while a normal fighter craft can be easily tracked and thus it's likely targets pinpointed). In the Gulf War, Allied attack helicopters were fooled by an even older and simpler form of deception warfare: dummy vehicles put up by the Iraqis. Deception Warfare is also linked to an army's maneuverability. An army that can move quickly can deceive an enemy as to his location and intentions much as a dummy army can.

 

Small Scale Tactics

A military's strategic planning and action is one part of the puzzle, tactics are the other. Tactics in the modern army have evolved from massed infantry formations advancing across open hills and plains to modern concepts based on an army's movement. There are two principle forms of such warfare seen in the world, due to the former bilateral world situation (between the Soviets and West).

The West: Fire and Movement, Operational Flexibility

Fire and movement is a tactical concept formed by the Germans in WWII and used by nations affiliated with NATO and the "West" in general. It consists of section-by-section movement, alternating between running, dropping to the ground, and firing. A force will approach an enemy unit or position at platoon level, and then split off to sections/squads, and on down to fireteams as they get closer. One half of the unit moves while the other half provides suppression fire, the goal being to prevent the enemy from getting a clear shot. As they get within range, the attacking force is eventually down to a buddy system, where two men are responsible for each other as each moves incrementally to the enemy position. It must be pointed out that the greater tactics of such movement dictates that only the weakest link of the enemy's fortifications will be attacked, if at all. For a modern army, attacking an enemy defensive position is the last resort, it is desirable to go around the enemy instead to encircle him (much like the objective of a blitzkrieg attack).

Operationally, the West gives it's field commanders latitude. In the grand tradition of the Prussian armies of von Moltke an officer is expected to be able to think for himself. He is given the flexibility to make his own battlefield decisions despite orders that might be contrary because he knows the overall plan and may be in a better position to achieve it. Such an army is dangerous to an enemy because it is more unpredictable, you cannot simply have a profile on the main commander and know how the attack will likely take place. It can also be dangerous for itself, though. If communications are deficient, you have a situation where the right hand doesn't know what the left is doing. Lack of coordination could lead to the individual units being cut off and destroyed piecemeal. Thus, most armies still maintain a coherent chain of command and operational coordination is maintained as much as possible.

The Soviets: Operational Momentum and Planning

The Soviets took a different route to the West. While their infantry fought much like the West's in terms of immediate movement, they typically send their forces (usually green units, conscripts, "penal brigades", etc.) in a wave attack, striking all along the enemy line. When a weakness is detected, or an actual break made, reserves (usually made up of elite units) hit the weakness and pour through.

Partially because of their tactics, and also likely influenced by the totalitarian nature of their nation, the Soviets were "by the book" in terms of operational coordination. Officers were to follow the plan: deviations are left for those higher up as the situation changes. Again, loss of communication can be fatal, since their level of coordination requires them to know what every unit is doing, and if a unit is cut off, it may panic and break the plan even if it's situation is not as bad as they think. In addition, the commanders at the top cannot make any changes if they lose sight of the battlefield, nor can they act on any need to change if they can't communicate with line units. Due to superior adherence to command and the overall plan, they are able to make incredibly complex and complicated operations and contingencies, more so than an army emphasizing flexibility.

Third World nations tend to swing either way, depending on where they leaned during the Cold War (pro-West or pro-Russian). Some may even use a combination of the two.

 

Acknowledgements and Thanks:

To the Federation of American Scientists website, and their readily available copy of Sun-Tzu's "The Art of War".

To Eifion Jones for previous discussion on infantry tactics of the modern world.

To Chris Purnell and Marina O'Leary for general discussion.

To the History Channel, my favorite television station. :-)