Originally posted by indy007
You seem to have a generally poor understanding of Strategy and Grand Strategy.
Agreed, I have no military education
Originally posted by indy007
1) Conventional forces historically have had major problems fighting insurgencies. Look at the Turk-Arab conflict for example. The difference is that now technology and tactics are changing so that smaller numbers of troops have a larger sphere of influence. It looks to be the only way to effectively battle an insurgency.
The only tactics to effectively fight insurgency is medieval - take hostages, slaughter entire settlements to terrorise others.
Originally posted by indy007
2) If Hitler, and the general that led the attack on Moscow weren't morons, WW2 would've gone differently. They were overly confident because of their success, abandoned the indirect approach strategy, and wasted too much manpower trying to capture a "symbol" instead of resources.
Hm. Let me disagree. Biggest part of Soviet industry was under Germans by Oct. 1941. Moscow is a HUGE industrial and transportation center, it's importance can't be overestimated.
Originally posted by indy007
3) Modern defense works to an extent (excluding the fact a company of M1A1s wiped out a dug-in battalion of T-72s from the Medina Division in the first gulf war after literally stumbling into them), but it still overmatched by highly mobile forces using an indirect approach. Static defenses are immensely effective at blunting direct attacks... but that's it. I believe Guderian proved that point very well.
Soviet plans were based on flank attacks and usage of motorised and tank units to cut off enemy lines and counterattack. But this tactics failed
Static defence is usefull only in unimportant directions. It's a basic thing, please correct me if I am wrong.
Static defence was impossible for USSR, it's obvious, the density of defense was too thin, we simply didn't have enough troops for reliable defense.
Originally posted by indy007
4) The "historic success" of Russian swarm tactics are overblown. The Germans were still winning battles outnumbered 8 to 1, with inferior tanks. Had Hitler not enforced a static line defense to hold captured terrority, a flexible-line strategy would've checked Russian offenses and kept gains to a minimum.
"Russian swarm tactics"? What's that?
USSR lost maybe 30% more troops then Germany, mostly because of 1941 catastrophe.
"Germans winning battles outnumbered 8 to 1" is another myth.
Originally posted by indy007
There's only a small handful of Russian generals that I know of who effectively used the indirect approach. The soviet equipped & trained armies of modern day don't grasp the principles of it. If they did, Israel would've been conquered & the Israeli-Iran war wouldn't have been a war of attrition.
Hmm. This opinion has a right to exist
The main problem with Arabs is that they are not warriors. Worse then Romanian army. No training can turn cowards into soldiers.
Just imagine one Soviet motoinfantry division in Kuwait-City in 1991. They could turn a city into a small-scale Stalingrad instead of running away.
Originally posted by indy007
okay, flame away.
You disappoint me
What I meant in my forst post in this thread is that US is unable to wage a full-scale war relying on "smart weapons" and other fancy stuff. You see, they ran out of cruise missiles in Yugoslavia and then in Iraq. In Russia they'll probably get as low as bayonet attacks (exaggerating). Fighting a country with full scale echeloned air-defence, rocket artillery and thousands of tanks, sattelite recon, ECM corps, submarine fleet and every male knowing how to assemble his Kalashnikov is quite different from beating third-world countries exausted by decades of sanctions.
