Confused CPT

armyupress.army.milConducting the Offense Through Drone-Enabled Maneuver in EuropeSeven Greywolf leaders explain how drone integration, delegated strike authority, headquarters changes, and fieldcraft enabled offensive maneuver during Combined Resolve 26-07 in Europe.

Greywolf Leaders (the ABCT from that one JMRC rotation) are out with a paper talking about their experience I think it adds a lot of behind the scenes context to CPT Watsons T&P article and gets to something Tony and Justin run out of space to discuss www.armyupress.army.mil/journals/mil...

Tony Stark@tonystark.bsky.social

My latest: WarTalk co-host Justin and I took some time to teach you the fundamentals of fighting drones. “Strong and consistent rehearsals are what separate “equipped” soldiers from “trained” soldiers.” open.substack.com/pub/breaking...

open.substack.comDrones Hate UsThe Secret Guide to Fighting Metal Birds

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Versus what I usually come across which is just unit isn’t doing x survivability for some unknown reason and they suck and are dumb. The reason why I think this is important is because this leads to questions of how much suppression of enemy reconn-strike systems does an ABCT need

And if we don’t have the time to achieve that result or you don’t have that capability to produce it (you aren’t the ME, you’re on the defense on day one, whatever) here’s your options but here how it messes with your paradigms

open.substack.comDrones Hate UsThe Secret Guide to Fighting Metal Birds

Tony Stark@tonystark.bsky.social

That while yes some of the reasons we don’t do simple things from the Ranger Handbook like “take the unexpected route” is professional laziness it’s also because that induces additional friction and reduced tempo that if you can avoid you generally want to. As the Greywolf authors point out

by increasing survivability of the formation they decreased its (immediate) lethality. Move-Strike-Protect anyone? Which marks at least the first public long form discussion that I’ve seen in the Army of hey we’re doing all these survivability things - they’re slowing us down cause trade offs

balloonstodrones.com#1944Revisited – Locating Japanese Radars: The First Dedicated Radar Countermeasures Units in the US NavyBy Thomas Wildenberg Editor’s note: In 2024, From Balloons to Drones will publish a series of articles that seek to provide a new perspective on the air war in 1944. If you are interested in contri…

Didn’t realize the intensity of the EW duels over the South Pacific in 44/45

From Balloons to Drones@balloons2drones.bsky.social

#fromthearchives - #1944Revisited – Locating Japanese Radars: The First Dedicated Radar Countermeasures Units in the US Navy balloonstodrones.com/2024/10/08/1... #airpowerhistory #WW2 #plsRT

How pressure should have ended

Confused CPT@josh97.bsky.social

With an end credits scene of SHAEF going what do you mean hedgerows are a thing while a narrator in the style of a NTC OCT who seen this too many times go “SHAEF was so busy looking at getting onto the beach - they forgot to plan what to do once they got off”

Airborne is obsolete. I will be taking no questions at this time

🦋Special Kherson Cat🐈🇺🇦@specialkhersoncat.bsky.social

Ukraine’s 93rd Mechanized Brigade has released footage showing heavy multirotor drones airlifting and deploying unmanned ground vehicles (UGVs) behind Russian lines. This is the very method recently revealed by the 3rd Army Corps as part of Operation Vivaldi on the Lyman axis.

npr.orgUkraine fires over 1,000 drones at Russia, including hundreds launched at MoscowMoscow's mayor described the wave of drones as the "largest ever" attack on the Russian capital and said there had been damage to a Moscow oil refinery and a residential building.

22 Sept

1,000 bomber raids are back on the menu

Puck the Puddle Pilot@puckthepilot.bsky.social

Noice.

The post 2553 Halo books/video games - the ones where Cortana goes rampant and dominates the galaxy/Forerunner AIs start appearing and doing things - hit a little different now a days tbh

I think I’d also argue the OP is measuring this through the lens of war (strategy) and not war (tactics/operations) (don’t yell at me about On Operations - I’ve read it lol) The slop IMO is more likely to appear and have distinct, measurable effects at the tactical/operational level 1/2

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Like the AI produced a COA that the staff did no additional analysis on (AI directed vice CDR directed) and missed x factor and now B CO is gone, oops we hit an incorrect target, etc. I.e normal human friction but enhanced in some areas, reduced in others. But still there and with a unique AI tinge

Every year Military Review runs a writing competition. This year’s prompt was how to update PME with tech (AI) This is the winning article. Which I think is pretty good and encourage people to read, but had some stuff I wanted to bring up for group convo 1/x www.armyupress.army.mil/Journals/Mil...

That’s a generous overlooking of the clashes between the need for innovation by the Russian Army and how innovative it actually is. I would also argue this constant innovation is limiting uniformity and helping prevent return to large scale maneuver 6/x

I could get behind this. (No one yell at me about the principles of war really being principles of battle). Fini

(And sometimes it’s not even the militaries fault) Why do we keep ignoring the FSB assessment was Ukraine would not fight and Russian columns thus entered Ukraine frequently in March order and trying (very initially) to avoid casualties (outside the FSB kill lists of intelligentsia) 5/x

Like if your national intelligence is telling you a BDE CDR something - you’re probably gonna believe it. Especially in a military-political-social culture where stepping out of the party line is quite dangerous. Overlooking this - may complicate your pure military analysis 5/x

and had large armies that you couldn’t all instantaneously upgrade to new tech, and it all kept changing, it was expensive to adapt. Heck before WW1 arms treaties kept getting floated because everyone was going broke trying to keep up with adversaries In fairness this paragraph addresses that 3/x

But what I’d argue is even when we state adaptation gaps are a thing and we need to be prepared (not often) we then don’t talk about the inevitability of having to fight before it’s closed and how you just have to do that and do your best to - you go to war with the army you have or something 4/x

Id argue that more recent scholarship has suggested that leaders before the War understood long war was possible but sought to avoid it, understood high casualties but couldn’t figure out a way around that, had multiple conflicting tech developments that were hard to keep up with in total, 2/x

Confused CPT reposted

Ulrike Franke

@rikefranke.eu

My most boomer opinion is that you should be able to connect a printer straight out of the box with a cable to the pc and print. No wifi, no bluetooth, no freaking app.

27 Aug

You know who really gets a jump on the seasons changing? Cookbook magazines in the grocery store aisle. Like after 1 July it’s all about fall recipes

27 Aug

Wild times

Fared Al Mahlool | فريد المحلول@faredalmahlool.bsky.social

Syrian President Ahmed Al-Sharaa carries out the first electronic payment using a Visa card in Syria following the lifting of sanctions, in the presence of Central Bank of Syria Governor Safwat Raslan, in Old Damascus.

21 Aug

In the inter-Wehrmacht debates between June 1940 and May 1941 more than a few German mid grade officers argued that 1940 and 1914 were the same campaign just at a faster pace with new technology

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21 Aug

The levels of war are planned down but executed up Strategic guidance and reality directs operational objectives which are then fought by tactical action but tactical action must be successful to achieve operational and strategic goals

Whatismoo@whatismoo.bsky.social

Going to push back hard that kit and tactics are utterly meaningless. All the subfields of military art are interrelated, mutually interdependent, and critical to success. Operational or strategic acumen cannot redeem tactical failure, nor can tactical success redeem strategic incoherence.

21 Aug

UAF counteroffensive 2023: Strategic resourcing and alliance politics dictated the operational approach around a specific tactical paradigm the failure of that tactical paradigm sunk operational success and sparked strategic changes

18 Aug

Very classic Army 19k response Gunnery: Tank identified, range 1400, fire and adjust Combat: Oh shit there’s a fucking tank!!! Nail the bastard

Dreadnought Holiday@dreadships.bsky.social

I think this quote adequately sums up the Royal Navy's traditional response to idiotic odds...

m.youtube.comStar Wars: Ahsoka Season 2 | Teaser Trailer | Streaming January 20 on Disney+YouTube video by Star Wars

15 Aug

Let’s fucking go m.youtube.com/watch?v=Fdar...

mwi.westpoint.eduDrones Have Changed the Battlefield—They Have Not Solved the Command Problem - Modern War InstituteThe battlefield in Ukraine is becoming increasingly transparent, increasingly lethal, and increasingly difficult to command. Unmanned aircraft systems watch movement far beyond the forward line. First...

This is really good 1/x mwi.westpoint.edu/drones-have-...

@michaelstahlke.bsky.social @sodrock.bsky.social @whatismoo.bsky.social @bradduplessis.bsky.social @walkerdm.bsky.social @rpg-volley.bsky.social @brasidas.bsky.social @gravitysra1nbow.bsky.social @thinkingbayonet.bsky.social @tonystark.bsky.social

14 Aug

This is really good 1/x mwi.westpoint.edu/drones-have-...

See latest Mike Kaufman podcast on how Russian UAS and fires is declining because they’re losing so many JOs that they can’t conduct high degrees battlefield orchestration. As well as that much of their uas mesh network efforts is an attempt to pull leaders off the front to more survivable 11/

Positions but they can still C2 advances Fini?

This is really good 1/x mwi.westpoint.edu/drones-have-...

To put this in MDMP/TOC terms. Look at how fast/accurate your running estimates and battle tracking is when you can just watch someone. And why I think we’ll we do mission command or have NCOs isn’t a perfect dodge of why we wouldn’t do this too Of course there are extremely valid fears 9/x

Agreed - however I think we in are overlooking drones as a communication tool and the ramifications thereof as part of a focus on drones as strike. I agree with author drones cannot solve command and control but they bring benefits commanders will realize and attempt to use - and danger 10/

This is really good 1/x mwi.westpoint.edu/drones-have-...

in the ETO junior officer casualties were so high they had to start instructing that leaders needed to be more selective about when to go to the front to both survive but also actually direct. Returning to Ukraine, we’ve seen a lot of commentary about how an overwatching commander or staff 7/x

Can better place the units action in context and fully understand what opposing force capabilities are effecting them. Thus enabling the friendly commander to give better direction. Hence the UAF tactic of two UAS up - one over the enemy, one over the friendlies. 8/x

This is really good 1/x mwi.westpoint.edu/drones-have-...

Back in 22/23 there was a lot of commentary about how the dumb Russians were using UAS to coordinate and synchronize ground maneuver because they didn’t understand mission command but no one ever mentioned the UAF was doing the exact same thing…which would suggest there are some benefits… 5/x

I.e helping solve the last mile of command problem (new phrase I really like) by enabling the CDR to see exactly what his units are seeing. Indeed we frequently in the army discuss leaders leading from the front or being at the point of friction but if we look at say WWII, for US DIVs 6/x

This is really good 1/x mwi.westpoint.edu/drones-have-...

really quickly start going yeah get me that live video feed in the TOC - radio isn’t communicating enough, I want to see. Which I think is interesting considering the classic running GWOT grip about Senior Leaders using UAS to track squads and platoons and issue orders 3/x

This is somewhat correct. 6-0 does stress this but it’s more nuanced - as we see in the second photo while subordinate decision making and decentralized execution is the goal it’s contingent on a lot of factors that may reduce the amount of leeway given to such subordinates/units 4/x

This is really good 1/x mwi.westpoint.edu/drones-have-...

I definately think as an Army we’ve grok’d networks changing how quickly they communicate and how fast the battlefield is but I agree we are underestimating how much this changes Commanders “see” Something I keep noting in AARs/reviews from TiC units is that BN CDRs/staffs who get new UAS 2/x

Combined Arms Bros - this seems good

For the Cobra heads - the operation is being increasingly looked as a potential model for solving the modern battlefield challenge: IN centric combined arms with massed fires breaks *in* armored combined arms centric forces break *out* 1/? www.armyupress.army.mil/Journals/Mil...

Secretary of Defense Rock@sodrock.bsky.social

The analogy I keep circling back to is Normandy ‘44. The Allies struggled for 2 months to do any maneuver and were stuck doing attrition warfare one bocage at a time in the east and one panzer division a time in the west…it was eventually the exploitation of fires that finally allowed a breakout

That’s a lot of vehicles, room, and supplies which idk really know how we mass that anymore -3k+ aircraft and 45 battalions of artillery in support. Modern tech can reduce that number but enormous operational and strategic resources were put behind this. A single division concept this is not

-as SefDefRock points out. The Germans have spent six weeks getting badly attritted and the bulk of their armor isn’t even in the American sector. Which is fortuitous because the Germans counter attack at Morton pretty fast after the breakout (mechanization goes both ways) it’s

Secretary of Defense Rock@sodrock.bsky.social

So as weaknesses -First Army took 100,000 casualties in six weeks after the landing trying to get through the bocage. And that was with air superiority already established, that was just trying to breakout themselves/get more breathing room on the coast.

-Air superiority was achieved both to stymie German reinforcements and protect the buildup of the Allied mass to do this. It’s four IN divisions each in BN, RCT column on a frontage 1 mile wide. With two AR divisions behind them in the initial VII Corps and then 2 more AR DIVs in VII Corps them.

Secretary of Defense Rock@sodrock.bsky.social

I think there’s still some questions and assumptions underlying this strategy but A) You always have to make those B) This is probably more right than wrong and is advancing us towards whatever the “final” answer is. Technologies may be revolutionary but militaries are evolutionary 🤷 2/?