Current US Military

[Smitty-48]

F-15E serves no other purpose than Fast CAS at this point, can't send it deep against triple digit, the only survivable near peer mission for the Strike Eagle is CAS now, high and fast pass, drop 16 SDB II's, back to base to reload, wash rinse repeat, as, for anything else the F-15E is a sitting duck.

It's not the 1970's anymore, digital paradigm radar and missiles are just too deadly to fly 4th generation against, it's point and click, you fly in there, you get shot down, so even F-15E's have to be held back in a support role in the contemporary paradigm, otherwise you'd have none left by the end of the second week.

[Speaker to Animals]

F-15E serves no other purpose than Fast CAS at this point, can't send it deep against triple digit, the only survivable near peer mission for the Strike Eagle is CAS bow, high and fast pass, drop 16 SDB II's, back to base to reload, wash rinse repeat, for anything else the F-15E is a sitting duck.

Maybe. I don't know. Have not kept up with it much, but I know there have been a lot of updates to that platform. The Silent Eagle program, for instance. The guys I know still involved with it seem to think it's pretty damned good.

Personally, I think it's a moot point because the JSF is equally unsurvivable against a real fifth generation air superiority fighter, so what's the fucking point anymore?

We have massive too-big-to-die carrier groups that are sitting ducks. Our only good fifth generation fighter was put on the back burner for a boondoggle lawn dart that might not survive against Russian and Chinese fifth generation fighters.

Seems to me that the next big war is going to start like the last big war, with huge losses and a lot of brass getting fired so we can fix this thing and win.

[Smitty-48]

Manned strikes in 4Gen against near peer IADS would have to be peripheral, the missiles are just too accurate now, back in the day, the SAM's had a very low chance of hitting you, nowadays its the opposite, very high chance of getting hit by any SAM system now, so loitering low and slow over the battlefield is basically suicide, unless you're just bombing the Taliban or whomever, but you couldn't operate like that against the Russians and/or Chinese at this juncture, without being decimated in the process.

[Smitty-48]

The main thing is, you have to get out of the WWII mindset, it wouldn't be like WWII, the systems are so autonomous and accurate now, that both sides would have to hang back and try to take their shots at long ranges, because if you close, there's thousands of robotic weapons of one type or another which would just rip you to shreds, you already see it in Ukraine, the Russians do not launch blitzkriegs, what they do is hang back and use electronic warfare to detect you, then they rain long ranged artillery down relentlessly from stand off distances, they don't even send the tanks and attack helicopters in, until they know you have already been beaten by the joint indirect fires, tanks and whatnot are only used to mop up, artillery is the king of battle, and the Russian Army is built around artillery; rockets, rockets, rockets, they loves them some rockets them Russians, and that's how they would fight if you ever came head to head.

It would be more accurate to call the 1st Guards Tank Army the 1st Guards Artillery Army, because that's how it really is, a giant sized Grand Battery protected by air defenses which would just creep forwards a few kilometers at a time, blasting everything in its path from stand off ranges, only sending the tanks in at the very end, when you've already been pounded into a paste.

Even back in the 1980's, we were still stuck in the WWII mindset, the chain of command just assumed that the Soviets would come across the trace in a Wehrmacht style blitzkrieg, but even forty years ago, that paradigm was already obsolete, and it's only more so now.

Turns out, World War Three would actually be more like World War One, except with a no man's land which was 100-200 km deep, trading long range indirect fires back and forth across, with only the fastest, stealthiest and robotic weapons actually going into no man's land betwixt.

Tanks and attack aircraft like Abrams and A-10, couldn't even be sent in, until you had air dominance, at which point you've already won, so the tank and attack aircraft are not arms of decision, they are basically combat support now, used entirely for mopping up.

B-1, B-2, F-22, F-35, JASM, JSOW, TLAM, MLRS, SDB, JAGM, Top Attack EFP submunitions etc, those are the arms of tactical decision at this juncture, either they win the war or they don't, if they win, then you can send A-10's in to mop up, if they don't, well, you either sue for peace, or fall back on the SIOP.

[Zero]

What could possibly go wrong...?

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/pol ... 853131001/

[ssu]

The main thing is, you have to get out of the WWII mindset, it wouldn't be like WWII, the systems are so autonomous and accurate now, that both sides would have to hang back and try to take their shots at long ranges, because if you close, there's thousands of robotic weapons of one type or another which would just rip you to shreds, you already see it in Ukraine, the Russians do not launch blitzkriegs, what they do is hang back and use electronic warfare to detect you, then they rain long ranged artillery down relentlessly from stand off distances, they don't even send the tanks and attack helicopters in, until they know you have already been beaten by the joint indirect fires, tanks and whatnot are only used to mop up, artillery is the king of battle, and the Russian Army is built around artillery; rockets, rockets, rockets, they loves them some rockets them Russians, and that's how they would fight if you ever came head to head.

It would be more accurate to call the 1st Guards Tank Army the 1st Guards Artillery Army, because that's how it really is, a giant sized Grand Battery protected by air defenses which would just creep forwards a few kilometers at a time, blasting everything in its path from stand off ranges, only sending the tanks in at the very end, when you've already been pounded into a paste.

Even back in the 1980's, we were still stuck in the WWII mindset, the chain of command just assumed that the Soviets would come across the trace in a Wehrmacht style blitzkrieg, but even forty years ago, that paradigm was already obsolete, and it's only more so now.

Turns out, World War Three would actually be more like World War One, except with a no man's land which was 100-200 km deep, trading long range indirect fires back and forth across, with only the fastest, stealthiest and robotic weapons actually going into no man's land betwixt.

Tanks and attack aircraft like Abrams and A-10, couldn't even be sent in, until you had air dominance, at which point you've already won, so the tank and attack aircraft are not arms of decision, they are basically combat support now, used entirely for mopping up.

B-1, B-2, F-22, F-35, JASM, JSOW, TLAM, MLRS, SDB, JAGM, Top Attack EFP submunitions etc, those are the arms of tactical decision at this juncture, either they win the war or they don't, if they win, then you can send A-10's in to mop up, if they don't, well, you either sue for peace, or fall back on the SIOP.

But what you say here has one old and traditional mindset: that assumes that war starts with a huge artillery/missile barrage. As if there peace until it's in a flash turned into an all-out war.

This isn't the way Great Powers are or have been thinking of war as well, war is the last resort and conventional war with your own army totally and openly committed to action is the last resort in war. Everything else becomes before that.

If you want your opponent on his knees, you start far earlier and in a far different theater than with Cruise missiles or artillery missiles.

With the Russians' it has been dubbed the Gerasimov doctrine, but what is notable here is that Gerasimov himself wrote that this is how the West is attacking (Russia) and hence Russia should follow the methods and understand them. The Russians saw the "Color Revolutions" as this hybrid warfare and true to that, especially with the ousting of Milosevic, what NATO bombs couldn't do, the State Department could do easily with the fraction of the cost to get Milosevic ousted.

1. You start blurring the situational awereness of your enemy
2. You try to get political influence within your enemy.
3. You create bridgeheads (enterprises, think-tanks, ngo's, recruit agents)
4. You use information operations and weaken social cohesion and create social disturbance
5. You damage your enemy's alliances and relations
6. You damage critical infrastructure, target key players, use terrorist strikes
7. Hopefully you can perpetrate a coup détat
8. You use Proxy fighters or volunteers
9. If everything else fails, then use your own military openly.

So, if you want to talk about the last piece in the puzzle, conventional war, that's one thing. But it ain't what reality will likely look like.

[Speaker to Animals]

The reality is that total nuclear war is so terrible, the only viable form of warfare against another major power is political and social subversion. It's basically what our federal government has been doing to Eastern Europe for years now to destabilize the region and creep the instability closer and closer to Russia. I think Ukraine was the last straw and Russia is going to start fighting back in their own way if it continues. The election of Trump produced a lull in the conflict, but I doubt it will last. Destabilization and subversion of Eastern Europe will resume and the Russians will start doing it to the Americas in response. That's my two cents.

[Smitty-48]

So, if you want to talk about the last piece in the puzzle, conventional war, that's one thing. But it ain't what reality will likely look like.

In case you missed it, which you obviously did; were actually talking about the last piece of the puzzle, tactical to operational level theater conventional warfare in fact, until that is; you veered off topic, so; do try to keep up, Finnish Pogue.

[Smitty-48]

The reality is that total nuclear war is so terrible, the only viable form of warfare against another major power is political and social subversion.

Yes, well, except; when that is the paradigm, that's how shooting wars actually get started, nobody actually goes out intending to start an all out shooting war these days, but if course, that's exactly how shit happens, to wit, it's all fun and subversion, until somebody loses an eye.

[Speaker to Animals]

The reality is that total nuclear war is so terrible, the only viable form of warfare against another major power is political and social subversion.

Yes, well, except; when that is the paradigm, that's how shooting wars actually get started, nobody actually goes out intending to start an all out shooting war these days, but if course, that's exactly how shit happens, to wit, it's all fun and subversion, until somebody loses an eye.

That probably is how it gets started.