Not at all simplistic, that's an accurate statement.
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Originally Posted by
Ron Humphrey
Long and short
Is it too "simplistic" to say that the key strength in swarming might be found in its ability to recognize and act on any vacuum afforded in a given path
I believe it to be accurate at any rate. However, militarily, problems arise in several areas:
- Recognizing. The really big one...
- Getting the massive numbers available to a swarm of bees is problematical; add getting most much less all the actors in a swarm of humans, unlike bees, to do the correct thing at the right time...
- Rocks are tough and durable but they are also static and rarely react to, evade, withdraw temporarily or counterattack the water that erodes them over considerable time -- time which may not be available to a military force...
That's not to say that swarms won't work, just that the fates must be kind and the reliability of effective action is unlikely to be adequate to satisfy most commanders or politicians -- the human factor (on the part of the Swarmers, the Swarmees and their respective bosses... :wry: ).
The Mongol Crow Swarm ...
and MAJ Shannon's thesis. The FP article by Arquilla, The New Rules of War, mentioned the Mongol "Crow Swarm":
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Simultaneous attack from several directions might be at the very cutting edge in conflict, but its lineage is quite old. Traditional tribal warfare, whether by nomadic horse archers or bush fighters, always featured some elements of swarms. The zenith of this kind of fighting probably came with the 13th-century Mongols, who had a name for this doctrine: "Crow Swarm." When the attack was not carried out at close quarters by charging horsemen, but was instead conducted via arrows raining down on massed targets, the khans called it "Falling Stars."
Classing the highly organized Mongol forces under Subodai (I'd call them conventional light and heavy cavalry) as "traditional tribal warriors" seemed a bit suspect to me, so I Googled up "Crow Swarm" and "Mongol". I found a master's thesis by MAJ William D. Shannon (USMC), Swarm Tactics and the Doctrinal Void: Lessons from the Chechen Wars (June 2008), U.S. Naval Postgraduate School (John Arquilla was a thesis advisor).
MAJ Shannon's issues (pp.16-17 pdf):
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Is there potential to turn swarming concepts into doctrine for U.S. forces? In order to answer this question, this thesis will ask the following questions:
• Are there relevant historical precedents that provide sufficient analysis to explore development of swarming concepts?
• Does the concept of swarming address any gaps in military doctrine?
• Can we [U.S. forces, and more specifically, Marines] incorporate swarm tactics into our doctrine for use in the offense and defense without drastic changes to organization, command, control and communications (C3), training, and logistics?
and Conclusion (pp.91-92 pdf):
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G. CONCLUSION
The research conducted here and in other scholarly and professional publications, coupled with military doctrine and experimentation, all but leads to the conclusion that there is potential to develop doctrinal swarming concepts. This is based on developing answers to the three research questions posed in Chapter I.
First, that the Chechen Wars did provide additional information and lessons learned in relation to not only the war in general, but to this thesis’ independent variables, regarding the use of swarm tactics.
Second, reviewing doctrine and warfighting experiments has confirmed the existence of doctrinal void in the area of swarm tactics, which implies a need to construct doctrinal swarming concepts, engage in experimentation, and promulgate swarm TTPs in doctrine and training.
Finally, with the implementation of the DO concept, our knowledge from the first two research questions and previous scholarly research on swarming, a potential future swarming doctrine concept foundation is set. This would allow Marines and other forces to employ swarm tactics offensively and defend against and repulse enemy swarms. The only thing left for us to do is “do it.”
So, tossing out another piece of red meat to be swarmed on .... ;)
Regards
Mike
PS: MAJ Shannon presents four "swarming" examples from history (pp. 18-23 pdf)
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1. The Mongol Swarm ....
2. Napoleon’s Retreat from Russia ....
3. The Winter War ....
4. The Soviet Afghan War ....
I expect there will be some controversy about those examples. :)