....so basically enhancing and supporting the convoy system? No convoys, no point.Originally Posted by Fuchs
I think the question could be, did the Wolfpacks require a disproportionate allocation of resources to defeat, balanced by was the Wolfpack the best use of the U-boat - which I do not think it was!
Infinity Journal "I don't care if this works in practice. I want to see it work in theory!"
- The job of the British Army out here is to kill or capture Communist Terrorists in Malaya.
- If we can double the ratio of kills per contact, we will soon put an end to the shooting in Malaya.
Sir Gerald Templer, foreword to the "Conduct of Anti-Terrorist Operations in Malaya," 1958 Edition
The subs weren't the best use for the resources spent on the sub force (should have gone into the army), but the wolfpack tactic was a great use for the subs as long as the sub tech was competitive.
The disproportionate allocation of resources happened on the allied side; their production of new ships made the German sub effort look tiny by 1943.
Eighteen American shipyards built 2,751 Liberty ships between 1941 and 1945, many more other freighters and tankers were built, the new escorts (destroyers, destroyer escorts, corvettes) already outnumbered the subs. The allied air power dedicated to the Battle of the Atlantic exceeded the total German bomber force since 1942.
Industrial dissimilarity and very special technological factors (the wolfpack tactic required the subs to cruise faster than the convoy, which was impossible for the late-war early SSKs) defeated the sub wolfpacks, not some tactic in itself (although new tactics helped to reduce cargo ship losses and caused greater sub losses).
So there is hope in this dark world, may netwar deliver us.But the principles of networking don't have to help only the bad guys. If fully embraced, they can lead to a new kind of military -- and even a new kind of war. The conflicts of the future should and could be less costly and destructive, with armed forces more able to protect the innocent and deter or defend against aggression.
Vast tank armies may no longer battle it out across the steppes, but modern warfare has indeed become exceedingly fast-paced and complex. Still, there is a way to reduce this complexity to just three simple rules that can save untold amounts of blood and treasure in the netwar age
After that cheap shot let us look at this swarming thing.
According to this definition all armed forces swarm. Or better all the armed forces are swarms, be it on the battlefield or when in search of food.
It gets even better. According to this article we are also swarms, or at least have them in us!
I will continue later...Even brain cells may follow the same rules for collective behavior seen in locusts or fish.
“One of the really fun things that we’re doing now is understanding how the type of feedbacks in these groups is like the ones in the brain that allows humans to make decisions,” Dr. Couzin said. Those decisions are not just about what to order for lunch, but about basic perception — making sense, for example, of the flood of signals coming from the eyes. “How does your brain take this information and come to a collective decision about what you’re seeing?” Dr. Couzin said. The answer, he suspects, may lie in our inner swarm
Firn
Firn:
Yes. Yes they do.According to this definition all armed forces swarm.
Actually, that's precisely what it is.
To quote Sean J. A. Edwards in his work on the topic, swarming is:
Not sure why defining and understanding the past, present, and future of a core component of warfare isn't useful.a primary maneuver that results in an attack from multiple directions (all points on the compass) by 5 or more (semi) autonomous units on a single target/unit.
Moving on, here's what Ronfeldt and Arquilla wrote in 2000:
Which is very much in tune with what Marc wrote:Examples of swarming can be found throughout history, but it is only now able to emerge as a doctrine in its own right. That is largely because swarming depends on a devolution of power to small units and a capacity to interconnect those units that has only recently become feasible, due to the information revolution.
Arquilla's basic point is that the world has changed - we've entered an era of unprecedented connectivity and, logically, military structure should reflect that shift.Smaller units and increased segmentation can work and be incredibly effective, but they are dependent upon the technologies involved, especially the defensive, mobility and logistics technologies, and the use to which they are put.
Swarming is a useful approach to understanding how to do so, and the rules Arquilla outlines are useful in thinking how to accomplish that task - smaller units (#1) wielding sophisticated information flows (#2) are able to accomplish complex and varied tasks as the need arises(#3).
I totally agree...
Now all we have to do is convince the Politicians who do not trust Generals to start doing so and get the Generals who do not trust Captains to start trusting Sergeants.
Swarming has worked; will work -- but you need trained and trusted troops to do it. We, the US do not do either thing as well as we can or should.
Scott,
Arquilla doesn't say swarming is new. He says that the conditions are now in place for a swarming to have a strategic role rather than a purely tactical one. Doctrine.There's no need to confuse the terms - attacking from multiple directions isn't new. Ken's right - it takes trained and trusted troopers to do it. It's being done everyday in Iraq on the streets and has been for several years. I'm just not sure what the "new" term does other than confuse folks.
Sure. It doesn't go far enough though. The hierarchy is still prevalent, and thus susceptible to disruption from nimble enemies who have embraced the swarm as doctrine.Another point that Arquilla neglects is modularity - there's no divisional structure anymore that just plops down. Yeah, some "divisions" go with "their" brigades at the same time, but that's just due to a rotation. When units get to theater, they're broken down according to their capabilities and sub-units are attached to different commands. Both Afghanistan and Iraq are like this. 3rd BCT, 1st Cav in 06-08 was three of it's assigned battalions, a light cav squadron from the 82nd, a Stryker infantry battalion, Paladins from 3rd ACR, and an MLRS battery from Sill.
To get a handle on just how deep a rethink we need, and to put in tangible terms what effect integrating the swarm at a doctrinal level can hae, a quote from the article:
Which brings us to Ken's point, on which he's absolutely right. It does take a different kind of culture, particularly in regards to training. (Don Vandergriff's leading the way on that front. I'd recommend his books on the topic. )A networked U.S. military that knows how to swarm would have much smaller active manpower -- easily two-thirds less than the more than 2 million serving today -- but would be organized in hundreds more little units of mixed forces. The model for military intervention would be the 200 Special Forces "horse soldiers" who beat the Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan late in 2001. Such teams would deploy quickly and lethally, with ample reserves for relieving "first waves" and dealing with other crises. At sea, instead of concentrating firepower in a handful of large, increasingly vulnerable supercarriers, the U.S. Navy would distribute its capabilities across many hundreds of small craft armed with very smart weapons. Given their stealth and multiple uses, submarines would stay while carriers would go. And in the air, the "wings" would reduce in size but increase in overall number, with mere handfuls of aircraft in each. Needless to say, networking means that these small pieces would still be able to join together to swarm enemies, large or small.
S
Again how? Examples? My use of the word "Strategic" is the use of force for a political goal.
Infinity Journal "I don't care if this works in practice. I want to see it work in theory!"
- The job of the British Army out here is to kill or capture Communist Terrorists in Malaya.
- If we can double the ratio of kills per contact, we will soon put an end to the shooting in Malaya.
Sir Gerald Templer, foreword to the "Conduct of Anti-Terrorist Operations in Malaya," 1958 Edition
Swarming is just another example of confusing terms
While I will admit that Edwards did his homework on the battles of Alexander against the Scythians and Crassus against the Parthians - what he fails to do is link the term "Parting Shot" to the "Parthian Shot." He tries to, but doesn't go that far. Yes, it's true, the Parting Shot came from Persia - or at least the term does.
What Arquilla fails to do is realize (or at least recognize) that "swarming" or a coordinated attack from multiple directions (as Wilf points out) is not new. It's old - at least tactically. Edwards examples show that. Clearly the Romans and the Macedonians understood that the Parthians and Scythians had enough of a network or at least a plan to attack from multiple directions.
There's no need to confuse the terms - attacking from multiple directions isn't new. Ken's right - it takes trained and trusted troopers to do it. It's being done everyday in Iraq on the streets and has been for several years. I'm just not sure what the "new" term does other than confuse folks.
Another point that Arquilla neglects is modularity - there's no divisional structure anymore that just plops down. Yeah, some "divisions" go with "their" brigades at the same time, but that's just due to a rotation. When units get to theater, they're broken down according to their capabilities and sub-units are attached to different commands. Both Afghanistan and Iraq are like this. 3rd BCT, 1st Cav in 06-08 was three of it's assigned battalions, a light cav squadron from the 82nd, a Stryker infantry battalion, Paladins from 3rd ACR, and an MLRS battery from Sill.
Scott
Late to the party
First, a thank you to Wilf for giving me a head's up about this discussion earlier today. It was interesting to read being composed of a mixture of fair criticism of Arquilla's article and some comments that are, IMHO, missing the forest for the trees or are inexplicably just missing. I'd like to weigh in on a couple of points.
What I found to be very odd, on a board where strategic thinking is highly valued, that no one addressed Arquilla's introduction where he raised the critical variable of cost-effectiveness of large unit operations against smaller, irregular and networked opponents. Maybe Arquilla was not explicit enough. Let me try.
In WWII, the US spent approximately $ 330 billion 1940 dollars to wage war. By any standard that was a lot of money. However, for that fantastic sum, the US received a considerable strategic and tactical ROI including: contributing to the destruction, defeat and occupation of Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy and Imperial Japan; the deaths of roughly 11 million Axis soldiers and civilians; according to John Keegan, producing enough equipment and munitions to outfit 1200 divisions; thousands of combatant ships; 300,000 planes and three functioning atomic bombs, two of which saw use against the enemy.
Now, taking the lower-end estimate expenditure of $ 1 trillion for the war on terror, how does the ROI today compare to the example of WWII?
We have killed or captured low thousands (less than 10k) Islamist insurgents, some of who are al Qaida (President Bush claimed 75 % of AQ leadership) but AQ has held out against the US more than twice as long as the Wehrmacht and still has refuge in Pakistan. We have occupied Afghanistan and overthrown the Taliban government that hosted AQ, but the Taliban too has a refuge in Pakistan and continues to field fighters in Afghanistan. We invaded and occupied Iraq and needed a prolonged campaign to pacify the country and managed to exterminate an AQ affiliate there ( that only appeared because of our invasion). We have circumscribed AQ's operational capacity but from 2001-2010, the group has still managed to sporadically sponsor/inspire significant acts of terrorism in allied countries.
How much do you think each capture/kill of AQ costs per capita compared to killing or capturing an Axis soldier in WWII ?
"a big battalion can split into the 'small and many' when required". True, but how much is it costing us for the "big battalion" to try to go "small and many". Is the burn rate of money sustainable for the United States until AQ runs out of guys?
If not, then you have the operational prescription for spending your way to defeat. Which is what we are doing now.
Kind of like.... Vietnam, where incidentally, we lost despite having much better everything than the enemy (except of course, a strategy to win).
Speaking of the Vietnam War, if Wilf is confused on how small unit, tactical, swarming can have a strategic effect (or what it is), roll some old news video of VC terrorists swarming and seizing the US Embassy in Saigon during Tet, broadcast to the whole world.
Re-capturing the Embassy (which was not in doubt) or inflicting a catastrophic military defeat on the VC ( which the US and ARVN did) hardly mattered. The VC casualties during Tet were ultimately replaced by Northerners but the lost political credibility of MACV or the USG could not.
Did he say that? I must have missed it. OK, so stupid people doing stupid stuff is .... stupid? Point being, if War today is really "more fast moving and unbelievably complicated," why should modern War not cost more than old simple WW2?
Fact is, War today is not more complicated - nor is warfare. We just believe it is, so we are happy to justify the costs on that basis. So what's Arquilla's point? That the level of analysis is very poor? Not argument from me.
Certainly not confused. The attack on the Embassy had no element of so-called "swarming" what so ever. Many hundreds of decisions and actions taken after 1968 had significantly more effect on the outcome of the Vietnam war than some news footage. Wars are won and lost because of really decisive events. Not pictures of irrelevant events.Speaking of the Vietnam War, if Wilf is confused on how small unit, tactical, swarming can have a strategic effect (or what it is), roll some old news video of VC terrorists swarming and seizing the US Embassy in Saigon during Tet, broadcast to the whole world.
Saying "Swarming" is baby talk. It's like saying "Blitzkrieg". It pretty much indicates the person using it, is not well grounded in history, tactical doctrine, or anything that usefully progresses the discussion.
Infinity Journal "I don't care if this works in practice. I want to see it work in theory!"
- The job of the British Army out here is to kill or capture Communist Terrorists in Malaya.
- If we can double the ratio of kills per contact, we will soon put an end to the shooting in Malaya.
Sir Gerald Templer, foreword to the "Conduct of Anti-Terrorist Operations in Malaya," 1958 Edition
Perils of accepting the CNN effect...
Sir,
Although addressed to Wilf I would like to make some observations. The example you use of the attack on the Saigon embassy is disingenuous. The attack’s perceived victory had more to do with the North’s Dich Van propaganda programme which paid dividends when US news anchors handed the North a victory on a plate without checking the facts on the ground first. The camera men had no situational awareness and had never been embedded with US troops and thus knew nothing about combat or the disorientation that they would experience. Furthermore, the attack itself was actually a poorly planned “raid” by a reinforced infantry section/depleted platoon which was, appearances to the contrary (i.e., “news” footage), was quickly dealt with my the marines and MPs in duty. “Swarming” as a concept is what Kripke would have called a flaccid designator (i.e., what it seeks to designate is not the same across all possible worlds or even contexts) given that many of the activities which it claims to explain (in catch-all fashion) actually have established TTPs within service/JP doctrine (such as carrier aviation attacks on enemy ships, submarine “wolfpacks”, SOF raids, et al). “Swarming” as a concept, rather than a loose metaphor, is about as useful as designating all modern conflicts short of full-scale inter-state war “4th Generation Warfare”.
On the embassy attack see the following (for example);
http://www.airforce-magazine.com/Mag...8/0108tet.aspx
Hi Zen,
I picked up on it but, honestly, i thought it was a complete and utter red herring. The cost effectiveness argument is based on a positive returns ROI only. In other words, he isn't including the "costs" (or potential costs) of not having big units with a lot of conventional force. My suspicion as to why he left it out is that the two examples that come to my mind, Rome late 4th century and Byzantium ca. 1030, both took his current advice and got trashed as a result of it. It is analogous to a bank saying "Well, we haven't had a robbery in years, so let's cut costs by doing away with our security people and systems"; aka, as my friends in IT put, an id1t error.
Sic Bisquitus Disintegrat...
Marc W.D. Tyrrell, Ph.D.
Institute of Interdisciplinary Studies,
Senior Research Fellow,
The Canadian Centre for Intelligence and Security Studies, NPSIA
Carleton University
http://marctyrrell.com/
Huh? Seriously? OK, so based in that 5 planes attacking a single ship with 72 degrees of separation counts as swarming? Obviously that definition is not useful, workable or insightful. More over, based on my example, why is so good? Fact is, in this example it's less useful, not more.
because it is not a core component, and its misleading.Not sure why defining and understanding the past, present, and future of a core component of warfare isn't useful.
That may be his point but I find it without evidence. Unless he can show me practical and workable examples of how this all works, I cannot see how he is helping. Militaries need to change for the same reasons they have always needed to change - to be better at warfare. Theoretical navel gazing is not the answer.Arquilla's basic point is that the world has changed - we've entered an era of unprecedented connectivity and, logically, military structure should reflect that shift.
OK, give me practical real world examples of Points #1-3, and explain your reasoning.Swarming is a useful approach to understanding how to do so, and the rules Arquilla outlines are useful in thinking how to accomplish that task - smaller units (#1) wielding sophisticated information flows (#2) are able to accomplish complex and varied tasks as the need arises(#3).
Infinity Journal "I don't care if this works in practice. I want to see it work in theory!"
- The job of the British Army out here is to kill or capture Communist Terrorists in Malaya.
- If we can double the ratio of kills per contact, we will soon put an end to the shooting in Malaya.
Sir Gerald Templer, foreword to the "Conduct of Anti-Terrorist Operations in Malaya," 1958 Edition
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