Force Ratios (the old 3-to-1 rule)

[JMA]

Checks on sanity may be very necessary. 3:1 may not serve that purpose, and I believe we can do better. Essentially it MAY be an aid to planning, but after that it really fails the "So what" test of effectiveness, because it is at best simplistic and at worse very misleading.

My opinion FWIW is that for a peacetime army 3:1 in training is probably essential. It certainly provides commanders (at junior levels) in battle for the first time with the ability to roll off a plan which will probably work just fine in most cases.

Yes also to the fact that as one gains combat experience against a specific enemy in a particular environment one no longer needs this 3:1 crutch... but that takes some time and a number of contacts at varying ranges, durations and intensities.

In our little war we did not have the resources in terms of helicopter lift and CAS to get anywhere near this sort of ratio on the bigger attacks into Mozambique and Zambia and subsequently had to rely heavily on the initial air strikes by aging Canberras and Hawker Hunters to get the comrades to adopt the swastika position and run into the stop lines. For example on Op Dingo - Zulu 1 - Chimoio of the 1,200 ZANLA fighters killed about half were killed by the airstrikes and the rest by the 184 men (96 SAS paras, 48 RLI paras, 40 RLI heliborne). Cost to us 2 KIA, 7 WIA. So it was a .04:1 ratio - made possible by accurate and decisive air strikes. In many cases the time of the daily muster parade when the whole camp was formed up on the parade square was a sitting duck for the Canberras and their cluster bombs.

Two days later Op Dingo - Zulu 2 - Tembue was also a turkey shoot except that their morning parade had been delayed so they missed their appointment with the flechettes which were dropped that day from a Hawker Hunter.

Op Barras - Sierra Leone - year 2000 the Brits applied a similar force level (180) against 600 West Side Boys to release hostages and suffered 1 KIA and 11 WIA. It is assumed that the aim was to free the hostages and not to get maximum kills. So 25 confirmed kills must be accepted. The ratio here was .3:1 ratio

Now contrast all this with the final Dien Bien Phu attack of 25,000 Viet Minh against fewer than 3,000 garrison troops. An 8.33:1 ratio.

In the end you do what you need to do to win... and to win you need to know your enemy!