Urban / City Warfare (merged thread)

[SWJ Blog]

Communications in Sub- and Superterranean Structures

This is a Journal article.

[SWJ Blog]

Anticipating Megacity Responses to Shocks: Using Urban Integration and Connectedness to Assess Resilience

This is a Journal article.

[SWJ Blog]

Using the Internet of Things to Gain and Maintain Situational Awareness in Dense Urban Environments and Mega Cities

This is a Journal article.

[davidbfpo]

Readers will know I am skeptical about the value of big data in future operations in mega-cities, so it was interesting to read this civilian project's use of mobile phone data in the Yemen to assess the impact of he Arab Spring.

There is a podcast on I-Tunes, behind a registration "wall".

Backed by highlights in an article:http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/...i-cell-phones/

A fuller article is in Foreign Policy, behind a registration "wall":https://www.foreignaffairs.com/artic.../yemen-calling

[SWJ Blog]

An Analytic Framework for Operations in Dense Urban Areas

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[SWJ Blog]

A Look at Urban Warfare in the Syrian City of Aleppo

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[SWJ Blog]

Assessing Physiological Response to Toxic Industrial Chemical Exposure in Megacities

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[davidbfpo]

Discovered a website today on the "peace walls" in Belfast, Northern Ireland which once separated communities and were intended to reduce violence. Urban barriers, a polite term for urban military architecture, appeared in Iraq on a massive scale awhile back. Though I cannot recall a thread on them.

The website has a collection of photos and links:http://www.peacewall-archive.net/ On their Twitter there is much more, including a few photos in the grim years of the 1970's with fortified army bases:https://twitter.com/Peacewalls

[SWJ Blog]

TED Talk: How Megacities Change the Map of the World

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[AdamG]

"New".* DDilegge and I started talking about this in 1998 or 1996, IIRC.

The nearly five-year civil war in Syria has exposed some of the difficulties that military forces have conducting intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance against terrorists and insurgents in crowded urban environments. These challenges, while not insurmountable, will continue to plague even the most advanced military forces, including the United States, as migration out of rural areas and into cities continues unabated.

For the foreseeable future, deterring and countering near-peer adversaries such as Russia and China will undoubtedly remain at the forefront of American grand strategy. But in addition to meeting the challenges associated with traditional and well-known state-based threats, the U.S. military will be expected to combat an array of violent non-state actors — a blanket term that includes well-established groups like Islamic State, al Qaeda and the transnational criminal gang MS-13 but also countless other and less well-known militias, insurgent groups and terrorist organizations.

http://blogs.reuters.com/great-debat...in-megacities/

See also
http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...ght=megacities

*

[SWJ Blog]

‘Mad Scientist’ Megacities and Dense Urban Areas Conference

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[davidbfpo]

Just discovered this 2007 Australian paper by Professor Michael Evans, of the Australian Defence College, which was reviewed on SWJ Blog in 2008 by General Jim Molan (SWJ Blog link now redundant).

Jim Molan's Foreword ends with:

As this fine Occasional Paper demonstrates, fighting in cities is a tough proposition, but it is not an impossible task for modern armed forces. What is required above all else is preparation and forethought. Dr Evans’ comprehensive study represents a valuable and important analysis of an area of the military art that is likely to exercise our minds increasingly in coming years. This is a publication that deserves a wide readership and I commend it to fellow military professionals.

Link to article:http://www.defence.gov.au/adc/public...withoutjoy.pdf

Link to SWJ Blog:http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/city-without-joy

In the Spring 2015 Parameters Michael Evans responded to other authors on megacities, in 'The Case against Megacities':http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute...15%20v45n1.pdf

I expect the two articles are best read together.

Finally Professor Evans and I have been friends since 1985, when he was in Zimbabwe, with the ZDF.

[SWJ Blog]

The Role of Network Science in Analyzing Slums in Rapidly Growing Urban Areas

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[SWJ Blog]

Mad Scientist: Megacities and Dense Urban Areas Compendium

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[AdamG]

Even as the Army continues to sharpen its core warfighting skills inside tightening, unpredictable budgets, the service also must look to the future to prepare for a quickly changing, increasingly volatile battlefield, the Army’s top general said.

“We prioritized the present, and we mortgaged the future,” said Army Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Milley. “Frankly, the biggest challenge is having a predictable, steady stream of money to work with industry, [science and technology], and research and development, to accelerate, advance and explore these opportunities and options for the future.”

To start, the world is “rapidly urbanizing,” Milley said. Today, between 50 percent and 60 percent of the world’s population live in urban areas, he said. By 2050, Milley predicts that will jump to 80 percent to 90 percent.

“You’re seeing a massive growth right now, as we speak, of megacities,” Milley said. “Today, an example of a megacity is Seoul, South Korea, with 27 million people, that has urban sprawl essentially from the [demilitarized zone] all the way south of Seoul, and it is this massive urban belt and complex.”

The Army has been designed, manned, trained and equipped for the last 241 years to operate primarily in rural areas, Milley said.

“In the future, I can say with very high degrees of confidence, the American Army is probably going to be fighting in urban areas,” he said. “We need to man, organize, train and equip the force for operations in urban areas, highly dense urban areas, and that’s a different construct. We’re not organized like that right now.”

http://www.defensenews.com/articles/...-in-megacities

[SWJ Blog]

Islamic State Expected to Fall Back, Wage Urban Warfare in Mosul

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[AdamG]

The year is 2030. Forget about the flying cars, robot maids, and moving sidewalks we were promised. They’re not happening. But that doesn’t mean the future is a total unknown.
According to a startling Pentagon video obtained by The Intercept, the future of global cities will be an amalgam of the settings of “Escape from New York” and “Robocop” — with dashes of the “Warriors” and “Divergent” thrown in. It will be a world of Robert Kaplan-esque urban hellscapes — brutal and anarchic supercities filled with gangs of youth-gone-wild, a restive underclass, criminal syndicates, and bands of malicious hackers.
At least that’s the scenario outlined in “Megacities: Urban Future, the Emerging Complexity,” a five-minute video that has been used at the Pentagon’s Joint Special Operations University. All that stands between the coming chaos and the good people of Lagos and Dhaka (or maybe even New York City) is the U.S. Army, according to the video, which The Intercept obtained via the Freedom of Information Act.

https://theintercept.com/2016/10/13/...iggest-cities/

[Windows97]

I don't get it (then again I don't get a lot of things) but I still don't see or, rather, cannot envisage, why a military would want to operate in cities. I can understand a domestic COIN / Law enforcement operation or counter-terrorism mission but seriously if you are an invading army why not just isolate a city and exhaust the offending inhabitants. No city can survive without a hinterland. Hell, if it worked for Caesar why not now? All I read and hear is a regurgitation of attritionist fetishes.

[Windows97]

Dr. Russell Glenn, Australian National University, presents, "Megacities: The Good; The Bad and the Ugly" during the 2016 Megacity Mad Scientist Conference at Arizona State University April 21-22, 2016


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MgWm9BOVT3E

[AdamG]

I don't get it (then again I don't get a lot of things) but I still don't see or, rather, cannot envisage, why a military would want to operate in cities.

Because the enemy always gets a vote, particularly on where the game is played.