NATO tactics don't work in Ukraine because they revolve around overwhelming American Air Superiority to offset Russian/Soviet advantages in ground based fires. Without air superiority Ukraine is instead having to fight an artillery war against an opponent who generally has a superiority in fires.
@@xxxlonewolf49 still, even if Russian artillery saturation is not efficient, it is countered much easier via air superiority vs engaging in artillery duels
@RaikoTechnologies of course, why didn't the Ukrainians think of the obvious invading another country to go around the minefield, or launching an amphibious invasion of Russia to go around the minefields 🙈
well said, one Ukrainian returning from western training said they told him just to "avoid or, bypass minefields" which unfortunately shows how modern NATO forgot the old lessons of peer on peer combat in the last 30 years
Another thing that has been talked about a lot, but not emphasized enough that with the combination of the flat open terrain, massive number of artillery assets and 24/7 drone surveillance of the battle space it is practically impossible to concentrate forces to conduct larger scale offensive opperations without immediately suffering an artillery raid. By extension that's why we don't see maneuvering tank formations, because they cannot set up assembly areas close enough to the front so they have to march long distances before engaging the enemy, which is in part responsible for the poor performance of armoured assets in this war, because those movements are extremely taxing to the crew even in more ergonomic NATO tanks. The Ukrainian counter offensive is a great example of this in effect. After that fiasco they started using smaller infantry units with limited armoured support, which led to the small amount of gains they could achieve in that operation. This tactic seems to be prevailing on both side to this day.
@@acceptablecasualty5319 I know that as I laid that out in my original comment. I am curious what @looinrims will answer, because his comment suggests that neither is inherently capable of conducting such an operation, which I don't think is true.
@@looinrimsboth sides have such capability. But, when troops will be accumulated in the staging area - they would be clapped by artillery, or, if it will be AFU - also by helicopters or strike aircrafts, or by both. So, this is become purely arty warfare, with small groups constantly trying to infiltrate to enemy lines.
I see a lot of similarities between the war in Ukraine and the Iraq-Iran-War. Lot of what you have mentioned was executed there between 1980 -1988 too: trench and mine warfare, tanke fire indirect fire, attack helicopters stopping armour, a permanent lack of ressources. In genreal: Firepower over movement.
Movement, in this case, is not freely permitted. The entire battlefield is perpetually surveilled. Drones have altered tactics, with military institutions quick to adopt, but slow to counter. Even "efficient" Russian jamming seems to have moderate effect.
@@panzlockDrones changed a lot. Especially when it comes to dislocation of troops. But I want to point out some things: 1.) The informations provided by drones have to be put together. There are in my opion no doubts that there's friction too concerning this.Also the informations have to be transferred to CPs and staffs to work with them. Another point which requires constant corrections due to combat operations. 2.) The other ways of reconnaissance are not gone. They can provide pictures of situations still. i.e. during the Iraq-Iran-War the iranias didn't use encryption or coding on tactical level radio transmissons most of the time but plain text.(!) On operational level the Iraqis were able to deciphered Irans radio transmissions (with the help of swiss machines and czech operators). 3.) In the end you need to have the resources to use the informations on the battlefield. That means you need to have the the appropriate weaponry and you need them in appropriate numbers. You also need troops that are able to conduct the right tactics. Again: Drones change a lot. I absolutly agree. But i.e. the informations provided by drones do not change the inferiority of the ukraine army concerning artillery.
You lie. There are no any similarities at all. trench and mine warfare is inevitable in case when enemies are equal in strength. It's not war against Afhgan peasants or any other 3d world contries what USA and NATO did in their history.
- multilayered defences more then 50 km deep - automated remining of huge areas in hours, which makes mineclearing a herculean or better sisiphosian task - drone surveilance deep into enemy territory - round about 50 - 70 km range - no air superiority - increasing thermal imaging capabilities on both sides - glide bombes - long range artillery and huge ammount of it (Russia)
To be fair. All these factors have always been part of the basis of NATO doctrine; an all out war with the Soviet Union. Ukraine isn't employing NATO doctrine. It uses NATO weapon systems in a Soviet style.
@@065Tim Thank you... and to add NATO doctrine does work in these condtions... really look at every war NATO has fuaaght for exemples of how they overcoming these types of issues.
reminds me the thing with genius Ameriquan êkspêrts evaluating MiG-25 "It weren't we, who've fucked up and who must take some responsibility. It's Sovets who invented a wrong plane!" It isn't our textbook which never shed light on a possible scenario. It's just dæmned Æstern Eüropa.
@@worldoftancraft and then as a response the Ameriquan êkspêrts developed the most successful air superiority fighter in history that also happened to destroy several MiG-25 with no combat losses of its own
@@colinadams5419 good thing it never enters truly protected airspace. Now you should go remember the noombar 1 US-of-A interceptor: the M1 Abrams and how it annihilated everything in Easting 73 airzone, together with Bradley AWACS system. Also English literacy is a joke. Cope with that. It's people of this tribe that make the used spellings not that unimaginable. Or you have been through a hiccough while reading them?
@@colinadams5419 also it's kinda neglectful from you that you omitted the curious fact that the most powerful entity that kicked the ass of an F-15 was... Earth. The beloved blue-green ball that, as I can recall, doesn't have conscious. Also, curious fact number two is... what you've wrote is am example of WhatAvoutIsm. The irony itself.
Because the text books also don't tell you to sit on your hands doing nothing while the enemy makes a big ass mine field. Ukraine is going to be a text book example of squandering your edge over the enemy. (They had U.S. intel, Drones, optics, thermals, air defense)
Of course! That's how Ukraine successfully advanced to the rear in Avdiiv . . . err . . . Avdeevka, causing eleventy billion casualties to the Russians while Private Oinkskiy stubbed his toe as the only Ukrainian casualty.
@@TacoSallust The thing that gets me is how poutine didn't predict his massive loss of eleventy billion casualties. As we all know, the Russians ran out of ammunition 2 years ago and have been using exclusively shovels since then. If only NATO weren't so stingy with the money, Ukraine could have defended against the shovel-wielders and their illegal invasion more quickly.
@@asahearts1 Love to see that there's people out there who understand that war is an extension of politics. I clearly remember that Nuland was involved in planning the counter offensive, at least so she stated herself. Well turns out that Coup plotting propagandists don't make for good military strategists lmao
And that air dominance requires what? Exactly, a vastly inferior enemy army. And even then, look at the declassified documents of Vietnam's air war. It was a complete turkey shoot for the Vietnamese and their allies whenever they engaged NATO aircraft.
They have literally proven air dominance is not required. They’ve turned a total defeat into a stalemate against an enemy that has every advantage possible.
@@Sercer25 Thanks, what I meant was that it seemed like the intention was to apply as much NATO tactics as possible, but it probably wasn't going to fully work either way, even if there was a solid air force on the top of things. The Russians were prepared, the Ukrainians struck where they were prepared whilst this didn't happen in the previous, more successful offenses.
NATO equipment was also maintained to a better standard, once upon a time. You know, back in the days when crèches on army bases were not a top priority.
NATO and SOVIET doctrine was developed without any actual direct engagement with their main adversaries. It's unique in that it's a battle of two hypotheticals that were never tested in the real world.
First Gulf war, the Iraqi's followed the Soviet doctrine to the letter and were steamrolled by the coalition who did nothing but practice against soviet doctrine. The tech gap that was shown in that conflict scared the shit out of the Russians and the Chinese. While the Russians said they were going to rework their military (They didn't) the Chinese did, they [China] are attempting to make their military like a modern western one.
@@tdlainc.4737 Am sorry but Iraq isnt russia or by extension the soviet union. We know for a fact that suppressing russia's air defenses would be too costly for anyone that dared. Iraq had no such defenses. Once the US attained air supremacy, that was it. Soviet doctrine focuses on denying the opponent air supremacy. This is seen with there heavy focus on air defenses. And it works, Ukraine denied russia air superiority for 2 whole years. Its only now starting to fall apart. Ukraine was using mostly S300 systems..... We apply that to russia who have even more advanced systems and you can see how daunting the task is for Nato doctrine. Any fight with russia is one where you are committed to go all in. Its gonna be costly. And am talking conventional. For a group like Nato, they know that spending there strength on russia is stupid when the dragon in the east is merely watching....
1. They’ve been tailored to fight insurgencies in the Middle East and Africa for the past 30 years 2. They hinge WAY too much on favorable conditions such as air superiority, numerical superiority, etc. 3. Fail to account for the limitations of equipment, as Ukraine has complained about.
We hinge on Air Superiority or Air Dominance because THAT is a guaranteed factor. We outnumber the RuAF two and even three to one, with more advanced technology across the board and better pilots. The Airspace will be contested, but WE will still be the ones doing strike missions even as the sky is not fully secured. Russians will be on the defensive through and through. They can rely on their SAMs, but they will pretty much be attrited at only a slightly slower pace than the enemy aircraft. Ukraine is on the opposite spectrum. They cannot even gain air superiority at all, nor can they even contest the airspace. It’s only because of Russia’s pure incompetence that they haven’t been pummeled into the ground at a rate never before seen in the war up to this point. In regards to the air war… Ukraine is to Russia what Russia is to us.
@@PeterMuskrat6968 No it’s not and you’re a fool to think it would be. Modern air defenses can lock down airspace very effectively. You’re grossly overestimating our capability. Anybody who’s worked for the military (like me) knows the Russians aren’t the losers you make them out to be. They’re very competent fighters, their pilots have more combat hours than any other air force on earth, and their missile technology is either on par with or exceeds ours. Anecdotal, but my cousin was a CCT in the Air Force and even admitted we wouldn’t just magically gain air superiority over Russia. Don’t let your hubris be your downfall. We thought Ukraine would punch through easily last summer, thought the Abrams would single handedly roll through Moscow, and thought the NATO trained troops were superior to Russia’s. All of that was wrong.
@@PeterMuskrat6968 If your whole strategy relies on one factor being guaranteed, doesn't that mean then your whole stratagem was very vulnerable. What if you underestimate your opponents Anti Air ability and they make it costly for your airpower. Or worse they actually out compete or make your airpower a none factor? What's worse is you then package this way of fighting to a country who does not even have that one guaranteed factor either, setting them up for failure.
@@PeterMuskrat6968 Never in a million years, as things stand, would NATO even contest for Russia's airspace. Their air defence capabilities would make short work of the USAF, downing aircraft at a rate that would make replenishment untenable, considering America's shambolic lack of production surge capacity. Not to mention the crucial loss of experienced pilots. Stop the cope.
@@chico9805 Russia could barely deal with what little Ukraine received in missiles, you think they'd stop hundreds of tomahawks and f35s? You're drunk go home. You say USA can't produce replacement, what, prey tell would Russia use to replace their air defenses once they're exhausted? If this war showed anything is that Russia anti air was way overhyped.
the introduction of drones to reach into and past local defense for clearing fog of war and accurate targeting of high value targets really has changed the game imo. the idea that we would be reduced to world war 1 style combat again just blows my mind. modern battlefields are going to remain a trench slog with very limited mobility until such a time as drones can be quickly and efficiently dealt with. there are other factors of coarse but i would argue these drones are the single biggest impact item which has thrown mobile warfare under the bus
I disagree. The trench slogging we're seing really shouldn't come as any surprise given the terrain and forces at play. The ground is not conducive to manuver in the best of circumstances. The donbass and adjacent regions are a tangled knotwork of hedges and streams and small towns, not like the plains to the West.
@@horsemumbler1this isn't the french countryside circa WW2, this is literally the terrain armor was designed to operate in, it's like 1000km of grain fields with very little cover and only one major obstacle in the form of the Dniper. the ability for drones to prevent any kind of force concentration close to the front has created this situation which amounts to no one being willing to expose more than a platoon or 2 of infantry at a time. any time Russia tries to put any kind of tank numbers together, drone swarms either engage them directly, pinpoint their positions for accurate artillery or give Ukraine information to prepare for a spoil/counter attack.
@@horsemumbler1the reason why Ukraine entry into NATO was considered such a threat by Russia is that Ukraine has long been considered to be undefendable to modern mobile warfare doctrines and a direct path to Moscow.
Trench warfare is because PSU lacks aircraft and VKS don't have weapons to deal with AFU anti-air systems. Plus the fact that the armour was caught naked against the drones with strapped-in explosives (which are basically just next-gen ATGMs that are better and 2 order of magnitude cheaper than e.g. Javelin).
@@skipperg4436 Javelin is so expensive only because that's what it costed to have a robotic drone in 1996. 20 years later, identical capability is much cheaper due to progress in mass manufacture of MEMS devices . . . everyone is going to make them now, en mass. add a NVidia Jetson image processor to it and it doesn't even need a pilot anymore. As soon as we run out of tanks, they will become cheap enough to target individual people, and each other.
Generally what I’ve seen is usually only high up drone footage. In that it’s usually very hard to see any infantry but they are usually there. Reporting from Ukraine has lots of details of assaults that combined tanks covering fire while APC stormed up to drop troops at the trenches.
i am baffled every time when theres a lonely tank rolling around and then taken out. i wonder what going on there, i doesnt look like something you would want to do....but they know better in the field i guess.
smoke launchers get rusty, yes, but they don't fail because of it. They only need to transmit an electrical signal to the smoke canisters through a few metal pins, worst case scenario you clean the pins and it works again. Honestly I've seen or heard of nearly every part of our tanks failing except for smoke launchers.
@@trunglequoc542 its more likely a training and equipment issue. the australian Armor Museum stated in a video about T-72 that it has "dead man cirquits" in its hatches, that disable certain equipment like the smoke launchers or with the drivers hatch, even the turret controls, when not closed. If this is correct, most tanks in ukraine cant use smoke due to operating with open hatches. And NATO tank crews come from sovjet tanks and thus have limited experience using smoke.
In soviet/Russian doctrine vehicle smokes are considered as a unit's tactical measure, not an individual protection system. For example, ivfs driving across the field in front of friendly infantry deploying smoke to cover grunt's movements. Even smoke launchers in older models of t72 were set up to throw a smoke charge as far as possible, smoking the enemy position 100-200 meters away, not the individual tank. These launchers have been changed but everyone is used to old tactics
@@zhufortheimpaler4041dead man circuits are standard worldwide and you can disable them. This is necessary in case they malfunction or your hatches can't be closed properly anymore. You're drilled to close the hatch first and then smoke, though to be honest if I were in combat I'd disable the turret and chassis safety features by default. I'd rather smoke immediately and then close the hatch instead of fumbling with the hatch for precious seconds without being able to do anything. For the driver too, if the motorblock gets damaged I'd rather not have the "you lost the cooling circuit, we'll shut off the engine for you right now while you're under fire so you don't damage it :)" feature. Disabling these does require the crew to know what they are doing to some extent though.
In 100 hours in Desert Storm During air and ground operations, U.S. and allied forces destroyed over 3,000 tanks, 1,400 armored personnel carriers, and 2,200 artillery pieces along with countless other vehicles. How? Most of the enemy vehicles were destroyed by the USAF.
These are fairy tales for young children, as the proverb says, a donkey loaded with bags of gold opens the gates of any fortresses, the Iraqi generals were simply bought so that they would not withdraw their troops from the garrisons, this is the truth.The Americans have never won wars!Because this is not a nation of soldiers, they cannot tolerate the loss of millions of soldiers, like the rest of the Europeans!
Proliferation of drones, both military and consumer ones makes having the element of suprise extreamly hard. Which is needed for company or battalion size manuvers
I think the major thing that you either missed or minimized was the total proliferation of drones. Neither side can move. If the Russians move out into the open, they are immediately spotted by drones and then attacked by massed artillery fires and the same goes for Ukraine. If NATO was fighting in Ukraine, they also would be unable to move. Drones have absolutely changed the battlefield. There simply will not be any large-scale breakthroughs or operational maneuvers unless one side figures out a way to neutralize the other sides drones. Everything else you mentioned is merely tertiary.
Its like the barbed wire and machine guns of WW1. No one wants to admit a coil of sharp wire destroyed their gallant charges with cavalry with gleaming sabres in hand. Drones have done the same to people that think a dozen Abrams rolling through the desert with total air dominance against n outdated enemy was how all wars would be fought. There shouldn't be "NATO" tactics. There should be different tactics based off the available forces in relation to the opposing enemy.
Anglo/euro tactics do not work when used by slavs, and slav tactics do not work when used by anglos/euros. This is because the devs thought it would be less fun if everyone used the same meta build
Funniest comment, and true in a way. All of the nations that have been corrupted by the Soviets all utilize the same basic formula… at varying scales of course. They use the Soviet doctrines… in terms of Armies, Air Forces and everything in between. They worked for the Soviets when they were a juggernaut… but they barely work even for the russians, who hold the majority shares of the soviet juggernaut.
@@PeterMuskrat6968they didn't even work for the soviets. After ww2, their only military operation outside of other Warsaw Pact members was Afghanistan. 100k dead Soviets within 10 years, and a humiliating loss
@@PeterMuskrat6968 maybe because American tactics only works on weak enemies who you can bully with airpower. Russia have so many Anti-aircraft systems that it is pretty impossible unless it is most of US's air units/missiles against Russian Army. And then when Nukes enter chat.
@@innelator6941 what are you talking about? NATO has a different concept of AA and many different systems but the lack of a tracked vehicle (btw Romania still has Gepards) doesnt proof anything. the AA Gun vehicle was pretty useless until massive drones started to show up anyway.
What is even more interesting earlier armies advanced trough countyside and got stuck in urban battles. Now going trough fields is almost suicid because of drones and artillery and advance is easier trough urban enviroment. Due to drones enemy can always see your forces.
@danielhalachev4714 this is flat out wrong. Russians have not cared about civilian lives on the slightest, No leveling modern cities and towns requires an absolutely excessive amount of explosives without nukes, so much that attempting it with conventional munitions would run any modern countries stocks dry.
@danielhalachev4714 The rubble will still be there. And yes, advancing through urban areas in that scale likely requires that you destroy the potential for resistance.
This works because of 2 reason. Russia have less will to obliterate civilian population, so they ends up fighting room for room battle that make the cities a good defensive position for UAF. Secondly, Russia got quite the confidence due to their Chechen forces who's specialize in that kind of combat, and Wagner elite units that fought in Syrian cities.
Smoke launchers aren't really used in US training for armor formations. I've been on tanks for 10 years (SEP V2 and V3). We used it once in 2015 and then once in 2023 to test the new tank gunnery table. Its not used because either the launchers are broke, its not safe, or units are not allowed to draw it due to it being seen as a waste of money for the unit. As for the tanks using direct fire, No not on any of the tanks or in the books I got a MG school show that we have indirect capability. Its rather looked down on due to being a 'Waste of ammo'. Our Firing table books show a lot of info that Im sure it can be done, but American units are to ridged to come up with things like that because we are not trained. (While its COOL that we are so DISICPLINE, what a joke by the way, that we won't attempt to come with ideas and try concepts. Its not in our culture.) Yes you are correct in the deployment of tanks in this war. Its something I've seen on my end. Though this also needs to be understood: The sexy idea of 'Tank on Tank' combat is just a sexy idea. I get that we will always go back to '73 Eastings' but you must understand that majority of tank engagements in history were majority 'Tank on Troops'. NATO believes firmly that each platform will engage the same platform (Tank on tank, troops on troops) and you will never deviate from that. NEVER. Its not in the script. Examples: NTC rotations for myself in 2016 and 2019. Hohenfelts Training Center for myself in 2018 and 2022. (I've been in ABCT's for my whole Army career.) Tanks units only fought tanks in both NTC and Hohenfelts. We didn't see troops assaulting our armor positions. The only time we did is when we did it on accident and attacked the troops. This ridged behavior prevents any form of 'Think on your feet' mentality. In my view it seriously discourages you to be flexible in a fight. More often then not, the idea that you as a tanker will fight anything other than tanks is just a joke and you are made fun of for it. For instance, the US Armor community views the MPF (Mobile protected Firepower) M10 Booker is a waste because 'IT CANT FIGHT TANKS!!!!!' When in reality its doing the job of an actual tank which is to SUPPORT THE INFANTRY WITH PROTECTED DIRECT FIRE SUPPORT. OK, Im done.
I have a question, if you don't mind: what do you think about the effectiveness of the standard HEAT "multipurpose" projectile that you used as suppression of enemy fire points and other infantry/units support? How effective in this role do you think compared to Soviet/Russian HE projectile the OF-19/26?
I was a Jäger and not a Panzergrenadier in the german Bundeswehr but all I heard about the German Puma IFV why it's so different (and expensive) to every other IFV is, because german tank units NEVER fight without IFVs and thats why the IFV needs the protection level against MBTs. Every Platoon in an IFV has AT Weapons on them, too and the three parts MBT-IFV-infantry fight in a symbiosis against MBT-IFV-infantry. Its plan still is MBT against MBT but at least they think and train to be in the same place as tanks AND infantry... That would mean that the germans knew better?
And by the way, thanks for the post. Based on the logic of both your armored forces and tank designs, especially the Abrams, I have the strong impression that the US Army has firmly absorbed the German WWII experience. Because not technologically, of course, but conceptually, the Abrams is another version of the Panther: a tank whose job is to stop the "endless" tank hordes rolling from the East. Your words further reinforced that impression for me.
@@maade9642 "That would mean that the germans knew better?" I think their Military was conceptualizing land warfare against the Warsaw Pact forces based on the AAR of your ex-nazi generals. You know, the "Hitler was a complete idiot, he should have listened to us (which he did) and this is how we fought the Bolshevik hordes brilliantly" ones.
HEAT on Tanks is not used and has been phased out as of 2016 by the US Army. So do with that info as you will. We used MPAT (Multipurpose Anti Tank) but it is not ideal. Its not a heavy enough HE load to do what it is needed against troops effectively. Soviet HE-FRAG is better because of the actual frag element vs the mid explosive of the MPAT or HEAT. To deal with troops we use Coax and CAN. But if i have to hit a bunker, then we use MPAT-OR. Though that is 3 rounds (MPAT, MPAT-OR, and HEAT) that you have to carry with in your ammo rack vs HE-FRAG where I can deal with all that and still have more room in the ammo rack. While MPAT can be used for PC's, Buildings, and Helicopters they are not the best for dealing with troops due to lack of fragments. It has just enough explosive, but not enough. OR is also rare and heavy. I consider, due to the role of Tanks in supporting infantry, the Soviet HE-Frag is a better solution for this. @@Ailasher
It could be a lot of things, like how from the outset they were poorly thought out and based around the idea of total air superiority, but a critical aspect is also that for the last 30 years, everything NATO, from the equipment to the tactics, to the doctrine and strategy, to the logistical base have been retooled to fight profitable insurgnecy/anti-terrorism/ seal-clubbing conflicts where the opponent can't really fight back. Now placed against a peer opponent, unsurprisingly, it fails spectacularly.
More broadly, the NATO doctrine works on the assumption of technological superiority, or achieving technological superiority, in several key areas like intelligence and reach. The Soviet doctrine works on no such assumptions - it assumes the enemy is at least as strong, at least as smart, at least as knowledgeable, etc. Thus the idea of maskirovka, attempting to deceive the enemy, thus the complex tactical maneuvering to separate and destroy the enemy piecemeal, thus "meatgrinder" defensive positioning, etc. NATO doctrine is 'comfortable' fighting, Soviet doctrine is blood sweat and tears until victory. All the difference, really.
@@SeanMirrsenчто за детский штампованный стериотипный бред. Советская доктрина это массовая армия с танками и артиллерией, с сильным ПВО и мощнейшей промышленностью с многочисленным подготовленным мобилизационным резервом наряду с тыловыми учебными центрами. Где был учтен опыт тяжелейшей второй мировой войны и устранены все главные недостатки, организм был хорошо отлажен и проработан. Насколько бы ты не был хорошим воином и супер дорогая точная техника на войне потери будут, что и продемонстрировала война на Украине, без мощного тыла и промышленности ты проиграешь войну. Тот резерв которая Украина накопила, обучала и идеологически подпитывала ненавистью ко всему русскому с 2014 года уже истощен и потерян, на данный момент значительная часть армии ВСУ плохо обучена и немотивирована. В начале войны довоенные части ВСУ действительно хорошо себя показали, они были крайне насыщены западными противотанковыми средствами и множество идей противодействия российской доктрине сработало. Так что сколько не готовь крутые подразделения, если будет настоящая война крутых вояк рано или поздно выбьют и придут на смену им зеленые ребята, и качество подготовки сильно упадет без мощного тыла. Вам пора бы открыть глаза и отказаться от копиума превосходства доктрины нато), у каждой идеи есть свои плюсы и недостатки.
@@alek9195 kinda like the Soviet Union integrated so much AA defenses into their armed forces that two former Soviet states would have a hard time knocking it all out.
Any attacking force is equivalent to taking your unprotected hand and messing up a wasp's nest with it. This goes for both sides. The moment you get into the open, the drones, the wasps, swarm. This gives an advantage to the slow moving firepower heavy side. You simply can't do movement warfare anymore against an equal foe.
@@sowianskizonierz2693 My guy, whenever someone calls out someone else "YoU're a BeTEer ExpErt ThAn MiLitaRy exPerTs" let's have a quick reality check. Both RU and UA (with assistance of US and A primarily) made horrible decisions throughout these two years and I don't have to be a Michelin star kitchen chef to tell you that shit on a plate is still shit on a plate, no matter who "cooked" it.
Many judge the war based on opening overconfidence of Russia. They thought they will be welcomed as heroes saving Ukraine, they did not expect resistance. So they thought they could take Ukraine just rushing to Kiev. Many took this as military incompetence, but that is not really the case. It was an intelligence problem. And honestly that kind of logic is underestimating Russians. What happens in Ukraine is when the sides have comparable level of tech. People become too complacent on how war works watching US fight poor people. And this "NATO tactics" thing is the part of the same problem.
The point of origin of Russia's failure in the February/March 2022 offensive certainly is to be found in the intelligence department, however the Russian armed forces absolutely did display great levels of incompetence at the same time : first failing to account for the possibility of resistance, failing with logistics, failing to adapt rapidly to a "we are at war" mindset, failing with air defences, failing to suppress Ukrainian air forces, air defences and anti-ship capabilities, etc. And then there are the mindless assaults on strategically unimportant positions that cost Russia tens of thousands of men even in the recent months. Not to forget, quite importantly, the performance of many supposedly advanced Russian weapon systems, which have definitely proven to be stuck in the 20th century in terms of capabilities, even despite having been hyped for years as Russia catching up to the US. Now it is true that Western forces shouldn't be complacent. Even with some level of incompetence on Russia's side, their doctrine was still forged in fire and blood, and they are absolutely not dumb enough to not make use of what advantages they have. Russians are still capable of using their artillery, their mining capabilities, their long range cruise missiles, etc. And while their air defences are certainly not performing to the level they were expected to by pre-war international observers, they are still a major presence forcing Ukraine to only make limited use of air power (combined with Ukraine limited air forces of course).
@@MadManchou I agree with some of the stuff, but still people underestimate how many things can go wrong in a war. There are many stories from US veterans on how things went wrong on various theaters like Iraq or Afghanistan on internet. Only difference was the enemy was not capable to use or even recognize those weaknesses. And even costly frontal assaults are not that senseless if you know how Russians work. Any other western nation would refuse to go that blunt, and probably lose. But no cost is too great for Russians, if they win in the end. They did the same thing in ww2.
I would point out that this did have a lot of success elsewhere as Russia marched into the south without a fight and took the land bridge without a fight, except for specifically the city of Mariupol. It was Kiev that had the most trouble but I think the problem was that Russia moved quickly, bypassing urban areas, lacking control of the rear and this is where their logistics got caught up by small teams of Ukrainians. This choice in tactic and insufficient troop numbers to neither control the rear or take Kiev, would imply that Russia didn’t intend to take Kiev or even hold cities. I think it was a rush to pressure Ukraine to the negotiating table. By the 2nd day of the invasion, Russia had already pursued negotiations. Also, there was no such battle to push Russia out of the Kiev region, they simply withdrew. I think it’s accurate that Russia agreed to leave the region as a condition of the peace treaty that was showing promise as the Ukrainian negotiators have since reported. It would seem that Russia believed it would quickly end with negotiations and were themselves incredibly unprepared for this war. I think that is exactly why the west had such confidence at the beginning, and seeing an opportunity, they told Ukraine not to negotiate.
@@randomdude8202 Costly frontal assaults might make sense in the Russian mindset, they are nonetheless a manifestation of incompetence - Russian officers are stuck in a mindset where the Russian bear has endless waves of bodies to throw into offensives, whereas in reality their manpower is very finite, and becoming more finite every year. "No cost is too great" is the philosophy that makes you lose wars, not win them. If from the outset, losses do not scare you, how can you be expected to make effective and efficient use of your ressources ? A competent military shouldn't shy away from confrontation, obviously, but it should be conscious of the value of its personnel and equipment and not throw them away willy nilly. BTW, I remember MHV actually demonstrating that the idea of the soviet human wave tactic "winning WW2" is mostly a myth, considering the casualty ratios by the end of the war were actually pretty fair for an offensive. Soviets also won ww2 in no small part because the West was also there pulling its own weight, even though tankies love to claim the soviets did 90% of the work.
Hey, I was a US mortarman for two decades and trained the Ukraine and Russia soldiers (among many other nations). If you want more insight I am happy to give it, especially on smoke missions
We trained US Forces for years about Jungle Warfare. We noticed you guys without air superiority can be routes out or surrounded. Smoke missions are useful while moving forward in open terrains. In Urban or vitigation terrain smoke missions is useless.
@@PinkFZeppelin So, the regime in Kiev shelling Ethnic Russians in Donbass since 2014 (the year of the coup d'etat in Ukraine by west-Ukraine, sponsored by America) isn't aggression? During those 8 years of shelling by the regime in Kiev, more than 11,000 ethnic Russians, men, women, and children were killed, and more than 40,000 injured .
There are drones everywhere. It is hard to get a decent grouping of vehicles together when the enemy can see it coming. Minefields are everywhere with built in artillery zeroed in on those areas. No air superiority. No shock and awe.
I would love to see how NATO intervention would shake up the war now. Russian artillery fired would drop off a cliff quickly because the logistics train would be de-railed by constant Missile and Air attacks. No artillery=No success at offense. As far as defense goes, that is the more interesting question. How would we apply the overwhelming Air Superiority and to where would we apply it, Can’t blast through the minefields, so it would just be a slow crawl through the stretches of minefields until we reach the other side. Russians likely would not be able to effectively build new lines because they would be harassed by Air attacks. The Dnipro frontline might even become a major focal point if the US can come up with a plan on how to get forces across the river. Less Russian artillery and no real air strike capabilities would allow for pontoon bridges to be set up and armor to cross. Which would turn that sector into a new Shock and Awe run.
@@PeterMuskrat6968 Iraqis also had minefields , quite extensive , but the fact of 2000 aircraft bombing them everyday gave the coalition quite some breathing room to clear them
@@PeterMuskrat6968 Fortunately for you NATO command unanimously disagree with your assumptions. Also, China will start supplying weapons to Russia, and after both sides are in ruins, China attack Taiwan.
Lack of air supremacy or even dominance, lack of coordinated fire superiority, lack of joint operations maneuver warfare, lack of timely equipment replacement/repair, lack of proper equipment to do it with, zero strategic weapons to destabilize the enemy, and the list goes on and on and on. The Ukrainians have done and continue to do an amazing job, but even bringing this up as if they *did* NATO tactics is absurd. They were trained on maneuver warfare but then not equipped to even pull it off, so how did NATO tactics fail? Easy, they were never truly used. It's a disingenuous question.
tbh, the problem is that "NATO styled doctrine/tactics" (in quotation marks because each nation developed their own doctrine) historically during the cold war were primarily focused on the defensive, rather than the offensive, and instances where a NATO force conducted an offensive strategy (ie the gulf war), they approached it the same way as something akin to bewegungskrieg, and by that I meant a surprise deep strategic strikes at military targets and C2 hubs (shock and awe), followed by driving a spearhead, manoeuvre to bypass, engage in decisive set piece battles to win freedom of manoeuvre, encircle all the cities/ launch decapitation strikes to finish the job. On paper this sounds fine, but in Ukraine pulling the exact same thing ended up disastrously for Russia, either because a lack in equipment, training, logistics, introduction of a variety of effective "anti-manoeuvrist" weapon systems, and the generally far more "near-peer" status of the two sides (the gulf war probably would have ended up very different if the Iraqis have drones, Javelins, thermals, and an air defense umbrella that could deter NATO air power). In a way, it is less of a failure of NATO doctrine/tactics but rather a failure of manoeuvre warfare in general, and how even a small infantry centric force now have the kit necessary to deter large armoured formations and can only be dislodged by attrition.
Iraq was the most heavily defended airspace in the entire southern hemisphere, far better than even 99% of NATO countries at the time- hell even better than the US as far as "home defense" Because they had so much less land to cover. The Iraqis had the 4th highest funded army in the world at a time where military spending meant a LOT to most countries (you didn't hear about the "peace dividend" yet in 1991) S-200 and S-300 launchers, new soviet fighters and tanks, the works. And it really wasn't a surprise because they (the coalition) spent more than 6 months building up their forces. The Iraqis KNEW they were coming, just not when. The airwar lasted over a month before ground combat began for a good reason, the Iraqis would have slaughtered even US pilots if the US didn't ALSO have some of the best strategists in the world.
Ukraine and Russia had and have been pretty similar in doctrine and Equipment so they know what to expect now. Russia attempt to reach Kiev was blunt and not that well prepared and Ukraine fought them off with everything they had.
Re employment of Multi Barrelled Smoke Grenade Dischargers (MBSGDs). Here in Australia the doctrine aligns with US usage - i.e. popping smoke is almost an immediate action for the Crew Commander when the vehicle comes under fire. Usually our MBSGDs are covered by rubber boots so at least prior to first use, the maintenance issue is not very severe. It should also be noted that MBSGDs on NATO vehicles are primarily defensive in nature, whereas those on Soviet type vehicles are more offensive in nature - due to the range they project the grenades.
Hard to conduct the Western style of war without a lot of planes. Oth, Soviet doctrine always assumed a disadvantage in the air, hence they made 1m AA systems. Cheers Bernhard, well explained.
The old Soviets also made a doctrine that reflected their experiences with being invaded and outnumbered. An uncomfortable fact is the USSR actually had the numerical disadvantage until October 1943, and even were mismatched in artillery until March 1944. So they came up with ways to keep a front active while not committing to big engagements and concentrating their skills or resources, where needed to achieve important victories. The later Soviets, and then the modern Russians, kept the assumption in war, that favorable advantages cannot be relied upon as a presupposition for assumption of operation. So they focus on leveraging advantages that are tougher to disrupt, such as artillery, saturation, armored, harassment, attacks armor as mobile fire support, and frequent misdirection attacks up and down the line of contact. So it’s never clear where the Russians are going to attack from and even if they’re outnumbered, they will force you to keep defending so they can build a local advantage, and then attack while you have to protect elsewhere to prevent multiple breakthroughs.
@@juliantheapostate8295 Russia was greatly outnumbered in 2022, especially after the contract soldiers left en masse in August of 2022. The mobilization of 300,000 reservists followed by a recruitment drive bringing in a average of 1,200 (1,400 by another source) recruits per day over the last year and a half has eventually reversed that situation.
No, it's not. It's built around delay tactics and maneuvers. Air superiority is never assumed and wargames usually assume that air superiority will be denied.
It will soon, they're developing Mach 5 scout/missile bait jets to bait Anti Aircraft weapons and atritive drones to shield stealth aircraft + Link 16 battle zone data share nodes. USA owns the Death Star basically. You aren't witnessing NATO combined arms in the first place.
@@arnoldvezbon6131 'US doesn't even have hypersonic capabilities.' lol actually they are the only nation that does. They have multiple hypersonic vehicles (real ones, not just a modified ICBM that claims to be able to maneuver) in fact a new one was launched 2 weeks ago. To be clear, neither Russia or China have hypersonic missiles (i.e. steerable missiles). If they did then Ukraine wouldn't be able to shoot them down, which they do all the time.
Artillery smoke, smoke canisters, and the onboard smoke generators, can help primarily during a disengage. And the reason for that is that they do not persist. They have short duration, relatively low volume, and/or high cost. They are not adequate for any sort of large scale movement or breach. For offensive actions, such as a breach or a heavily opposed advance, you need Mechanical Smoke produced by proper smoke generators. For example, the Humvee-mounted M56, or the Stryker-mounted M76. They produce high volumes of smoke that can be persistent (depending on the weather) and can be generated through extended periods of time. Moreover, the smoke can be made opaque to enemy sensors such as thermal optics, etc. A company's worth of smoke generators can cover several kilometers of front and last as long as needed if proper supplies and maintenance are available. The smoke is not toxic and doesn't require the soldiers working under it to use any specialized equipment. There are other tools that are part of the NATO Arsenal that need to be provided to UK in order for them to break the stalemate. Without those humble combat multipliers, proper NATO doctrine for this type of scenario cannot be implemented. A couple companies of smoke generators could be worth more than a few F-16's in UK present situation. NATO doctrine is actually pretty comprehensive. It contemplates obstacle-based offense and defense. There are whole chapters in the Field Manuals dedicated to this, though they are rarely read by anyone below the level of a Company-Grade officer.
Good video, but the "air part" was a little to short for my liking. Nato doctrin relies heavily on joint fire support, and airwarfare is a really important part of it. Nato wouldn't fight without an capable air force.
NATO can't fight without air superiority. That's a major problem. Meanwhile, Soviet/Russian doctrine always assumed that the air would be contested. Which is why they have a plethora of AA assets that merely needed to be upgraded to deal with drone threats. Meanwhile, NATO was stuck sending museum pieces into combat.
@@JurekOK what i meant was, that the West did not provide all that is needed for the operstion. Nato would not fight without airpower but expects ukraine to do so. You know what i mean?
@@Crosshair84 well some of those museum pieces are quite capable, like the gepard spaag. Lots of aa equipment was put out of service to save money and it was considered obsolete, because they did not expect a full scale war.
I see a bunch of comments about Air Dominance and don't get me wrong, it matters and it is a criteria to enable large scale operations! But I think a critical factor is missed in the discussion. How NATO enables tactics. NATO tactics are not how people understand tactics traditionally. After Vietnam, the US was looking at how they did so shockingly poorly again men in skirts with AK's, when they had what they thought was the best kit in the world at the time they looked at their weapons inventories and how they want to fight and noticed a gross mismatch between the two. The US then began to start designing and building a whole fleet of new systems to enable all of the conditions they needed to succeed This is the genius of NATO tactics because NATO as a whole went on to follow this exact train of thought! You want to breach a minefield, yeah you want the skies clear but that's not to enable the operation, that's to allow helicopter fire support and Wild Weasels to take out mobile AA. Then with the greater vision provided from an eye on the sky, saturation fires happen in tight boxes to eliminate all heavy fire power. Once heavy equipment is out of the fight, armour in the form of MBT's and IFV's form a line to begin suppressing infantry. Only then does the M1150 mine clearer show up! Shreader creates perfect straight paths though the minefield with the MICLIC, plows the land and drives the first 100 metres where Shredder is joined by an Abrams Wingman and a new Shreader to continue clearing. Each MICLIC and bulldozed area is 120 sq metres and takes good crews 10 mins for accomplish So while Ukraine doesn't have Air Dominance, just getting F-16's won't win the fight. They also need to be able to operate a large number of systems, in a coordinated fashion and currently while they learn of this, we don't if this is how Ukraine can fight or even wants to fight. While we absolutely need to step up weapons deliveries, the great failure isn't the tactics, but listening and learning how Ukraine wants to fight, and then providing what we can to enable that way of fighting.
Spot on. Also, NATO generally has senior military leadership that understands NATO doctrine, not bunch of old Soviet trained generals who are still fighting 2014 war with somewhat new equipment.
regarding use of NATO tanks for indirect fire, there are actually range tables and associated gun laying instruments on US tanks at least up until M60A3 that allow you to do that albeit in a limited manner. It can be set up in pretty much the same manner as field artillery, and in fact was quite popular thing up until Vietnam war. Some old FM (I believe it was FM 17-xx series) also outlined methods for digging in/making berms for tanks to increase firing angle, how to conduct fire mission, etc. I suspect that newer smoothbore guns and ammo are not considered to be particularly well suited for this, so that function got eliminated
With my very very limited knowledge on this topic, would smooth bore guns be ineffective as a HE shell would not spin as it left ? Or is it something else
@@Bornst3ll3r technically you can still make fin-stabilized shell for smoothbore weapons (similar to mortar), although I'm not sure how very high muzzle velocity gun and the ammo design itself affect that but M1A1/A2 weren't even issued with dedicated HE shell anyway, the closest would just be M830/M830A1 HEAT
@@Bornst3ll3r Smoothbores use fin stabilization that is technically less accurate but when soviets switched to smoothbores decades before NATO they deemed the accuracy loss acceptable in direct fire as the 115mm shell was heavy enough to compensate through sheer energy - a smaller gun they would still consider being rifled and indeed they have with their light tank projects up until they crammed the 125 into one (Sprut-SD).
M1 tanks still have the equiptment to perform indirect fire, every M1 company has several men with the "master gunner" rank, these guys have gunner quadrants and the training to set up each tank for indirect fire if it is needed. the round used for that would be HEAT-MP
Just like Vietnam, if you design a doctrinal system to operate with certain expected parameters, and then decide that political considerations prevent those parameters from being put into effect, you must either adapt your doctrinal system, or operate inefficiently. It's a good idea to work up doctrines in accordance with realistic expectations about political considerations and other constraints, of course, so you don't have to develop doctrine from scratch in the field while you're already under fire, and it's also a good idea to consider letting doctrine guide political pressure to at least some extent. That's where this war is being lost to the Soviets: For some reason, they're being allowed to dance political circles around Ukraine and its allies, which I have found perplexing from the beginning.
You ever been to/in present day(ok, of 2010's) Rossija? Haven't? Then, why would you use your cringe loanword from French that describes the past? Because you are smarter than anyone around?
@@EvilSmonker He's still in Cold war. Probably torturing people trying to get false evidence of them having allegiance to communism. And shooting down Italian airliners which carry national oil company's CEO, because only in Soviet Russia there's "no god" therefore people suspiciously fall out of windows.
It's intentional, once you understand this war is choreographed to prevent MAD. The US could flatten any country in the world in a week even after nuclear exchange in conventional warfare. It's a low boil war for war hawks to make money out of.
Ukraine tried NATO tactics in their "counter" offensive. They ran into Russian minefields and other defenses and got totally obliterated. Hence the now infamous Bradley square. What we learned so far from this war is, that NATO tactics are unusable without air superiority and air support. That means any country that is in danger of getting attacked by NATO will probably have to make sure they have good (Russian) anti air weapons.
@@ZappyOh how did NATO turn out to be a paper tiger if it didnt fight in that war? Remember that if NATO was pulled into a full scale conventional conflict would probably completely obliterate russian air in a month lmao. Keep dreaming
@@ZappyOhThe real issue is political, which, to be honest, isn't that surprising. Not many people want to spend billions of dollars sending some random Eastern european country top of the line fighter jets and bombers. If they did, it's almost certain that Russia wouldn't stand a chance, but right now Russia is sorta banking on wavering support in the West while they gamble their whole economy on this war. Basically it's a difference in motivation, and while I don't think Europe is motivated now, if Russia moves any farther West, I guarantee things will change.
@@123four... You do understand, that Russia have more nukes, and better delivery systems, than anyone else, right? I'm pretty sure, that direct western participation would be dealt with harshly. They are even saying so openly, as to drive the point home, that we are playing with fire. In my view, NATO have no teeth, because what we have invested in, simply can't be used as intended.
NATO tactics wprk perfectly. They are not designed to win battles. They are designed to supply the most expensive gear with the most expensive serviceable equipment in an endless conflict using the most expensive munitions. The industrial complex writes the NATO tactis to ensure financial gain.
Let me explain a few things here. 1. The Ukrainians are exceptional soldiers. They are losing, but they are fighting skilfully and bravely. 2. ISR, drones and very effective AAA has transformed the battlefield. NATO tactics might need a review. 3. The Russians have been doing "fire and manoeuvre" since the 1930's. They are masters at it. If they aren't doing "big arrow" offensives in Ukraine it's because no one can. 4. No one really thought Iraq was a military power. Iran is a military power, which is why you haven't invaded it.
Iraq is just average middle east military superpower level, have money to buy all the fancy equipment at that time but can't train their soldier into competent level
The Chieftain has actually commented on a likely reason for why smoke is not used by forces on either side. Namely that Soviet vehicle-borne smoke launchers are used in an offensive role, rather than a defensive one like in the West. Basically this comes down to Soviet smoke launchers having a rather large launch distance.
I'm simply amazed that Anti-personnel guided missiles aren't already been done. Even ATGMs are used against infantry with great effect without regard to its cost so it'd be very easy to produce smaller missiles at scale to completely saturate the front with them. Proliferation of precision guided small explosives will completely change infantry tactics.
On the topics of smoke: I can imagine 3 more reasons why smoke isn't used that are not mentioned in the video: A: With drones around permanently, using smoke on your own position (for example by having it emanate from your vehicle) actually makes it *more obvious* where you are. If a drone wants to spot a group of 4 vehicles, it either has to be quite close, or that formation is a series of small dots, painted in a similar shade of green as its surroundings and thus only really visible in thermal sights, potentially hidden under/behind trees, ... If a drone wants to spot 4 armor vehicles that are "obscured" by smoke, it has to spot a huge (hundreds or dozens of meters across) blob of usually white (very much standing out against the foliage even in visible spectrum) fluff that billows out to above the tree tops. Yes, the positions of each attacking vehicle in that smoke could is more hidden, but if the defender has something that can just hit the whole smoke cloud at once... B: Using smoke on the position of the defender (or in between your own position and that of the defender) only really works if the defender is on the ground. But drones are in the air, and there's really no good way to deliver smoke to a specific position in the air (the smoke grenade/shell/canister will just keep dropping until it hits the ground). And even if you could make the smoke canister hang in the air, you can only do that if you know where the drone is *(in 3 dimensions)*, and then the drone is usually nimble enough to just move. As a result, you can suppress the position where the enemy's small arms fire and MANPADs are coming from, but neither where the enemy is observing you from nor where they are launching their artillery fire from. C: Explosive artillery shells can be used to *both* attrition the defenders *and* to suppress them in preparation for an incoming assault. Meaning if the attacker launches explosive artillery at the defender, they can't really know which of the two things the attacker is doing. Whereas if the attacker launches _smokes_ ahead of an assault, the defenders immediately know that it can *only* be an assault (or a pretended assault), since you can't really physically attrition defenders by launching smoke at them.
No, because NATO/Western tactics do not work unless the USAF has secured air supremacy. Without the USAF in all its glory, all NATO ground forces (including the US Army) would be superbly defeated.
Interestingly while Russia could not really take over Kyiv or invade all of Ukraine, the Ukrainians could not successfully mount a counter-offensive despite real-time NATO (mostly USAF) ELINT and other support. Just goes to show.
Ukraines' western sponsors believed that Nato doctrine could function without air supermacy. Now they know it cant..... Btw, Ukraine did use Nato doctrine at the start.... they only abandoned that shit after taking massive losses.
It is NATO doctrine minus the air force. Which is exactly why it doesn't work. Good luck trying to achieve that against a military that isn't composed of goat herders and hairy men in slippers. Oh and the F16s won't do anything new for ukraine lol.
Ukraine: Why NATO Tactics fail? Because the AFU command and training are mired in legacy Soviet doctrines. Both Russian and Ukrainian forces have mirrored legacy Soviet tactics, even as cutting edge technologies and NATO training assistance have been introduced. The Ukraine war is an anomaly shaped by both belligerents common Soviet philosophy of war.
It's of course right to conclude that NATO doctrine, whatever works on paper or not, is not in practice implemented in Ukraine, because the actors lack either means or knowhow. But there's a larger point that is still somehow usually overlooked, which is that the point of modern warfare is not to implement some specific doctrine, but to impose conditions over the adversary that allow one's forces to maneuver over and against them, thus rapidly and decisively degrading their combat power and denying them the enjoyment of held terrain. Doctrine is just a systematic means to an end. That's what Ukraine was always going to need to become able to accomplish, with whoever's doctrine, new or old. Both Russian and Ukrainian forces lack the capacity to fulfill Soviet doctrine as well!
There's also to note the huge improvement in Operational Security on the russian side compared to one year ago, they managed to get their soldiers to keep the phones off, everything is managed by a dedicated infrastructure.
Air superiority as a prerequisite is a dangerous assumption. If your plan has to be perfectly executed, it's a bad plan. It isn't the same to fight Third World countries and to prepare for a major confrontation with a serious enemy. It feels like the British confident to start WWI because they had defeated the Boers and the Zulus.
NATO tactics can't fail if NATO tactics are not employed in the first place. The term "NATO tactics" is another discussion, but generally speaking people accept that US tactics and "NATO tactics" are similar/same. So only by looking in recent history that involves modern tactics what does the US/NATO do ? Gain air superiority, use air power to disrupt enemy lines of communication (supplies, reinforcements), use air power to destroy enemy troop concentrations and artillery positions, deploy land forces, use artillery to saturate enemy positions, use mechanized forces to reach the enemy positions, assault with infantry. So if Ukraine failed at steps 1 through 3, are they really employing "NATO tactics" or are they doing their own thing that fails?
Can't see any NATO tactics since the start of the conflict. Ukraine is too weak for that. No air superiority, no close air support, no focus formation, no mobile warfare, no combined arms combat. There was a small chance last summer, but Ukraine expressly did not follow US planning.
Numbers. More complex tactics would be more efficient but would have less redundancy. One link breaks and the whole thing falls apart, combat efficiently of a unit would be significantly diminished. Ukraine did increase the use of air power during the counteroffensive, but didn’t achieve air superiority due to the lack of numbers. Numbers would offer the much needed redundancy. Small reminder that the US Air Force enjoyed overwhelming numerical advantage in the first Gulf war.
Because NATO tactics are usually tailored to go against vastly inferior opponents, when their foes can actually fight back and have similar technology their tactics collapse...
NATO never expected Ukraine to win a ground war the war just gave NATO excuses to pressure the world into sanctioning Russia into oblivian which backfired in the most beautiful way it forced Russia to be self sustaining, making it even harder for NATO use economic terrorism with any success
@@madgavin7568 How so? I literally wrote this comment based on how actual NATO/US wars happened, all their cold war victories were against either country on a brink of collapse or against a country that is technologically or numerically inferior.
@@Sveta7 NATO tactics were designed in mind to combat the Warsaw Pact, specifically the Soviet Union. What are we saying here, that the Warsaw Pact was inferior to NATO? It just so happened that such tactics worked against lesser states who by and large utilized Soviet weaponry and to some extent, their tactics. That doesn't mean such tactics were only made to work against such opponents, that's complete rubbish.
While NATO tactics are far better than anything eastern block ever made or practiced, there are practical issues and flaws that go much deeper than the simple "ukraine sucks thats why it doesnt work". I call it the "GOWT professional deformation" and the "1944 western front syndrome" First, The GOWT did a huge disservice to NATO, to the point i would call 2000-2015 era "the lost years" With the 90s ending any further military development regarding peer on peer warfare, was either slashed or was morphed to fit GOWT, The focus was on "high speed operators" and how many gadgets optics and tacticool equipment you could stick on those guys, at the expense of the regular army (except the air force and the flawed light units equipped with strykers, because air mobility was all the hype, and actual combat capability was secondary at best) . The ugly truth is , SF units are overhyped, and if put them on the frontline they wont suffer any less than regular infantry, because they are just fancy light infantry in the end. A 152 hell doesnt care for your experience and training. NATO countries in short slashed their regular armies to skeletons and much if not most of the peer to peer capability was lost. The second part is a critique of the NATO/western style of combat that leans too much on the western Allied/ American experience of 1944), assuming all of your supply and logistics will always work , your air force will have complete air domination and you will be able to pummel your enemy with ungodly one sided concentration of firepower. In short NATO has to train and accept in its doctrine not everything will go perfect, especially when it comes to logistics in a peer on peer war. There is also one other element NATO countries have to accept, but also entire nations.... losses will be heavy regardless of the training A peer on peer war isnt like GOWT and losses will be in the thousands within a month, not a year, or a decade... an effective yet time saving training system for replacements is needed, as well as usage of manpower that is above 30 years of age, due to low fertility the developed world faces.
The reliance on SOF during the GWOT is not talked about enough. Especially in the last ten years. SOF has an integral part in peer conflict but it’s support role not the main show. GWOT allowed SOF really distort policy makers perception of its use.
I like how you made a super detailed argument and an interesting insight, but then just had to drop the "Nato tactics were always better all the time!!" propaganda. Like why do you americans have such an inferiority complex?
“Nato tactics are far better” are they? Based on what? Its just assumed that they are superior and that nothing can be learned from any enemy, which just sounds like the perfect recipe for stagnation
Maneuver is rather limited because in this war battlefields are shaped by good coordination between UAVs, counter-battery radars and artillery. This combination makes "you're spotted -> you're dead" the main principle of this war, since a good amount of accurate firepower could be brought in minutes after target detection. As a result, movement is limited even in the rear areas, so amassing forces, or even supplying those who are on the front line without taking heavy losses would be a rather difficult task.
One can employ whatever a good number of tactics, if there is no strategy, or a strategy based on false premises, it will all fall apart. Including the Tables of Equipment and the logistics capacity.
One thing many are forgetting is that US/NATO has 0 experience fighting opponent that is equal or near equal to them in terms of technology and manpower. Last time US fought such war was in Korea,since than US always enjoyed technological and/or numerical superiority
Even in Korea, they fought a far inferior Chinese army which mainly relied on numbers. If they fight China or Russia now, it will be a bloody stalemate.
@@realnapster1522So… you are just assuming that we are as dumb as the Russians? We spent the time that we weren’t fighting a near peer by studying our opponents and developing new doctrines to solve supposed problems. I don’t know why so many of you lack brain cells. Even during GWOT we still kept our eyes on our enemies, even if we didn’t fund DARPA projects about Peer level technologies.
nor does russia, name 1 time after the cold war where russia has fought an opponent that is equal or near equal, the answer is never, because the cold war was a series of proxy wars where neither side has fought a equal peer, that said, the us lead coalition did destroy iraq which was the largest soviet arms importer at the time.
The drones role was underrated. Basically, these small and cheap artifacts make useless or less effective the smoke use and many of the NATO tactics based on surprise and constant movement.
smoke can, and has always been used, to obscure aerial observation - that's one of the reasons why airborne ground surveillance radar is a thing drones are not really that much different if faced with proper smoke ops, in fact their onboard EO sensors are not particularly great and will be even less effective than those onboard regular planes unless you got a large UAV, which for all intents and purposes are basically more expendable prop planes
People love to go on about "NATO Tactics". NATO doesn't have Tactics, it has plans. Tactics are something that differs between member countries. Consequently, individual equipment is also designed according to those individual needs. It's a tall order, trying to squeeze all the various armored, artillery and other assets that have made their way to Ukraine into a single, effective structure.
Adam Something analyzed it perfectly. Zaluzhniy received much less than 1/4th. of the hardware that he had requested for a long, protracted push to the pre-February 24th. borders if that was possible, and on top of all that, Ukrainian troops received only appalingly basic NATO training. There's simply no way that Ukraine can keep on going like this unless USA and NATO finally decide to start having balls and send Tomahawks and ATACMS in large numbers to help them, but so far, this conflict has only been ever kept alive due to token arms transfers, which end in nothing if the equipment is going to be used like shit, and not how exactly it was mean't to be used. NATO and USA's faults are dragging their feet to get shit done, like we saw with the first attempted transfer of MiG-29 jets to Ukraine, and Ukraine's faults for this counter-offensive are this poorly-prepared and executed rush towards a prepared enemy, and overall poor command structure when it comes to mechanized warfare on an open ground, even without air support. Why send priceless F-16 jets to the Ukrainians if American-made cruise missiles and air defense systems do the work just fine? My point is: The worst thing about this war is that it has only been kept alive due to token arms transfers, all from donations, while NATO, USA and it's allies lack balls and have been dragging their feet for the entire war. Zaluzhniy received much less than 1/4th. of equipment that he needed to go back to pre-February 24th. borders. It's better to send Tomahawks, ATACMS and SAM systems rather than F-16's and Abramses. It's essential nowadays that we bring once massive industrial buildings that helped us win WW2, like the Detroit Arsenal Tank Plant, back into use so that they could help win the war in Ukraine by vastly overfilling the shortage of artillery shells and equipment sent to fight. I personally believe that the war in Ukraine might have been won if the West wasn't dragging it's feet, sent Zaluzhniy exactly what he wanted instead of the 1/4th. that he got, supplied his troops with more essential stuff and if Ukraine revised it's tactics, then the counter-offensive wouldn't have even failed. It ashames me and saddens me to see what has happened to America, or more rather, Miss Columbia's old war industry from WW2 or places like the Ruhr industrial valley. So much decay and neglect when we need it the most. Technology has advanced, where it isn't now vast armies fighting like in WW2, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't be able to mass-produce at least IFV's/APC's anymore, or lots of artillery shells of multiple different calibers to keep the war effort going. I would be at tears when i saw what modern war has become after we retired some essential components that made it good in the past, like for example, streamlined and simplified mass production. But now, an M1 Abrams tank is apparently just so advanced and complex that we can't even supply these in larger numbers to Ukraine, despite America literally having dozens of thousands in storage, and yet, they had the audacity to only supply Poland just 116 hand-me-down retired M1A1 FEP tanks leftover from the United States Marine Corps retiring it's own tank fleet, literally telling us that "this was all they had"? And what, they're keeping all of those M1A2's dusting in sand for Ukraine despite them dragging their feet the entire time? Come on! When the US was sending over Shermans to Europe in WW2, nobody asked for it and all of that firepower was more than welcome. Well, look at the US and NATO now. What a joke. Out of 450 retired ex-USMC M1A1 FEP tanks, they gave us only 116?! For this number of second-hand "hand-me-down's", America could've given us at least 250 M1A2 SEP V3 tanks for fucks sake. We lost what to be proud of anymore, and we need to gain that back. It's too late for the F-16's and M1 Abramses. It would have been a much better idea to send large amounts of long-range ATACMS (AtaSeeEms) ballistic missiles, Tomahawk cruise missiles and lots of modern SAM defenses for a protracted defensive war. America has shit-tons of M1 Abrams tanks literally just sitting out there, stockpiled in the desert, and they must be whipped into shape in order to send them like they were sending M4 Shermans to Europe during WW2, a scale which sadly we aren't even seeing today. This is starting to remind me of Britain's budget cutting spree in the lead up to the Falklands War, same level of unpreparedness and carelessness, a collapsing gerantocracy, lack of self-improving countries and no national pride. With this much of a passive giant even more than during the Great Depression before America entered WW2 in 1941 after it took the Japanese to attack Pearl Harbor, what would even be any use having the United States as an ally when nowadays it wouldn't even react much once attacked in peacetime? If they really don't need all of those 3,400 Abrams tanks currently in storage, at this rate i can just buy out the entire United States military by myself if their management is so passive, weak in pride and unwilling to act in terms of achieving world peace by stopping totalitarian leaders from achieving world dominance.
I'll commit to the "extrapolating from games to reality"-folly on this one... but I think the use of smoke is actually somewhat comparable in this regard. If you don't know what you're doing, then smoke is worse than useless. As you say, it can benefit the enemy just like yourself. But if you do know how to use it right, then it can be a game changer. Either greatly improve your own safety, or create absolutely oppressive situations for the enemy. Moreso in games than reality, where firefights are decided in mere seconds rather than hours, and indirect fire is less important... but obviously direct sight is an immensely important component in real military operations as well. In the hypothetical context of a NATO force operating in Ukraine, smoke would probably both be extremely useful at keeping vehicles alive (such as the classic use of rapid position changes by combing the quick reverse speeds of NATO vehicles with smoke launchers) and during offensive operations in combination air denial/drone jammers. Even if we exclude the mass use of air power to supress enemy artillery that NATO would attempt, large scale smoke use can protect the crossing of mine fields and make it hard for the enemy to find out where to focus their artillery if they cannot get a good overview with drone spotters. Even drones can have fewer angles available to actually detect forces moving under smoke, making them more vulnerable to counter measures.
@@MilitaryHistoryNotVisualizedDoes WARNO fix some of the problems with Wargame: Red Dragon, especially ATGM teams getting spotted and killed by tanks while the missiles are still in flight, causing the missile to miss ALL. THE. TIME...??
@@Noble713 I don't know if it is exactly the same like in Red Dragon, but currently it is similar. (Spotting might be different.) Yet, I think there was also a mention that ATGMs should continue if there is loss of sight etc.
You can't take a part of a doctrine and hope it all just works out in the end. The entire NATO doctrine is based around the ability to establish complete air superiority and working from there. It's something that NATO would absolutely be able to do as America alone has the undisputed most capable airforce in the world with the remaining TOP 10 spots being filled primarily by other NATO countries, so if there was ever a war with the entire alliance, the textbook NATO tactics would work. Ukraine however is not able to establish air superiority. Despite its many issues Russia is still the dominant force in the sky, which is why the tactics start falling apart. It's like trying to win a fencing match but instead of a saber you have a stale baguette. You might try to use the technique but it won't work well bc you don't have a fundamental element of it. The landmines wouldn't be an issue if Ukraine had air superiority and was able to deploy countermeasures. The rocket attacks wouldn't be an issue if Ukraine was able to perform air recon and airstrikes on Russian rocket batteries instead of having to use drones, ground recon and just reacting to an ongoing bombardment. If Ukraine had control over the sky it'd be able to stop Russian forces from fortifying their possitions well before they get to the point they're at now and they'd be able to more effectively deal with existing fortifications. Air superiority and the fantastic logistics system of NATO members, particularly the US, are the backbone around which not just the tactics but the equipment itself was built. NATO tanks are significantly larger, heavier and more expensive than Soviet/Russian tanks because NATO has the logistical capabilities to get them where they're needed and to keep them well supplied and maintained, because NATO as a block is the single largest economic power on the planet. Out of the top 10 largest economies by nominal GDP 6 are NATO countries and 2 are working closely with NATO, leaving only China and India (not Russia bc it doesn't make the top 10 cut according to the IMF). NATO is capable of producing the best equipment in the world and a lot of it at the same time, not being forced to pick between quality and quantity bc it can manage both. That is again something Ukraine doesn't have the luxury of. Any loses in western vehicles it takes are only recoverable through good will of the west to keep it supplied, which is why they decided to reserve them to engagements they deem important enough.
Well there may be certain aspects of NATO doctrine regarding ground forces that did not work in ukraine. Some examples where brougth in this video. There are other aspect like the insane density of minefields that exceed any NATO assumption by factor of 10. But even before the war during my active service time I always felt this concept of smoke cover during operations was kind of overoptimistic. Smoke is heavily weather dependend. Wind can negate your smokescreen in minutes. Heavy rain reduces its effectivness my a magnitude. And the russian will not be so kind to only figth in good weather. So at some point smoke cover had to be replaced by supressiv fire. But all of this is of far less consequence than the role of air power. As mentioned the russians stopped ukrainian advances by helicopters and of course this would never happen with NATO. But that fells short of what NATO does. Look to operation desert strom. First NATO will engage in SEAD (suppression of enemy air defense). This means in an area of operation the enemy capabilties to shot down planes (ground based air defense and figthers) will be destroyed or suppressed. Than air supremecy will be established. And I say supremecy not superiority. There is a difference. Superiority means you have more planes in the air than the enemy. Supremacy means the enemy can not get his aircraft into that area. Once that is established the ground attacks will beginn. Ground attack aircraft will attack the enemy infantry positions and their fire support units. Meanwhile combat patrols will engage any supply vehicles or reinforcements dump enough to drive in the area. And this is all done from a hight that allow planes to stay out of manpack range. When finally NATO ground forces engage, the enemy will be cut of from retreat, regrouping or supply by air power and their fire support was turned into burned metal. Breaking dense minefield in front of entrechned positions is still no joke but if the enemy lacks any kind of fire support from air, artillery or tanks its fairly doable. And that is how NATO figth. But the back bone of it all is overwhelming air power - and that is expensive - to expensive for ukraine.
Lets not forget Ukraine is not a NATO member and is only receiving the support of them. Ukraine as a military was mostly still based on old soviet doctrines afak so it's not a shock that they aren't finding much success with a military that's suddenly had to change doctrine and has to learn everything from the ground up again with some hand holding. Now if we saw a full mobilization of all NATO member states then the results would probably be quite different.
Considering NATO can't adequately supply Ukraine, and is outproduced by Russia alone, I'm not sure how its mobilisation would help. Deploying more men to the field, without solid logistics against a firepower superior force, is called a meat grinder.
@@MilitaryHistoryNotVisualized Adam Something analyzed it perfectly. Zaluzhniy received much less than 1/4th. of the hardware that he had requested for a long, protracted push to the pre-February 24th. borders if that was possible, and on top of all that, Ukrainian troops received only appalingly basic NATO training. There's simply no way that Ukraine can keep on going like this unless USA and NATO finally decide to start having balls and send Tomahawks and ATACMS in large numbers to help them, but so far, this conflict has only been ever kept alive due to token arms transfers, which end in nothing if the equipment is going to be used like shit, and not how exactly it was mean't to be used. NATO and USA's faults are dragging their feet to get shit done, like we saw with the first attempted transfer of MiG-29 jets to Ukraine, and Ukraine's faults for this counter-offensive are this poorly-prepared and executed rush towards a prepared enemy, and overall poor command structure when it comes to mechanized warfare on an open ground, even without air support. Why send priceless F-16 jets to the Ukrainians if American-made cruise missiles and air defense systems do the work just fine? My point is: The worst thing about this war is that it has only been kept alive due to token arms transfers, all from donations, while NATO, USA and it's allies lack balls and have been dragging their feet for the entire war. Zaluzhniy received much less than 1/4th. of equipment that he needed to go back to pre-February 24th. borders. It's better to send Tomahawks, ATACMS and SAM systems rather than F-16's and Abramses. It's essential nowadays that we bring once massive industrial buildings that helped us win WW2, like the Detroit Arsenal Tank Plant, back into use so that they could help win the war in Ukraine by vastly overfilling the shortage of artillery shells and equipment sent to fight. I personally believe that the war in Ukraine might have been won if the West wasn't dragging it's feet, sent Zaluzhniy exactly what he wanted instead of the 1/4th. that he got, supplied his troops with more essential stuff and if Ukraine revised it's tactics, then the counter-offensive wouldn't have even failed. It ashames me and saddens me to see what has happened to America, or more rather, Miss Columbia's old war industry from WW2 or places like the Ruhr industrial valley. So much decay and neglect when we need it the most. Technology has advanced, where it isn't now vast armies fighting like in WW2, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't be able to mass-produce at least IFV's/APC's anymore, or lots of artillery shells of multiple different calibers to keep the war effort going. I would be at tears when i saw what modern war has become after we retired some essential components that made it good in the past, like for example, streamlined and simplified mass production. But now, an M1 Abrams tank is apparently just so advanced and complex that we can't even supply these in larger numbers to Ukraine, despite America literally having dozens of thousands in storage, and yet, they had the audacity to only supply Poland just 116 hand-me-down retired M1A1 FEP tanks leftover from the United States Marine Corps retiring it's own tank fleet, literally telling us that "this was all they had"? And what, they're keeping all of those M1A2's dusting in sand for Ukraine despite them dragging their feet the entire time? Come on! When the US was sending over Shermans to Europe in WW2, nobody asked for it and all of that firepower was more than welcome. Well, look at the US and NATO now. What a joke. Out of 450 retired ex-USMC M1A1 FEP tanks, they gave us only 116?! For this number of second-hand "hand-me-down's", America could've given us at least 250 M1A2 SEP V3 tanks for fucks sake. We lost what to be proud of anymore, and we need to gain that back. It's too late for the F-16's and M1 Abramses. It would have been a much better idea to send large amounts of long-range ATACMS (AtaSeeEms) ballistic missiles, Tomahawk cruise missiles and lots of modern SAM defenses for a protracted defensive war. America has shit-tons of M1 Abrams tanks literally just sitting out there, stockpiled in the desert, and they must be whipped into shape in order to send them like they were sending M4 Shermans to Europe during WW2, a scale which sadly we aren't even seeing today. This is starting to remind me of Britain's budget cutting spree in the lead up to the Falklands War, same level of unpreparedness and carelessness, a collapsing gerantocracy, lack of self-improving countries and no national pride. With this much of a passive giant even more than during the Great Depression before America entered WW2 in 1941 after it took the Japanese to attack Pearl Harbor, what would even be any use having the United States as an ally when nowadays it wouldn't even react much once attacked in peacetime? If they really don't need all of those 3,400 Abrams tanks currently in storage, at this rate i can just buy out the entire United States military by myself if their management is so passive, weak in pride and unwilling to act in terms of achieving world peace by stopping totalitarian leaders from achieving world dominance.
@@randomnobodovsky3692Homie after the Soviets ate shit and but the dust there was no peer. The only one that comes close is China. Russia is not close.
Because NATO tactics and training for the last 20 plus years have been focused on small unit tactics and fighting small wars or anti insurgency battles, not a full on War in a big country in Europe with hundreds of thousands of men on both sides. Or fighting an opponent on a similar level of tech or assets as you. NATO core weakness tactics wise is that NATO has built most of it's planning around the Fact the USA airpower will be in play and control the skies and so control the movement of the enemy.
Just like Cold War battles, American western doctrine bases its strategy mostly in sync with massive air power. Soviet Russian doctrine is a mastery of artillery and infantry infiltration. Without air power the western trained armies are trained to be dependent on, the Soviet strategy will overwhelm them. With the airpower support for the western trained armies, the Soviet strategy will struggle Vietnam War is an example.
the only time i saw a Russian tank use smoke was at Stepove in the duel between the two Bradley and T90 and that T90 just hanged around after deploying smoke
Because it can't back out at high speed. No present day Russian tank can. It would have to turn its backside toward the enemy, and that's not a good idea, even with only 20 or 25 mm weapons shooting at it.
The fact is that NATO doctrine and Soviet doctrine (Russian doctrine is just modernised soviet doctrine) have both been designed from the ground up to be a counter to each-other. For example, western weapons are usually on the bleeding edge of technology. This means it is more fragile, easier to damage, needs more care and support to use ect. Soviet weapons are designed for ease of manufacture and longevity. Take something as boring as artillery barrels. Soviet ones are heavy, fairly smooth, but thick and can last an extremely long time. Western barrels are much more precise but they wear out much more often. The western ones are technically superior in every way but soviet doctrine does not care about technical superiority but manufacturing superiority. Or take it to aircraft and the F-16. There is no* Russian equivalent to the F-16 because they don't make single engines aircraft because they expect the aircraft to take a hit and keep going - on one engine if need be. The F-16 needs a pristine runway, no debris and a squad of mechanics to keep it functional. The su-27 just doesn't need anything near the same maintenance. But it goes further than that. Soviet doctrine is all about throwing equipment away and replacing it with a massive industrial base at home. Russia DID dismantle a lot of it after the soviet union fell but they still have a lot more than the west. But take it into my speciality, (I'm a professional military analyst specialising in the DPRK). The DPRK is still old style Soviet in design so all of their factories can be turned from doing basically nothing to arms manufacture instantly. That's why the DPRK could give Russia a million shells without breaking a sweat. They can literally replace them without thinking too hard about it. The reason they have people manning these factories that have no work is becasue they could at any moment be asked to stark producing military equipment. So they go to work, took for something to do in the civilian sector and if they don't find anything, they just go home doing nothing. Completely inefficient from a western viewpoint but from a soviet one it means that if a war started today that the DPRK would throw everything it already has into the war and production would outpace usage 10 fold. Basically, yes, a DPRK tank is junk. But 50 of them vs an M1 and the DPRK win. Thats their mindset - and they keep swarming. But there is more than that. The soviet doctrine is rightly labelled by them as a "defensive doctrine". That does not mean they don't invade anyone. It is how they fight. They have small groups (currently called "storm Z detachments") that they use to push forward. If they face any form of resistance they run away - back into artillery range pulling the defenders in with them. The artillery defence then showers the area killing the defenders and then they repeat. If they don't face any resistance, they move up the artillery and air defence and the regular troops to the place the storm Z detachments go to. The reason they developed this is that Russia is big - very big. SO even back in the Napoleonic days Russia had no issue trading land for 2 things. Enemy soldier deaths and stretching of supply lines. So Russia just kept redesigning the same old strategy of scorched earth. pull back until the enemies supply lines are so long and fragmented that the enemy runs out of weapons and then there is no defence to push forward. Now look what is happening in Ukraine. The Russians were pushed back (they followed their doctrine) and they don't seem to be advancing (they followed their doctrine) but as soon as the Ukranian military ran out of ammunition, they seem to be advancing everywhere (they followed their doctrine). When the ammo comes back to Ukraine, the Russians will retreat at the slightest sign of resistance again, pulling the enemy into their artillery and air defence again. They are literally running the Ukraine campaign using classical soviet doctrine. Even the air-force usage from day one. They enter and run away, hoping to pull the enemy fighters into their SAM range. And the whole ukraine concept of not losing one square centimeter of land is exactly what the Soviet defensive doctrine is designed to take advantage of. The thing is, the Ukrainians know this because they were educated in Soviet doctrine. Thats why they said that the counteroffensive was a mistake, they knew exactly what was going to happen but the west demanded it, so they did it and it went just as they thought it would. The hole is logistics. As long as they get infinite shells from their production facilities, they can do this forever. Soviets can. China and the DPRK can. However Russia westernised so its just about how much of their production facilities they closed down in the process. The wildcard was (and kind of still is) wagner. They are full of western trained specialist that use a western doctrine so they don't pull back. That is why we had Bahkmut and why the RUssians thought they were idiots. They wanted to keep and capture land instead of trading it for kills. *the Russians did design a single engined fighter recently, but it was for export only and noone purchased it (yet)
The failure to use smoke has stumped me this whole war. Even as a novice in the tactics of modern warfare its clear to me that if you're going to assault enemy defensive positions you would want your troops obscured for as long as possible before the enemy can engage them. Why the Ukrainians aren't using prep fires then smoke rounds as their assault groups approach the trenches is quite confusing.
Smoke obscures you from the enemy, but it also obscures the enemy from you DUH, not to mention that just in case they didn't know where you were they now have a pretty good idea where to look, and the smoke isn't going to last there for long
If I remember correctly, according to an article either by RUSI or War on the Rocks, Ukrainian commanders don't use smoke because they can't see what their subordinates are doing via drone footage. If so, that means that Ukrainian commanders are micromanaging their subordinates and do not allow them to take the initiative.
@@looinrimsstuff like this is why UAF is struggling. The commanders are just so fkng bad. No smoke because you want to micromanage units at the tactical level is idiotic. There's other examples beyond this too.
Why NATO tactics are not working? Because NATO is used to "fighting" people that do not match them in weapons, electronics, satellites etc... I The Russians are not like Granada...
Same reason why every soviet tank has week lower plate armor… it’s not a priority. Hit probability and terrain. There is no tank on the planet that armors that section more than anyone else, because it would be a waste of material and weight.
What can be seen and said objectively about this war. Both NATO and Soviet/post-Soviet military understand were both proven to be correct and wrong foundationally yet both never took things and factors into account on how the said battle would be fought which let's be honest was going to happened. However NATO isn't learning as much as it will like due to the simple fact they are using a post-Soviet military that isn't foundationally build around NATO understanding where as the Russians are learning more from what they already know foundationally and can improve more faster and adjust better than the NATO side of things. Ukraine is learning when compare to already existing NATO build military forces is learning them on the fly or couldn't bring all of it in even if they wanted to but is currently a mix of NATO and Soviet views of warfare in its own way for the context of what it's facing for both better and for worse. The problem why people on both sides have got this war wrong in outcome is frankly the simple fact people didn't understand the Russians and still don't want to admit they keep getting them wrong. Too much of this war still is based on rhetoric against the Russian side if you're already in the West/anti-Russian camp both depending on which part of the world you are from or hold already existing bias. This goes to both side but the lies are objectively worse for Ukrainian side of this conflict in favor for them then of the Russians. People don't know anything about the Russians and yet still repeat the same mistakes that are clearly proven wrong or have strong reasons to be not the case for why X is happening. The SMO kicked off with the Russians doing something that many people seem to not understand is this conflict regardless of which side you're on was model roughly around what happened in 2008 in Georgia where Russia was aiding local forces with a expeditionary force which due to its size might as well be something else. However the scale of it will be repeat but larger and only with limited set goals which from the time was understandable and correct but didn't realize the political and diplomatic reactions in keys moments the early moments of the SMO when it finally happened. Unlike NATO Russia is fighting a nation that has a very large force that isn't made up of people that aren't unable/unwilling to fight and also knew their ways of battle as they were effetely the same thing in reality, the Russians went in a already existing conflict zone with a enemy that had more over them while defending then what the Russians had and only now have 1v1 number finally since late 2022. Before the raise in numbers the Russians were force to give up ground that before was meant to scare Ukraine into the peace talks which did happen but to due to both back door talks and events elsewhere in the conflict zone this never happened. The problem with NATO planners is they were still looking at war from their point of view and hold high and mighty trash talking views over something they really didn't knew much about and their pride got the better of them. Russia too had the same thing but at least adjusted for what is happening and were mostly more humbled about it and why they were fighting. Another thing we failed to realize about this conflict is people are saying we're learning new things yet in reality we are actually relearning what historically was already a thing but with mostly cold war era stuff with upgrades. Go on find your take from this war and odds are you will find it's older than you might think I wait. So if one can put it we're getting a relook of old conflict of what it could've been in modern times. People forgot what a real war between forces that in context to what they are bringing into the fight is really like and NATO historically got off lucky where as Russia right now isn't, the closest that could've been if it's not for some factors that change the reasons for it was the Falklands in 82. The lessons else where was from a outside point of view and both top to bottom personal from lower ranks to officers simply didn't learn much as they like to think in all this time in how a war was going to be fought. The US and Russians soldiers might had been great against fighting weaker forces that didn't have the means to fight back say in the middle in Iraq and Syria but when either one of these soldiers find themselves in combat with a train and able enemy that has a equal chance to them they might not be able they like to think and reality comes knocking them down. War Mappers are the only real source for what is actually happening in this war as the changes on the map is showing us what is actually happening. Don't waste time with people talking about X about the Russians or Ukrainians just look at what is happening on the map first before anything else, because this will show which side might not be telling you the truth about this conflict and its progress. Great examples to follow are Defense Politics Asia, Military Summary, Weeb Union. This said we need to ask the following question why is X happening say the reports of Russians making gains in X when you painted them out as X? This will tell us a lot about what is really happening over what is being said by those promoting X about the conflict and how well should you trust them or not. Tactics vs Strategy are two things people forget when addressing wars most people are focusing on the Tactics in the short term in war rather than the bigger picture in the Strategy. The Russians are learning tactics sure and have always been know for them too but they have always been a long term mindset people both in politics and military, something that people in the west tend to historically speaking never been or honestly rather lost that understanding both towards Russia and of ourselves and how we handle matters. No really ask yourselves this question for just a moment how many conflicts since the 90's the west won that are to this day kept rather lost later after winning them in the short run? Russia has only lost one conflict so far and even that wasn't what people think it was by in large they actually have a better track than we do really as many of those conflicts are either won for good or promised for the foreseen future. Let's face and without bringing in names people on both sides mostly in the west got this wrong and it's time to actually learn the truth about this rather than what we personally want it to be that is sadly imposed on people's minds at this time. I may add more but I think this is good enough for the moment. I wish nothing more than peace between brothers will end and bring back the good old days odd and strange yet enjoyable memes and online broken English trash talking online with people talking about things that often make no sense and is largely unrelated to the original thing they were yelling about that you can only get from Slavs. Peace.
Ukraine is not using NATO tactics. BTW, there really is not such thing as NATO tactics. Each military has its own ways of doing things. USA uses lots of air support. British uses lots of US air support. Germans use broom handles and positive feelings. French want to rule everything, then get mad and quit. Spanish and Italians pretend they will do something. Canadians talk a lot, but do very little. Romanians steal diesel fuel. The Polish want to charge on to Moscow, regardless of whatever is going on. The others are kinda somewhere... maybe not on the battlefield, but definitely in the HQ doing HQ stuff.
13:00 regarding minefields and NATO doctrine, I believe a key thing to remember is that the Ukraine invasion was not always like that. It only got into this stage because Russia was unable to score a decisive victory in the beginning, due to its military being poorly prepared at every level. Significant minefields and fortifications were limited to the Donbass region, and this would not have mattered if the other advances had broken through as intended. So if we assume that we insert NATO into such a war in this stage, then yes, there would be significant complications. But we if assume a "clean slate" scenario at the beginning of such a war, then it would actually be correct to not prioritise the breaking of such extensive fortifications yet. And with the geopolitical situation of NATO, it is extremely unlikely that it would ever find itself pressed for time to conduct such an operation, as invading the sovereign territory of a nuclear power is generally not an option to begin with.
poorly prepared only exists in poorly Orc propaganda. The Russians (really) made a mistake when they thought that the orcs a -reasonable people- would not turn their country into ruins, as was the case in Crimea, where more than half of the troops simply joined the Russian Armed Forces. In addition, they had an order to avoid losses among the population and EVEN THE TROOPS of Ukraine (see the example of Crimea). When it became clear that the orcs were not surrendering, and the groups of Russian troops near Kiev and in the northern part of the country were too small and stretched along the front, and also did not have sufficient supplies (no one expected a long war) - they were withdrawn. Let me remind you that the Russian Federation has 200-250 thousand contract soldiers throughout the country, about 100 entered Ukraine. Including the Russian Guard (police) and the People's Militia of the L/DPR, the total number involved is approximately 160-180 thousand versus 260 initially. But already in May the orcs had 700 thousand, by the summer - a million, while mobilization became constant. The Russians received their first reinforcements only in the fall, during the partial mobilization of 300 thousand. The density of Russian troops is easy to imagine, knowing that initially the front was about 2000 km, after the withdrawal of troops from Kyiv - about 1000 km.
Чушь, Россия и не планировала побеждать быстро, на начальном этапе у украинцев было численное превосходство, Путин надеялся договорится о мире, это предложение отвергли и вот тогда пришлось доукомплектовать армию.
You clearly have problems with your head. However, like everyone else in the West. You have always lived inside your own fantasy schizophrenic world. ))
I think drones is what made things different. A real time data and cheap smart guided bombs practically made everyone move very slow with utmost alert from the sky.
In respect to the use of smoke grenade launchers on MBT´s: Sovjet Era MBT´s like T-72 seem to have a "dead man cirquit" in their crew hatches, that disable certain functions of the tank when the hatches are open. Turret or Drivers hatches are open - smoke launchers are disabled. Drivers hatch open - turret rotation/control is locked So you can really only operate under closed hatches. That might be one of the core reasons why we dont see much smoke use from MBT´s in Ukraine, as they just cant use it.
As a former member of 2ACR , Training emphasized hi intensity Defense supplemented with quick Transition to HI Intensity Offense to exploit gaps in Offensive lanes or axis. Air superiority is a given, except occasional loss by enemy emphasis of Offensive on that axis. Training was frequent on M68 cannons (M60 series & M1 tanks) w/direction from Fire Direction Control targeting. Until the gulf War ( Verify w/ a txt. to Chieftain..... Excellent Video & topic ) Ex Cav Fan ....not-visualsed
I think it has more to do with the fact NATO is used to fighting poorly armed and trained militias they can airstrike, and not a conventional military.
They do fail, many reasons but note that nato doctrine on this was developed in the 1980’s. Tank pump smoke….drone operator thank you for giving me a flight path. I don’t think nato equipment is poorly maintained. Often it’s show after or during high intensity warfare. Things have changed in 40 years, also we trickle in equipment. Intensity is low it’s just on smaller scale.
NATO tactics don't work in Ukraine because they revolve around overwhelming American Air Superiority to offset Russian/Soviet advantages in ground based fires. Without air superiority Ukraine is instead having to fight an artillery war against an opponent who generally has a superiority in fires.
Russia has masses(had, running out of ammo) of fires, but not accurate fires or effective, when compared to US artillery fires.
@@xxxlonewolf49 still, even if Russian artillery saturation is not efficient, it is countered much easier via air superiority vs engaging in artillery duels
They haven't even been using NATO tactics at all. They've been fighting on Russia's terms the whole time, even when they shouldn't have been.
@TheLumberjack1987 Very true. The COTS drones are also a whole new aspect to war neither side planned or had trained around.
@@xxxlonewolf49
'Murika ... F**k yea. only 'muricans can shoot guns accurately, no one else ... give me a brake !
Tactics dont Suddenly make a 5km Deep minefield that the enemy has no intention of attacking Over cease to exist
"just go around bro"
@RaikoTechnologies of course, why didn't the Ukrainians think of the obvious invading another country to go around the minefield, or launching an amphibious invasion of Russia to go around the minefields 🙈
well said, one Ukrainian returning from western training said they told him just to "avoid or, bypass minefields" which unfortunately shows how modern NATO forgot the old lessons of peer on peer combat in the last 30 years
@@DD-qw4fzNo that’s what GERMANS said.
I have four years in the Marines with training filled with minefield clearing.
@@kaneworsnop1007 the joke was "you mean going into the sea? there are mines here as well"
Another thing that has been talked about a lot, but not emphasized enough that with the combination of the flat open terrain, massive number of artillery assets and 24/7 drone surveillance of the battle space it is practically impossible to concentrate forces to conduct larger scale offensive opperations without immediately suffering an artillery raid. By extension that's why we don't see maneuvering tank formations, because they cannot set up assembly areas close enough to the front so they have to march long distances before engaging the enemy, which is in part responsible for the poor performance of armoured assets in this war, because those movements are extremely taxing to the crew even in more ergonomic NATO tanks. The Ukrainian counter offensive is a great example of this in effect. After that fiasco they started using smaller infantry units with limited armoured support, which led to the small amount of gains they could achieve in that operation. This tactic seems to be prevailing on both side to this day.
It doesn’t really matter since neither side has the capability to even conduct battalion sized attacks
@@looinrims why do you think is that?
@@oliverpasztor788the factors above, any battalion size assembly immediately comes under fire by artillery
@@acceptablecasualty5319 I know that as I laid that out in my original comment. I am curious what @looinrims will answer, because his comment suggests that neither is inherently capable of conducting such an operation, which I don't think is true.
@@looinrimsboth sides have such capability. But, when troops will be accumulated in the staging area - they would be clapped by artillery, or, if it will be AFU - also by helicopters or strike aircrafts, or by both. So, this is become purely arty warfare, with small groups constantly trying to infiltrate to enemy lines.
I see a lot of similarities between the war in Ukraine and the Iraq-Iran-War. Lot of what you have mentioned was executed there between 1980 -1988 too: trench and mine warfare, tanke fire indirect fire, attack helicopters stopping armour, a permanent lack of ressources. In genreal: Firepower over movement.
Movement, in this case, is not freely permitted. The entire battlefield is perpetually surveilled. Drones have altered tactics, with military institutions quick to adopt, but slow to counter. Even "efficient" Russian jamming seems to have moderate effect.
@@panzlockDrones changed a lot. Especially when it comes to dislocation of troops. But I want to point out some things:
1.) The informations provided by drones have to be put together. There are in my opion no doubts that there's friction too concerning this.Also the informations have to be transferred to CPs and staffs to work with them. Another point which requires constant corrections due to combat operations.
2.) The other ways of reconnaissance are not gone. They can provide pictures of situations still. i.e. during the Iraq-Iran-War the iranias didn't use encryption or coding on tactical level radio transmissons most of the time but plain text.(!) On operational level the Iraqis were able to deciphered Irans radio transmissions (with the help of swiss machines and czech operators).
3.) In the end you need to have the resources to use the informations on the battlefield. That means you need to have the the appropriate weaponry and you need them in appropriate numbers. You also need troops that are able to conduct the right tactics. Again: Drones change a lot. I absolutly agree. But i.e. the informations provided by drones do not change the inferiority of the ukraine army concerning artillery.
You lie. There are no any similarities at all. trench and mine warfare is inevitable in case when enemies are equal in strength. It's not war against Afhgan peasants or any other 3d world contries what USA and NATO did in their history.
How in 1980 they used child soldiers, in 2024 its drones
dumb ahh comparison
- multilayered defences more then 50 km deep
- automated remining of huge areas in hours, which makes mineclearing a herculean or better sisiphosian task
- drone surveilance deep into enemy territory - round about 50 - 70 km range
- no air superiority
- increasing thermal imaging capabilities on both sides
- glide bombes
- long range artillery and huge ammount of it (Russia)
Also dont announce the entire world that u are going to attack
@@annguyenlehoang7779 They even made a trailer XD
To be fair. All these factors have always been part of the basis of NATO doctrine; an all out war with the Soviet Union.
Ukraine isn't employing NATO doctrine. It uses NATO weapon systems in a Soviet style.
@@065Tim Thank you... and to add NATO doctrine does work in these condtions... really look at every war NATO has fuaaght for exemples of how they overcoming these types of issues.
@@juannieves8642 🤫🤫🤫🤫🤫
Because the textbooks didn’t expect the enemy to have 10 light years of mines 3 high and two inches apart
reminds me the thing with genius Ameriquan êkspêrts evaluating MiG-25
"It weren't we, who've fucked up and who must take some responsibility. It's Sovets who invented a wrong plane!"
It isn't our textbook which never shed light on a possible scenario. It's just dæmned Æstern Eüropa.
@@worldoftancraft and then as a response the Ameriquan êkspêrts developed the most successful air superiority fighter in history that also happened to destroy several MiG-25 with no combat losses of its own
@@colinadams5419 good thing it never enters truly protected airspace.
Now you should go remember the noombar 1 US-of-A interceptor: the M1 Abrams and how it annihilated everything in Easting 73 airzone, together with Bradley AWACS system.
Also English literacy is a joke. Cope with that. It's people of this tribe that make the used spellings not that unimaginable. Or you have been through a hiccough while reading them?
@@colinadams5419 also it's kinda neglectful from you that you omitted the curious fact that the most powerful entity that kicked the ass of an F-15 was... Earth. The beloved blue-green ball that, as I can recall, doesn't have conscious.
Also, curious fact number two is... what you've wrote is am example of WhatAvoutIsm. The irony itself.
Because the text books also don't tell you to sit on your hands doing nothing while the enemy makes a big ass mine field.
Ukraine is going to be a text book example of squandering your edge over the enemy. (They had U.S. intel, Drones, optics, thermals, air defense)
Are you telling me pumping all of your soldiers and equipment into a position surrounded on three sides isn't an effective tactic?
it worked when running a simulation with bad coefficients for the stupid orks! :)
Of course! That's how Ukraine successfully advanced to the rear in Avdiiv . . . err . . . Avdeevka, causing eleventy billion casualties to the Russians while Private Oinkskiy stubbed his toe as the only Ukrainian casualty.
@@TacoSallust The thing that gets me is how poutine didn't predict his massive loss of eleventy billion casualties. As we all know, the Russians ran out of ammunition 2 years ago and have been using exclusively shovels since then. If only NATO weren't so stingy with the money, Ukraine could have defended against the shovel-wielders and their illegal invasion more quickly.
@@asahearts1 Love to see that there's people out there who understand that war is an extension of politics. I clearly remember that Nuland was involved in planning the counter offensive, at least so she stated herself. Well turns out that Coup plotting propagandists don't make for good military strategists lmao
@@bimbocrammmm Speakimg of Nuland, I noticed there's been a lot of sudden turnover. I wonder what that's all about. 🤔
NATO tactics without air dominance? Lmao. Without air dominance, you can't concentrate forces to pull off a shock and awe push.
Still Ukraine was goaded into the counteroffensive that was to reach the black sea.. With no air power and inferior artillery.
So NATOs doctrine is completely flawed. Good luck trying to achieve air superiority when the enemy aren't armed with AK 47s and slippers.
@@x7zy-xx And less than 15% of required demining systems
And that air dominance requires what? Exactly, a vastly inferior enemy army. And even then, look at the declassified documents of Vietnam's air war. It was a complete turkey shoot for the Vietnamese and their allies whenever they engaged NATO aircraft.
They have literally proven air dominance is not required. They’ve turned a total defeat into a stalemate against an enemy that has every advantage possible.
No plan survives first contact with the enemy.
That plan has been in place for years now.
Cute pupper in profile pic tho
@@Sercer25 Thanks, what I meant was that it seemed like the intention was to apply as much NATO tactics as possible, but it probably wasn't going to fully work either way, even if there was a solid air force on the top of things. The Russians were prepared, the Ukrainians struck where they were prepared whilst this didn't happen in the previous, more successful offenses.
NATO equipment was also maintained to a better standard, once upon a time. You know, back in the days when crèches on army bases were not a top priority.
In the words of Mike Tyson, "Everyone got a plan until they get punched in the mouth".
@@PowermadNavigator and how long did those "successful offences" last? be critical or shut up
I know the "communities" have quite some overlap, but seeing WARNO footage from Vulcan first thing really surprised a laugh out of me.
NATO and SOVIET doctrine was developed without any actual direct engagement with their main adversaries. It's unique in that it's a battle of two hypotheticals that were never tested in the real world.
Part of the great tragedy that wars are. In certain aspects generals are as clueless as random people.
First Gulf war, the Iraqi's followed the Soviet doctrine to the letter and were steamrolled by the coalition who did nothing but practice against soviet doctrine. The tech gap that was shown in that conflict scared the shit out of the Russians and the Chinese. While the Russians said they were going to rework their military (They didn't) the Chinese did, they [China] are attempting to make their military like a modern western one.
@@tdlainc.4737 Am sorry but Iraq isnt russia or by extension the soviet union. We know for a fact that suppressing russia's air defenses would be too costly for anyone that dared. Iraq had no such defenses. Once the US attained air supremacy, that was it. Soviet doctrine focuses on denying the opponent air supremacy. This is seen with there heavy focus on air defenses.
And it works, Ukraine denied russia air superiority for 2 whole years. Its only now starting to fall apart. Ukraine was using mostly S300 systems..... We apply that to russia who have even more advanced systems and you can see how daunting the task is for Nato doctrine. Any fight with russia is one where you are committed to go all in. Its gonna be costly. And am talking conventional.
For a group like Nato, they know that spending there strength on russia is stupid when the dragon in the east is merely watching....
@@tdlainc.4737 which only says that Iraq made a mistake using soviet doctrine, not being adjusted to it. Just like Ukraine now.
@@alispeed5095Looks like you enjoyed that tall glass of Cope-a-Cola.
1. They’ve been tailored to fight insurgencies in the Middle East and Africa for the past 30 years
2. They hinge WAY too much on favorable conditions such as air superiority, numerical superiority, etc.
3. Fail to account for the limitations of equipment, as Ukraine has complained about.
We hinge on Air Superiority or Air Dominance because THAT is a guaranteed factor.
We outnumber the RuAF two and even three to one, with more advanced technology across the board and better pilots. The Airspace will be contested, but WE will still be the ones doing strike missions even as the sky is not fully secured. Russians will be on the defensive through and through. They can rely on their SAMs, but they will pretty much be attrited at only a slightly slower pace than the enemy aircraft.
Ukraine is on the opposite spectrum. They cannot even gain air superiority at all, nor can they even contest the airspace.
It’s only because of Russia’s pure incompetence that they haven’t been pummeled into the ground at a rate never before seen in the war up to this point.
In regards to the air war…
Ukraine is to Russia what Russia is to us.
@@PeterMuskrat6968 No it’s not and you’re a fool to think it would be. Modern air defenses can lock down airspace very effectively. You’re grossly overestimating our capability. Anybody who’s worked for the military (like me) knows the Russians aren’t the losers you make them out to be. They’re very competent fighters, their pilots have more combat hours than any other air force on earth, and their missile technology is either on par with or exceeds ours. Anecdotal, but my cousin was a CCT in the Air Force and even admitted we wouldn’t just magically gain air superiority over Russia. Don’t let your hubris be your downfall. We thought Ukraine would punch through easily last summer, thought the Abrams would single handedly roll through Moscow, and thought the NATO trained troops were superior to Russia’s. All of that was wrong.
@@PeterMuskrat6968 If your whole strategy relies on one factor being guaranteed, doesn't that mean then your whole stratagem was very vulnerable. What if you underestimate your opponents Anti Air ability and they make it costly for your airpower. Or worse they actually out compete or make your airpower a none factor?
What's worse is you then package this way of fighting to a country who does not even have that one guaranteed factor either, setting them up for failure.
@@PeterMuskrat6968 Never in a million years, as things stand, would NATO even contest for Russia's airspace. Their air defence capabilities would make short work of the USAF, downing aircraft at a rate that would make replenishment untenable, considering America's shambolic lack of production surge capacity. Not to mention the crucial loss of experienced pilots.
Stop the cope.
@@chico9805 Russia could barely deal with what little Ukraine received in missiles, you think they'd stop hundreds of tomahawks and f35s? You're drunk go home. You say USA can't produce replacement, what, prey tell would Russia use to replace their air defenses once they're exhausted? If this war showed anything is that Russia anti air was way overhyped.
the damn shovels with washing machine chips....
Them shovels sure are effective. I want many for my country.
@@DinnerForkTongue thinkntwice! Shovels are cheap, reliable and easy to use and maintain.. they dont generate much GDP just keep working...
Ballistic cluster shovels, heat-seeking thermobaric shovels, guided titanium shovels, hypersonic shovels and AI swarm shovels.
@@DinnerForkTongueget out of here, stalker
NATO should import that tech
the introduction of drones to reach into and past local defense for clearing fog of war and accurate targeting of high value targets really has changed the game imo. the idea that we would be reduced to world war 1 style combat again just blows my mind. modern battlefields are going to remain a trench slog with very limited mobility until such a time as drones can be quickly and efficiently dealt with. there are other factors of coarse but i would argue these drones are the single biggest impact item which has thrown mobile warfare under the bus
I disagree.
The trench slogging we're seing really shouldn't come as any surprise given the terrain and forces at play. The ground is not conducive to manuver in the best of circumstances. The donbass and adjacent regions are a tangled knotwork of hedges and streams and small towns, not like the plains to the West.
@@horsemumbler1this isn't the french countryside circa WW2, this is literally the terrain armor was designed to operate in, it's like 1000km of grain fields with very little cover and only one major obstacle in the form of the Dniper. the ability for drones to prevent any kind of force concentration close to the front has created this situation which amounts to no one being willing to expose more than a platoon or 2 of infantry at a time. any time Russia tries to put any kind of tank numbers together, drone swarms either engage them directly, pinpoint their positions for accurate artillery or give Ukraine information to prepare for a spoil/counter attack.
@@horsemumbler1the reason why Ukraine entry into NATO was considered such a threat by Russia is that Ukraine has long been considered to be undefendable to modern mobile warfare doctrines and a direct path to Moscow.
Trench warfare is because PSU lacks aircraft and VKS don't have weapons to deal with AFU anti-air systems.
Plus the fact that the armour was caught naked against the drones with strapped-in explosives (which are basically just next-gen ATGMs that are better and 2 order of magnitude cheaper than e.g. Javelin).
@@skipperg4436 Javelin is so expensive only because that's what it costed to have a robotic drone in 1996. 20 years later, identical capability is much cheaper due to progress in mass manufacture of MEMS devices . . . everyone is going to make them now, en mass. add a NVidia Jetson image processor to it and it doesn't even need a pilot anymore. As soon as we run out of tanks, they will become cheap enough to target individual people, and each other.
All the armor videos that I have seen were operating independently of either mechanized infantry and/or regular infantry support.
yes, that's interesting, isn't it?
possibly this is due to the prevalence of cluster munition artillery? armor is somewhat resistant to these
Generally what I’ve seen is usually only high up drone footage. In that it’s usually very hard to see any infantry but they are usually there. Reporting from Ukraine has lots of details of assaults that combined tanks covering fire while APC stormed up to drop troops at the trenches.
i am baffled every time when theres a lonely tank rolling around and then taken out. i wonder what going on there, i doesnt look like something you would want to do....but they know better in the field i guess.
@@simonschneider5913 and who should acompany said tank? and how exactly they/it would protect a tank from a drone or guided arty?
@@TheRifild see why i find it curious what theyre doing there? can you explain it?
smoke launchers get rusty, yes, but they don't fail because of it. They only need to transmit an electrical signal to the smoke canisters through a few metal pins, worst case scenario you clean the pins and it works again. Honestly I've seen or heard of nearly every part of our tanks failing except for smoke launchers.
Maybe the warehouse with most of the NATO supply of smoke canisters got striked or got blown up in transit?
@@trunglequoc542 its more likely a training and equipment issue.
the australian Armor Museum stated in a video about T-72 that it has "dead man cirquits" in its hatches, that disable certain equipment like the smoke launchers or with the drivers hatch, even the turret controls, when not closed.
If this is correct, most tanks in ukraine cant use smoke due to operating with open hatches.
And NATO tank crews come from sovjet tanks and thus have limited experience using smoke.
In soviet/Russian doctrine vehicle smokes are considered as a unit's tactical measure, not an individual protection system. For example, ivfs driving across the field in front of friendly infantry deploying smoke to cover grunt's movements. Even smoke launchers in older models of t72 were set up to throw a smoke charge as far as possible, smoking the enemy position 100-200 meters away, not the individual tank. These launchers have been changed but everyone is used to old tactics
@@zhufortheimpaler4041dead man circuits are standard worldwide and you can disable them. This is necessary in case they malfunction or your hatches can't be closed properly anymore. You're drilled to close the hatch first and then smoke, though to be honest if I were in combat I'd disable the turret and chassis safety features by default. I'd rather smoke immediately and then close the hatch instead of fumbling with the hatch for precious seconds without being able to do anything. For the driver too, if the motorblock gets damaged I'd rather not have the "you lost the cooling circuit, we'll shut off the engine for you right now while you're under fire so you don't damage it :)" feature. Disabling these does require the crew to know what they are doing to some extent though.
@@ando3087 with the training level in ukraine and russia... knowing what they do is not really the case for most tank crews
In 100 hours in Desert Storm During air and ground operations, U.S. and allied forces destroyed over 3,000 tanks, 1,400 armored personnel carriers, and 2,200 artillery pieces along with countless other vehicles. How?
Most of the enemy vehicles were destroyed by the USAF.
And Iraq was pummeled for month before.
But Russia is not weak as Iraq.
@@alek9195What you actually mean is that russia is not as strong as the US
These are fairy tales for young children, as the proverb says, a donkey loaded with bags of gold opens the gates of any fortresses, the Iraqi generals were simply bought so that they would not withdraw their troops from the garrisons, this is the truth.The Americans have never won wars!Because this is not a nation of soldiers, they cannot tolerate the loss of millions of soldiers, like the rest of the Europeans!
@@cheften2mk Russia is stronger then the US.
based vulcanHDgaming footage
Proliferation of drones, both military and consumer ones makes having the element of suprise extreamly hard. Which is needed for company or battalion size manuvers
So basically it boils down to "NATO tactics fail when the enemy doesn't do what we want them to do". That's wild.
Its really wild that "Let's not do what they want us to" came as a shock.
@@Pangora2 especially since thats like rule one of every military conflict - outsmart your opponent, if you're to weak to overpower them right off
I think the major thing that you either missed or minimized was the total proliferation of drones. Neither side can move. If the Russians move out into the open, they are immediately spotted by drones and then attacked by massed artillery fires and the same goes for Ukraine. If NATO was fighting in Ukraine, they also would be unable to move. Drones have absolutely changed the battlefield. There simply will not be any large-scale breakthroughs or operational maneuvers unless one side figures out a way to neutralize the other sides drones. Everything else you mentioned is merely tertiary.
Its like the barbed wire and machine guns of WW1. No one wants to admit a coil of sharp wire destroyed their gallant charges with cavalry with gleaming sabres in hand. Drones have done the same to people that think a dozen Abrams rolling through the desert with total air dominance against n outdated enemy was how all wars would be fought. There shouldn't be "NATO" tactics. There should be different tactics based off the available forces in relation to the opposing enemy.
Thing with relying on *superior training* is that it doesn't help when OpFor don't play jousting with you and just level the area.
Anglo/euro tactics do not work when used by slavs, and slav tactics do not work when used by anglos/euros. This is because the devs thought it would be less fun if everyone used the same meta build
Funniest comment, and true in a way.
All of the nations that have been corrupted by the Soviets all utilize the same basic formula… at varying scales of course.
They use the Soviet doctrines… in terms of Armies, Air Forces and everything in between.
They worked for the Soviets when they were a juggernaut… but they barely work even for the russians, who hold the majority shares of the soviet juggernaut.
@@PeterMuskrat6968they didn't even work for the soviets. After ww2, their only military operation outside of other Warsaw Pact members was Afghanistan. 100k dead Soviets within 10 years, and a humiliating loss
@@PeterMuskrat6968 maybe because American tactics only works on weak enemies who you can bully with airpower.
Russia have so many Anti-aircraft systems that it is pretty impossible unless it is most of US's air units/missiles against Russian Army. And then when Nukes enter chat.
@@AKUJIVALDOfact that NATO doesn’t have stuff like Pantsyr (mobile AA with guns and missiles) proves your point
@@innelator6941 what are you talking about? NATO has a different concept of AA and many different systems but the lack of a tracked vehicle (btw Romania still has Gepards) doesnt proof anything. the AA Gun vehicle was pretty useless until massive drones started to show up anyway.
What is even more interesting earlier armies advanced trough countyside and got stuck in urban battles. Now going trough fields is almost suicid because of drones and artillery and advance is easier trough urban enviroment. Due to drones enemy can always see your forces.
@danielhalachev4714 this is flat out wrong. Russians have not cared about civilian lives on the slightest, No leveling modern cities and towns requires an absolutely excessive amount of explosives without nukes, so much that attempting it with conventional munitions would run any modern countries stocks dry.
@danielhalachev4714 I mean, that's exactly what they are doing lmao
@danielhalachev4714 The rubble will still be there. And yes, advancing through urban areas in that scale likely requires that you destroy the potential for resistance.
@danielhalachev4714have you seen Bakhmit or Mariinka , there is hardly a building in sight anymore
This works because of 2 reason. Russia have less will to obliterate civilian population, so they ends up fighting room for room battle that make the cities a good defensive position for UAF. Secondly, Russia got quite the confidence due to their Chechen forces who's specialize in that kind of combat, and Wagner elite units that fought in Syrian cities.
Smoke launchers aren't really used in US training for armor formations. I've been on tanks for 10 years (SEP V2 and V3). We used it once in 2015 and then once in 2023 to test the new tank gunnery table. Its not used because either the launchers are broke, its not safe, or units are not allowed to draw it due to it being seen as a waste of money for the unit.
As for the tanks using direct fire, No not on any of the tanks or in the books I got a MG school show that we have indirect capability. Its rather looked down on due to being a 'Waste of ammo'. Our Firing table books show a lot of info that Im sure it can be done, but American units are to ridged to come up with things like that because we are not trained. (While its COOL that we are so DISICPLINE, what a joke by the way, that we won't attempt to come with ideas and try concepts. Its not in our culture.)
Yes you are correct in the deployment of tanks in this war. Its something I've seen on my end. Though this also needs to be understood: The sexy idea of 'Tank on Tank' combat is just a sexy idea.
I get that we will always go back to '73 Eastings' but you must understand that majority of tank engagements in history were majority 'Tank on Troops'. NATO believes firmly that each platform will engage the same platform (Tank on tank, troops on troops) and you will never deviate from that. NEVER. Its not in the script.
Examples: NTC rotations for myself in 2016 and 2019. Hohenfelts Training Center for myself in 2018 and 2022. (I've been in ABCT's for my whole Army career.)
Tanks units only fought tanks in both NTC and Hohenfelts. We didn't see troops assaulting our armor positions. The only time we did is when we did it on accident and attacked the troops.
This ridged behavior prevents any form of 'Think on your feet' mentality. In my view it seriously discourages you to be flexible in a fight. More often then not, the idea that you as a tanker will fight anything other than tanks is just a joke and you are made fun of for it. For instance, the US Armor community views the MPF (Mobile protected Firepower) M10 Booker is a waste because 'IT CANT FIGHT TANKS!!!!!' When in reality its doing the job of an actual tank which is to SUPPORT THE INFANTRY WITH PROTECTED DIRECT FIRE SUPPORT.
OK, Im done.
I have a question, if you don't mind: what do you think about the effectiveness of the standard HEAT "multipurpose" projectile that you used as suppression of enemy fire points and other infantry/units support? How effective in this role do you think compared to Soviet/Russian HE projectile the OF-19/26?
I was a Jäger and not a Panzergrenadier in the german Bundeswehr but all I heard about the German Puma IFV why it's so different (and expensive) to every other IFV is, because german tank units NEVER fight without IFVs and thats why the IFV needs the protection level against MBTs. Every Platoon in an IFV has AT Weapons on them, too and the three parts MBT-IFV-infantry fight in a symbiosis against MBT-IFV-infantry. Its plan still is MBT against MBT but at least they think and train to be in the same place as tanks AND infantry...
That would mean that the germans knew better?
And by the way, thanks for the post. Based on the logic of both your armored forces and tank designs, especially the Abrams, I have the strong impression that the US Army has firmly absorbed the German WWII experience. Because not technologically, of course, but conceptually, the Abrams is another version of the Panther: a tank whose job is to stop the "endless" tank hordes rolling from the East. Your words further reinforced that impression for me.
@@maade9642 "That would mean that the germans knew better?" I think their Military was conceptualizing land warfare against the Warsaw Pact forces based on the AAR of your ex-nazi generals. You know, the "Hitler was a complete idiot, he should have listened to us (which he did) and this is how we fought the Bolshevik hordes brilliantly" ones.
HEAT on Tanks is not used and has been phased out as of 2016 by the US Army. So do with that info as you will. We used MPAT (Multipurpose Anti Tank) but it is not ideal. Its not a heavy enough HE load to do what it is needed against troops effectively. Soviet HE-FRAG is better because of the actual frag element vs the mid explosive of the MPAT or HEAT. To deal with troops we use Coax and CAN. But if i have to hit a bunker, then we use MPAT-OR. Though that is 3 rounds (MPAT, MPAT-OR, and HEAT) that you have to carry with in your ammo rack vs HE-FRAG where I can deal with all that and still have more room in the ammo rack.
While MPAT can be used for PC's, Buildings, and Helicopters they are not the best for dealing with troops due to lack of fragments. It has just enough explosive, but not enough. OR is also rare and heavy.
I consider, due to the role of Tanks in supporting infantry, the Soviet HE-Frag is a better solution for this. @@Ailasher
It could be a lot of things, like how from the outset they were poorly thought out and based around the idea of total air superiority, but a critical aspect is also that for the last 30 years, everything NATO, from the equipment to the tactics, to the doctrine and strategy, to the logistical base have been retooled to fight profitable insurgnecy/anti-terrorism/ seal-clubbing conflicts where the opponent can't really fight back.
Now placed against a peer opponent, unsurprisingly, it fails spectacularly.
exactly
More broadly, the NATO doctrine works on the assumption of technological superiority, or achieving technological superiority, in several key areas like intelligence and reach. The Soviet doctrine works on no such assumptions - it assumes the enemy is at least as strong, at least as smart, at least as knowledgeable, etc. Thus the idea of maskirovka, attempting to deceive the enemy, thus the complex tactical maneuvering to separate and destroy the enemy piecemeal, thus "meatgrinder" defensive positioning, etc. NATO doctrine is 'comfortable' fighting, Soviet doctrine is blood sweat and tears until victory. All the difference, really.
@@SeanMirrsenчто за детский штампованный стериотипный бред. Советская доктрина это массовая армия с танками и артиллерией, с сильным ПВО и мощнейшей промышленностью с многочисленным подготовленным мобилизационным резервом наряду с тыловыми учебными центрами. Где был учтен опыт тяжелейшей второй мировой войны и устранены все главные недостатки, организм был хорошо отлажен и проработан.
Насколько бы ты не был хорошим воином и супер дорогая точная техника на войне потери будут, что и продемонстрировала война на Украине, без мощного тыла и промышленности ты проиграешь войну.
Тот резерв которая Украина накопила, обучала и идеологически подпитывала ненавистью ко всему русскому с 2014 года уже истощен и потерян, на данный момент значительная часть армии ВСУ плохо обучена и немотивирована. В начале войны довоенные части ВСУ действительно хорошо себя показали, они были крайне насыщены западными противотанковыми средствами и множество идей противодействия российской доктрине сработало.
Так что сколько не готовь крутые подразделения, если будет настоящая война крутых вояк рано или поздно выбьют и придут на смену им зеленые ребята, и качество подготовки сильно упадет без мощного тыла. Вам пора бы открыть глаза и отказаться от копиума превосходства доктрины нато), у каждой идеи есть свои плюсы и недостатки.
The answer is air power. NATO gets its power through air dominance, so without clear skies and fire support the blitz falls apart.
Just a caveat, NATO gets its power through AMERICAN air dominance.
Air power does not work with countries that have strong air defenses.
@@alek9195 kinda like the Soviet Union integrated so much AA defenses into their armed forces that two former Soviet states would have a hard time knocking it all out.
@@TacoSallust What are you talking about.
@@alek9195 Tell that to the US during Desert Storm when they faced one of the most dense air defence networks ever put together.
Drones, drones, drones, drones. That is what you seem to have missed.
Any attacking force is equivalent to taking your unprotected hand and messing up a wasp's nest with it. This goes for both sides. The moment you get into the open, the drones, the wasps, swarm. This gives an advantage to the slow moving firepower heavy side. You simply can't do movement warfare anymore against an equal foe.
Turns out that using single, unescorted armored vehicles for probing attacks is a bad idea. Who would've guessed?
they need to hire you ASAP as you clearly know better than the entire strategic brainpower of NATO
@@sowianskizonierz2693 actually yes🤓☝️
@@sowianskizonierz2693 My guy, whenever someone calls out someone else "YoU're a BeTEer ExpErt ThAn MiLitaRy exPerTs" let's have a quick reality check. Both RU and UA (with assistance of US and A primarily) made horrible decisions throughout these two years and I don't have to be a Michelin star kitchen chef to tell you that shit on a plate is still shit on a plate, no matter who "cooked" it.
@@vanjamenadzer it's always the commenters who know best which military decisions should have been made.
@@sowianskizonierz2693 shut up nerd
Many judge the war based on opening overconfidence of Russia. They thought they will be welcomed as heroes saving Ukraine, they did not expect resistance. So they thought they could take Ukraine just rushing to Kiev. Many took this as military incompetence, but that is not really the case. It was an intelligence problem. And honestly that kind of logic is underestimating Russians. What happens in Ukraine is when the sides have comparable level of tech. People become too complacent on how war works watching US fight poor people. And this "NATO tactics" thing is the part of the same problem.
Underrated comment
The point of origin of Russia's failure in the February/March 2022 offensive certainly is to be found in the intelligence department, however the Russian armed forces absolutely did display great levels of incompetence at the same time : first failing to account for the possibility of resistance, failing with logistics, failing to adapt rapidly to a "we are at war" mindset, failing with air defences, failing to suppress Ukrainian air forces, air defences and anti-ship capabilities, etc. And then there are the mindless assaults on strategically unimportant positions that cost Russia tens of thousands of men even in the recent months. Not to forget, quite importantly, the performance of many supposedly advanced Russian weapon systems, which have definitely proven to be stuck in the 20th century in terms of capabilities, even despite having been hyped for years as Russia catching up to the US.
Now it is true that Western forces shouldn't be complacent. Even with some level of incompetence on Russia's side, their doctrine was still forged in fire and blood, and they are absolutely not dumb enough to not make use of what advantages they have. Russians are still capable of using their artillery, their mining capabilities, their long range cruise missiles, etc. And while their air defences are certainly not performing to the level they were expected to by pre-war international observers, they are still a major presence forcing Ukraine to only make limited use of air power (combined with Ukraine limited air forces of course).
@@MadManchou I agree with some of the stuff, but still people underestimate how many things can go wrong in a war. There are many stories from US veterans on how things went wrong on various theaters like Iraq or Afghanistan on internet. Only difference was the enemy was not capable to use or even recognize those weaknesses.
And even costly frontal assaults are not that senseless if you know how Russians work. Any other western nation would refuse to go that blunt, and probably lose. But no cost is too great for Russians, if they win in the end. They did the same thing in ww2.
I would point out that this did have a lot of success elsewhere as Russia marched into the south without a fight and took the land bridge without a fight, except for specifically the city of Mariupol. It was Kiev that had the most trouble but I think the problem was that Russia moved quickly, bypassing urban areas, lacking control of the rear and this is where their logistics got caught up by small teams of Ukrainians. This choice in tactic and insufficient troop numbers to neither control the rear or take Kiev, would imply that Russia didn’t intend to take Kiev or even hold cities. I think it was a rush to pressure Ukraine to the negotiating table. By the 2nd day of the invasion, Russia had already pursued negotiations. Also, there was no such battle to push Russia out of the Kiev region, they simply withdrew. I think it’s accurate that Russia agreed to leave the region as a condition of the peace treaty that was showing promise as the Ukrainian negotiators have since reported. It would seem that Russia believed it would quickly end with negotiations and were themselves incredibly unprepared for this war. I think that is exactly why the west had such confidence at the beginning, and seeing an opportunity, they told Ukraine not to negotiate.
@@randomdude8202 Costly frontal assaults might make sense in the Russian mindset, they are nonetheless a manifestation of incompetence - Russian officers are stuck in a mindset where the Russian bear has endless waves of bodies to throw into offensives, whereas in reality their manpower is very finite, and becoming more finite every year.
"No cost is too great" is the philosophy that makes you lose wars, not win them. If from the outset, losses do not scare you, how can you be expected to make effective and efficient use of your ressources ? A competent military shouldn't shy away from confrontation, obviously, but it should be conscious of the value of its personnel and equipment and not throw them away willy nilly.
BTW, I remember MHV actually demonstrating that the idea of the soviet human wave tactic "winning WW2" is mostly a myth, considering the casualty ratios by the end of the war were actually pretty fair for an offensive. Soviets also won ww2 in no small part because the West was also there pulling its own weight, even though tankies love to claim the soviets did 90% of the work.
Hey, I was a US mortarman for two decades and trained the Ukraine and Russia soldiers (among many other nations). If you want more insight I am happy to give it, especially on smoke missions
A US serviceman training Russian soldiers?? What.
@@stephenhumphrey7935 Russia and US used to do many joint exercises. They stopped when Russia invaded Ukraine in 2014.
We trained US Forces for years about Jungle Warfare. We noticed you guys without air superiority can be routes out or surrounded. Smoke missions are useful while moving forward in open terrains. In Urban or vitigation terrain smoke missions is useless.
@@PinkFZeppelin So, the regime in Kiev shelling Ethnic Russians in Donbass since 2014 (the year of the coup d'etat in Ukraine by west-Ukraine, sponsored by America) isn't aggression? During those 8 years of shelling by the regime in Kiev, more than 11,000 ethnic Russians, men, women, and children were killed, and more than 40,000 injured .
@@rustyshacklferd1854the way he worded it to make it seem like russia was the aggressor was really deceiving
There are drones everywhere. It is hard to get a decent grouping of vehicles together when the enemy can see it coming. Minefields are everywhere with built in artillery zeroed in on those areas. No air superiority. No shock and awe.
I would love to see how NATO intervention would shake up the war now.
Russian artillery fired would drop off a cliff quickly because the logistics train would be de-railed by constant Missile and Air attacks.
No artillery=No success at offense.
As far as defense goes, that is the more interesting question.
How would we apply the overwhelming Air Superiority and to where would we apply it,
Can’t blast through the minefields, so it would just be a slow crawl through the stretches of minefields until we reach the other side.
Russians likely would not be able to effectively build new lines because they would be harassed by Air attacks.
The Dnipro frontline might even become a major focal point if the US can come up with a plan on how to get forces across the river.
Less Russian artillery and no real air strike capabilities would allow for pontoon bridges to be set up and armor to cross.
Which would turn that sector into a new Shock and Awe run.
@@PeterMuskrat6968 Iraqis also had minefields , quite extensive , but the fact of 2000 aircraft bombing them everyday gave the coalition quite some breathing room to clear them
Drones aren't the problem, have no idea about drones until after you lost everything is the problem.
@@PeterMuskrat6968 Fortunately for you NATO command unanimously disagree with your assumptions.
Also, China will start supplying weapons to Russia, and after both sides are in ruins, China attack Taiwan.
@@PeterMuskrat6968 You would catch nukes in your major cities and then none of your fan fiction would happen.
Is it me, or does it feel like this video would have been perfect for a Military History Visualized?
WARNO is just beautiful game
i quite enjoyed the WARNO footage lol. was even quite relevant, with ATGMs firing when he discusses ATGM, smoke when he talks about smoke etc
No
Lack of air supremacy or even dominance, lack of coordinated fire superiority, lack of joint operations maneuver warfare, lack of timely equipment replacement/repair, lack of proper equipment to do it with, zero strategic weapons to destabilize the enemy, and the list goes on and on and on.
The Ukrainians have done and continue to do an amazing job, but even bringing this up as if they *did* NATO tactics is absurd. They were trained on maneuver warfare but then not equipped to even pull it off, so how did NATO tactics fail? Easy, they were never truly used. It's a disingenuous question.
tbh, the problem is that "NATO styled doctrine/tactics" (in quotation marks because each nation developed their own doctrine) historically during the cold war were primarily focused on the defensive, rather than the offensive, and instances where a NATO force conducted an offensive strategy (ie the gulf war), they approached it the same way as something akin to bewegungskrieg, and by that I meant a surprise deep strategic strikes at military targets and C2 hubs (shock and awe), followed by driving a spearhead, manoeuvre to bypass, engage in decisive set piece battles to win freedom of manoeuvre, encircle all the cities/ launch decapitation strikes to finish the job. On paper this sounds fine, but in Ukraine pulling the exact same thing ended up disastrously for Russia, either because a lack in equipment, training, logistics, introduction of a variety of effective "anti-manoeuvrist" weapon systems, and the generally far more "near-peer" status of the two sides (the gulf war probably would have ended up very different if the Iraqis have drones, Javelins, thermals, and an air defense umbrella that could deter NATO air power). In a way, it is less of a failure of NATO doctrine/tactics but rather a failure of manoeuvre warfare in general, and how even a small infantry centric force now have the kit necessary to deter large armoured formations and can only be dislodged by attrition.
NATO tactics only work with total air dominance and ineffective enemy AA systems.
Iraq was the most heavily defended airspace in the entire southern hemisphere, far better than even 99% of NATO countries at the time- hell even better than the US as far as "home defense" Because they had so much less land to cover.
The Iraqis had the 4th highest funded army in the world at a time where military spending meant a LOT to most countries (you didn't hear about the "peace dividend" yet in 1991) S-200 and S-300 launchers, new soviet fighters and tanks, the works.
And it really wasn't a surprise because they (the coalition) spent more than 6 months building up their forces. The Iraqis KNEW they were coming, just not when.
The airwar lasted over a month before ground combat began for a good reason, the Iraqis would have slaughtered even US pilots if the US didn't ALSO have some of the best strategists in the world.
And one drone with a projectile is basically a thousand buck, while an Abrams tank is $8.92 million lol
Ukraine and Russia had and have been pretty similar in doctrine and Equipment so they know what to expect now.
Russia attempt to reach Kiev was blunt and not that well prepared and Ukraine fought them off with everything they had.
@@CultureCrossed64still the US had far more up to date weapons and further range and were well trained in it's employment.
Re employment of Multi Barrelled Smoke Grenade Dischargers (MBSGDs). Here in Australia the doctrine aligns with US usage - i.e. popping smoke is almost an immediate action for the Crew Commander when the vehicle comes under fire. Usually our MBSGDs are covered by rubber boots so at least prior to first use, the maintenance issue is not very severe.
It should also be noted that MBSGDs on NATO vehicles are primarily defensive in nature, whereas those on Soviet type vehicles are more offensive in nature - due to the range they project the grenades.
Hard to conduct the Western style of war without a lot of planes.
Oth, Soviet doctrine always assumed a disadvantage in the air, hence they made 1m AA systems.
Cheers Bernhard, well explained.
The old Soviets also made a doctrine that reflected their experiences with being invaded and outnumbered. An uncomfortable fact is the USSR actually had the numerical disadvantage until October 1943, and even were mismatched in artillery until March 1944. So they came up with ways to keep a front active while not committing to big engagements and concentrating their skills or resources, where needed to achieve important victories.
The later Soviets, and then the modern Russians, kept the assumption in war, that favorable advantages cannot be relied upon as a presupposition for assumption of operation. So they focus on leveraging advantages that are tougher to disrupt, such as artillery, saturation, armored, harassment, attacks armor as mobile fire support, and frequent misdirection attacks up and down the line of contact. So it’s never clear where the Russians are going to attack from and even if they’re outnumbered, they will force you to keep defending so they can build a local advantage, and then attack while you have to protect elsewhere to prevent multiple breakthroughs.
@@Mortablunt True, but over the course of the war they had a 5 to 1 advantage in tanks, and ample fuel to supply them
@@juliantheapostate8295 Russia was greatly outnumbered in 2022, especially after the contract soldiers left en masse in August of 2022. The mobilization of 300,000 reservists followed by a recruitment drive bringing in a average of 1,200 (1,400 by another source) recruits per day over the last year and a half has eventually reversed that situation.
@@juliantheapostate8295 Fuel & ammo more than sheer numbers on the Ostfront.
@@thechloromancer3310 Can you supply me with your source? Those numbers sound well off.
Before watching it: Isnt nato doctrine build on total superiority or slowing down the enemy when not in a superior position?
its build on: "go nuclear after 4 weeks"....and it shows...
@@simonschneider5913no? Only 3 nato nations have nuclear weapons
@@looinrims "participation"...they are/were all around europe.
No, it's not. It's built around delay tactics and maneuvers. Air superiority is never assumed and wargames usually assume that air superiority will be denied.
Human lives are valued in free countries so losing 100k KIA in only 2 years would be a failure
Finally an honest comment section have civilized talks about tactics and strategy, a rare sight these days
Air Superiority can be assumed only against beduins. This will not work with majors
It will soon, they're developing Mach 5 scout/missile bait jets to bait Anti Aircraft weapons and atritive drones to shield stealth aircraft + Link 16 battle zone data share nodes. USA owns the Death Star basically. You aren't witnessing NATO combined arms in the first place.
Iraq
@@knowahnosenothing4862US doesn't even have hypersonic capabilities. This is what happens when you have to much estrogen in the water supply.
@@cheften2mk😂😂 you mean The iraq military a 3rd world country
@@arnoldvezbon6131 'US doesn't even have hypersonic capabilities.' lol actually they are the only nation that does. They have multiple hypersonic vehicles (real ones, not just a modified ICBM that claims to be able to maneuver) in fact a new one was launched 2 weeks ago. To be clear, neither Russia or China have hypersonic missiles (i.e. steerable missiles). If they did then Ukraine wouldn't be able to shoot them down, which they do all the time.
Artillery smoke, smoke canisters, and the onboard smoke generators, can help primarily during a disengage. And the reason for that is that they do not persist. They have short duration, relatively low volume, and/or high cost. They are not adequate for any sort of large scale movement or breach.
For offensive actions, such as a breach or a heavily opposed advance, you need Mechanical Smoke produced by proper smoke generators. For example, the Humvee-mounted M56, or the Stryker-mounted M76. They produce high volumes of smoke that can be persistent (depending on the weather) and can be generated through extended periods of time. Moreover, the smoke can be made opaque to enemy sensors such as thermal optics, etc.
A company's worth of smoke generators can cover several kilometers of front and last as long as needed if proper supplies and maintenance are available. The smoke is not toxic and doesn't require the soldiers working under it to use any specialized equipment.
There are other tools that are part of the NATO Arsenal that need to be provided to UK in order for them to break the stalemate. Without those humble combat multipliers, proper NATO doctrine for this type of scenario cannot be implemented. A couple companies of smoke generators could be worth more than a few F-16's in UK present situation.
NATO doctrine is actually pretty comprehensive. It contemplates obstacle-based offense and defense. There are whole chapters in the Field Manuals dedicated to this, though they are rarely read by anyone below the level of a Company-Grade officer.
Good video, but the "air part" was a little to short for my liking. Nato doctrin relies heavily on joint fire support, and airwarfare is a really important part of it. Nato wouldn't fight without an capable air force.
One does not stop fighting because of lack of you'd like to have.
NATO can't fight without air superiority. That's a major problem. Meanwhile, Soviet/Russian doctrine always assumed that the air would be contested. Which is why they have a plethora of AA assets that merely needed to be upgraded to deal with drone threats. Meanwhile, NATO was stuck sending museum pieces into combat.
@@JurekOK what i meant was, that the West did not provide all that is needed for the operstion. Nato would not fight without airpower but expects ukraine to do so. You know what i mean?
@@Crosshair84 well some of those museum pieces are quite capable, like the gepard spaag. Lots of aa equipment was put out of service to save money and it was considered obsolete, because they did not expect a full scale war.
@@Crosshair84interestingly enough , western AA seems quite capable in this war
great video ... really comes down to doctrine for combined arms mobile warfare vs. the reality of positional warfare in Ukraine
And NATO having a consistent history of sucking badly in any sort of combined arms warfare.
I see a bunch of comments about Air Dominance and don't get me wrong, it matters and it is a criteria to enable large scale operations! But I think a critical factor is missed in the discussion. How NATO enables tactics.
NATO tactics are not how people understand tactics traditionally. After Vietnam, the US was looking at how they did so shockingly poorly again men in skirts with AK's, when they had what they thought was the best kit in the world at the time they looked at their weapons inventories and how they want to fight and noticed a gross mismatch between the two. The US then began to start designing and building a whole fleet of new systems to enable all of the conditions they needed to succeed
This is the genius of NATO tactics because NATO as a whole went on to follow this exact train of thought! You want to breach a minefield, yeah you want the skies clear but that's not to enable the operation, that's to allow helicopter fire support and Wild Weasels to take out mobile AA. Then with the greater vision provided from an eye on the sky, saturation fires happen in tight boxes to eliminate all heavy fire power. Once heavy equipment is out of the fight, armour in the form of MBT's and IFV's form a line to begin suppressing infantry. Only then does the M1150 mine clearer show up! Shreader creates perfect straight paths though the minefield with the MICLIC, plows the land and drives the first 100 metres where Shredder is joined by an Abrams Wingman and a new Shreader to continue clearing. Each MICLIC and bulldozed area is 120 sq metres and takes good crews 10 mins for accomplish
So while Ukraine doesn't have Air Dominance, just getting F-16's won't win the fight. They also need to be able to operate a large number of systems, in a coordinated fashion and currently while they learn of this, we don't if this is how Ukraine can fight or even wants to fight. While we absolutely need to step up weapons deliveries, the great failure isn't the tactics, but listening and learning how Ukraine wants to fight, and then providing what we can to enable that way of fighting.
Spot on. Also, NATO generally has senior military leadership that understands NATO doctrine, not bunch of old Soviet trained generals who are still fighting 2014 war with somewhat new equipment.
Well said sir.
@@misarthim6538More like 1914.... because even in 1917 there were already new ideas.
what a crock.
Are you going to provide the soldiers then? Cause these weapons you're talking about ain't manned by dogs.
regarding use of NATO tanks for indirect fire, there are actually range tables and associated gun laying instruments on US tanks at least up until M60A3 that allow you to do that albeit in a limited manner.
It can be set up in pretty much the same manner as field artillery, and in fact was quite popular thing up until Vietnam war. Some old FM (I believe it was FM 17-xx series) also outlined methods for digging in/making berms for tanks to increase firing angle, how to conduct fire mission, etc.
I suspect that newer smoothbore guns and ammo are not considered to be particularly well suited for this, so that function got eliminated
With my very very limited knowledge on this topic, would smooth bore guns be ineffective as a HE shell would not spin as it left ? Or is it something else
@@Bornst3ll3r technically you can still make fin-stabilized shell for smoothbore weapons (similar to mortar), although I'm not sure how very high muzzle velocity gun and the ammo design itself affect that
but M1A1/A2 weren't even issued with dedicated HE shell anyway, the closest would just be M830/M830A1 HEAT
@@Bornst3ll3r Smoothbores use fin stabilization that is technically less accurate but when soviets switched to smoothbores decades before NATO they deemed the accuracy loss acceptable in direct fire as the 115mm shell was heavy enough to compensate through sheer energy - a smaller gun they would still consider being rifled and indeed they have with their light tank projects up until they crammed the 125 into one (Sprut-SD).
M1 tanks still have the equiptment to perform indirect fire, every M1 company has several men with the "master gunner" rank, these guys have gunner quadrants and the training to set up each tank for indirect fire if it is needed.
the round used for that would be HEAT-MP
@@Klovaneer thats false, smoothbore guns and fin stabilized rounds are as accurate, if not more accurate than rifled guns
Just like Vietnam, if you design a doctrinal system to operate with certain expected parameters, and then decide that political considerations prevent those parameters from being put into effect, you must either adapt your doctrinal system, or operate inefficiently. It's a good idea to work up doctrines in accordance with realistic expectations about political considerations and other constraints, of course, so you don't have to develop doctrine from scratch in the field while you're already under fire, and it's also a good idea to consider letting doctrine guide political pressure to at least some extent.
That's where this war is being lost to the Soviets: For some reason, they're being allowed to dance political circles around Ukraine and its allies, which I have found perplexing from the beginning.
You ever been to/in present day(ok, of 2010's) Rossija? Haven't? Then, why would you use your cringe loanword from French that describes the past? Because you are smarter than anyone around?
The Soviets?
@@EvilSmonker He's still in Cold war. Probably torturing people trying to get false evidence of them having allegiance to communism. And shooting down Italian airliners which carry national oil company's CEO, because only in Soviet Russia there's "no god" therefore people suspiciously fall out of windows.
Also, if you think you're losing to the Soviets, wait til you meet the Russian federation 😂
It's intentional, once you understand this war is choreographed to prevent MAD. The US could flatten any country in the world in a week even after nuclear exchange in conventional warfare. It's a low boil war for war hawks to make money out of.
Ukraine tried NATO tactics in their "counter" offensive. They ran into Russian minefields and other defenses and got totally obliterated. Hence the now infamous Bradley square. What we learned so far from this war is, that NATO tactics are unusable without air superiority and air support. That means any country that is in danger of getting attacked by NATO will probably have to make sure they have good (Russian) anti air weapons.
Also watch out for mines!
NATO turned out to be a paper tiger.
"Everyone has a plan, until they get punched in the face" -- Mike Tyson
@@ZappyOh how did NATO turn out to be a paper tiger if it didnt fight in that war? Remember that if NATO was pulled into a full scale conventional conflict would probably completely obliterate russian air in a month lmao. Keep dreaming
@@ZappyOhThe real issue is political, which, to be honest, isn't that surprising. Not many people want to spend billions of dollars sending some random Eastern european country top of the line fighter jets and bombers. If they did, it's almost certain that Russia wouldn't stand a chance, but right now Russia is sorta banking on wavering support in the West while they gamble their whole economy on this war. Basically it's a difference in motivation, and while I don't think Europe is motivated now, if Russia moves any farther West, I guarantee things will change.
@@123four... You do understand, that Russia have more nukes, and better delivery systems, than anyone else, right? I'm pretty sure, that direct western participation would be dealt with harshly.
They are even saying so openly, as to drive the point home, that we are playing with fire.
In my view, NATO have no teeth, because what we have invested in, simply can't be used as intended.
NATO tactics wprk perfectly. They are not designed to win battles. They are designed to supply the most expensive gear with the most expensive serviceable equipment in an endless conflict using the most expensive munitions.
The industrial complex writes the NATO tactis to ensure financial gain.
Fr, crazy how most people dont realize the US rarely wins wars and just gets involved simply to make money
Let me explain a few things here.
1. The Ukrainians are exceptional soldiers. They are losing, but they are fighting skilfully and bravely.
2. ISR, drones and very effective AAA has transformed the battlefield. NATO tactics might need a review.
3. The Russians have been doing "fire and manoeuvre" since the 1930's. They are masters at it. If they aren't doing "big arrow" offensives in Ukraine it's because no one can.
4. No one really thought Iraq was a military power. Iran is a military power, which is why you haven't invaded it.
Iraq is just average middle east military superpower level, have money to buy all the fancy equipment at that time but can't train their soldier into competent level
The Chieftain has actually commented on a likely reason for why smoke is not used by forces on either side. Namely that Soviet vehicle-borne smoke launchers are used in an offensive role, rather than a defensive one like in the West. Basically this comes down to Soviet smoke launchers having a rather large launch distance.
I'm simply amazed that Anti-personnel guided missiles aren't already been done. Even ATGMs are used against infantry with great effect without regard to its cost so it'd be very easy to produce smaller missiles at scale to completely saturate the front with them. Proliferation of precision guided small explosives will completely change infantry tactics.
On the topics of smoke: I can imagine 3 more reasons why smoke isn't used that are not mentioned in the video:
A: With drones around permanently, using smoke on your own position (for example by having it emanate from your vehicle) actually makes it *more obvious* where you are.
If a drone wants to spot a group of 4 vehicles, it either has to be quite close, or that formation is a series of small dots, painted in a similar shade of green as its surroundings and thus only really visible in thermal sights, potentially hidden under/behind trees, ...
If a drone wants to spot 4 armor vehicles that are "obscured" by smoke, it has to spot a huge (hundreds or dozens of meters across) blob of usually white (very much standing out against the foliage even in visible spectrum) fluff that billows out to above the tree tops.
Yes, the positions of each attacking vehicle in that smoke could is more hidden, but if the defender has something that can just hit the whole smoke cloud at once...
B: Using smoke on the position of the defender (or in between your own position and that of the defender) only really works if the defender is on the ground. But drones are in the air, and there's really no good way to deliver smoke to a specific position in the air (the smoke grenade/shell/canister will just keep dropping until it hits the ground). And even if you could make the smoke canister hang in the air, you can only do that if you know where the drone is *(in 3 dimensions)*, and then the drone is usually nimble enough to just move.
As a result, you can suppress the position where the enemy's small arms fire and MANPADs are coming from, but neither where the enemy is observing you from nor where they are launching their artillery fire from.
C: Explosive artillery shells can be used to *both* attrition the defenders *and* to suppress them in preparation for an incoming assault. Meaning if the attacker launches explosive artillery at the defender, they can't really know which of the two things the attacker is doing. Whereas if the attacker launches _smokes_ ahead of an assault, the defenders immediately know that it can *only* be an assault (or a pretended assault), since you can't really physically attrition defenders by launching smoke at them.
Because Ukraine isn't using NATO doctrine. Unleas they've massively hidden the air supremacy...
No, because NATO/Western tactics do not work unless the USAF has secured air supremacy.
Without the USAF in all its glory, all NATO ground forces (including the US Army) would be superbly defeated.
Interestingly while Russia could not really take over Kyiv or invade all of Ukraine, the Ukrainians could not successfully mount a counter-offensive despite real-time NATO (mostly USAF) ELINT and other support. Just goes to show.
@@MrBahjatt All the real time satellite intel in the world not going to help when your troops still have 10 miles of minefields to cross lol....
Ukraines' western sponsors believed that Nato doctrine could function without air supermacy. Now they know it cant.....
Btw, Ukraine did use Nato doctrine at the start.... they only abandoned that shit after taking massive losses.
It is NATO doctrine minus the air force. Which is exactly why it doesn't work. Good luck trying to achieve that against a military that isn't composed of goat herders and hairy men in slippers.
Oh and the F16s won't do anything new for ukraine lol.
Ukraine: Why NATO Tactics fail? Because the AFU command and training are mired in legacy Soviet doctrines. Both Russian and Ukrainian forces have mirrored legacy Soviet tactics, even as cutting edge technologies and NATO training assistance have been introduced. The Ukraine war is an anomaly shaped by both belligerents common Soviet philosophy of war.
It's of course right to conclude that NATO doctrine, whatever works on paper or not, is not in practice implemented in Ukraine, because the actors lack either means or knowhow.
But there's a larger point that is still somehow usually overlooked, which is that the point of modern warfare is not to implement some specific doctrine, but to impose conditions over the adversary that allow one's forces to maneuver over and against them, thus rapidly and decisively degrading their combat power and denying them the enjoyment of held terrain. Doctrine is just a systematic means to an end. That's what Ukraine was always going to need to become able to accomplish, with whoever's doctrine, new or old.
Both Russian and Ukrainian forces lack the capacity to fulfill Soviet doctrine as well!
Warno models a meeting engagement not positional warfare
There's also to note the huge improvement in Operational Security on the russian side compared to one year ago, they managed to get their soldiers to keep the phones off, everything is managed by a dedicated infrastructure.
Air superiority as a prerequisite is a dangerous assumption.
If your plan has to be perfectly executed, it's a bad plan.
It isn't the same to fight Third World countries and to prepare for a major confrontation with a serious enemy. It feels like the British confident to start WWI because they had defeated the Boers and the Zulus.
The last sentence is a really nice comparison
NATO tactics can't fail if NATO tactics are not employed in the first place. The term "NATO tactics" is another discussion, but generally speaking people accept that US tactics and "NATO tactics" are similar/same. So only by looking in recent history that involves modern tactics what does the US/NATO do ? Gain air superiority, use air power to disrupt enemy lines of communication (supplies, reinforcements), use air power to destroy enemy troop concentrations and artillery positions, deploy land forces, use artillery to saturate enemy positions, use mechanized forces to reach the enemy positions, assault with infantry.
So if Ukraine failed at steps 1 through 3, are they really employing "NATO tactics" or are they doing their own thing that fails?
Can't see any NATO tactics since the start of the conflict. Ukraine is too weak for that. No air superiority, no close air support, no focus formation, no mobile warfare, no combined arms combat. There was a small chance last summer, but Ukraine expressly did not follow US planning.
Numbers.
More complex tactics would be more efficient but would have less redundancy. One link breaks and the whole thing falls apart, combat efficiently of a unit would be significantly diminished. Ukraine did increase the use of air power during the counteroffensive, but didn’t achieve air superiority due to the lack of numbers.
Numbers would offer the much needed redundancy.
Small reminder that the US Air Force enjoyed overwhelming numerical advantage in the first Gulf war.
Because NATO tactics are usually tailored to go against vastly inferior opponents, when their foes can actually fight back and have similar technology their tactics collapse...
NATO never expected Ukraine to win a ground war
the war just gave NATO excuses to pressure the world into sanctioning Russia into oblivian
which backfired in the most beautiful way
it forced Russia to be self sustaining, making it even harder for NATO use economic terrorism with any success
The Cold War proves otherwise.
@@disconductorder Russian bot/vatnik.
@@madgavin7568 How so? I literally wrote this comment based on how actual NATO/US wars happened, all their cold war victories were against either country on a brink of collapse or against a country that is technologically or numerically inferior.
@@Sveta7 NATO tactics were designed in mind to combat the Warsaw Pact, specifically the Soviet Union. What are we saying here, that the Warsaw Pact was inferior to NATO?
It just so happened that such tactics worked against lesser states who by and large utilized Soviet weaponry and to some extent, their tactics. That doesn't mean such tactics were only made to work against such opponents, that's complete rubbish.
While NATO tactics are far better than anything eastern block ever made or practiced, there are practical issues and flaws that go much deeper than the simple "ukraine sucks thats why it doesnt work".
I call it the "GOWT professional deformation" and the "1944 western front syndrome"
First, The GOWT did a huge disservice to NATO, to the point i would call 2000-2015 era "the lost years"
With the 90s ending any further military development regarding peer on peer warfare, was either slashed or was morphed to fit GOWT,
The focus was on "high speed operators" and how many gadgets optics and tacticool equipment you could stick on those guys, at the expense of the regular army (except the air force and the flawed light units equipped with strykers, because air mobility was all the hype, and actual combat capability was secondary at best) .
The ugly truth is , SF units are overhyped, and if put them on the frontline they wont suffer any less than regular infantry, because they are just fancy light infantry in the end.
A 152 hell doesnt care for your experience and training.
NATO countries in short slashed their regular armies to skeletons and much if not most of the peer to peer capability was lost.
The second part is a critique of the NATO/western style of combat that leans too much on the western Allied/ American experience of 1944), assuming all of your supply and logistics will always work , your air force will have complete air domination and you will be able to pummel your enemy with ungodly one sided concentration of firepower.
In short NATO has to train and accept in its doctrine not everything will go perfect, especially when it comes to logistics in a peer on peer war.
There is also one other element NATO countries have to accept, but also entire nations.... losses will be heavy regardless of the training
A peer on peer war isnt like GOWT and losses will be in the thousands within a month, not a year, or a decade... an effective yet time saving training system for replacements is needed, as well as usage of manpower that is above 30 years of age, due to low fertility the developed world faces.
Lol I literally tell people GWOT Syndrome all the time and no one understands. Thank you
The reliance on SOF during the GWOT is not talked about enough. Especially in the last ten years. SOF has an integral part in peer conflict but it’s support role not the main show. GWOT allowed SOF really distort policy makers perception of its use.
Id add a political deminsion, the USA doesn't want to hear that every problem cant be handled by cruise missles, F22s and a handfull of operators.
I like how you made a super detailed argument and an interesting insight, but then just had to drop the "Nato tactics were always better all the time!!" propaganda. Like why do you americans have such an inferiority complex?
“Nato tactics are far better” are they? Based on what? Its just assumed that they are superior and that nothing can be learned from any enemy, which just sounds like the perfect recipe for stagnation
Maneuver is rather limited because in this war battlefields are shaped by good coordination between UAVs, counter-battery radars and artillery. This combination makes "you're spotted -> you're dead" the main principle of this war, since a good amount of accurate firepower could be brought in minutes after target detection. As a result, movement is limited even in the rear areas, so amassing forces, or even supplying those who are on the front line without taking heavy losses would be a rather difficult task.
One can employ whatever a good number of tactics, if there is no strategy, or a strategy based on false premises, it will all fall apart. Including the Tables of Equipment and the logistics capacity.
One thing many are forgetting is that US/NATO has 0 experience fighting opponent that is equal or near equal to them in terms of technology and manpower. Last time US fought such war was in Korea,since than US always enjoyed technological and/or numerical superiority
Iraq in 1991 was considered to be the 3rd strongest army in the world. Definitely qualified as near-peer.
Even in Korea, they fought a far inferior Chinese army which mainly relied on numbers. If they fight China or Russia now, it will be a bloody stalemate.
@@realnapster1522So… you are just assuming that we are as dumb as the Russians?
We spent the time that we weren’t fighting a near peer by studying our opponents and developing new doctrines to solve supposed problems.
I don’t know why so many of you lack brain cells.
Even during GWOT we still kept our eyes on our enemies, even if we didn’t fund DARPA projects about Peer level technologies.
nor does russia, name 1 time after the cold war where russia has fought an opponent that is equal or near equal, the answer is never, because the cold war was a series of proxy wars where neither side has fought a equal peer, that said, the us lead coalition did destroy iraq which was the largest soviet arms importer at the time.
@@shogaal14 LOL :D
The drones role was underrated. Basically, these small and cheap artifacts make useless or less effective the smoke use and many of the NATO tactics based on surprise and constant movement.
It wasn't underrated by Ukraine. Russia had none at the start.
@@skyworm8006 I mean in this vídeo.
smoke can, and has always been used, to obscure aerial observation - that's one of the reasons why airborne ground surveillance radar is a thing
drones are not really that much different if faced with proper smoke ops, in fact their onboard EO sensors are not particularly great and will be even less effective than those onboard regular planes unless you got a large UAV, which for all intents and purposes are basically more expendable prop planes
People love to go on about "NATO Tactics". NATO doesn't have Tactics, it has plans. Tactics are something that differs between member countries. Consequently, individual equipment is also designed according to those individual needs.
It's a tall order, trying to squeeze all the various armored, artillery and other assets that have made their way to Ukraine into a single, effective structure.
Adam Something analyzed it perfectly. Zaluzhniy received much less than 1/4th. of the hardware that he had requested for a long, protracted push to the pre-February 24th. borders if that was possible, and on top of all that, Ukrainian troops received only appalingly basic NATO training.
There's simply no way that Ukraine can keep on going like this unless USA and NATO finally decide to start having balls and send Tomahawks and ATACMS in large numbers to help them, but so far, this conflict has only been ever kept alive due to token arms transfers, which end in nothing if the equipment is going to be used like shit, and not how exactly it was mean't to be used.
NATO and USA's faults are dragging their feet to get shit done, like we saw with the first attempted transfer of MiG-29 jets to Ukraine, and Ukraine's faults for this counter-offensive are this poorly-prepared and executed rush towards a prepared enemy, and overall poor command structure when it comes to mechanized warfare on an open ground, even without air support. Why send priceless F-16 jets to the Ukrainians if American-made cruise missiles and air defense systems do the work just fine?
My point is: The worst thing about this war is that it has only been kept alive due to token arms transfers, all from donations, while NATO, USA and it's allies lack balls and have been dragging their feet for the entire war. Zaluzhniy received much less than 1/4th. of equipment that he needed to go back to pre-February 24th. borders. It's better to send Tomahawks, ATACMS and SAM systems rather than F-16's and Abramses.
It's essential nowadays that we bring once massive industrial buildings that helped us win WW2, like the Detroit Arsenal Tank Plant, back into use so that they could help win the war in Ukraine by vastly overfilling the shortage of artillery shells and equipment sent to fight. I personally believe that the war in Ukraine might have been won if the West wasn't dragging it's feet, sent Zaluzhniy exactly what he wanted instead of the 1/4th. that he got, supplied his troops with more essential stuff and if Ukraine revised it's tactics, then the counter-offensive wouldn't have even failed. It ashames me and saddens me to see what has happened to America, or more rather, Miss Columbia's old war industry from WW2 or places like the Ruhr industrial valley. So much decay and neglect when we need it the most. Technology has advanced, where it isn't now vast armies fighting like in WW2, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't be able to mass-produce at least IFV's/APC's anymore, or lots of artillery shells of multiple different calibers to keep the war effort going.
I would be at tears when i saw what modern war has become after we retired some essential components that made it good in the past, like for example, streamlined and simplified mass production. But now, an M1 Abrams tank is apparently just so advanced and complex that we can't even supply these in larger numbers to Ukraine, despite America literally having dozens of thousands in storage, and yet, they had the audacity to only supply Poland just 116 hand-me-down retired M1A1 FEP tanks leftover from the United States Marine Corps retiring it's own tank fleet, literally telling us that "this was all they had"? And what, they're keeping all of those M1A2's dusting in sand for Ukraine despite them dragging their feet the entire time? Come on! When the US was sending over Shermans to Europe in WW2, nobody asked for it and all of that firepower was more than welcome. Well, look at the US and NATO now. What a joke. Out of 450 retired ex-USMC M1A1 FEP tanks, they gave us only 116?! For this number of second-hand "hand-me-down's", America could've given us at least 250 M1A2 SEP V3 tanks for fucks sake.
We lost what to be proud of anymore, and we need to gain that back.
It's too late for the F-16's and M1 Abramses. It would have been a much better idea to send large amounts of long-range ATACMS (AtaSeeEms) ballistic missiles, Tomahawk cruise missiles and lots of modern SAM defenses for a protracted defensive war.
America has shit-tons of M1 Abrams tanks literally just sitting out there, stockpiled in the desert, and they must be whipped into shape in order to send them like they were sending M4 Shermans to Europe during WW2, a scale which sadly we aren't even seeing today.
This is starting to remind me of Britain's budget cutting spree in the lead up to the Falklands War, same level of unpreparedness and carelessness, a collapsing gerantocracy, lack of self-improving countries and no national pride.
With this much of a passive giant even more than during the Great Depression before America entered WW2 in 1941 after it took the Japanese to attack Pearl Harbor, what would even be any use having the United States as an ally when nowadays it wouldn't even react much once attacked in peacetime?
If they really don't need all of those 3,400 Abrams tanks currently in storage, at this rate i can just buy out the entire United States military by myself if their management is so passive, weak in pride and unwilling to act in terms of achieving world peace by stopping totalitarian leaders from achieving world dominance.
I did not expect warno footage in a random video about ukraine that popped up in my feed lol. I've been playing it a lot lately
I'll commit to the "extrapolating from games to reality"-folly on this one... but I think the use of smoke is actually somewhat comparable in this regard.
If you don't know what you're doing, then smoke is worse than useless. As you say, it can benefit the enemy just like yourself.
But if you do know how to use it right, then it can be a game changer. Either greatly improve your own safety, or create absolutely oppressive situations for the enemy. Moreso in games than reality, where firefights are decided in mere seconds rather than hours, and indirect fire is less important... but obviously direct sight is an immensely important component in real military operations as well.
In the hypothetical context of a NATO force operating in Ukraine, smoke would probably both be extremely useful at keeping vehicles alive (such as the classic use of rapid position changes by combing the quick reverse speeds of NATO vehicles with smoke launchers) and during offensive operations in combination air denial/drone jammers. Even if we exclude the mass use of air power to supress enemy artillery that NATO would attempt, large scale smoke use can protect the crossing of mine fields and make it hard for the enemy to find out where to focus their artillery if they cannot get a good overview with drone spotters. Even drones can have fewer angles available to actually detect forces moving under smoke, making them more vulnerable to counter measures.
I haven't even watched this yet, and NATO making Ukraine fight their way without Air superiority, was to my mind, criminal on our part
That would be absolutely criminal. But fortunately, we didn't force them to fight NATO way. They don't fight NATO way and never did.
Сама война на Украине - американское преступление.
You play Warno?
yeah
@@MilitaryHistoryNotVisualized You should look at Broken Arrow. Quite a promising game WARNO and Wargame style.
@@MilitaryHistoryNotVisualizedDoes WARNO fix some of the problems with Wargame: Red Dragon, especially ATGM teams getting spotted and killed by tanks while the missiles are still in flight, causing the missile to miss ALL. THE. TIME...??
@@Noble713 I don't know if it is exactly the same like in Red Dragon, but currently it is similar. (Spotting might be different.) Yet, I think there was also a mention that ATGMs should continue if there is loss of sight etc.
You can't take a part of a doctrine and hope it all just works out in the end. The entire NATO doctrine is based around the ability to establish complete air superiority and working from there.
It's something that NATO would absolutely be able to do as America alone has the undisputed most capable airforce in the world with the remaining TOP 10 spots being filled primarily by other NATO countries, so if there was ever a war with the entire alliance, the textbook NATO tactics would work.
Ukraine however is not able to establish air superiority. Despite its many issues Russia is still the dominant force in the sky, which is why the tactics start falling apart.
It's like trying to win a fencing match but instead of a saber you have a stale baguette. You might try to use the technique but it won't work well bc you don't have a fundamental element of it.
The landmines wouldn't be an issue if Ukraine had air superiority and was able to deploy countermeasures. The rocket attacks wouldn't be an issue if Ukraine was able to perform air recon and airstrikes on Russian rocket batteries instead of having to use drones, ground recon and just reacting to an ongoing bombardment. If Ukraine had control over the sky it'd be able to stop Russian forces from fortifying their possitions well before they get to the point they're at now and they'd be able to more effectively deal with existing fortifications.
Air superiority and the fantastic logistics system of NATO members, particularly the US, are the backbone around which not just the tactics but the equipment itself was built.
NATO tanks are significantly larger, heavier and more expensive than Soviet/Russian tanks because NATO has the logistical capabilities to get them where they're needed and to keep them well supplied and maintained, because NATO as a block is the single largest economic power on the planet. Out of the top 10 largest economies by nominal GDP 6 are NATO countries and 2 are working closely with NATO, leaving only China and India (not Russia bc it doesn't make the top 10 cut according to the IMF). NATO is capable of producing the best equipment in the world and a lot of it at the same time, not being forced to pick between quality and quantity bc it can manage both. That is again something Ukraine doesn't have the luxury of. Any loses in western vehicles it takes are only recoverable through good will of the west to keep it supplied, which is why they decided to reserve them to engagements they deem important enough.
Well there may be certain aspects of NATO doctrine regarding ground forces that did not work in ukraine. Some examples where brougth in this video. There are other aspect like the insane density of minefields that exceed any NATO assumption by factor of 10. But even before the war during my active service time I always felt this concept of smoke cover during operations was kind of overoptimistic. Smoke is heavily weather dependend. Wind can negate your smokescreen in minutes. Heavy rain reduces its effectivness my a magnitude. And the russian will not be so kind to only figth in good weather. So at some point smoke cover had to be replaced by supressiv fire.
But all of this is of far less consequence than the role of air power. As mentioned the russians stopped ukrainian advances by helicopters and of course this would never happen with NATO. But that fells short of what NATO does. Look to operation desert strom.
First NATO will engage in SEAD (suppression of enemy air defense). This means in an area of operation the enemy capabilties to shot down planes (ground based air defense and figthers) will be destroyed or suppressed. Than air supremecy will be established. And I say supremecy not superiority. There is a difference. Superiority means you have more planes in the air than the enemy. Supremacy means the enemy can not get his aircraft into that area. Once that is established the ground attacks will beginn. Ground attack aircraft will attack the enemy infantry positions and their fire support units. Meanwhile combat patrols will engage any supply vehicles or reinforcements dump enough to drive in the area. And this is all done from a hight that allow planes to stay out of manpack range.
When finally NATO ground forces engage, the enemy will be cut of from retreat, regrouping or supply by air power and their fire support was turned into burned metal. Breaking dense minefield in front of entrechned positions is still no joke but if the enemy lacks any kind of fire support from air, artillery or tanks its fairly doable. And that is how NATO figth. But the back bone of it all is overwhelming air power - and that is expensive - to expensive for ukraine.
Lets not forget Ukraine is not a NATO member and is only receiving the support of them.
Ukraine as a military was mostly still based on old soviet doctrines afak so it's not a shock that they aren't finding much success with a military that's suddenly had to change doctrine and has to learn everything from the ground up again with some hand holding.
Now if we saw a full mobilization of all NATO member states then the results would probably be quite different.
Very different...most of Europe would be a radiated wasteland.
@@soaringbumnm8374most of Russia too
Considering NATO can't adequately supply Ukraine, and is outproduced by Russia alone, I'm not sure how its mobilisation would help. Deploying more men to the field, without solid logistics against a firepower superior force, is called a meat grinder.
@@chico9805 NATO fights air wars
NATO doctrine is based around air superiority. And most NATO countries couldn't achieve this without the presence of the US.
I love and play Warno BUT i think that is little bit distracting from the actual content
As stated the video and content developed rather rapidly and originally it was intended as Ukraine Veteran about Warno.
@@MilitaryHistoryNotVisualized Adam Something analyzed it perfectly. Zaluzhniy received much less than 1/4th. of the hardware that he had requested for a long, protracted push to the pre-February 24th. borders if that was possible, and on top of all that, Ukrainian troops received only appalingly basic NATO training.
There's simply no way that Ukraine can keep on going like this unless USA and NATO finally decide to start having balls and send Tomahawks and ATACMS in large numbers to help them, but so far, this conflict has only been ever kept alive due to token arms transfers, which end in nothing if the equipment is going to be used like shit, and not how exactly it was mean't to be used.
NATO and USA's faults are dragging their feet to get shit done, like we saw with the first attempted transfer of MiG-29 jets to Ukraine, and Ukraine's faults for this counter-offensive are this poorly-prepared and executed rush towards a prepared enemy, and overall poor command structure when it comes to mechanized warfare on an open ground, even without air support. Why send priceless F-16 jets to the Ukrainians if American-made cruise missiles and air defense systems do the work just fine?
My point is: The worst thing about this war is that it has only been kept alive due to token arms transfers, all from donations, while NATO, USA and it's allies lack balls and have been dragging their feet for the entire war. Zaluzhniy received much less than 1/4th. of equipment that he needed to go back to pre-February 24th. borders. It's better to send Tomahawks, ATACMS and SAM systems rather than F-16's and Abramses.
It's essential nowadays that we bring once massive industrial buildings that helped us win WW2, like the Detroit Arsenal Tank Plant, back into use so that they could help win the war in Ukraine by vastly overfilling the shortage of artillery shells and equipment sent to fight. I personally believe that the war in Ukraine might have been won if the West wasn't dragging it's feet, sent Zaluzhniy exactly what he wanted instead of the 1/4th. that he got, supplied his troops with more essential stuff and if Ukraine revised it's tactics, then the counter-offensive wouldn't have even failed. It ashames me and saddens me to see what has happened to America, or more rather, Miss Columbia's old war industry from WW2 or places like the Ruhr industrial valley. So much decay and neglect when we need it the most. Technology has advanced, where it isn't now vast armies fighting like in WW2, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't be able to mass-produce at least IFV's/APC's anymore, or lots of artillery shells of multiple different calibers to keep the war effort going.
I would be at tears when i saw what modern war has become after we retired some essential components that made it good in the past, like for example, streamlined and simplified mass production. But now, an M1 Abrams tank is apparently just so advanced and complex that we can't even supply these in larger numbers to Ukraine, despite America literally having dozens of thousands in storage, and yet, they had the audacity to only supply Poland just 116 hand-me-down retired M1A1 FEP tanks leftover from the United States Marine Corps retiring it's own tank fleet, literally telling us that "this was all they had"? And what, they're keeping all of those M1A2's dusting in sand for Ukraine despite them dragging their feet the entire time? Come on! When the US was sending over Shermans to Europe in WW2, nobody asked for it and all of that firepower was more than welcome. Well, look at the US and NATO now. What a joke. Out of 450 retired ex-USMC M1A1 FEP tanks, they gave us only 116?! For this number of second-hand "hand-me-down's", America could've given us at least 250 M1A2 SEP V3 tanks for fucks sake.
We lost what to be proud of anymore, and we need to gain that back.
It's too late for the F-16's and M1 Abramses. It would have been a much better idea to send large amounts of long-range ATACMS (AtaSeeEms) ballistic missiles, Tomahawk cruise missiles and lots of modern SAM defenses for a protracted defensive war.
America has shit-tons of M1 Abrams tanks literally just sitting out there, stockpiled in the desert, and they must be whipped into shape in order to send them like they were sending M4 Shermans to Europe during WW2, a scale which sadly we aren't even seeing today.
This is starting to remind me of Britain's budget cutting spree in the lead up to the Falklands War, same level of unpreparedness and carelessness, a collapsing gerantocracy, lack of self-improving countries and no national pride.
With this much of a passive giant even more than during the Great Depression before America entered WW2 in 1941 after it took the Japanese to attack Pearl Harbor, what would even be any use having the United States as an ally when nowadays it wouldn't even react much once attacked in peacetime?
If they really don't need all of those 3,400 Abrams tanks currently in storage, at this rate i can just buy out the entire United States military by myself if their management is so passive, weak in pride and unwilling to act in terms of achieving world peace by stopping totalitarian leaders from achieving world dominance.
when is the last time NATO fight seriously against peer-level enemy ?
Never ?
In 2003. You probably don't realize it because of how epic walkover it was.
@@misarthim6538 You missed the "peer-level" part.
@@randomnobodovsky3692Homie after the Soviets ate shit and but the dust there was no peer.
The only one that comes close is China.
Russia is not close.
@@PeterMuskrat6968 NATO is struggling to keep up with just Russian production.
You' are Russia's peer, you are not China's peer.
@@misarthim6538 Russia had a epic walkover in Afghanistan before losing too
These videos on Ukraine and doctrine/tactics are great
Im going to guess before I watch the video, that NATO tactics don't work because the force fighting is just Ukraine, and not NATO.
Because NATO tactics and training for the last 20 plus years have been focused on small unit tactics and fighting small wars or anti insurgency battles, not a full on War in a big country in Europe with hundreds of thousands of men on both sides. Or fighting an opponent on a similar level of tech or assets as you. NATO core weakness tactics wise is that NATO has built most of it's planning around the Fact the USA airpower will be in play and control the skies and so control the movement of the enemy.
Just like Cold War battles,
American western doctrine bases its strategy mostly in sync with massive air power.
Soviet Russian doctrine is a mastery of artillery and infantry infiltration.
Without air power the western trained armies are trained to be dependent on, the Soviet strategy will overwhelm them.
With the airpower support for the western trained armies, the Soviet strategy will struggle
Vietnam War is an example.
That Warno Game looks good, i played early 2000 a similar Game for Naval Forces , Janes "Fleet Command" was pure fun for years.
Respect. Two of my favourite channels working together.
theoreticaly some arty like Panzerhaubize 2000 or french truck based howizer hits it all. In reality it is hunted by drones.
the only time i saw a Russian tank use smoke was at Stepove in the duel between the two Bradley and T90 and that T90 just hanged around after deploying smoke
Because it can't back out at high speed. No present day Russian tank can. It would have to turn its backside toward the enemy, and that's not a good idea, even with only 20 or 25 mm weapons shooting at it.
I've seen smoke used in a couple other engagements.
The fact is that NATO doctrine and Soviet doctrine (Russian doctrine is just modernised soviet doctrine) have both been designed from the ground up to be a counter to each-other.
For example, western weapons are usually on the bleeding edge of technology. This means it is more fragile, easier to damage, needs more care and support to use ect. Soviet weapons are designed for ease of manufacture and longevity.
Take something as boring as artillery barrels. Soviet ones are heavy, fairly smooth, but thick and can last an extremely long time. Western barrels are much more precise but they wear out much more often. The western ones are technically superior in every way but soviet doctrine does not care about technical superiority but manufacturing superiority.
Or take it to aircraft and the F-16. There is no* Russian equivalent to the F-16 because they don't make single engines aircraft because they expect the aircraft to take a hit and keep going - on one engine if need be. The F-16 needs a pristine runway, no debris and a squad of mechanics to keep it functional. The su-27 just doesn't need anything near the same maintenance.
But it goes further than that. Soviet doctrine is all about throwing equipment away and replacing it with a massive industrial base at home. Russia DID dismantle a lot of it after the soviet union fell but they still have a lot more than the west. But take it into my speciality, (I'm a professional military analyst specialising in the DPRK). The DPRK is still old style Soviet in design so all of their factories can be turned from doing basically nothing to arms manufacture instantly. That's why the DPRK could give Russia a million shells without breaking a sweat. They can literally replace them without thinking too hard about it.
The reason they have people manning these factories that have no work is becasue they could at any moment be asked to stark producing military equipment. So they go to work, took for something to do in the civilian sector and if they don't find anything, they just go home doing nothing. Completely inefficient from a western viewpoint but from a soviet one it means that if a war started today that the DPRK would throw everything it already has into the war and production would outpace usage 10 fold.
Basically, yes, a DPRK tank is junk. But 50 of them vs an M1 and the DPRK win. Thats their mindset - and they keep swarming.
But there is more than that. The soviet doctrine is rightly labelled by them as a "defensive doctrine". That does not mean they don't invade anyone. It is how they fight. They have small groups (currently called "storm Z detachments") that they use to push forward. If they face any form of resistance they run away - back into artillery range pulling the defenders in with them. The artillery defence then showers the area killing the defenders and then they repeat. If they don't face any resistance, they move up the artillery and air defence and the regular troops to the place the storm Z detachments go to.
The reason they developed this is that Russia is big - very big. SO even back in the Napoleonic days Russia had no issue trading land for 2 things. Enemy soldier deaths and stretching of supply lines. So Russia just kept redesigning the same old strategy of scorched earth. pull back until the enemies supply lines are so long and fragmented that the enemy runs out of weapons and then there is no defence to push forward.
Now look what is happening in Ukraine. The Russians were pushed back (they followed their doctrine) and they don't seem to be advancing (they followed their doctrine) but as soon as the Ukranian military ran out of ammunition, they seem to be advancing everywhere (they followed their doctrine). When the ammo comes back to Ukraine, the Russians will retreat at the slightest sign of resistance again, pulling the enemy into their artillery and air defence again.
They are literally running the Ukraine campaign using classical soviet doctrine. Even the air-force usage from day one. They enter and run away, hoping to pull the enemy fighters into their SAM range. And the whole ukraine concept of not losing one square centimeter of land is exactly what the Soviet defensive doctrine is designed to take advantage of.
The thing is, the Ukrainians know this because they were educated in Soviet doctrine. Thats why they said that the counteroffensive was a mistake, they knew exactly what was going to happen but the west demanded it, so they did it and it went just as they thought it would.
The hole is logistics. As long as they get infinite shells from their production facilities, they can do this forever. Soviets can. China and the DPRK can. However Russia westernised so its just about how much of their production facilities they closed down in the process.
The wildcard was (and kind of still is) wagner. They are full of western trained specialist that use a western doctrine so they don't pull back. That is why we had Bahkmut and why the RUssians thought they were idiots. They wanted to keep and capture land instead of trading it for kills.
*the Russians did design a single engined fighter recently, but it was for export only and noone purchased it (yet)
Nice summary man, wonder why no bots commenting here yet
The failure to use smoke has stumped me this whole war. Even as a novice in the tactics of modern warfare its clear to me that if you're going to assault enemy defensive positions you would want your troops obscured for as long as possible before the enemy can engage them. Why the Ukrainians aren't using prep fires then smoke rounds as their assault groups approach the trenches is quite confusing.
Smoke obscures you from the enemy, but it also obscures the enemy from you DUH, not to mention that just in case they didn't know where you were they now have a pretty good idea where to look, and the smoke isn't going to last there for long
If I remember correctly, according to an article either by RUSI or War on the Rocks, Ukrainian commanders don't use smoke because they can't see what their subordinates are doing via drone footage. If so, that means that Ukrainian commanders are micromanaging their subordinates and do not allow them to take the initiative.
Commanders don’t authorize smoke missions because they want to see the battle from their observation drone
-Michael Kofman
@@looinrimsstuff like this is why UAF is struggling. The commanders are just so fkng bad. No smoke because you want to micromanage units at the tactical level is idiotic. There's other examples beyond this too.
There is this thing called wind
Why NATO tactics are not working? Because NATO is used to "fighting" people that do not match them in weapons, electronics, satellites etc... I The Russians are not like Granada...
why nato tanks have weak hull armor? leo2a7v and strv 122 have frontal armor upgrade but the lower plate still weak.
Same reason why every soviet tank has week lower plate armor… it’s not a priority.
Hit probability and terrain.
There is no tank on the planet that armors that section more than anyone else, because it would be a waste of material and weight.
because you can't make a "strong armor". some ATGMs can penetrate like 1200mm armor... good luck with protecting a tank at least at the front
they are built to have only turret exposed when they are dug in
What can be seen and said objectively about this war.
Both NATO and Soviet/post-Soviet military understand were both proven to be correct and wrong foundationally yet both never took things and factors into account on how the said battle would be fought which let's be honest was going to happened. However NATO isn't learning as much as it will like due to the simple fact they are using a post-Soviet military that isn't foundationally build around NATO understanding where as the Russians are learning more from what they already know foundationally and can improve more faster and adjust better than the NATO side of things. Ukraine is learning when compare to already existing NATO build military forces is learning them on the fly or couldn't bring all of it in even if they wanted to but is currently a mix of NATO and Soviet views of warfare in its own way for the context of what it's facing for both better and for worse.
The problem why people on both sides have got this war wrong in outcome is frankly the simple fact people didn't understand the Russians and still don't want to admit they keep getting them wrong. Too much of this war still is based on rhetoric against the Russian side if you're already in the West/anti-Russian camp both depending on which part of the world you are from or hold already existing bias. This goes to both side but the lies are objectively worse for Ukrainian side of this conflict in favor for them then of the Russians. People don't know anything about the Russians and yet still repeat the same mistakes that are clearly proven wrong or have strong reasons to be not the case for why X is happening.
The SMO kicked off with the Russians doing something that many people seem to not understand is this conflict regardless of which side you're on was model roughly around what happened in 2008 in Georgia where Russia was aiding local forces with a expeditionary force which due to its size might as well be something else. However the scale of it will be repeat but larger and only with limited set goals which from the time was understandable and correct but didn't realize the political and diplomatic reactions in keys moments the early moments of the SMO when it finally happened.
Unlike NATO Russia is fighting a nation that has a very large force that isn't made up of people that aren't unable/unwilling to fight and also knew their ways of battle as they were effetely the same thing in reality, the Russians went in a already existing conflict zone with a enemy that had more over them while defending then what the Russians had and only now have 1v1 number finally since late 2022. Before the raise in numbers the Russians were force to give up ground that before was meant to scare Ukraine into the peace talks which did happen but to due to both back door talks and events elsewhere in the conflict zone this never happened.
The problem with NATO planners is they were still looking at war from their point of view and hold high and mighty trash talking views over something they really didn't knew much about and their pride got the better of them. Russia too had the same thing but at least adjusted for what is happening and were mostly more humbled about it and why they were fighting.
Another thing we failed to realize about this conflict is people are saying we're learning new things yet in reality we are actually relearning what historically was already a thing but with mostly cold war era stuff with upgrades. Go on find your take from this war and odds are you will find it's older than you might think I wait.
So if one can put it we're getting a relook of old conflict of what it could've been in modern times.
People forgot what a real war between forces that in context to what they are bringing into the fight is really like and NATO historically got off lucky where as Russia right now isn't, the closest that could've been if it's not for some factors that change the reasons for it was the Falklands in 82. The lessons else where was from a outside point of view and both top to bottom personal from lower ranks to officers simply didn't learn much as they like to think in all this time in how a war was going to be fought. The US and Russians soldiers might had been great against fighting weaker forces that didn't have the means to fight back say in the middle in Iraq and Syria but when either one of these soldiers find themselves in combat with a train and able enemy that has a equal chance to them they might not be able they like to think and reality comes knocking them down.
War Mappers are the only real source for what is actually happening in this war as the changes on the map is showing us what is actually happening. Don't waste time with people talking about X about the Russians or Ukrainians just look at what is happening on the map first before anything else, because this will show which side might not be telling you the truth about this conflict and its progress. Great examples to follow are Defense Politics Asia, Military Summary, Weeb Union. This said we need to ask the following question why is X happening say the reports of Russians making gains in X when you painted them out as X? This will tell us a lot about what is really happening over what is being said by those promoting X about the conflict and how well should you trust them or not.
Tactics vs Strategy are two things people forget when addressing wars most people are focusing on the Tactics in the short term in war rather than the bigger picture in the Strategy. The Russians are learning tactics sure and have always been know for them too but they have always been a long term mindset people both in politics and military, something that people in the west tend to historically speaking never been or honestly rather lost that understanding both towards Russia and of ourselves and how we handle matters. No really ask yourselves this question for just a moment how many conflicts since the 90's the west won that are to this day kept rather lost later after winning them in the short run? Russia has only lost one conflict so far and even that wasn't what people think it was by in large they actually have a better track than we do really as many of those conflicts are either won for good or promised for the foreseen future.
Let's face and without bringing in names people on both sides mostly in the west got this wrong and it's time to actually learn the truth about this rather than what we personally want it to be that is sadly imposed on people's minds at this time. I may add more but I think this is good enough for the moment.
I wish nothing more than peace between brothers will end and bring back the good old days odd and strange yet enjoyable memes and online broken English trash talking online with people talking about things that often make no sense and is largely unrelated to the original thing they were yelling about that you can only get from Slavs.
Peace.
You need to learn to be more pithy. Writing a book is not helpful.
Ukraine is not using NATO tactics. BTW, there really is not such thing as NATO tactics. Each military has its own ways of doing things.
USA uses lots of air support. British uses lots of US air support. Germans use broom handles and positive feelings. French want to rule everything, then get mad and quit. Spanish and Italians pretend they will do something. Canadians talk a lot, but do very little. Romanians steal diesel fuel. The Polish want to charge on to Moscow, regardless of whatever is going on. The others are kinda somewhere... maybe not on the battlefield, but definitely in the HQ doing HQ stuff.
LoL
13:00 regarding minefields and NATO doctrine, I believe a key thing to remember is that the Ukraine invasion was not always like that.
It only got into this stage because Russia was unable to score a decisive victory in the beginning, due to its military being poorly prepared at every level. Significant minefields and fortifications were limited to the Donbass region, and this would not have mattered if the other advances had broken through as intended.
So if we assume that we insert NATO into such a war in this stage, then yes, there would be significant complications.
But we if assume a "clean slate" scenario at the beginning of such a war, then it would actually be correct to not prioritise the breaking of such extensive fortifications yet. And with the geopolitical situation of NATO, it is extremely unlikely that it would ever find itself pressed for time to conduct such an operation, as invading the sovereign territory of a nuclear power is generally not an option to begin with.
poorly prepared only exists in poorly Orc propaganda.
The Russians (really) made a mistake when they thought that the orcs a -reasonable people- would not turn their country into ruins, as was the case in Crimea, where more than half of the troops simply joined the Russian Armed Forces. In addition, they had an order to avoid losses among the population and EVEN THE TROOPS of Ukraine (see the example of Crimea).
When it became clear that the orcs were not surrendering, and the groups of Russian troops near Kiev and in the northern part of the country were too small and stretched along the front, and also did not have sufficient supplies (no one expected a long war) - they were withdrawn.
Let me remind you that the Russian Federation has 200-250 thousand contract soldiers throughout the country, about 100 entered Ukraine. Including the Russian Guard (police) and the People's Militia of the L/DPR, the total number involved is approximately 160-180 thousand versus 260 initially. But already in May the orcs had 700 thousand, by the summer - a million, while mobilization became constant.
The Russians received their first reinforcements only in the fall, during the partial mobilization of 300 thousand.
The density of Russian troops is easy to imagine, knowing that initially the front was about 2000 km, after the withdrawal of troops from Kyiv - about 1000 km.
Чушь, Россия и не планировала побеждать быстро, на начальном этапе у украинцев было численное превосходство, Путин надеялся договорится о мире, это предложение отвергли и вот тогда пришлось доукомплектовать армию.
You clearly have problems with your head. However, like everyone else in the West. You have always lived inside your own fantasy schizophrenic world. ))
I can hardly understand a word this guy is saying. I love it.
Ukraine does not use NATO tactics as they have no aviation, so NATO tactics did not fail
I think drones is what made things different. A real time data and cheap smart guided bombs practically made everyone move very slow with utmost alert from the sky.
In respect to the use of smoke grenade launchers on MBT´s: Sovjet Era MBT´s like T-72 seem to have a "dead man cirquit" in their crew hatches, that disable certain functions of the tank when the hatches are open.
Turret or Drivers hatches are open - smoke launchers are disabled.
Drivers hatch open - turret rotation/control is locked
So you can really only operate under closed hatches.
That might be one of the core reasons why we dont see much smoke use from MBT´s in Ukraine, as they just cant use it.
No it’s because smoke would invite artillery or rockets in under 3 minutes
It makes no sense to do it and put yourself in more danger
As a former member of 2ACR , Training emphasized hi intensity Defense supplemented with quick Transition to HI Intensity Offense to exploit gaps in Offensive lanes or axis. Air superiority is a given, except occasional loss by enemy emphasis of Offensive on that axis. Training was frequent on M68 cannons (M60 series & M1 tanks) w/direction from Fire Direction Control targeting. Until the gulf War ( Verify w/ a txt. to Chieftain..... Excellent Video & topic ) Ex Cav Fan ....not-visualsed
I think it has more to do with the fact NATO is used to fighting poorly armed and trained militias they can airstrike, and not a conventional military.
They do fail, many reasons but note that nato doctrine on this was developed in the 1980’s. Tank pump smoke….drone operator thank you for giving me a flight path. I don’t think nato equipment is poorly maintained. Often it’s show after or during high intensity warfare. Things have changed in 40 years, also we trickle in equipment. Intensity is low it’s just on smaller scale.
‘Isn’t low