Mad Scientist Laboratory

[Editor’s Note:  Mad Scientist Laboratory welcomes returning guest blogger LTC Steve Speece with another insightful post, this time addressing how Great Power Conflict in the Twenty-first Century requires us to re-think how we mobilize the Nation’s talent to successfully compete and win against all adversaries.  Army Mad Scientist has previously acknowledged that the “United States’ advantage lies in its people’s ability to innovate.” In today’s post, LTC Speece examines U.S. Auxiliary Forces, their role in unconventional warfare, and how our adversaries are developing and employing them.  Our national security policy makers should re-examine and tailor legacy U.S. Auxiliary Force roles to support the nation when engaged in Great Power Conflict, and, where necessary, create entirely new Auxiliary Force organizations — expanding volunteer service opportunities to those otherwise disqualified from enlisting in the Active or Reserve Components.  Read his compelling case why Auxiliary Force organizations harnessing the breadth of this Nation’s talent are essential to winning Great Power Conflict!]

Neglecting a Competitive Advantage

In March 2021, the White House’s Interim National Security Strategic Guidance (NSS) directed departments and agencies to renew “enduring advantages so that we can meet today’s challenges from a position of strength.” However, the Department of Defense is failing to envision capitalizing on what is probably the United States’ greatest competitive advantage — an enormous service economy with a skilled and adaptable workforce.

The COVID-19 pandemic forced many private and public institutions to adopt labor market innovations including Working from Home (WFH) arrangements, reliance on what is now commonly termed the gig economy, and introduced many to digital currencies and cashless payment mechanisms. The current U.S. Auxiliary Force architecture fails to capitalize on these innovations, neglecting to provide volunteer service opportunities to those disqualified for military service, or integrate Auxiliary Forces into Great Power Conflict-relevant missions including Homeland Defense and Unconventional Warfare. According to JP 3-27 Homeland Defense, auxiliary organizations include the USAF Auxiliary [Civil Air Patrol], USCG Auxiliary, Military Auxiliary Radio System, and State Defense Forces. Conspicuously absent in any Joint doctrine reference to auxiliary architecture is the U.S. Selective Service System.

Few defense policies are so consistently problematic to U.S. civil-military relations as the possibility of forced conscription. In September 2021, Congress passed a National Defense Authorization Act, including the first major reform of the Selective Service System since 1980 which expanded registration requirements to all Americans between the ages of 18 and 25, regardless of biological sex. Interestingly, this expansion of the Selective Service System arrives on the heels of unsuccessful attempts to eliminate the agency in 2019 and 2020, and the near irrelevance of the institution to the 2018 National Defense Strategy.

The Selective Service System defines itself as the third tier of national defense, behind the active duty military and reserve components. Its plan to provide this military manpower under current law entails the use of state lottery-style clear plexiglass tanks filled with percolating ping pong balls on which birth dates of registrant cohorts are randomly selected. This seemingly archaic protocol blinded to individual human capital is an artifact of the Selective Service System’s Cold War origins. It was neglected and avoided during the Global War on Terror, and reflects an urgent need to modernize the legacy U.S. Auxiliary Force architecture to provide relevance in an era of renewed Great Power Competition and Conflict.

The Deterrent Value of Auxiliary Force Signals

Apart from the mass mobilization of the U.S. Selective Service System, how can the modernization of existing or the creation of entirely new non-combatant volunteer auxiliary forces deter an attack on the homeland by Russia or China? These legacy institutions were envisioned to develop and maintain a pool of skilled civilians for the military services to draw upon in the event of national mobilization, provide non-combat direct support to the military services, and to provide volunteer consequence management services in the event of an attack on the homeland as part of the broader state and federal Civil Defense architecture.

The National Security Resources Board’s report on U.S. Civil Defense policy in 1950 specifically cited the role of consequence management preparations in strategic nuclear deterrence. During the early years of the Cold War, the credibility of nuclear retaliation was contingent upon the ability of the homeland to endure a devastating nuclear attack and restore order in its aftermath. While Civil Defense-promoted student “duck and cover” drills were later criticized for the questionable protection offered by the tactic and the prospect of nuclear war terrifying children, these measures signaled to the Soviet Union that the United States was preparing to endure the kind of nuclear attack that put non-combatants and even children at risk.

The role of Civil Defense preparations in strategic deterrence remained prominent in U.S. National Security policy until 1963, when President Kennedy de-emphasized its importance relative to massive nuclear force expansion ensuring the survival of retaliatory capability. Auxiliary forces since that time broadened their missions away from specifically nuclear civil defense to general consequence management services, including natural disaster response or search and rescue. Since the creation of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) in 1979, DoD auxiliaries have provided support to civil authorities in domestic disaster response efforts.

The March 2021 Interim-NSS directed departments and agencies to “reduce the role of nuclear weapons in our national security strategy,” despite the rapid nuclear expansion of our adversaries and emerging threats to the homeland. The Department of Defense’s answer to this strategic challenge is the concept of ‘integrated deterrence,’ which broadens the concept of deterrence across warfighting domains and elements of national power. Emerging threats to the homeland will lack symmetric response options implying a need for Auxiliary Forces to return to strategic deterrent roles in signaling domestic resiliency.

 Auxiliary Forces’ Role in Unconventional Warfare

Special Operations Command Europe’s 2020 Resistance Operating Concept (ROC) noted a key challenge in planning for Unconventional Warfare against occupying Great Power adversaries was the need for smaller states to adopt a whole-of-society approach, also known as Total Defense. U.S. Special Operations Forces need resilient and survivable irregular partners to enable in occupied areas. According to the ROC, a small state ally needs to plan for and develop such irregular partner forces now, in order for the prospect of prolonged Unconventional Warfare to have any deterrent effect against an adversary with superior conventional military capabilities.

Generating auxiliary forces by conscription to supplement conventional force formations commonly remains the default Total Defense plan for smaller U.S. allies and partners, including South Korea, Israel, and the Baltic States.  However, as Switzerland noted in its Cold War Total Defense plan, maintaining a volunteer auxiliary force separate from conventional military and formal government control protects it from necessary surrender in the event a military occupation coerces a capitulation agreement. In this example, the greatest limitation of volunteer auxiliary forces in peacetime, their lack of formal bureaucratic control, becomes a key advantage in the post-occupation resistance phase of Total Defense war plans.

A survivable underground resistance organization requires more than combatants. Auxiliary Forces can develop applicable capabilities in peacetime applicable to both strategic attack resiliency and Unconventional Warfare. An auxiliary force of information technology experts can establish secure mesh networks for resilient communication. Aviation enthusiasts and drone hobbyists who practice post-natural disaster Incident Awareness and Assessment (IAA) can also provide surveillance and reconnaissance in urban areas. Rural auxiliaries can maintain small electricity generators (e.g., from renewable sources like solar or wind power) to support continuity of operations in the event of essential service disruption.

Adversaries’ Auxiliary Force Development

How do Russia and China approach the roles of their own Auxiliary Forces and what lessons can be learned? As of 2017, Beijing employed up to 2 million Chinese internet users to post up to 448 million fabricated social media posts per year. This auxiliary force engaged in information operations is known as the ’50c Party’ after the standard payment of 0.5 Yuan per post — less than $0.08 USD at current exchange rates. While the 50c Party is likely not responsible for every pro-Beijing post or comment on the internet, the introduction of micropayment incentives to a receptive volunteer workforce allows China to rapidly scale up capacity to respond to information operations challenges in the cyber domain.

Moscow’s Hybrid Warfare doctrine expanded the use of separatist auxiliary forces in client states, clandestine enablers, and Private Military Companies (PMCs) like Wagner Group. According to open sources, Russia’s Wagner Group uses short term and low cost private security contracts to grow and sustain its mercenary forces deployed globally. A BBC investigation claimed Wagner deliberately seeks prospective recruits otherwise not qualified for conventional military service due to criminal backgrounds. This force generation strategy extends service opportunities to otherwise qualified Russians without diverting potential manpower from formal Russian military service.

In the maritime domain, Beijing’s expanded use of its Maritime Militia further illustrates how auxiliary forces designed to capitalize on competitive advantages like the world’s largest fishing fleet can serve a role complementary to conventional forces in Great Power Conflict. While compliance with Beijing’s civil-military fusion law is not voluntary, it does provide incentives for active participation, including fuel subsidies.  The Maritime Militia provides Beijing options to assert sovereignty claims in contested waters that its regional neighbors are challenged to match. In the event of a conflict, the Maritime Militia’s role would probably expand to reconnaissance and minelaying which they are trained to conduct.

Expanding Opportunities for Volunteer Service

National security policy makers are at times alarmed by the declining number of young Americans deemed eligible for military service. In 2009, a group of retired General Officers published a report Ready, Willing, and Unable to Serve, identifying several drivers of declining eligibility for those young people willing to enlist, including poor health, lower education, and past involvement in criminal activities. However, rather than adapting these barriers-to-entry for volunteer service to reflect the changing nation we serve, senior Service Leaders have seemingly doubled-down on a force generation model that cannot quickly scale up in a major war without inefficient and coercive policies which potentially put U.S. civil-military relations at risk.

If publicly available information is accurate, the rapidly modernizing Chinese People’s Liberation Army maintains approximately 2 million personnel in regular forces.  In a prolonged Great Power Conflict against an adversary of that capacity, the Joint Force cannot afford to disregard or misallocate any potential human resources. If conscription through the Selective Service System must remain a policy option for such contingencies, the American public must be confident that national security policy makers will only call upon such measures after all voluntary sources of manpower are exhausted.

National security policy makers should consider new roles and incentive structures to make the U.S. Auxiliary Force architecture credibly employable and relevant to Great Power Conflict. It is possible that some legacy Auxiliary Force institutions can be reformed to that end, but cost-benefit analysis might reveal opportunities to create entirely new Auxiliary Force organizations. To the extent possible under current law, Auxiliary Forces should expand volunteer service opportunities to those disqualified from otherwise enlisting in the Active or Reserve Components. The issue of who can serve and how remains of critical importance; civil-military relations with the U.S. Auxiliary Forces should no longer be deprecated as hobbyists, but elevated to recognize their potential role in Great Power Conflict.

If you enjoyed this post, check out LTC Steve Speece‘s equally insightful Alternate Futures 2050: A Collection of Fictional Wartime Vignettes

… as well as the following related content:

The Operational Environment (2021-2030): Great Power Competition, Crisis, and Conflict

The Case for Restructuring the Department of Defense to Fight in the 21st Century, by LTC Christopher Heatherly

Global Entanglement and Multi-Reality Warfare and associated podcast, with COL Stefan Banach (USA-Ret.)

Going on the Offensive in the Fight for the Future and associated podcast, with Former Undersecretary of the Navy James F. “Hondo” Geurts and Dr. Zachary S. Davis

Young Minds on Competition and Conflict

The Convergence: Innovating Innovation with Molly Cain and associated podcast

Sub-threshold Maneuver and the Flanking of U.S. National Security, by Dr. Russell Glenn

“Once More unto The Breach Dear Friends”: From English Longbows to Azerbaijani Drones, Army Modernization STILL Means More than Materiel and China and Russia: Achieving Decision Dominance and Information Advantage by Ian Sullivan

About the Author:  Steve Speece is an active duty U.S. Army officer currently assigned to the Joint Staff J2 as an Executive Intelligence Briefer to the Chairman’s Special Staff. All opinions are his own and do not reflect any official statement of the Joint Staff, the U.S. Army, or the Defense Intelligence Agency.

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this blog post do not necessarily reflect those of the Department of Defense, the Joint Staff, Defense Intelligence Agency, Department of the Army, Army Futures Command (AFC), or U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC).

[Editor’s Note: Army Mad Scientist is pleased to present our latest episode of The Convergence podcast, featuring six subject matter experts (SMEs) discussing their experiences in modern warfare at the “bleeding edge” of battle, the future of conflict, and the requirements and challenges facing future ground warfighters. Our two previous episodes explored how our adversaries Russia and China would fight — today’s episode and post explore the gritty realities our Soldiers could face in front line combat — Enjoy!]]

[If the podcast dashboard is not rendering correctly for you, please click here to listen to the podcast.]

The character of warfare has consistently changed over time, with technology evolving from edged weapons, bows and arrows, gunpowder, and battlefield mechanization, to more advanced technologies today, including long-range precision weapons, robotics, and autonomy.  However, warfare remains an intrinsic human endeavor, with varied and profound effects felt by Soldiers on the ground.  To explore this experience with those engaged in the tactical fight, we spoke with the following combat veterans, frontline reporters, and military training experts for this episode of The Convergence:

Denys Antipov is a Ukrainian war veteran who served as a platoon leader and reconnaissance drone operator with the 81st Airborne Brigade in the Ukrainian Army, defending his homeland and fighting Russian paramilitary groups and anti-government separatists in the Donbas in 2015-2016. 

Heydar Mirza spent 36 days on the frontline as a war reporter in Terter and Agdere during the 44-day Second Nagorno-Karabakh war during the Fall of 2020.  He is currently the program author and host of the weekly RADIUS military analysis program on Azerbaijan Public Television and Radio Broadcasting Company – ICTIMAI TV and Caliber.az YouTube channel. 

Nolan Peterson is Senior Editor at Coffee or Die Magazine and The Daily Signal‘s Ukraine-based foreign correspondent. A former U.S. Air Force special operations pilot and veteran of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, he was among the first journalists to embed with Ukrainian forces in combat in eastern Ukraine. In Iraq, he embedded with Kurdish peshmerga forces in operations around Mosul and Sinjar. He has reported from throughout Eastern Europe, France, the U.K., and was onboard the USS George H.W. Bush off the Syrian coast to cover the air war against ISIS.

John Spencer is the Chair of Urban Warfare Studies at the Modern War Institute, Co-Director of the Urban Warfare Project, and host of the Urban Warfare Project podcast.  He served over twenty-five years in the U.S. Army as an infantry Soldier, with two combat tours in Iraq as both an Infantry Platoon Leader and Company Commander.  He has also served as a Ranger Instructor with the Army’s Ranger School, a Joint Chief of Staff and Army Staff intern, fellow with the Chief of Staff of the Army’s Strategic Studies Group, Strategic Planner and then Deputy Director of the Modern War Institute where he was instrumental in the design and formation of the institute.  He has just returned from walking the battlefields of Nagorno-Karabakh, gleaning lessons learned about modern combat on complex terrain.

Jim Greer  (Colonel, USA-Ret.) graduated from the U.S. Military Academy in 1977 and served 30 years in CONUS, Europe, and the Middle East, including combat operations in Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine, and the Balkans. He commanded an infantry-heavy battalion task force in Bosnia, led the OIF Study Group in the invasion of Iraq, was Chief of Staff of Multi-National Security Transition Command – Iraq, and commanded 1st Armor Training Brigade. Agent of change, futurist, and concept developer, he played a significant role in Army transformation for Force XXI digitization and the Objective Force, was the Army’s representative to DOD’s Revolution in Military Affairs, and led the transformation of Initial Entry Training from a Cold War paradigm to one that prepared Soldiers for 21st Century combat. An educator and trainer, he taught tactics at West Point and was the Director of the School of Advanced Military Studies.

COL Scott Shaw is the G-3, U.S. Army I Corps. He previously commanded the Asymmetric Warfare Group, providing global operational advisory support to U.S. Army forces to rapidly transfer current threat-based observations and solutions to tactical and operational commanders in order to defeat emerging asymmetric threats and enhance multi-domain effectiveness.

In our interviews with the aforementioned SMEs, we explore their respective experiences in modern warfare at the “bleeding edge” of battle, the future of conflict, and the requirements and challenges facing future ground warfighters.  The following bullet points highlight key insights from our interviews:

• • • Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs, or drones) are becoming increasingly commonplace on the battlefield for reconnaissance, direct strike, and area denial (i.e., mine emplacement) missions. These comparatively low cost systems enable lesser powers and non-state actors to execute air domain operations, lower operational risk to Service personnel, and may be operated by Soldiers with limited training. While larger UAVs can be disrupted or disoriented by direct fire and jamming devices, the size and speed of smaller drones makes them especially difficult to interdict. Further, distinguishing enemy from friendly drones will become an increasingly complicated challenge for Soldiers as they proliferate on future battlefields.

• • • Modern warfare will continue to require Soldiers to traverse, operate in, and clear complex terrain. Even in urban environments, however, artificial intelligence (AI) and enhanced aerial observation technology will make it increasingly challenging to mask military operations. Thus, it will be imperative to train Soldiers to mask their movements and operations, even down to individual heat signatures.

• • • Information operations will continue to adapt to the technological age, allowing adversaries to weaponize information against Soldiers and their families, allies and partners, and local populations. This pervasive messaging will attempt to win the hearts and minds of nations, as well as confuse and disrupt militaries. Such messaging could attempt to persuade Soldiers of their failures, contradict orders they are given, or convince domestic populations of their force’s imminent defeat by triumphant adversaries. In some cases, these efforts may lead decisionmakers to cut access to social media networks altogether.

• • • Adaptable, innovative leadership will be critical in a rapidly changing environment. Recent conflicts have witnessed the convergence of old weapons, basic infantry tactics, and combined arms maneuver, integrated and repurposed with new technologies at the point of need.   U.S. Army Leaders will need to quickly adopt and integrate technological advancements with their Soldiers and be willing to consider constant force reorganization to maintain dominance on the battlefield.  These changes will also require the Army to continue developing high levels of trust between the Force and its Leaders, particularly as these relationships are tested in contested environments.

• • • Problem solving, understanding technological capabilities, and the initiative to fill leadership positions attrited through combat are key skillsets for Soldiers on the future battlefield. Coding, understanding data’s capabilities and limitations, and facility/agility with new technologies will enable future Soldiers to operate seamlessly, both on and off the battlefield.

Stay tuned to the Mad Scientist Laboratory for our next episode of The Convergence podcast — Innovation at the Edge — featuring senior military leaders, field and company grade officers, and young Soldiers discussing innovation at the unit and individual level, thinking differently about modern warfare, and implementing grassroots transformation in the U.S. Army.

If you enjoyed this post and podcast, check out the following related content:

Top Attack: Lessons Learned from the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War with COL John Antal (USA-Ret.) and its associated podcast

Insights from the Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict in 2020 (Part I and II)

“Once More unto The Breach Dear Friends”: From English Longbows to Azerbaijani Drones, Army Modernization STILL Means More than Materiel, by Ian Sullivan.

The Convergence: The Future of Ground Warfare with COL Scott Shaw and its associated podcast

Insights from the Robotics and Autonomy Series of Virtual Events, as well as all of the associated webinar content (presenter biographies, slide decks, and notes) and associated videos

Character of Warfare 2035

Ground Warfare in 2050: How It Might Look, “The Convergence” — Episode 6: The Intelligent Battlefield of the Future, and its associated podcast with proclaimed Mad Scientist Dr. Alexander Kott

War Laid Bare, by Matthew Ader

Nowhere to Hide: Information Exploitation and Sanitization

China and Russia: Achieving Decision Dominance and Information Advantage, by Ian Sullivan

Young Minds on Competition and Conflict

>>>> REMINDER — ONLY FOUR DAYS LEFT! Army Mad Scientist Fall / Winter Writing Contest:  We want to crowdsource the intellect of the Nation (You!) with our Fall / Winter Writing Contest’s two themes — Back to the Future and Divergence — check out the associated writing prompts in the contest flyer and announcement, then get busy crafting your submissions — entries will be accepted in two formats:

Written essay (no more than 1500 words, please!)

Tweet @ArmyMadSci, using either #MadSciBacktotheFuture or #MadSciDivergence

We will pick a winner from each of these two formats!

 

Contest Winners will be proclaimed official Mad Scientists and be featured in the Mad Scientist Laboratory.  Semi-finalists of merit will also be published!

 

DEADLINE: All entries must be submitted to madscitradoc@gmail.com NLT 11:59 pm Eastern on January 10, 2022!

Any questions? Don’t hesitate to reach out to us — send us an eMail at: madscitradoc@gmail.com

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this blog post and associated podcast do not necessarily reflect those of the Department of Defense, Department of the Army, Army Futures Command (AFC), or Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC).

[Editor’s Note:  Our mission is to continually explore the Operational Environment (OE) and the changing character of warfare on behalf of the Army.  One of the tools we use — crowdsourcing — engages our extensive community of action to help broaden the Army’s horizons and explore future possibilities; discerning the impacts emergent technologies and trends will have on the OE and the future of combat.

Army Mad Scientist had a banner year in 2021, with 29 posts by guest bloggers. Crowdsourced submissions of note included:

CPT Anjanay Kumar‘s winning submission The U.S. Joint Force’s Defeat before Conflict — from our Mad Scientist Writing Contest on the 4C’s:  Competition, Crisis, Conflict, and Change  — plausibly laying out a scenario where China could reunite Taiwan with the mainland under the mantle of the CCP, while operationally and tactically immobilizing the U.S. Joint Force in a lightning fast strike lasting perhaps no longer than a three day weekend — fait accompli — achieving a stranglehold over the global economy.

LTC Christopher J. Heatherly‘s submission The Case for Restructuring the Department of Defense to Fight in the 21st Century — also from the aforementioned contest — challenging the “old guard” in calling for a number of bold, transformative actions, including a major restructuring of the DoD, fully embracing the philosophy of Mission Command, drastically improving the Army’s deployment speed, making radical changes to the procurement cycle, and developing and implementing an enduring national military strategy.

In keeping with our New Year’s tradition, Mad Scientist Laboratory is pleased to announce SGM Daniel S. Nasereddine is our “Maddest Guest Blogger for 2021.”  His winning submission The Dawn of the Loitering Munitions Era — from last year’s Mad Scientist / U.S. Army Sergeants Major Academy Annual Writing Contest — generated much interest on our blog site and Twitter page.  Will the U.S. Army heed the lessons learned over the past three decades — most recently by the Russians and Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh — regarding the disruption wrought by loitering munitions on today’s battlefield?  Until measures specifically addressing operations in the presence of loitering munitions make their way into Army doctrine, manuals, and training pipelines, our Soldiers remain vulnerable — Read on!]

For many years, scholarly articles, books, and publications warned, with varied degrees of urgency, about the inevitable next step in the development of unmanned weapons platforms. At the mention of drone warfare, most casual observers still think about the Predator and Reaper drones of the War on Terror vintage.  However, the next step in unmanned warfare – and warfare in general – is already here. These new weapon systems have many names: kamikaze drones, loitering munitions, and suicide drones, to name a few. They also differ in terms of capabilities, sophistication, autonomy levels, and capacity to cooperate in a swarm. However, they are all inexpensive, impossible to control in terms of proliferation, and they are here today. The latest conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh demonstrated that modern loitering munitions are causing a revolution in land warfare similar to the introduction of the machine gun. While the United States is developing similar offensive capabilities, there is an urgent need for a comprehensive change to doctrine and training across the U.S. military to enable operations in environments with a significant prevalence of enemy loitering munitions.

A Cautionary Tale

Trench warfare, a staple of visual media depicting the Western Front during the Great War, followed a series of devastating maneuver battles fought in the opening months of the hostilities. The year 1914 proved pivotal in the development of modern tactical thinking. Prior to the outbreak of the war, most armies saw some evolutionary doctrinal advances over the Napoleonic Wars-era drill. The Franco-Prussian War, the Anglo-Boer conflicts, and the Russo-Japanese War repeatedly demonstrated the devastation that the power of breechloaders, magazine rifles, and machine guns unleashed upon close-order line formations (Jackman, 204, p. 98).

In 1898, writing about the nature of colonial conflicts, Hilaire Belloc coined a famous quip, “Whatever happens we have got The Maxim Gun, and they have not” (p. 41). Despite the experiences of over 30 years of warfare, major militaries of Europe entered the Great War with a strange blend of the old Napoleonic drill and more modern techniques. The German 1906 regulations largely preserved the “old Prussian Drill” and close control, radically breaking with old approaches only after the outbreak of the war (Jackman, 2004, p. 102). While British doctrine was more advanced, including open and extended order formations, it still overexposed the Soldier to murderous machine gun fire during the prescribed bayonet rush (Anonymous, 1919, p. 460). Moreover, in 1917, the U.S. War Department sent information collection teams to the Western Front, resulting in the U.S. Army entering the fight in 1918 with the modernized doctrine (Stieghan, 2018, p. 30). The primary implication here is that at the end of 1916, the U.S. Army still maintained the Civil War-era line and skirmish tactics.

All militaries mentioned above had ample warning that a fundamental change to the nature of warfare was at hand. Moreover, all of them had an opportunity to employ the new weaponry in limited and colonial conflicts, as well as observe its use by their rivals. The exact reasons behind those nations’ failure to implement appropriate doctrinal changes are complex and varied; however, the old adage stating that generals always prepare to fight the previous war seems to hold true.

The first properly modern loitering munition, IAI Harpy, appeared in the late 1980s (Gilli & Gilli, 2016, p. 68). Since then, it has seen employment in several limited and irregular conflicts and now in one relatively large-scale war.

It took military professionals 30 years to notice and appreciate the machine gun’s effect on the battlefield. Following this logic, it is now past time to do the same for loitering munitions.

 

 

Loitering Munitions

History

Arguably, the Israelis were the first to appreciate the importance of an unmanned aerial platform in a combat capacity. Recalling problems the Soviet-made surface-to-air missiles (SAM) posed to the Israeli Air Force (IAF) during the Yom Kippur War, the IAF developed an innovative approach of providing real-time targeting links from unmanned drones to their warplanes during an operation to suppress Syrian integrated air defense system (IADS) in the Beqaa Valley, Lebanon in 1982 (Grant, 2002, para. 4).

As the result, the IAF wiped out the entire Syrian IADS within two hours, following it with a wholesale slaughter of the Syrian Air Force with a score of 87-0 (Grant, 2002, para. 5). After this demonstration of unmanned vehicles’ targeting capabilities during the challenging Suppression of Enemy Air Defense (SEAD) mission, the next logical step was to forego the need for a manned platform to carry the munition. Thus, 1982’s Operation Mole Cricket 19 became the starting point for modern drone warfare. What followed was the adoption of an armed drone by militaries and intelligence services of many nations. However, to this day, most armed drones occupy the niche of a light attack warplane, being large, costing millions of dollars, requiring remote operation, and carrying expensive munitions. These features significantly limit the number of systems a combatant can afford to deploy. As such, these platforms are vulnerable to a sophisticated enemy’s standard Anti-Access/Area Denial (A2/AD) measures, such as IADS. Moreover, using a million-dollar SAM to target a million-dollar drone makes economic sense.

Platform to Munition

Early in the development of unmanned platforms, the Israelis recognized their inherent limitation of high cost and consequent limited numbers, which led to the development and fielding of IAI Harpy, the first successful modern attempt at a vehicle which combined the advantages of an unmanned aerial platform with the limited cost of a single-use munition (Gilli & Gilli, 2016, p. 68). Loitering munitions do not need precision targeting ahead of time, unlike cruise missiles, and cost orders of magnitude less than armed unmanned aerial platforms. The American-made Switchblade reportedly costs around $70,000 per unit, while modern variants of a larger and more expensive IAI Harpy come out to approximately $300,000 per munition (Gettinger & Michel, 2017, p. 3). Furthermore, with today’s networking and artificial intelligence (AI) technologies, loitering munition development is trending toward smaller and cheaper units with swarming and autonomous capabilities. For example, the 1990 IAI Harpy is over two meters long and weighs 135 kilograms, while most loitering munitions developed after 2010 weigh between two and 30 kilograms and possess significant onboard computing and networking capabilities (Gettinger & Michel, 2017, p. 3). No traditional A2/AD system can deal with threats this smart, small, cheap, and numerous.

Proliferation

To date, all attempts by non-state actors, such as Hezbollah or Islamic State, to produce loitering munitions locally resulted in the limited success of employing remote-controlled planes and commercial drones packed with explosives, as well as slightly modified cruise missiles supplied by their state sponsors (Gilli & Gilli, 2016, p. 69). Such weapons retain the weaknesses of their precursors and are not proper modern loitering munitions. However, the list of nations producing loitering munitions continues to grow. What started 30 years ago with Israel, the U.S., and Britain, now includes China, Turkey, South Korea, Poland, and Iran, as well as several other countries that do not normally reside at the cutting edge of technology (Gettinger & Michel, 2017, pp. 3-5). Furthermore, many other nations operate foreign-made loitering munitions. As the technology becomes more ubiquitous, non-state actors are joining the developing nations in operating technology many still consider emerging, despite becoming practical over 30 years ago. Loitering munitions already have significant application history.

Before Nagorno-Karabakh: Turkey and Iran

The Turkish military successfully employed armed unmanned platforms and loitering munitions against the Russian proxy forces in Syria and Libya, including locations characterized by complete air dominance of the Russian Airspace Forces and Syrian-Russian IADS. However, early 2020 saw Turkish involvement in Libya against the Russian-backed forces of General Haftar. As a highlight, the Turkish military organized a spectacular hunt for the Russian Pantsir-S short-range air defense (SHORAD) systems using unmanned platforms and loitering munitions, posting close to 30 unique destruction videos on the Internet (Kasapoğlu, 2020, p. 122). In both conflicts, Turkish unmanned platforms and loitering munitions penetrated the latest Russian A2/AD systems, often manned by Russian Soldiers thinly disguised as mercenaries.

Using Yemeni Houthis as proxies, Iran targeted the Saudi oil refinery at Abqaiq using a saturation attack by Sammad-series loitering munitions in September of 2019. While not as high-tech as Israeli or Turkish unmanned systems, the Iranians employed a saturation attack, a precursor to swarming. Even more disturbingly, the Saudis deployed the U.S.-made Patriot system to protect this critical piece of infrastructure, which proved ineffective in the event (Kalin & Westall, 2019). However, the Syria, Libya, and Saudi Arabia events do not rise to the level of conventional warfare. Not one of these cases represents loitering munitions successfully operating in the A2/AD environment of a fully functional national IADS primed and ready to defend against a conventional opponent. However, this situation changed with the flare-up of a long-frozen conflict in the Caucasus.

The 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh War

The 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh War represents the first employment of loitering munitions en masse against a fully functional state military. Armenia operated an IADS comprised of a combination of Soviet and Russian short, medium, and long-range systems, integrated with targeting, tracking, and early warning radars into a single command and control infrastructure (Shaikh & Rumbaugh, 2020, para. 15). During the conflict’s opening phase, the Azerbaijani military employed a mixture of Turkish and Israeli unmanned weapons platforms and loitering munitions primarily in the SEAD role. The successful penetration and destruction of Armenian IADS becomes evident if we consider that within 48 hours, the attacks by unmanned systems transitioned from SEAD to knocking out Armenian heavy equipment, command and control, and fire support (Shaikh & Rumbaugh, 2020, para. 2). Much like Turkey, the Azerbaijani military made full use of propaganda by posting hundreds of strike videos on the Internet. Besides their propaganda value, these videos are useful for research, as many depict Azerbaijani loitering munitions striking fully deployed Armenian SHORAD complexes. This is significant because such systems are the means that are supposed to protect the force against such threats; however, Armenian SHORAD seemed unable to defend itself (Shaikh & Rumbaugh, 2020, para. 15). Toward the end of the conflict, with much of the Armenian equipment destroyed or withdrawn, Azerbaijani unmanned platforms and loitering munitions hunted small groups and even individual Soldiers.

From the tactical point of view, Armenian trenches, earthworks, bunkers, armored vehicles, and other places troops tend to concentrate in to find protection on the battlefield became places of increased danger instead of safety. In effect, in an operational environment with a significant presence of loitering munitions, the trench becomes a mass grave. The Azerbaijani military is a third-rate force, while Azerbaijan itself is not technologically advanced. However, this conflict demonstrates that even minor actors can acquire and effectively employ this type of technology. Naturally, sophisticated adversaries’ capabilities in the realm of loitering munitions are certainly more advanced. Therefore, the ability to protect friendly forces from the effects of loitering munitions becomes paramount.

Traditional Protection Problem

Many years of limited conflict gutted the U.S. Army’s Air Defense Artillery (ADA) branch to the extent that there are no organic ADA assets below Corps level. However, the reliance on the Air Force and air components of other Services to establish air dominance over the battlefield is misplaced. While it is likely that the U.S. air assets will gain air superiority or air dominance against any threat, the Russian experience demonstrates that air dominance cannot protect ground troops against attacks by loitering munitions and Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicles. Similarly, Russian and Armenian experiences displayed the weakness of traditional SHORAD and even IADS against this threat. Dozens of videos depicting the destruction of modern S-300, Tor, and Pantsir-S air defense complexes are readily available on the Internet. Furthermore, while electronic countermeasures are effective against the legacy remote-controlled unmanned platform, they are not as useful against loitering munitions in a fully automated mode or under control of an on-board AI. Most loitering munitions resist detection and observation by radar because of their small size and composite construction materials, which makes detection, targeting, and early warning a challenge. Furthermore, swarming, saturation, and multi-vector coordinated attacks can overwhelm even rotary cannon Close-In Weapon Systems, such as Phalanx. Therefore, while strengthening the ADA branch is better than doing nothing, currently fielded systems will not be able to cope with loitering munitions. The primary lesson of the conflicts in Libya, Syria, and Nagorno-Karabakh is that loitering munitions do not belong in the same category as other airborne threats. The U.S. military must internalize that lesson.

Doctrine and Training

One can only hope that technologies that can effectively negate the threat of loitering munitions are in development for the U.S. military. In 1914 it took time; however, militaries learned to cope with the machine gun, first with the transition to trench warfare and later with the development of mobile, armored firepower. Making a parallel with the Great War, the “tank” has not arrived yet, but the Soldier already possesses an entrenching tool. Similarly, it is prudent to prepare U.S. ground forces to operate in environments with significant employment of loitering munitions by the enemy.

Unfortunately, the current doctrine, such as Army Doctrinal Publication 3-37 (Protection) does not contain a single mention of loitering munitions. The more specialized Field Manual 3-01 (Air and Missile Defense) does specify that “[Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS)] platforms also can serve as a means for weapons delivery or may themselves serve as the weapon” (Department of the Army, 2020, p. 3-7). Nevertheless, the current combined arms active protection solution suggests that “maneuver forces on the tactical edge of the battlefield use their organic weapons to engage surveilling or attacking rotary- or fixed-wing aircraft and UASs” (Department of the Army, 2020, p. 11-4). Finally, the combined arms air defense manual, Army Techniques Publication 3-01.8, does not discuss loitering munitions either. It provides only generalized guidance on passive defense measures – camouflage, dispersion, and hardening – common to all types of airborne threats. This is exactly the mistake that the Russians and the Armenians made; they did not consider loitering munitions separate from other types of airborne threats, learning the hard way that traditional active or passive defensive measures are not effective against them.

As U.S. doctrine currently makes precisely the same mistake, the U.S. Army lacks procedures to train its tactical formations to operate in environments with a significant presence of loitering munitions. For example, the Combat Training Centers do not simulate unmanned platforms as kinetic threats. In the absence of an appropriate doctrine, branch-level publications for infantry, armor, artillery, and support do not address loitering munitions and use generalized narratives for active and passive air defense measures borrowed from specialized publications. This situation is similar to the one that Western militaries found themselves in at the beginning of World War I. They all had machine guns. They understood the potential of machine guns sufficiently to purchase and field the new weapon. However, they failed to adjust doctrines and training to prepare and train their forces to operate against an enemy who also had machine guns.

Conclusion

The urgent need for a comprehensive change to American doctrine and training to account for the threat of loitering munitions is undeniable. The understanding of loitering munitions that may exist at upper echelons is currently irrelevant to personnel operating at the tactical level. It does not improve their ability to cope with this form of threat environment. Russia and Armenia already paid for their failure to recognize the appearance of a revolutionary weapon on the battlefield with thousands of lives and billions of dollars in lost military hardware. The U.S. military is – and will remain – similarly vulnerable, until measures specifically addressing operations in the presence of loitering munitions make their way into doctrine, manuals, and training pipelines. The first step in the right direction must be the acknowledgment that loitering munitions do not belong in the same category as planes, helicopters, and other types of UAS. Lastly, this threat is here today. Therefore, if technologies and equipment to counter loitering munitions already exist, the U.S. military must press forward immediately with their acquisition and fielding, while there is time to integrate them into operational architectures at appropriate command levels. Other countries already paid for this lesson; there is no need to pay for it again.

If you enjoyed this post, check out the following related content:

Insights from the Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict in 2020 (Part I and II)

Top Attack: Lessons Learned from the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War and listen to the associated podcast

“Once More unto The Breach Dear Friends”: From English Longbows to Azerbaijani Drones, Army Modernization STILL Means More than Materiel, by Ian Sullivan.

The Convergence: The Future of Ground Warfare with COL Scott Shaw and listen to the associated podcast

Jomini’s Revenge: Mass Strikes Back! by proclaimed Mad Scientist Zachery Tyson Brown

How Big of a Deal are Drone Swarms? by proclaimed Mad Scientist Zachary Kallenborn

>>>> REMINDER — ONLY ONE WEEK LEFT! Army Mad Scientist Fall / Winter Writing Contest:  We want to crowdsource the intellect of the Nation (You!) with our Fall / Winter Writing Contest’s two themes — Back to the Future and Divergence — check out the associated writing prompts in the contest flyer and announcement, then get busy crafting your submissions — entries will be accepted in two formats:

Written essay (no more than 1500 words, please!)

Tweet @ArmyMadSci, using either #MadSciBacktotheFuture or #MadSciDivergence

We will pick a winner from each of these two formats!

 

Contest Winners will be proclaimed official Mad Scientists and be featured in the Mad Scientist Laboratory.  Semi-finalists of merit will also be published!

 

DEADLINE: All entries must be submitted to madscitradoc@gmail.com NLT 11:59 pm Eastern on January 10, 2022!

Any questions? Don’t hesitate to reach out to us — send us an eMail at: madscitradoc@gmail.com

About the Author:  Sergeant Major Daniel S. Nasereddine enlisted in the U.S. Army in 2004 as a 13B Cannon Crewmember. He served in a number of Field Artillery and broadening positions and completed five deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan. He holds a master’s degree in Diplomacy from Norwich University.

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this blog post do not necessarily reflect those of the Department of Defense, Department of the Army, Army Futures Command (AFC), or Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC).

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References

Anonymous. (1919) Infantry tactics, 1914–1918. Royal United Services Institution Journal, 64(455), 460-469. https://doi-org/10.1080/03071841909426062

Belloc, H. (1898). The modern traveler. Edward Arnold. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/61521/61521-h/61521-h.htm

Department of the Army. (2016). Techniques for combined arms for air defense (ATP 3-01.8). https://armypubs.army.mil/epubs/DR_pubs/DR_a/ARN2446-ATP_3-01.8-000-WEB-1.pdf

Department of the Army. (2019). Protection (ADP 3-37). https://armypubs.army.mil/epubs/DR_pubs/DR_a/pdf/web/ARN18685_ADP%203-37%20FINAL%20WEB_v2.pdf

Department of the Army. (2020). U.S. Army air and missile defense operations (FM 3-01). https://armypubs.army.mil/epubs/DR_pubs/DR_a/ARN31339-FM_3-01-000-WEB-1.pdf

Gettinger, D., & Michel, A. (2017). Loitering munitions: In focus. Bard University. https://dronecenter.bard.edu/files/2017/02/CSD-Loitering-Munitions.pdf

Gilli, A., & Gilli, M. (2016). The diffusion of drone warfare? Industrial, organizational, and infrastructural constraints. Security Studies, 25(1), 50–84. https://doi-org/10.1080/09636412.2016.1134189

Grant, R. (2002, June 1). The Beqaa Valley War. Air Force Magazine. https://www.airforcemag.com/article/0602bekaa/

Jackman, S. (2004). “Shoulder to shoulder: Close control and ‘old Prussian Drill’ in German offensive infantry tactics, 1871-1914.” The Journal of Military History, 68(1), 73-104.

Kalin, S., & Westall, S. (2019, September 17). Costly Saudi defenses prove no match for drones, cruise missiles. Reuters. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-saudi-aramco-security/costly-saudi-defenses-prove-no-match-for-drones-cruise-missiles-idINKBN1W22FR

Kasapoğlu, C. (2020). Turkey’s burgeoning defense technological and industrial base and expeditionary military policy. Insight Turkey, 22(3), 115-130. http://dx.doi.org/10.25253/99.2020223.08

Shaikh, S., & Rumbaugh, W. (2020, December 8). The air and missile war in Nagorno-Karabakh: Lessons for the future of strike and defense. Center for Strategic and International Studies. https://www.csis.org/analysis/air-and-missile-war-nagorno-karabakh-lessons-future-strike-and-defense

Stieghan, D. (2018). “Fire and maneuver: The U.S. infantry revolution of 1918.” Infantry, 107(3), 30–33.

“Urban environments’ physical environment characteristics present unique challenges in any of their three dimensions of above, below, or at ground level. Maneuver, protection, intelligence gathering, communications, fires, and battle damage assessment are among the issues. Vertical and subterranean features will disrupt line-of-sight (LOS), complicating situational awareness, increasing risk, and requiring adaptive leaders trained and practiced in the nuances of mission command.” — TRADOC Pamphlet 525-92-1, The Changing Character of Warfare: The Urban Operational Environment, April 2020, p. 19.

[Editor’s Note:  Storytelling — creative fictional writing and narrative building — is one of the tools Army Mad Scientist uses to help the Army explore how concepts, technologies, and other capabilities could be employed and operationalized. As previously shared by proclaimed Mad Scientists and best-selling authors P.W. Singer and August Cole, narrative effectively packages information the way our brains are designed to absorb it, creating lasting messages. By connecting information to our emotions, narrative is more likely to promote action. People are driven to share narratives, leading the audience to become part of its marketing. This virality contributes to the creation of a network of people with increased understanding of potential futures.

Mad Scientist Laboratory is pleased to feature today’s guest post by the Radio Research Group, with their compelling story about the challenges a Special Operations team face in executing a SubTerranean (SubT) mission beneath Dense Urban Terrain in the future Operational Environment.  Degraded situational awareness and comms, lethal autonomous weapons, psychotropic gas, and a transparent battlefield, all wrapped within Great Power Competition — Aqsa and her SubT Quantum Team 1  “embrace the suck,” adapt, and overcome to execute their harrowing mission and exploit their target beneath the streets of Singapore — Read on!]

SubT Quantum Team 1, Singapore

The utility tunnel stretched deep into the dark, industrial nest of cables and pipes. Infrared illuminators lit up the subterranean tropical humidity with beams of vicious light. Sounds of quiet footsteps filled the tunnel, the squad of women walked silently, specifically selected and trained for SubTerranean (SubT) combat.

Aqsa paused to sip water from her Camelbak, adjusting her night vision. It’s damned hot, she thought to herself, kitted out in ceramic body armour, laden with weapons and comms gear.

Her Next Generation Squad Weapon sat heavy in her hands, made by Sig Sauer and running plastic-cased 6.8mm ammunition.

Freaking ridiculous, Aqsa thought to herself, looking down at the heavy rifle, a relic of the War on Terror. The least useful piece of kit we have. Give me a Glock and a more powerful tactical computer. 

She stood amidst a battle of bits and qubits, a combat of influence and electromagnetic dominance. In fifth generation warfare, a tiny 6.8mm projectile was meaningless — dead weight.

Aqsa and her battalion were a select group of female warriors, specially trained in SubT combat and infiltration. The women came from a diverse background of computer scientists, physicists, cryptographers, and even a digital artist — true modern warriors.

“Going Hot! Smoke, Smoke, Smoke!” whispers from the point woman filled Aqsa’s earpiece.

An explosion of light filled the tunnel; each member flipped up their night vision devices. She removed her SGE gas mask, lifting parts of her combat hijab to assure a good seal. She checked her rebreather status with her flexible ATAK (Android Team Awareness Kit) display strapped around her forearm.

The Breacher stabilized an oxygen acetylene torch, and the tunnel filled with toxic smoke.

Each member of the twelve woman unit was kitted out with ELABS (Extreme Limited Access Breathing Systems). These units were SCBA (Self-Contained Breathing Apparatus) systems specifically designed for SubT combat. A single thermobaric grenade could remove the oxygen from an entire tunnel network, hence the need for ELABS.

The Point woman held a bulletproof barricade behind the Breacher, in case someone fired through the locked door. She looked down at her E-INK (Electronic Ink) ATAK wrist display; inertial guidance placed them just meters from their target.

Aqsa looked up at the conduits above, bundles of wires, ethernet, and quantum encrypted fiber snaked above. One of these was their target. She wished they could simply cut and splice the damned cable, then and there. Lives had been taken for this mission, and it was never as simple as just “a simple splice” — not in a post-quantum key cryptography world.

“Breach, Breach, Breach!” came through Aqsa’s bone conduction headset. The torch was silenced, and a sledgehammer sounded out upon a door. “Alarm tripped, Mark!”

A drone was thrown into the room.

Fifteen seconds,

“Clear!”

The women flooded the new chamber, trained since childhood for a mission like this.

Slow is Smooth. Smooth is fast. Aqsa worked her feet and her rifle as she entered the room. A flashlight was lit, and her night vision came off, revealing a tightly confined server room.

Nothing, no enemy, no weapons, just servers and bundles of wires.

The air was still trash, so with her gas mask fogged out, Aqsa moved up to the shimmering server rack. A large cable snaked up through the floor.

The HASEX-1 (Hong Kong and Singapore Exchange) fiber optic cable stared back at Aqsa, front and center. The bright orange cable glistened in their headlamps at the center of the room. The cable had been built by “private investors” to reduce latency between the two most active stock markets in the world. Samples of the fiber optics “borrowed” during manufacture showed a completely new crystalline structure, something far more clear and stable than anything coming out of Asia before.

Intel was convinced it was being used as part of an elicit quantum command and control network — an Asian quantum MILNET. The elegance of quantum encryption is that a simple “wiretap” destroys the quantum state. With current understandings of physics, it’s unbreakable, as observing the information destroys it.

But Aqsa, like the rest of her colleagues knows that nothing is “unbreakable” — there is always a way. Aqsa wrote her PhD on the topic. She kneeled down before the shimmering server rack, or a Quantum multiplexer, to be more precise. She retrieved a small black box from her belt, and plugged it into her SDR (Software Defined Radio). A temperature was displayed on her ATAK display.

Near absolute zero degrees kelvin.

Aqsa set the portable quantum computer atop the fiber optic multiplexer, and plugged in a dangling CAT-7 running from the portable quantum computer.

The multiplexer rebooted. Logs began appearing on her display. Aqsa wiped the sweat from the outside of her gas mask. She looked down to her ATAK display trapped to her arm, code scrolled up the 30 Hz, full color, flexible display.

The display was hooked up to her SDR.  It held a considerable amount of computing power, which in this case was being used to run an exploit model on a commercially manufactured ethernet switch.

Intel couldn’t provide the manufacturer of the switch, but if it is not SSITH (Systems Security Integration Through Hardware and firmware)-certified, or used commercial cryptography in any way, Aqsa would break it.

“We’ve got company, automated, entering the tunnel” the head ISR officer sounded out calmly, “Five units, verified enemy.”

The sounds of safeties flicked off, as two Soldiers surrounded an Israeli-made ballistic barricade in front of the door.

Nav looked to Aqsa, “Time?”

She looked down at her display, not every model had run, but the switch wasn’t cracking. The model was being run across all of her unit’s tactical SDRs, using the MANET (Mobile Ad Hoc Network) as a distributed computing network. “Unknown — It’s not using a commercial curve or known zero days. We haven’t seen this level of security before.”

ISR looked down to her display, “We’ve gotta go!”

Aqsa made a quick decision, unstrapping her SDR, unplugging her display and removing velcro patch antennas from her shoulders. She tucked the radio into the server rack, leaving the antennas at random locations behind the server.

She plugged her display and comms cables into her backup SDR located on the back of her plate carrier, and ran the new patches.

A feeling of intense anxiety crept over the team. The exploit had failed — for now, and enemy forces had entered the tunnel.

“Lights out!”

The server room descended into darkness, as Aqsa flipped on her night vision.

“Comms check,” Her radio synchronized with the MANET using spread spectrum LPI/ LPD (Low Probability of Intercept / Low Probability of Detection) waveforms.

“Roger,” her colleague retorted back.

An ISR notification pinged across the MANET, detecting a slight decrease in electronic background  noise entropy. Someone, or something was transmitting encrypted data nearby.  Our local instance of EWIRDB (Electronic Warfare Integrated Reprogramming Database) declared it was most likely a Red-made generic SDR, a copy of a Persistent Systems unit, and was attempting to jam.

“Visual Contact!”

Several robotic grenades were thrown into the tunnel. Gunfire erupted.

“Gas, Gas, Gas!” someone yelled. “AQGR-12” flashed across their wrist screens.

Aqsa’s skin began to tingle. While technically non-lethal, the nerve agent AQGR-12 caused a strange sensation on any open skin. If inhaled, it would cause intense, nightmarish psychedelic effects. While local teenagers had been reported to take the nerve agent for fun, it would mark certain death in a tactical situation requiring the utmost mental clarity.

Aqsa checked her gas mask, and ensured everyone’s ELAB was running nominally from her ATAK display.

One of the robotic grenades exploded on target as a nightmarish scene unfolded in the tunnel ahead.

“Formation!” the point woman yelled, showing a hand signal for a charge. Two women fired semi-automatic Benelli shotguns into the void. Command had refused to purchase shotguns, arguing they had already made a significant investment in new 6.8mm assault weapons. The automatic shotguns had to be “smuggled” into their unit from the States. Counter robotic units had found them to be invaluable.

Gunfire erupted from ahead, slamming into the self-healing, ballistic barrier. Another robotic grenade went off, then gunfire stopped.

Aqsa, now working to control her breathing, checked her display. Still connected via 60 GHz MANET to the quantum computer in the server room. The exploit had made its way into the ethernet controller using a cracked certificate, and was working on the multiplexer’s CPU. A popup appeared: “Success, rebooting…”

“Exploit Delivered, Nice job ladies!” Aqsa whispered into her radio. She triggered a self-destruct of the SDR.

The exploit was complex, and classified to everyone except Aqsa. It would take months to know if it had worked.

Now it was time to get the hell out.

The unseen UAU (Unknown Autonomous Unit) fired an infrared dazzler, destroying nearly everyone’s night vision devices. If everyone hadn’t been wearing UV shielded gas masks, the entire team would have been blinded. Most of the unit flicked up their destroyed NVDs. White headlamps flicked on. A bright spotlight illuminated the tunnel ahead from atop the handheld barricade.

Someone threw a flare into the smoky, noxious gas filled void. The visible flash from the dazzler was still wearing off. They were going in blind.

Another autonomous grenade went off.

ISR: “We’ve still got signal!”

Someone on point fired their machine gun. A shotgun blast. They charged forward, passing the destroyed ruins of an unnamed bipedal vehicle of Asian origin. Aqsa fired two shots into the AU for good measure. Asian script marked the side with the name “Dot.”

A soft thump echoed through the chamber, Grenade!

An explosion.

Aqsa screamed as she was knocked on her fourth point of contact. Her Team Wendy helmet scraped against cement. She heard her colleagues crying out, someone lost their gas mask, inhaling the psychoactive atmosphere.

More gunfire.

Aqsa steadied herself, grabbing a second level barricade. The first layer had been wiped out. Three of her colleagues were down.

“I need backup here, three down. Taking point!” Aqsa held up the barricade and moved forward. Two of her team joined behind and fired through the barricade, launching two more robotic grenades. An Explosion.

ISR: “Signal Gone, No movement!”

Aqsa reached the staircase to the surface, retrieving the robotic grenades and clipping them to her plate carrier. Their rear ISR drone floated above the spiral staircase in the smoke, its LED lights flashing the “friendly” color code for the day. Their medic, who had inhaled some of the toxins, had been sedated and was now under oxygen — but not before she confirmed two of her colleagues KIA, and applied medical aid (still hallucinating) to another.

They carried the bodies of their downed teammates behind them and hoisted the corpses up the staircase.

Tunnel Exfil represented the gutted server room of a bombed out highrise. Clearly the AUs had located their position. The probability that the AUs had gotten a message out from the tunnel (during active jamming) was calculated by ATAK to be at least 10%. It was time to send a sitrep to command, and get the hell back to FOB Bali.

Aqsa stripped off her gas mask, without checking CBRN, and nearly finished the contents of her Camelbak.

“Watch out for your hands and face,” Aqsa spoke into her bone mic. “The Chems are active for 12 hours unless neutralized. Comms?”

Comms: “I’ve got nothing on the uplink.” While their local MANET was live, and extremely difficult to jam (due to the short range of 60 GHz), SATCOMs had been taken out months ago. Low earth orbit had gone full Kessler, meaning the cascading effect of a few anti-sat missiles had caused every single object in low earth orbit to be completely obliterated.

No GNSS, no Comms, no LEO ISR. The remaining SATCOMS in geostationary, and even arctic elliptical were blown. While SOCOM was working on launching a few interplanetary optical relays (Try shooting SATCOMs out in Legrange points, Reds!), such deployments were still months away.

Allied forces at that point in time relied on a “Targeting Mesh,” made up of millions of small drones for ISR and comms.

The only problem was that the Targeting Mesh wasn’t there!

Aqsa sat down in a rubble covered office chair, her headlamp glowing red, night vision fried by the IR dazzler. The office building’s ceiling had collapsed, posters lined what was left of the walls encouraging workers to “Wear a Mask”, and “Social Distance”. She laughed, and looked over to Comms, who had stripped off her gas mask and was working a Harris SDR from a tablet.

“We need to get outside,” Comms looked up to Aqsa, who was now in command. “It’s like the Mesh isn’t even there. Even HF is out. No Barrage Jamming, just silence.”

There was only one way to get a message back to command, and it was insane. “Get me the latest sky charts,” Aqsa ordered Comms, opening Google Earth on her tablet, “You know what I’m thinking. SOCOM is going to be pissed!”

ISR instructed each member of the team to remove their Israeli-made Fobrotex “GhostHoods.” These were essentially near and long range infrared camouflage ghillie suits, designed to conceal from enemy UAVs. The entire lightweight suit could fit into a small pocket. While these units would not protect from synthetic aperture, Red targeting computers relied mostly on thermal and visual signatures (and heavily modified OpenCV). Head ISR adjusted the GhostHoods on each of the members, draping them over the bodies of KIA.

With a plan in place, the women moved out of the office building, and into a back exit behind the office building (or at least what was left of the building). The Singaporean sky was dark, rubble and burned vehicles littered the streets. The husk of a Boston Dynamics robot lay melted and contorted.

Lightning flickered in the distant dry summer heat.

The single woman left with night vision looked up and shrieked. Aqsa squinted to see a perfectly distributed mesh of drones, slowly moving overhead. These were tagged with red LEDs, designed to induce fear in the enemy. Allied drones move pseudo randomly, this looked like a perfect beehive of aerial dominance. Aqsa had never seen something more nightmare inducing. She had seen a meme of something similar just a few days before. The first thing she thought was They are superior, then shook off the thought. It was a relic of subconscious programming, internet memes designed to hack her OODA loop.

Aqsa swore out loud. The Allied targeting mesh was obliterated.

“Relax ladies,” ISR whispered over the MANET, “Red Coherent Change is garbage, and with these suits we will be very hard to detect.” The Suits were designed with a camouflage pattern designed to trick computer vision systems. “Just move slow, we are close to our target!”

The output power of their MANET was reduced to below 1 watt, bringing their IP based conversations far below the noise floor of enemy sensors.

A deserted city park lay ahead, and a perimeter was set up. The city was crawling with UAUs, every member of the unit was scared. This wasn’t mechanized warfare, it was autonomous unmanned warfare. Bringing a human to a UAU fight is worse than fighting a machine gun position with a butter knife.

Comms unfolded a small, portable microwave SATCOM antenna, and aimed it below a gap between two buildings. Incredible thunderclouds rolled above. The Enemy targeting mesh remained unmoving, the thunderclouds rolling through and blurring the floating spots of red. Aqsa removed a SAR (Synthetic Aperture Radar) smoke grenade from her pouch marked “KA Band,” and adjusted the timer.

A crescent moon smiled above them, almost perfectly vertical, being observed from equatorial Singapore.

“What on Earth are we aiming at?” A team member asked.

Comms retorted back, “It’s not on Earth, we are aiming for the Moon,” she smiled, the Harris SDR established a microwave data link at full power. Aqsa pulled the pin on the SAR grenade.

A message decrypted across Aqsa’s wrist screen

SURFACE VESSELS, TARGET MESH DESTROYED. 7TH FLEET WIPED OUT. UUV MAKING WAY TO YOUR POSITION INDIA FOR EXFIL UNIFORM ZULU. ETA 72 HOURS GODSPEED

Aqsa looked up to the heavens, and prayed. They were to head by underwater, autonomous vehicle deep into the jungles of Indonesia…

If you enjoyed this post, check out the following related content:

Realer than Real: Useful Fiction with P.W. Singer and August Cole, and associated podcast 

Dense Urban Hackathon – Virtual Innovation, Dense Urban Environments (DUE): Now through 2050, A Chinese Perspective on Future Urban Unmanned Operations, and TRADOC Pamphlet 525-92-1, The Changing Character of Warfare: The Urban Operational Environment

Strategic Latency Unleashed! by Dr. Zachary S. Davis, Going on the Offensive in the Fight for the Future, and associated podcast

How does the Army – as part of the Joint force – Build and Employ Teams to Compete, Penetrate, Disintegrate, and Exploit our Adversaries in the Future?, The Convergence: The Future of Talent and Soldiers with MAJ Delaney Brown, CPT Jay Long, and 1LT Richard Kuzma, and associated podcast

New Skills Required to Compete & Win in the Future Operational Environment; Warfare in the Parallel Cambrian Age, by Chris O’Connor; Character of Warfare 2035; The Future of War is Cyber! by CPT Casey Igo and CPT Christian Turley; Military Implications of Smart Cities, by Alexander Braszko, Jr.; and Integrated Sensors: The Critical Element in Future Complex Environment Warfare, by Dr. Richard Nabors

Quantum Surprise on the Battlefield? by proclaimed Mad Scientist Elsa B. Kania

Space: Challenges and Opportunities and Star Wars 2050, by proclaimed Mad Scientist Marie Murphy 

Top Attack: Lessons Learned from the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War with COL John Antal (USA-Ret.), its associated podcast, Nowhere to Hide: Information Exploitation and Sanitization, and War Laid Bare, by Matthew Ader

Alternate Futures 2050: A Collection of Fictional Wartime Vignettes, by LTC Steve Speece; Kryptós by proclaimed Mad Scientist CPT Katherine Hathaway; AN41, by proclaimed Mad Scientist BG Jasper Jeffers, and Takeaways from the Mad Scientist Science Fiction Writing Contest 2019

>>>> REMINDER 1:  Army Mad Scientist Fall / Winter Writing Contest: Crowdsourcing is an effective tool for harvesting ideas, thoughts, and concepts from a wide variety of interested individuals, helping to diversify thought and challenge conventional assumptions. Army Mad Scientist seeks to crowdsource the intellect of the Nation (You!) with our Fall / Winter Writing Contest’s two themes — Back to the Future and Divergence – check out the associated writing prompts in the contest flyer and announcement, then get busy crafting your submissions — entries will be accepted in two formats:

Written essay (no more than 1500 words, please!)

Tweet @ArmyMadSci, using either #MadSciBacktotheFuture or #MadSciDivergence

We will pick a winner from each of these two formats!

Contest Winners will be proclaimed official Mad Scientists and be featured in the Mad Scientist Laboratory.  Semi-finalists of merit will also be published!

DEADLINE: All entries are due NLT 11:59 pm Eastern on January 10, 2022!

Any questions? Don’t hesitate to reach out to us — send us an eMail at: madscitradoc@gmail.com

>>>> REMINDER 2:  Army Mad Scientist is pleased to support the Army and its Army People Synchronization Conference (APSC) in January 2022. To that end, we’re sponsoring the associated writing contest in support of this critical endeavor prioritizing the Army Team (Soldiers, Department of the Army Civilians, their dependents, and Soldiers for Life).

[NOTE: This is not to be confused with the aforementioned and separate Army Mad Scientist Fall / Winter Writing Contest, described in Reminder 1, above.]

Check out this APSC writing contest’s details here.

We will feature the winning submission and author in a future Mad Scientist Laboratory blog post. Additionally, we will compile it, along with other submissions of merit, and provide copies to Senior Army Leadership attending the Army People Synchronization Conference.

So get cracking — craft a 500 word composition over the Holiday Season addressing one or more of the writing prompts listed in the contest details and submit it via email with “APSC” in the subject line NLT 1700 EDT on 03 January 2022, to: madscitradoc@gmail.com

About the Authors:  The Radio Research Group is a collection of experts in wireless mesh networking, electronic warfare, privacy, blockchain and decentralized systems. The group focuses particularly on fifth generation warfare, and the convergence of new technologies as they define modern conflict.

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this blog post do not necessarily reflect those of the U.S. Department of Defense, Department of the Army, Army Futures Command (AFC), or U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC).

A post on the forthcoming war for Information Advantage, Decision Superiority, and Cognitive Dominance

[Editor’s Note:  Earlier this year, Dr. Russell Glenn‘s Sub-threshold Maneuver and the Flanking of U.S. National Security post addressed how our adversaries are seeking to shape and achieve their nefarious objectives below the threshold of kinetic conflict using cyber and information operations. As noted, countering this “sub-threshold maneuver” will require a sea change in how we organize and apply our U.S. National Security structure to deter, and failing that, directly engage our adversaries in this new era of competition, crisis, and conflict.

Today’s provocative post by guest blogger Capt Martin Crilly, British Army, expands upon this theme to explore the challenges facing us in transforming for “post-digital hyper-war” — where kinetic engagements between exquisite, industrial age platforms may be rendered irrelevant by “more subtle, intellectual, and nuanced information, cyber, and cognitive influencing ‘soft power‘ capabilities.” While some may resist, preferring to cling to the traditional and familiar ways of warfare, “shrewd futurists see a whole host of new sunrise opportunities in the utility and application of a post-digital reimagined military, a completely redefined military equipped with a whole host of new capabilities to fight this post-digital strategic competition.” Read on to learn more about Capt Crilly’s prescription for winning the forthcoming hyper-war!]

Consensus on the definition of the post-digital era has yet to be found.  Some suggest it is the twilight of a time when everything has become digital, a pervasive epoch, simultaneously transformative yet equally irrelevant.  Others believe it should be referred to as an era of persistent connectivity with suggestions of military cloudlets accompanying troops onto the battlefield.  Either way, similar to the industrial era solutions of electricity, piped gas, and water mains, this time will see digital being regarded as just another ubiquitous commodity, mundane and nothing much to marvel.  It is also a time inhabited by digital natives, digital nomads, and machines where digital is just a bland homogeneous background commodity, noticed only by its absence.  Similar to our understanding of electricity, gas, and water supply, we won’t marvel at this new ubiquitous commodity; it too just exists, noticed only by its absence.

Consensus on the definition of hyper-war has also yet to be found but it is coming; a hyper-scale, hyper-connected and hyper-speed global competition between these digital natives, digital nomads and these digital machines making the concept of a traditional military platform-based contest largely irrelevant.  By assuming this dystopia as the baseline, it is then imperative we quickly move these sunset legacy platforms into history.  In doing so, it allows us to open space to pivot our thinking up into the contemporary capability layer, not marvelling at digital per se, but focusing on how these new capabilities have already changed the inter-state, intra-state, and sub-threshold battlefields (for both us and our adversaries).  We can now begin to ask far more interesting questions — Is the World Ready for this war?  How would we fight/compete in this era? With who? And how will we C2 all of it to ‘win’ this post-digital hyper-war?

The challenges of the post-digital hyper-war

We are not alone in this, the post-digital phenomenon is dominating all world societies, their institutions, and peoples — irrelevant of their socio-economic status.  The implications for states, government, and the C2 of future warfare are chilling.  How will a weakened state, pseudo-state, or next wave of dispersed virtual youth tribe fight, compete, or exert influence during this new age of conflict?  The nation-state faces a new acrimonious strategic competition using new forms of non-state violence, a war between philosophies, ideas, technologies, and economics — increasingly unlikely to be a physical kinetic conflict.  The traditional hard power capabilities of industrial age kinetic power militaries are no longer relevant in this post-digital battlefield, replaced by opportunities for more subtle, intellectual and nuanced information, cyber, and cognitive influencing ‘soft power‘ capabilities (see Figure 1, below).

Some lament and fight the sunset of these legacy ‘hard power’ capabilities, but shrewd futurists see a whole host of new sunrise opportunities in the utility and application of a post-digital reimagined military, a completely redefined military equipped with a whole host of new capabilities to fight this post-digital strategic competition.  In defining the next war in this context, the challenge becomes less about grafting advanced technical appendages onto lumbering iron targets but more the holistic transformation of our industrial-age physical military into a virtual, multi-dimensional, globally integrated influencing arm of the state.  This new, reimagined military will then need to be equally as nimble, practised, and competent at exerting state influence in the information, cyber and cognitive dimensions as it currently is in the physical dimension.

Future Threats:   Legacy institutions, ready to fight the last war?

This conundrum is not unique, it is being faced by all the world’s industrial age militaries and each is grappling with relentless upgrading of legacy platforms with iterative employment concepts every few years, e.g., JADC2, chasing the roller-coaster of seductive novel digital micro-modernisations to achieve fleeting information advantage.  Large standing militaries worldwide are firmly anchored in centuries of history, rules, processes and industrial-age anachronisms, but as observed by Gen Mark Welsh, CSAF, “holding on to the things that made us great in the past is not the way to make us great in the future.”  

The size of our legacy military capabilities correlates to the diminishing armed conflict ‘market’ largely being replaced by new influencing activities (see Figure 2, below), with these new capabilities being provided by other ministries, corporations, and media.   Traditional Industrial era militaries are increasingly lagging behind in the transformed market for state influence, their adoption to this new reality has just been too slow; most have now missed the opportunities presented during this era and are struggling for relevance.  The necessity is now to rapidly begin thinking more radically, bolder, and faster or they will also miss the post-digital era.

Recommendations

As digital increasingly pervades, metastasises and saturates our battlespaces (similar to civil society), processing data up the cognitive hierarchy into intelligence, then into understanding and options will require decisions to be now taken at unimaginable speeds (see Figure 3, below).  Into that complexity is added transmission latency, data overload, and cyber security as the new battlefield constraints.  The maintenance of relevancy is the commander’s new intent and being able to communicate our ideas, messages, and effects before others do will be the new mission.

We need to pause, think, and envision this hyper-war. We can assume and expect that it is going to be technically complex, involve massive amounts of data with new hyper-connectivity, multi-channel, and multi-media transmission challenges with constant flux being the default.  The human Multi-Domain Command and Control (MDC2) decider will soon be redundant, replaced and upgraded by a new AI machine.  It is just impossible for a human to comprehend and process the fire-hose of data traffic in this war of Information Advantage, Decision Superiority, and Cognitive Dominance at the quantum pace needed to succeed in these engagements.

Is the World Ready?

Yes, we are ready.  But we need to stop fretting about our ability to win information advantage in the information age — it is too low down the value chain and that time has passed.  We are actually well ahead of our competition in the post-digital age:  The early use of AI enabled decision support, machine learning, and our #1 top-secret weapon — our young Soldiers and officers — mean that a lot of the basics are already in place.

But some resistors are holding back the change:

1. Our Thinking:  Our reluctance to let go of old, outdated industrial-age doctrine, TTPs, thinking, and our sentiment for legacy sunset platforms is stymieing progress, sapping our energy, and slowing us down. I’m part of the problem — I thought we could architect the Information Age war, but I’m now worried if this is also too late or dated guidance.

2. Our Leadership:  We need to decide who is going to lead this hyper-war. Lt Gen Michael S. Groen, Director, Joint Artificial Intelligence Center (JAIC) says “How we want to fight in the future is a question for warfighters… not IT people” and in a future IT-enabled traditional physical, industrial-age battle, he is probably correct.  In a post-digital hyper-war where intellect, media-savvy, and digital competence will deliver decision superiority and cognitive dominance, then leadership traits might favour those with more intellectual nuanced demeanours.

3. Our Harnessing of Talent:  Inverting the pyramid and admitting we don’t know, and trusting our young Soldiers and officers to guide us in enabling it is going to be culturally difficult.  Fusing people and technology into a bionic organisation is what we need to give us the edge.  Thus, we need to hire intellectual over-achievers, dynamic young ranks and leaders based on their intellectual abilities, ambition and drive.  If we want elite digital warriors of the future, then we need to hire the right raw material, provide an employment package, work environment, and suitable intellectual challenging incubator to win the first engagement in this war – the battle for talent.

Yes, we are ready, but we need to check our fear of this future digital unknown ground.  Then be bold, disruptive, and confident in our unwavering belief that this is the right direction (even if we are not totally certain of the destination). We need to immerse into, own, shape, and dominate this post-digital battlespace, then inspire smart Soldiers/officers to find/apply/deploy the appropriate technology tools to dominate in the forthcoming hyper-war.   In doing so now, we give our newly reimaged military far more than an information advantage (that needs to be a given); we provide them with decision superiority and cognitive dominance over the brains of the protagonists in the battlespace of the future.

If you enjoyed this post, check out the following related content:

Sub-threshold Maneuver and the Flanking of U.S. National Security, by Dr. Russell Glenn

“Once More unto The Breach Dear Friends”: From English Longbows to Azerbaijani Drones, Army Modernization STILL Means More than Materiel and China and Russia: Achieving Decision Dominance and Information Advantage by Ian Sullivan

The Case for Restructuring the Department of Defense to Fight in the 21st Century, by LTC Christopher Heatherly

The Future of War is Cyber! by CPT Casey Igo and CPT Christian Turley

The Convergence: The Future of Ground Warfare with COL Scott Shaw and associated podcast

Hybrid Threats and Liminal Warfare and associated podcast, with proclaimed Mad Scientist Dr. David Kilcullen

Global Entanglement and Multi-Reality Warfare and associated podcast, with COL Stefan Banach (USA-Ret.)

Integrating Artificial Intelligence into Military Operations, by Dr. James Mancillas

The Future of Talent and Soldiers and associated podcast

In the Cognitive War – The Weapon is You! by Dr. Zac Rogers

Weaponized Information: What We’ve Learned So Far…, Insights from the Mad Scientist Weaponized Information Series of Virtual Events, and all of this series’ associated content and videos 

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Capt Martin Crilly is a British Army Reserve officer with 39 (Skinners) Signal Regiment in Bristol, England.  His day job is as the Chief Architect & Engineering Authority for a large Defence Prime.   His background is in contemporary ICT architecture, technology strategy, digital leadership with previous J2/J6 roles in BFC, ISS Ops Plans, GOSCC, DE&S Maritime and others.  He has Masters in business, org design and is currently completing a Doctorate in InfoOps.  Check out other similar articles by Capt Crilly in the UK’s Wavell Room.

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this blog post do not necessarily reflect those of the U.S. Department of Defense, Department of the Army, Army Futures Command (AFC), or U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC).