Comments by "Harry Mills" (@harrymills2770) on "China's NEW Giant Infantry Vehicle is a Nightmare" video.
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@alexmarlow2508 So they're good against 3rd-world/3rd-rate opposition, but useless in a war between great powers with roughly equal capabilities, including satellite surveillance. It's impossible to hide or fly air cover for a tank formation. The Battle of Kursk is a historical oddity.
These are shock and awe weapons for subjugation of a disarmed populace or a populace reduced to small arms. The problem with that is that hill tribes have RPGs and other helicopter/tank killer armaments that can be manufactured and distributed widely for far less cost.
Russia lost a lot of tanks in Ukraine, forcing them to abandon some pretty baked-in military doctrine from WW II. Nowadays, tanks are mainly for martial displays in communist parades.
Modern warfare is all about artillery, smart munitions and boots on the ground. There'll be a flurry of drone advances, anti-drone measures that likely feature some form of jamming/EMP, and hardening/countermeasures against jamming/EMP. Infra-red is impossible to hide, so maybe we'll see some electric attack vehicles, which will force the weight down, likely culminating in something like men on e-Bikes with anti-tank and anti-aircraft munitions strapped to their backs.
Then the e-bikes will slowly get bigger and bigger, with thicker and thicker armor... LOL! Then they'll finally turn to pedal-powered bikes made of composite materials with no infra-red or electromagnetic signature.
One day, they will arrive at defensive lines consisting of thousands of cushy fox-holes dispersed along a perimeter, with soldiers who can pop out of their holes and destroy everything in a half-mile radius, with overlapping fields of fire with others like himself.
Next level after that will be wack-a-mole munitions that target foxhole dwellers, with continuous satellite monitoring to detect each as it is being dug. If there's a man with a spade outdoors, they'll pick up on it and add it to their maps. Then there'll be a push to create entire underground complexes that are built without disturbing the surface. Then they'll get ground-penetrating radar to pick up on that. Then they'll delve deeper to get below the radar, and only pop to the surface during hostilities as the tanks are rolling in, winning World War 5 out of nowhere.
The thing about the war in Ukraine that NATO probably didn't understand, but which Russia learned to its dismay when it suffered high tank losses early, is that the act of concentrating forces sufficient to mount a major, shock-and-awe, blitzkrieg-type offensive tells your opponent exactly where your armored vehicles and your ammunition are, making them easy prey for stand-off munitions.
Simple arithmetic tells us something more. The expenditure necessary for missile-to-missile air defense is far greater than the cost of munitions they are designed to defeat. Already, you see that while the Kremlin probably has good coverage, residential areas not far away do not have coverage. This is not just an oversight. It is a reality of space and time. Too much space and too little time. But the more stark reality is that even the best-defended targets can be run out of ammo to a missile barrage of sufficient length and intensity.
We've known this since people were scoffing at Strategic Defense Initiative in the 1980s. A few powerful people would be a little better protected from direct attack in their stomping grounds, but MIRVs and now SMART MIRVs mean comprehensive defense against a determined opponent with sufficient stockpiles and/or sufficient manufacturing base, can overwhelm the air defenses of anyone. None of the Big Boys have gone after each other since the 1940s. It's been one-sided wars, proxy wars, palace coups, and wars of subversion. No heavyweights have gone toe-to-toe, and it may be that a lot of existing doctrine needs to be flushed down the toilet.
So basically, both sides can only push their perimeter out as far as they can push out their air defenses. There haven't been that many manned fighter sorties over enemy territory. We're just too good at shooting them down. You don't see that many sorties until after the air defenses have been knocked out. This was one of the features of Desert Storm and its bastard offspring. Target all the SAM sites and then the combined-arms assault, with total air superiority.
And to make forward progress, you have to wipe out the air defenses of your opponent. I think infantry assaults and infantry battle are much the same as ever, but when a Great Power is involved, they'll level a building rather than try to clear it with infantry assaults. There was probably a kernel of truth in Prigozhin's complaints about ammo shortages. There probably WAS a lag in the supply at a point where the Kremlin is saying "Show us more progress" and the front-line commander is saying "We will take heavy losses trying to clear that structure with small arms and flash-bangs.
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