More like the ambush of Groupment Mobile 100, on Vietnam's Highway 19, around Bridge 26. If you're not familiar with those events along The Street Without Joy* [La Rue sans joie] See Bernard Fall's classic book "A Street Without Joy".
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Posted on 11/29/2003 7:43:42 AM PST by Cannoneer No. 4
Part one of a three-part series on the United States evolving armed forces.
NORRISTOWN - Transformation is the guiding principle for today's U.S. military, and top Defense officials have mandated sweeping changes aimed to quicken the pace of warfare and streamline the Pentagon's cumbersome bureaucracy.
On Nov. 24, President Bush signed the $401 billion Defense Authorization Bill of 2004, the largest defense budget in history.
And though the military's fighting capability is second to none, officials warn that the time it takes to develop some weapons renders them obsolete by the time they are finally produced -often 15 to 20 years later.
Borrowing the best attributes of U.S. Special Operations Forces, the Defense Department envisions a faster, more agile, more lethal fighting force guided in battle by increasingly sophisticated digital technology.
What's Imperative for an Information Age fighting force, according to Adm. Arthur Cebrowski, Ret., director of the Pentagon's Office of Force Transformation, is being connected to the military's Tactical Internet and wowing the enemy.
"We want our enemies, current and future, to look at us and say, 'Wow, how do they do that?'" He told an audience at the Heritage Foundation think tank in Washington recently.
With a continuously improving fighting capability, defeated enemy forces will be left to scratch their heads wondering what hit them. They will see an attack unfold before their eyes, Cebrowski said, but they won't understand how it happened and will be powerless to stop it.
"That's the power of transformation," he said.
Network-centric warfare
Digital warfare came of age in Operation Iraqi Freedom in March. Functioning as the military's communications network, the Tactical Internet relayed command-and-control decisions from commanders to soldiers and Marines crammed inside armored vehicles rolling through the Iraqi desert.
The Force XXI Battle Command Brigade and Below (FBCB2) is the U.S. Army's main digital command-and-control system for highly mobile, real-time battle information.
Bradley Fighting Vehicles and M1A1 Abrams tanks equipped with FBCB2 gave the infantry a picture of the battlefield that included color-coded displays of friendly forces (blue icons) and enemy troop (red icons) locations. During the war, the system effectively replaced paper maps and radio voice communication.
The military's high-tech advantage needs to constantly change and improve, Cebrowski said, to keep enemies second guessing U.S. strategy. The Iraqi military, he said, likely studied the 1991 Gulf War strategy to gauge what coalition forces would do during the recent war.
"That's exactly what we want to happen," he said. "I like to see a lot of generals who want to fight the last war, (but) I just want them all to be on the other side." Not knowing precisely where geographically future threats will come from, defense officials say it's imperative to train troops jointly for rapid deployment to almost anywhere on earth.
The Transformation director and other Pentagon reformers are especially critical of the time it takes to produce weapons systems. Defense programs development cycles must be brought in line with those of commercial industry, Cebrowski said, which are typically measured in months and years - not decades.
Trimming weight
The U.S. Army's Crusader artillery program was an early casualty of the transformation initiative. The $11 billion program was cancelled last year. According to Cebrowski, any weapons program is expendable if it doesn't meet the new transformation criteria.
"(Crusader) is a legacy of industrial age warfare born to satisfy the Army's indirect fire requirements in a strategic context that no longer exists," he said. In other words, Crusader is a relic of the Cold War: too heavy, too expensive and too long in development.
The main Crusader tracked vehicle, equipped with a 150 mm howitzer [I think they mean 155mm - Cannoneer], requires a companion vehicle to supply it with ammunition. The two vehicles weigh in at a whopping 81 tons - a lot of hardware to haul to a battle front.
The lightweight Stryker infantry vehicle is one of transformation's new kids on the block exemplifying a light, more mobile capability. The Stryker family of vehicles, 10 in all, includes a version equipped with 105 mm gun, and models that carry infantry, ammunition and wounded troops.
The "trim" 19-ton vehicle comes loaded with digital technology and has a top speed of 62 miles per hour - 21 miles per hour faster than the much heavier 35-ton Abrams tank. Because of its lighter weight, the Stryker would be easier to transport to faraway fronts, another top transformation goal.
In February, the army began testing the mobile gun Stryker at Aberdeen Proving Ground, near Baltimore, Md. The vehicle is expected to debut in Iraq early next year.[emphasis Cannoneer's]
While Cebrowski doesn't want to eliminate tanks altogether, he clearly believes Stryker is the centerpiece of the military's future, giving the forces necessary nimbleness and speed in urban areas such as Baghdad.
Though the tanks proved effective in protecting their crews from artillery or missile fire, for the transformation director, the new high-tech vehicles give troops better awareness of where the enemy is located so that troops can avoid danger - or speed out of harm's way.
"Anyone that doesn't like speed, or says that speed isn't required, has never been shot at," he said.
However, the Stryker has its share of critics. A report prepared for New Jersey Republican Rep. James Saxton, a member of the House Armed Service Committee, concluded the vehicle is ill suited for warfare.
The July report, written by consultant Victory O'Reilly, said that the vehicle was poorly armored and vulnerable to rocket-propelled grenade attacks.
Responding to the report's finding, the army said that Strykers headed for combat have recently been reinforced with additional armor.
But even armor has limits. In some situations armor is necessary; in other cases it isn't, Cebrowski said.
"(Steel) didn't help 17 dead sailors on board (U.S.S.) Cole, for example," he said. "This is a steel ship. And so you don't see the Navy talking about adding more steel to its destroyers (ships)."
The U.S.S. Cole was attacked in Yemen by terrorists in a bomb-laden boat in 2000. The explosion created a huge hole in the ship.
Instead of more steel, the director said, timely reconnaissance is crucial for safeguarding fighting units. Unmanned aerial vehicles were used effectively in Afghanistan and Iraq to spot enemy troops from the air.
Once the enemy was located on the ground, air power was called in to bomb their positions. This close relationship between the infantry and air support was one of the pluses to come out of Iraq's post-war analysis. The air-infantry teamwork also raises questions about the necessity of Crusader or other artillery programs.
"It is as if we will have discovered a new sweet spot in the relationship between land warfare and air warfare and a tighter integration of those," he said.
A newly formed Stryker Brigade Combat Team - a 2nd Infantry Division unit from Fort Lewis in Washington state - is currently in Kuwait. When the unit moves into Iraq next year [Next year?], defense officials will be watching closely to see how Stryker performs.
The 5,000-strong Stryker brigade is part of a planned troop rotation next year.
Overall, the Pentagon plan to replace 130,000 American troops in Iraq with a fresh contingent that will shrink the force by 20 percent, according to The Associated Press.
The National Guard and Reserve troops make up about 20 percent of the current force of 130,000. According to AP, after the rotation ends in April, nearly 40 percent of the 105,000 troops in the new force will be National Guard and Reserve forces.
Tomorrow: The New Military, Part 2: "The Long Hitch"
Keith Phucas can be reached at kphucas@timesherald.com or at 610-272-2500, ext. 211.
We will be years recovering from this.
Your argument is silly. Wrt mobility, trax beats out wheels EVERY TIME. The denied terrain to tanks is a whole lot less than that of wheels.
Wait until the public demand for a congressionalinquiry into war profiteering begins, and congressmen begiun to realize that their careers can be made or broken on the results they offer to meet that demand.
But would our princilpled legislators offer up a couple of politicallly connected generals and an admiral or two, just for a chance to salvage their own careers and reputations?
Of course, if the Stryler proves to be an excellent vehicle, and there are no weeping widows and grieving families by the dozen-Stryker-crewmen-a-day load, no problem.
But those counting on the others in those vehicles to save their careers are hedging their bets, and delaying the introduction of the Stryker as target to those who view it as such for as long as possible.
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As well as the frags from 120mm mortar rounds. Watch that be the excuse given for the cancellation of the 120mm mortar transport version of the Stryker.
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Ummm hmmm.
More like the ambush of Groupment Mobile 100, on Vietnam's Highway 19, around Bridge 26. If you're not familiar with those events along The Street Without Joy* [La Rue sans joie] See Bernard Fall's classic book "A Street Without Joy".
-archy-/-
Of course. Mobility, lethality, and situational awareness are all things that should be maximized, particularly when you can't count on armor to save you. In many ways, I would just as soon ditch the Stryker and use a bunch of Hummers on steroids for the mission it nominally fills, with some weapon systems specifically designed for that type of platform and mission. More and smaller targets make you harder to kill.
A couple of things: limitations on depression of the Stryker's main gun and co-axial machinegun from the anti-RPG *slat armor* being placed on Strykers in-theatre. The amount of fuel/ammo to be carried aboard the gun Strykers, if they're ever really fielded, and what effect the extra weight of the turret and gun system will have on a vehicle whose ready-to-run-on-Baghdad-streets now approaches 25 tons... and whose axles were designed more for 15 T., and can't withstand the recoil fromn a 120mm mortar projectile's launch. The effect of stacked mines or other enhancements against a Stryker with HEAT rounds stored aboard may be interesting too; hopefully the crew numbers aboard the gun-Strykers will be reduced by half or more, which may keep the numbers down.
But unless the Afghanis/Iraqis begin using BTR 80/90 wheelies against US troops, there's no real reason for gun-Strykers to be fielded, other than to clain they've been *tested in combat.* And it's a pretty high price to pay if one or more are lost, and it's made clear that they're not even capable against dismounted infantry.
I wonder how the Israelis plan to use the ones they've announced they wish to acquire. And how they plan to modify them; its a good bet the bedframe armor is NOT in their plans.
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