“Russia lacked precision-guided weapons for its bombing campaign in Syria”
I find that hard to believe.
If you don’t care about collateral damage and civilian casualties, why use the good (and expensive) stuff?
Besides not needing to use their PGMs, I’m sure protecting knowlege of their precision capabilities under real combat conditions is part of Russias decision process.
“Russia lacked precision-guided weapons for its bombing campaign in Syria”
“I find that hard to believe.”
They are having a bit of a logistical issue getting there. I presume they are using Syrian bombs (originally made by the Russians) that Assad has “in stock” and saving back the expensive PGB.
Again, blowing up everything is a better strategy to break the will of a people.
Think: Dresden, Tokyo, Hiroshima, Nagasaki. Killing soldiers is one thing, but when you level the town, people quit fighting.
The USA should have just leveled every town and city in North Vietnam, for example, if it wanted to win that war. Instead, it blew up some stuff, but largely just a lot of jungle.