Learning from the Wars of Others

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The Six-Day War

When the six-day war occurred, I was serving with the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) and I recall hearing a conversation between two Mirage jet pilots. Their view was that we would have greatly benefitted by having some observers in Israel to see how they were using their Mirage jets in combat.

Anyone reading who is old enough will remember the war. For those who aren't old enough, here's what happened:

The Six-Day War, or the 1967 Arab–Israeli war, was fought between Israel and a coalition of Arab states, primarily Egypt, Syria, and Jordan, in the context of the Arab–Israeli conflict. In the war, Israel captured and occupied the West Bank from Jordan, the Gaza Strip and the Sinai Peninsula from Egypt, and the Golan Heights from Syria. 

Israel, as it seems accustomed to, won the war. 

What Could we Learn from the Russia - Ukraine War?

We have been watching the casualty numbers from the frontline. They tell us how many families the Kremlin is sacrificing to move the map by inches.

This month, and likely for the next few months as well, the number we are watching most closely is not personnel. It is military vehicles, rocket launchers, trucks and large fuel tankers.

It is mind-numbing to look at a battlefield with more than a million troops spread across the front, thousands of drones flying against each other every day, and the Kremlin still talking loudly about “battlefield realities,” only for us to sit here counting how much Russian equipment, worth hundreds of millions of dollars, Ukrainian drones are taking off the road.

The loss of trucks has a direct impact on Russia’s ability to move supplies to the frontline. Ammunition, fuel, food, spare parts, troops, repair cycles — all of it depends on the same logistics spine. 

Break enough trucks, and the army does not stop in one dramatic moment. It starts slowing down. Then it starts choosing. Then it starts leaving parts of the line underfed.

But the truck losses are only one part of the equation. The real value in this pattern is what Ukraine has to do before those trucks are destroyed.

To reach trucks running along highways behind the frontline, Ukrainian drones first have to penetrate the frontline. That is challenge one. Then they have to find their way toward the road network. That is challenge two. Then they have to identify, track, and hit the target. That is challenge three.

And they have to do this while spending meaningful time and distance inside Russian-controlled airspace.

So, the question is not only how many trucks Ukraine is destroying. The question is how Ukraine knows where those trucks will be at the point of interception. That is reconnaissance. That is targeting. That is a midrange strike system beginning to mature.

Doing it once is one thing. Doing it for weeks is something else. Doing it for months?

The Ukraine defence efforts have been spectacularly brilliant and continue to be so.

The losses of Russian personnel and equipment have been staggering and it's surprising they can continue pressing ahead every day, every week.

Our ADF (Australian Defence Force) is being equipped with drones and unmanned aircraft and submarines. 

What we need, and I'm not aware of whether we have or not, is troops on the ground observing the methods being used by the Ukrainian military to defeat Russia.

One day in the not-too-distant-future we may need all the skills the Ukrainian military has to protect ourselves from invaders.