How Much is Enough?

Posted on January 26, 2023 by Martin van Creveld

How Much is Enough was the title of a 1971 volume published by the RAND (Research and Development) Corporation, an American think-tank with close ties to the United States Air Force which provided the funding. The authors, A. C. Enthoven and K. V. Smith, were both veterans of the Pentagon where they had worked for President Johnson’s Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara. Both were experts on systems analysis. At that time it was a fairly new and exciting discipline that sought to subject as many problems as possible to mathematical analysis; including not just military problems but such as comprised health services, education, transportation and the like..

Some of the most important problems, taking up a considerable part of the book, concerned what people called the nuclear strategic balance between the US and the USSR. What, precisely were the objectives of building up America’s nuclear arsenal? How many nuclear warheads and their delivery vehicles would be needed to deter the USSR from launching an attack? Supposing deterrence failed and nuclear war broke out, what did victory mean and how to ensure it went to America? Should there be one kind of missile/bomber aircraft or a mix of several different ones? If the latter, then how many of each kind? How to best use them, and against what targets? How many, if any, should be kept in reserve? What was the best way to render them invulnerable to a Soviet attack? And so on and so on.

Today in NATO’s capitals—Washington, London, Paris, Berlin, and to some extent less important ones too—somewhat similar questions are being asked. With this difference that, as far as the public record is concerned, the issue is not nuclear weapons but how many conventional ones, specifically tanks, to send to Ukraine’s aid. Where and how to employ them, and so forth. It goes without saying that the discussions are highly classified. Still it is possible to draw up a list of some of the most important questions that, in one combination or another, will have to be resolved before a decision is make.

The nature of the mission. Is it to be defensive—just enabling Zelensky and his men to hold out until something gives—or offensive—liberating the Donbas and the Crimea? Suppose the latter is the case and these objectives are attained but the Russians still keep on fighting—as they did in 1812 and, in different ways, both in 1917-18 and 1941—what then? Note that, as a general rule, fighting on the defensive is easier and requires fewer forces than going on the offensive does.
Losses. How many tanks are the various NATO countries prepared to lose, and in what time frame?
Availability and production. Not only are at least some tanks going to be lost, but they are expensive beasts. A brand-new Leopard II costs about 15 million Euro. As a result, no country has an unlimited supply of the most modern tanks in particular. How many tanks can the NATO countries send into the field without putting their own security at too great a risk? How many can be sent now? How many in the future? How long will producing and fielding new ones take?
Substitution. Suppose NATO country A sends some tanks to fight in Ukraine. Will the rest make up for the deficit?
As the Russian invaders have discovered to their cost, and contrary to their image as kings of the battlefield, tanks are vulnerable. To other tanks. To certain kinds of anti-tank weapons. To drones, especially such as are used to attack them from above rather than from the front where tanks carry their thickest armor. Such being the case, tanks rarely operate on their own but are regularly escorted by other forces, primarily artillery, anti-tank missiles, anti-aircraft defenses, and engineers. How many of those can be sent now? How many in the future? How long will producing and fielding them take? How long will training Ukrainian troops in operating the tanks take?
How many tanks can be supported and kept supplied? Bear in mind that tanks and their supporting forces require huge amounts of supplies. Depending on the terrain as well as the kind of operation, a modern battle tank such as the Leopard II will easily consume 3.4 L/km on road and 5.3 L/km off it. Plus ammunition, plus spare parts. Plus, in case they fight on the defense, various engineering materials. Plus all kinds of other supplies (food, water, medical supplies) which, though small in weight, are must arrive at the right place at the right time. To aggravate the problem, tanks rarely remain at the same place for long, forcing the logistic tails to follow them.
What are the Russians likely to do in response? Open a new front by dragging Belarus into the war? Start at least some operations in NATO territory? Mobilize even more troops? Resort to tactical nuclear weapons?
Finally, politics. Building a model of what a nuclear exchange might be like, Enthoven and Smith all but ignored politics. Indeed their tacit (but far from unreasonable) assumption was that, in that case, there would be no politics. However, the war in Ukraine is not a one-time spasm. If only for that reason, NATO planners cannot ignore them. How much political capital are the various countries, both leaders and populations, prepared to spend in assisting Ukraine? For how long?

In the long run it is this question that is likely to be the most important of all.

There Once Was a Lady of Riga

Posted on January 12, 2023 by Martin van Creveld

There is an Israeli named Benjamin Netanyahu. Born in 1949, American-educated (MIT) and an excellent showman, he attracted the attention of Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, served 1983–1984 and 1986–1992) who appointed him head of the Israeli mission to the United Nations in New York. Joining Likud, the right-wing, rather hawkish, movement that, at that time, was contesting election after election with the more left wing, slightly less hawkish, Labor Party, subsequently he held all kinds of portfolios the most important of which was that of minister of finance. In 1996 he became prime minister for the first time. Since then he has been in that office on and off, clocking a total of fifteen years. More than any of his predecessors in Israel, and more than the vast majority of his peers in other democratic countries.

The latest elections were held on 1 November 2022. They gave him and his potential partners a clear majority in parliament and enabled him to set up a government, the sixth if I am not mistaken. But only in combination with a number of much smaller parties, some religious-orthodox, others right-wing extremist. The religious parties demanded, and to a considerable extent obtained, their long-standing demands. Including legal changes that will make it much harder for some classes of diaspora Jews to gain recognition as such, come to Israel, and become citizens. Other changes recognize the Torah Pentateuch) as a fundamental pillar of Israeli life; provide heavy subsidies for yeshive students, some 175,000 of whom are now receiving stipends that enable them to live (well, more or less) without working; put an end to any further improvements in the status of gay, lesbian and trans people;; and enacting all kinds of restrictive laws concerning kosher food, public transport on the Sabbath, education, and more. The most extreme measure—one which, thankfully, has not been implemented yet—is a law that will enable parliament to overrule any court decision by a simple majority of 61. Not good for democracy and the rule of law, many people say.

But why, the reader who is not an Israeli might ask, should he/she/they/whatever concern themselves with these things? After all, Israel is a sovereign state. Like all other states it has the right to institute its own set of laws, however quirky they may be. If those Jews want to exempt certain classes of their citizens from military service, or pay them for not working, or make all males cover their heads at all times, or prevent non-kosher food from being sold throughout the country, or welcome convicted criminals into the cabinet, then who are the gentiles to complain?

The trouble is that things do not end there. One change that has been agreed upon, more or less, is to take responsibility for securing the land bordering on Jerusalem towards the north, east and south away from the army and entrust it to the police instead. The police itself will be under the control of a ministry headed by Mr. Itamar Ben Gvir, an extreme right-winger. His appointment as “minister of national security” will certainly do nothing to improve relationships between Jews and Palestinians. Worse still, it may one day have terrifying implications for the rule of law as applied to Israel’s own population, both Arab and Jewish.

Other measures include putting the (very few), settlements that, following a decision by Israel’s Supreme Court, had to be evacuated in the past back on the map. Rebuilding them, re-populating them, and using any opportunity for expanding them. As well as unfreezing the ban on building new settlements in the northern part of the West Bank, one originally put in place by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert (2006-9) in the hope of perhaps facilitating peace with the Palestinians. Each of these measures separately is fairly minor and will make little difference to “reality on the ground” as Israelis like to say. Together, though, they mean putting more obstacles in front of any hope, however vague and however remote, of one day reconciling Israelis and Palestinians or at least preventing hostilities between them from escalating.

Perhaps more than at any other time in the past, Netanyahu himself seems to be aware of these problems and worried lest they alienate not just some of Israel’s supporters abroad but some of Likud’s voters as well. Presumably that is why starting almost immediately after the elections, he has been working furiously to postpone their implementation as much as he can; and anyone who knows Netanyahu knows that, with him as with any other number of politicians in any number of countries, postponement is often equivalent to rejection.

Both abroad and at home, many people dislike Netanyahu. If not for his policies then for his arrogance, his penchant for living it up at the expense of others, his tendency to make promises without any intention of keeping them, and his meddlesome wife who, at time, gives the impression of being half demented. Still at the moment he seems to be the only one who can hold Israel’s extremists at bay, more or less. Should he fail—and he is not getting any younger—then the following verses may very well apply:

There once was a lady of Riga

Who went for a ride on a tiger.

They came back from the ride

With the lady inside

And a smile on the face of the tiger.

Guest Article: The Greatest Danger

Posted on January 5, 2023 by Martin van Creveld

William S. Lind*

An article in the December 9, 2022 Wall Street Journal brought some rare good strategic news about the war in Ukraine. It seems that a few of Ukraine’s allies understand that a complete Russian defeat could bring about the dissolution of the Russian state, and that this represents the worst possible outcome.

The Journal article, “Ukraine Minister Urges Bold Support from Western Allies,” reports that:

Ukraine’s foreign minister called on the country’s allies not to fear a possible breakup of the Russian state as a consequence of the war. . .

Though Kyiv’s Western allies are united over the goal of preventing a Ukrainian defeat, not all embrace the objective of a full-blown Ukrainian military victory. . .

Some of these allies worry that such an outcome could destabilize the nuclear-armed Russian state, potentially leading to its fragmentation and wide-scale unrest, with unpredictable global consequences.

The Journal article does not identify the states that are expressing this concern, but hurrah for them. They are daring to inject a note of realism into a policy world dominated by Washington’s neo-Wilsonianism, which has already led to the destruction of several states, including Iraq, Syria, and Libya. These (undoubtedly European) governments expressing their concern about a potential Russian break-up seem to have grasped the central fact of the 21st century strategy, namely that a state collapse is a greater danger than state bad behavior. Europe would be facing fewer problems today if Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, and Libya were all functioning states ruled by tyrants.

As I have written many times, state collapse is the greatest danger we face and it is spreading. We may be witnessing it in Iran. I too would be happy to see the fall of Iran’s Islamic theocracy and the return of the young Shah, who’s father it might be remembered, was overthrown because he tried to modernize his country. But if the result of the ayatollah’s demise is a collapse of the Iranian state, which is a fairly fragile state because much of the population is non-Persian, then we are better off with the theocrats.

China, too, is facing unprecedented disorder, largely because of misgovernment by Xi Jinping. He botched the coronavirus problem (which probably started in a military lab in Wuhan that was tasked with developing biological weapons), collapsed the Chinese real estate market which is where most middle-class Chinese stashed their savings, and then rewarded himself with an unconstitutional third term. A more effective assault of the legitimacy of Communist Party rule is difficult to imagine. But as Washington delights in China’s problems, it forgets that China’s history is one of internal disunion, civil wars, and prolonged periods of warring states. Mix that with nuclear weapons and, as with Russia, it should be clear that stabilizing the Chinese state is a primary strategic objective. Of course, all the Wilsonians do is bleat more pathetically about “democracy” and “human rights.”

That is unrealism Washington may pay for heavily. If Russia or China break up into stateless regions, the world economy will tank the way it did in the 1930s, or worse. America will not escape a second Great Depression. If Washington’s folly results in nuclear weapons hitting American cities, the Blob (the foreign policy establishment) will find itself out of work if not hanging from lampposts.

America is deeply riven over irreconcilable cultural differences, to the point where all that holds it together is a seeming prosperity – seeming because it is built on ever-increasing levels of private and public debt. When the inevitable debt/financial crisis hits, that alone may endanger the American union. Add a weakening or vanishing of states around the globe and the 21st century could end up a repeat of the 14th century.

Let us hope those European states worrying about the potential break-up of the Russian Federation don’t lose their nerve.

Addendum: The recent “coup attempt” in Germany will go down in history as the “Clown Putsch.” Not only did the idiots behind it think a couple dozen men could overthrow the German state, they imagined they could put Prince Henry of Reuss on the Imperial German Throne. Every legitimist, monarchist and Reichsburger knows that the throne belongs to the head of the House of Hohenzollern and no one else. When Germany again becomes a monarchy, it will be through constitutional means and it will reflect a broad consensus among the German people that they want a Kaiser.

* This article has been posted on 22 December 2022 at TraditionalRight