"World War Three Will Be 'Extremely Lethal And Fast'" Topic

"To envision the wars of the future, first remember those of the distant past, with their soul-numbing artillery barrages and unstinting waves of conventional enemy forces. Then speed up that mental newsreel and imagine a ground war accelerated by artificial intelligence and precision munitions, nested in a larger strategic sphere where everything is moving at Internet velocity.

That's the picture that Army leaders are working from as they try to prepare their force to deter and defeat America's enemies over the next few decades.

The nation faces existential threats from "modern nation-states acting aggressively in militarized competition," said Lt. Gen. Joseph Anderson, Army deputy chief of staff for operations, plans, and training. "Who does that sound like? Russia?" He spoke on a future-of-the-Army panel at the annual meeting of the Association of the U.S. Army in Washington on Tuesday…."
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Amicalement
Armand

If the nation faces existential threats, it needs to stop drinking so mich coffee and listening to Depeche Mode and The Smiths. A bit of excercize wouldn't hurt, either.

Um, WWIII has always going to be "fast and lethal", ever since we all got the Bomb.

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(smile)

Amicalement
Armand

It could be, at least until we run out of ammo, spare parts, and weapons systems.

Then, it'll grind on for a very long time, I suspect, unless one side or the other wins decisiviely. Given the number of "wins" of late, it appears that a long, attritional slog could present itself as well, and the side with the best/only manufacturing base will come out on top.

"Lethal and Fast", I can imagine. However, there has also been a tendency in the modern age to be indecisive as well.

I think a WWIII involving superpowers would be fast and furious at the beginning, but after six months or so, all the shiny toys would be broken and the war would transition more to a slog of conventional warfare.

I also think it would be a war focused largely on the infrastructure and logistics of the belligerents, so despite our capability of performing surgical strikes with smart bombs and cruise missiles, there will be a large number of civilian casualties as we put each other's factories and whatnot out of commission.

And in the end … no one could afford it …

WWIII has always going to be "fast and lethal", ever since we all got the Bomb.

Even without the bomb, modern warfare was going to be 'lethal and fast'. That's been known for a loooong time (at least since the '70s when I was in). The lethality of modern weapons have made the battlefield a far more deadly place than in those halcyon days of WWII.

I think a WWIII involving superpowers would be fast and furious at the beginning, but after six months or so, all the shiny toys would be broken and the war would transition more to a slog of conventional warfare.

That's assuming it lasts 6 months or longer. Damn little chance of that happening. At some point, say, the first moment NATO or Russia feels its losing (about 3-4 days in), someone is going to go nuclear release and then its game over. For EVERYONE…

Are you all joking? You must be or was the Cold War a fantasy, a dream, a nightmare? There is NO comparison between the Cold War and what passes for regional nuclear wars. The CW involved thousands of nukes, inspired scary books and movies such as Fail Safe, The Day After, even Dr Strangelove. What do we get now? WW3 with fantasy Zombies and Clinton/Trump. N Korea is not a substitute for the USSR
There will be no WW3 on the model of NATO v USSR, not even close. Even Tom Clancy couldnt think up one for post USSR

World War III already happened.

What do you think all the proxy wars like Korea, Vietnam, Angola, Mozambique and Afghanistan were?

It wasn't fast and it wasn't, for the most part, lethal for the main protagonists as they used proxies. In Vietnam and Afghanistan they did fight and lose, but they avoided direct confrontation in Europe thanks to deterrence. The west won thanks to a stronger economy and bleeding the USSR white in an arms race it's economy wasn't built for.

WW4 on the other hand? Ideological, dispersed and deadly – happening now.

And let's hope whatever iteration of a World War we are currently in. It won't end like WWII with 50-70 dead.

Well said Legion.

DOH !!!! Errata : That should read 50-70 Million !!!! Damned auto-correct … or I am get early "old timers" disease …

And thanks Gwydion.

Ralph, your posts are so epic that they have errata?? You have truly transcended to a new level!

That's why I stopped gaming 'modern' warfare: if it could be seen , it was dead. (And this was 70's-80's military stuff.)

Father of Logic … That is why is I only game Sci-fi, now. But still study history … And of course 50-70 million are only estimates. I don't think we will ever know for sure. But as I said, what we should know is not to let that sort of thing happen again.

Having served '79-'90 in the Infantry, had WWIII happened … many of us would probably not be here today. Both military and civilian.

Ralph, your posts are so epic that they have errata?? You have truly transcended to a new level!

Oh I hope so !!!!

@Rick

It's deadly serious…

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Right now is as scary as anything that I remember from being a kid.

Legion- you really need to do ultra modern. It has some seriously fun stuff, once you get past the scary side of it.

I used to do ultramodern … but it did get too scary. Did I ever tell you one of my additional duties as a 1LT in the 101, '80-'83 was an Atomic Demolitions Missions Officer ? Very scary indeed …

If it goes nuclear, it certainly will be!

If it remains conventional, which is unlikely, then it will be a fast-burn start with a protracted and progressively dirtier middle game, ending in exhaustion and destruction without any clear winner and just many losers due to the threat of wider nuclear escalation. Chemical weapons, biological weapons, cyber warfare, economic sabotage, and unconventional hybrid warfare will be used to the harm of many.

Ultimately WWIII or its immediate aftermath will be a battle fought on the field of the human mind using propaganda, disinformation and draconian control of populations, if it does not go nuclear. No side will win except those in power who are so cynical that they don't care about the level of human suffering and material destruction which they will cause in the selfish pursuit of their objectives and interests. World War III will end up being a war between the rulers and the ruled, if anyone survives.

Cheers?
Rod Robertson.

I don't think WWIII as envisaged in 1946-1991 period is entirely plausible. NATO is a lot more fragmented and defanged than it was in 1946-1991. The Russians are far less well equipped nor have the resources to expand to USSR level behemoth.

The Chinese are a regional power. They lack the capability for global reach and won't really ever get that judging by the way they're going. They're not just lacking in aircraft carriers but also access to sea and lack the massive logistics transfer systems the US has (aerial transports, large number of transport ships).

Their military is still mainly regional orientated and this isn't really changing.

Even the US doesn't really have the ability to sustain high tempo conventional operations against a higher level opponent.

Given lead times for new weapons production, no one can actually engage in a massive and long war of attrition. New weapons are extremely complicated so have long lead times, especially for electronics. ("We've just burned out 10 years of fighter production in 3 months, now we have to wait 3 years to get new ones.")

I think condensed regionalised wars between major powers are highly likely.

E.g. a limited war between Japan/US versus China over Senkakus or an equally limited war between US and Russia over Baltics or even Ukraine or Syria if a more hawkish US government comes to power.

I suspect these would be "extremely lethal and fast" due to low geographic scope.

Anything with the Chinese would be naval and air action with limited spec ops operating and probably deliberately not on Chinese soil so as to not aggravate the situation.

Anything with Russia would involve conventional forces in quick blitzkriegs conducted by both sides. Bare in mind modern roads make it easy to quickly shift direction of attack and move troops.

The only risk is urban slugfests. Not so much a risk in Asia but a big one in Europe or Middle East.

I don't think nukes would be used in any of these cases. The old powers (USA, Russia) have a reasonable understanding of the implications of a nuclear exchange. The Chinese know they are undergunned when it comes to nukes so would probably want to avoid any nuclear escalation.

Even more likely is Pakistan-India, which could escalate into a tactical nuclear exchange. Apparently both Indian and Pakistani military chiefs view nukes as large artillery and there has not been much embrace in the concept of deterrence nor do their weapons have sufficient yield or numbers to be an effective deterrence (ie no MAD capability).

Major powers have been able to limit themselves before – the American War Of Independence saw Brits fighting French in the Americas but it didn't escalate into a European conflict. Same with Crimean War.