Lessons Learned by British Observers during the first 6 months of the Russian Invasion of Ukraine

 There Is No Sanctuary

The first clear lesson from the war in Ukraine is that the enemy can conduct strikes on targets throughout its adversary’s operational depth with long-range precision fires. Moreover, in target states, the 

• Russians have proven able to retain networks of agents in place to observe key targets and to update their command on the movement of troops and stores. The integration of human intelligence (HUMINT) into Russian long-range precision-fires kill chains is critical. G
• iven that Ukraine has also retained this capability, despite the exigencies of the counterintelligence regime on the occupied territories, it seems unlikely that states can plan on the assumption that they can conceal key sites, or the movement of materiel, from the enemy. 
• The Russians have missed targets because of self-imposed frictions in their kill chains, usually striking too late rather than not at all. Their misses have not been for want of intelligence. 
• The effect of these munitions on targets when they strike them is sufficient to destroy most military objects other than deep subterranean or heavily hardened structures. 
• Non-hardened structures are also targetable by loitering munitions, whose accuracy and affordability make them a persistent and pervasive threat. 

Warfighting Demands Significant Slack Capacity

• The professionalism of the British military and the competence of units is high. Ukrainian troops have found British training invaluable. 
• British weapons have also proven highly effective on the battlefield. High morale, skilled soldiering and significant corporate experience are of limited value in high-intensity warfare without ammunition, however. 
• It is abundantly clear that the British military is woefully deficient in its stockpiles across domains. At the height of the fighting in Donbas, Russia was using more ammunition in two days than the entire British military has in stock. At Ukrainian rates of consumption, British stockpiles would potentially last a week. 
• Of course, given that the UAF fielded more than 10 times as many operational artillery pieces as the British Army at the beginning of the conflict, it might take more than a week for the British Army to expend all its available ammunition. 
• the British Army lacks the firepower to deliver the kind of blunting effect that the UAF achieved north of Kyiv. The oft-cited refrain of the UK Ministry of Defence that these deficiencies are not a problem because the UK fights alongside NATO allies would be more credible if the situation Preliminary Lessons in Conventional Warfighting 56 Zabrodskyi et al. were much better among any of the UK’s European allies. It is not, except in Finland. Nor – as Ukrainian troops discovered to their surprise – are ammunition, charge bags and other essential consumables consistent between NATO artillery systems; there is an inadequate capacity to draw on one another’s stocks

UAS and CUAS Must Be Available Across All Branches and Echelons

• It is also evident that the UK and other NATO members have made mistakes in how they categorise UAS, generate the capability in the force and have governance for their employment.
• Because NATO forces were early adopters of UAS, they have inherited the legacy of earlier generations of system. Early UAS were expensive, complex and often difficult to fly. Thus, specific units were established to be trained to use UAS and considerable investment was put into making the platforms better. 
• Furthermore, because NATO forces have used UAS in an environment where even small numbers of casualties were politically significant, the emphasis has been skewed towards force protection. 
• Since UAS were flying objects, they should be managed as Preliminary Lessons in Conventional Warfighting 58 Zabrodskyi et al. such. In the UK this places permission for launching UAS under the responsibility of the Military Aviation Authority. 
• On NATO exercises careful attention is paid to airspace deconfliction, so that helicopters and UAS, for example, do not find themselves in the same airspace and at risk of collision. 

Fighting for the Right to Precision -EMS warfare

 As indicated in the discussion of UAS above, the experience in Ukraine clarifies some of the critical effects of a contested EMS. 

• Military discourse has – for several years – focused on the problem of EMS denial. Its denial was a major challenge for the UAF in 2014 and 2015. 
• Measures were taken to make the force more resilient. The 2022 invasion therefore provides a better canvas to assess the impact of EW on militaries with appropriately resilient systems, and tactics, techniques and procedures. The effect is not EMS denial. 
• Limitations of power, the tactical necessity to manage signatures and the consequences of EMS fratricide all mean that even forces with large EW capabilities cannot achieve blanket denial across large geographic areas for a sustained period. 
• Denial can be achieved for a short period, or across a limited geographic area. 
• Targeted denial can be delivered for a sustained period over a wide area. 
• However, any kind of targeted denial of bands of the EMS can be evaded through altering frequencies or bearers. 
• The result is that EMS interference and disruption is continual, but denial is limited.   

Disperse, Dig Deep or Move Fast

The concept of dispersion has been at the forefront of British Army discussion since 2015. In general, the importance of dispersion was vindicated by the data from the Russian invasion of Ukraine. 

• Ukrainian infantry companies tend to disperse across a 3-km frontage. Greater concentration often decreases the survivability of units because it begins to make the use of precision munitions and the allocation of ISTAR assets economical in terms of the effect delivered per munition. 
• One important consequence of dispersion is that it increases the tactical commander’s span of control. 
• When combined with the multiple enablers necessary for a formation to be competitive, it is evident that a battalion commander in this conflict is often dealing with a comparable frontage to that traditionally occupied by a brigade, with similar effects in terms of their ability to maintain a physical presence among their troops. 
• Since battalion staffs are not staffed like brigades – and would not be survivable if they were – there is considerable strain placed on company and battalion commanders. 
• The British Army, which tends to put senior personnel within their rank into command positions, is in a reasonable position to handle this challenge. 
• Nevertheless, developing C2 tools to allow beyond-line-ofsight C2 in sub-units is critical. 
• Another challenge for dispersed forces, especially if they must echelon through one another, is identifying friend from foe. 
• Ukrainian troops have tended to sacrifice camouflage for clear identification (using coloured bands) for their manoeuvre forces, relying on speed rather than concealment for survivability.

Conclusion [ of the big monstern link I Just sent you]

First, the war in Ukraine has demonstrated that consumption rates in high-intensity warfighting remain extraordinarily high and that resilience demands a capacity to build new units, produce spare parts and ammunition, and have sufficient stockpiles to remain competitive in the opening phases of fighting. 

At present, it is evident that NATO members other than the US are not in a strong position on these fronts. 

Second, the UAF were competitive against their adversaries not because of superior equipment in the early phases of the war but because they were adaptable – especially at the tactical level – and rapidly innovated new capabilities and concepts of employment to address specific areas of vulnerability where the Russians had achieved overmatch. 

For NATO countries, the critical question therefore is not whether a specific weapons system gives advantage, desirable though this is, but whether a country’s policies, permissions and industrial processes enable the rapid development, experimentation, refinement, acquisition at scale and employment of new systems and tactics. 

• Do personnel at all levels have the permissions to contribute their expertise? 
• Do tactical formations have the capability to procure and test equipment properly?
•  is defence Preliminary Lessons in Conventional Warfighting 65 Zabrodskyi et al. procurement a glacial process that is detached from the development of 
• tactics, 
• techniques
• procedures? 
• A state in the latter position is unlikely to adapt at the speed of relevance. 

Third, there has been abundant debate over whether the war proves the utility or obsolescence of various military systems: loitering munitions versus artillery, or ATGWs versus tanks. T

•  Legacy systems, from T-64 tanks to BM-21 Grad MLRS have proven instrumental in Ukraine’s survival. 
• That does not mean, however, that historical concepts of employment for these systems remain advisable. 
• The correct employment of exquisite capabilities can magnify the impact of cheap and crude equipment. 
•  changes to orders of battle, C2 and novel employment may be necessary. 
• The grouping of armour as a reserve, to be committed under propitious circumstances, for example, may make more sense than its distribution into the leading edge of offensive manoeuvre forces. 
• It is also entirely plausible that the synergies between old and new capabilities shift the balance of requirements for the next generation of armoured platforms. 
• The enduring utility of these tools is not diminished by these changes. In modernising, therefore, forces need to examine how old and new form novel combinations of fighting systems, rather than treating modernisation as a process of deciding what should be procured and what should be discarded.