Today, it is quite popular for war bloggers and even military and government officials to laud the future of warfare as one commanded solely by technology. While there is a good bit of truth to this, it is necessary to understand the importance of legacy warfighting systems and the infantryman on the ground as anyone other than a casual observer. If the US wants to maintain its military supremacy, it must maintain a doctrine that supports the warfighter at the end of the day, and technological investments must be paced with the current state of warfare.
There is one simple truth from which all military strategy must be based: in conventional warfare, the capture of enemy positions and population centers is how militaries win wars. All else must be subjugated to this concept and work to support it. In clearer terms, there must be soldiers who occupy physical positions. Technology alone assists in the process, but does not supplant it. An obvious modern-day example of this is the war in Ukraine. Facing a serious technological disadvantage, the Ukrainians were able to fend off Russian troops who had the advantage of prior cyber-attacks and missile and air barrages. These advantages alone clearly did not win the battle as Russia suffered humiliating defeats at the onset of the war, a symptom of an overzealous and overconfident Russian leadership. While poor tactics and training certainly played their own role in the early defeats of the Russian military, there is an important lesson to be learned: war, even in the 21st century, was shown not to be a battle simply of who had the technological advantage.
On the contrary, and after months of battlefield defeats, the one piece of equipment the Russians as well as Ukrainians seem to need most is artillery shells, and millions of them. Just last summer, as Russia was fending off Ukrainian advances, the Russian military was firing 20,000 shells per day. This is an inconceivable amount and one the US is not prepared to handle. By October of 2025, the US will have the capability to produce, at best, 100,000 shells per month. That would be enough for five days of fighting, assuming the vast majority fired are 155mm shells. The disparity between what would be needed in a hot war and what the US is capable of producing is staggering.
The alarms for some of America’s allies are even more panic-inducing. As of 2023, the United Kingdom had 212 artillery pieces. The Russians are reported to be losing hundreds of artillery pieces every month. Germany doesn’t fare any better than their English friends with a mere 20,000 rounds of high explosive artillery shells left in their inventory. The gap between what is needed, what is had on hand, and what our focus has been for the past two decades is massive.
Compare artillery to the new usage of FPV drones in Ukraine. How effective are they really? If we went based off of what we see online, it would be taken for granted that drones are playing an outsized role in the course of battle. This though, doesn’t appear to hold consistent. According to the Ukrainian military, drone attacks of this style are having mixed results. The accuracy is reportedly sitting at about 50% for an FPV drone, and can take 10 or more drones to destroy a tank. These drones also require the user to be in much closer proximity to the enemy and with limited obstacles obstructing signals compared to conventional means. This doesn’t take into account signal jamming and other countermeasures to drone attacks such as netting that can be employed to disrupt their effectiveness.
To clarify my position, I am not suggesting we return to fighting on equal grounds as our adversaries and allow our technological advantages slip away. Instead, the US must be more focused and realistic in its approach to investments in military technology as well as the aid it renders to countries around the world.
A relevant and important example is Taiwan. Facing both a numerical and technological disadvantage to the Chinese, US military and policy makers have for a long time debated the best way to support the Taiwanese in their ability to resist a full-scale Chinese invasion. For a long time and even into the present, the US has given Taiwan advanced technology that we as a superpower value such as new models of the F-16V. The glaring issue with strategic decisions like these is survivability. What are the chances these aircraft would survive an initial Chinese missile and artillery attack? And even if they can get into the air, how long will they survive against Chinese fighters and air defense systems? Numerically, they are at a massive disadvantage with Taiwan operating approximately 384 fighters and China at about 1,900 fighter aircraft. Is it then useful for the Taiwanese to continue buying more fighters or should they instead exploit the one advantage they do have in a potential conflict with China which is their geographic situation? Mobile systems that do not have to be in static prepositioned locations give the Taiwanese their best odds at successfully repelling Chinese attacks. Weapon systems such as the Stinger, HAWK, and Patriot systems have all proven to be effective and are much harder to destroy than fixed position counterparts or those that must be positioned at airfields.
As for the US, while we are more interested in maintaining our technological advantage, ensuring what we employ and invest in remains important. While potentially useful, what do self-steering bullets accomplish that a normal round doesn’t, especially when considering the cost? Advanced technology must have use cases that address the current strategic problems facing the US.
Returning to drones, it would be foolish to suggest they have no use case in the future of warfare. However, we must be more selective and intentional with the drone technology we invest in as drones cannot replace every function on the battlefield. For instance, sea drones do in fact seem to have an outsized impact on the battlefield, especially for the military at a technological disadvantage, and have proven their worth especially when considering the cost of their targets which could be hundreds of millions of dollars and are not easily replaceable. A second drone technology being tested by the Marines are low profile semi-submersible logistics drones that would be capable of resupplying isolated forward positions. These technologies also have legitimate use cases in subverting naval blockades by adversaries as they would be very difficult to detect and destroy. Finally of course is drones being used as tools of surveillance and an extra set of eyes. This has become standard practice for drone investment and should continue to be an area in which we invest to better the technology we already have.
The aspect these technologies all have in common is that they support the warfighter and have a measurable impact on warfare as a whole. They are an extension of a soldier and do not attempt to supplant technology that is already vital and in low supply. They balance the need for new technology to work in tandem with the old and are certainly worth exploring in more detail. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan must not cloud the vision of US policymakers on what the future of warfare holds. It will be a mix of the new and old; to succeed, we must understand this: Without the infantryman, the drone is useless; but with the drone, the infantryman becomes unassailable.
