The International Institute for Strategic Studies
Military Balance 2023
Excerpts from the report
The Ukraine war: some early lessons (p. 10-13)
In late 2021 and early 2022, US national-security officials engaged in a series of briefings to Ukrainian and European leaders, relating intelligence assessments about Russia’s intent to mount a full-scale invasion. Intelligence assessments were declassified with the judgement that Russia was planning an attack and that Moscow was plotting to stage a ‘false flag’ attack as a pretext for this. Although for many governments these did not appear to dramatically ‘move the needle’ in the weeks leading up to 24 February, there is a case to be made that such ‘intelligence diplomacy’ strategies may in future gain more traction, not least because of what Russia’s invasion implied about US intelligence penetration of Russian decision-making circles and the accuracy of its assessment in this case. That said, gaining such information may be more difficult elsewhere.
It is unclear whether governments have integrated this rapid declassification process such that it will automatically be employed in the next crisis, or even that they see a requirement for this. Processes have been established that would make it easier to share intelligence assessments and it is becoming easier to share information with trusted partners. Nonetheless, briefings like these, including the declassification of intelligence information and making this available to the public, have value in keeping populations informed and helping to shape narratives. They are particularly valuable when civilians are being asked to endure degrees of hardship because of wars else- were, as in the energy crisis in Europe in the winter of 2022. And they are important when civilians receive information from so many sources, some of varied analytical provenance, that can often provide information faster than governments have tradition- ally been able to, often because they are restricted by classification constraints. Moreover, there has been a wealth of open-source information on the war in Ukraine produced by citizen analysts and private firms, making use of commercially available satellite systems to deliver imagery-based assessments that were until recently the preserve of governments.
Questions of analysis
The war raises other questions relating to military capability assessments, in that Russia’s military power was in many quarters misjudged. A caveat is needed: some elements of the armed forces have been used only sparingly, such as the submarine service, while the strategic-bomber force has for the most part been able to launch its stand-off munitions – even if some of these have appeared to be sub-optimal. However, Russia’s military exercises, for instance, were more scripted than they appeared. This was widely understood to be the case for large-scale strategic exercises like Zapad, but not so much for Russia’s snap exercises – designed to test combat readiness – that had become a feature since Sergei Shoigu became defence minister in 2012. The same goes for Ukraine, where there was generally an underestimation of the capa- bility of its still-nascent non-commissioned officer (NCO) corps and, more broadly, of the fighting potential and ‘will’ of its armed forces and society. This calls for stricter application of structured analyt- ical techniques to avoid cognitive biases like mirror- imaging. But this is challenging when it is difficult to gain access to armed forces and harder still when these forces are themselves deceived by their own reporting. It calls for techniques, possibly including environmental scanning, that could lead to thorough study of societies as well as their armed forces, and for more regular and more qualitative assessments of military capability.
For instance, while Russia has sunk considerable sums into its post-2008 military-modernisation process, it may be that the effectiveness of these investments has been reduced by the impact of Russia’s political culture and of corruption. Alongside poor military and political leadership, further revelations of entrenched corruption in Russia’s armed forces will not help to improve mutual trust. In advanced Western armed forces this is seen as an important factor in helping to enable effective military leadership at all levels. Indeed, the war has highlighted the importance of the human factor in war and reinforced the value of investing in personnel, including the competence of commanders at all levels and adequate individual and collective training, without which investments in equipment can be wasted.
After 2014, Ukraine’s armed forces embarked on a programme to train and professionalise its troops, including the development of a profes- sional NCO cadre. With the support of NATO and individual member states, through vehicles such as NATO’s Ukraine Defence Education Enhancement Programme (DEEP), four areas were addressed for bilateral support from allies: basic training; train-the-trainer courses; the development of a professional NCO career system; and the creation of professional military education systems for NCOs. Reports on the progress of Ukraine’s military reform were in many cases mixed, though the demonstration under fire of Ukraine’s military adaptability and resil- ience indicates not only that more structured analysis would have been helpful here, but also that such reforms can bring results in traditionally hierarchical post-Soviet armed forces. However, it is important to also consider that the impressive performance of Ukraine’s forces has been against a Russian adversary that has proven surprisingly poor, so caution should be taken in judging whether all of Ukraine’s forces have improved to the same degree, or that they have overcome all of the challenges associated with their post-Soviet heritage.
However, in Russia, achieving effective change in this regard will require political will, as well as improvements in education and training. But devolving and encouraging independent decision-making seems to conflict with the type of control and governance that has characterised President Putin’s rule. This may be a risk in other authoritarian states too, perhaps including China, though circumstances are different there (for instance, China has had prominent anti-corruption initiatives), and again, much depends on the quality of the enemy these forces would face. Nonetheless, this is a problem for the Russian armed forces moving forward. The ground forces now need to rebuild while engaged in a high-intensity fight. Many of its most experienced troops were lost in the early months of the war, and it is unclear not only how Russia will address the issue of adequately training and then integrating new troops into existing units, but also whether its military culture can change enough in future so that its troops can become mili- tarily effective against a peer adversary.
Military matters
The war in Ukraine has shown how important it is for armed forces to be able to adapt. Both Russian and Ukrainian forces adapted during combat, though with varying degrees of success. After failing in its initial attempt to seize the country with a dispersed set of multiple axes of advance and an optimistic ‘thunder run’ approach, Russia reshaped its offensives towards the east. Russia’s failure to gain control of the air meant it had to resort to greater use of stand-off weaponry and, towards the end of 2022, to augment these with uninhabited aerial vehicles (UAVs) and direct-attack munitions sourced from Iran. Ukraine, for its part, has also rapidly sourced and used direct-attack munitions and has developed a capacity to fuse information from small UAVs to improve the capability of its artillery forces. It also dispersed its air force and maintained combat effec- tiveness and has also developed a capability to attack Russian targets at-reach using UAVs and missiles. These include the attacks on the Russian Black Sea Fleet flagship Moskva and some of Russia’s strategic- bomber bases, and at closer ranges using direct-attack munitions. Attacks like these have highlighted risks to static locations including supply bases and head- quarters and also troop concentrations; it appears to be increasingly difficult to hide on the battlefield.
The war has also been a stark reminder of the importance of magazine depth, evidenced by high usage rates for guided weapons and artillery ammunition and the severe attrition of armour. It indicates that any future military capability that relies exclu- sively on precision weapons will not only likely be costly, but will also need careful replenishment planning. This may require some production lines to remain open that would otherwise close, and government and industry to work together on suit- able procurement mechanisms. It may also require striking a balance between mass and capability. There is greater concern over supply-chain issues because of the war – concerns which had already been expressed during the coronavirus pandemic. There are now additional concerns relating to sourcing and traceability in the lower levels of the supply chain. Along with interest in supply chain assurance, this is also leading to a reconsideration in some countries over what supply chains and compo- nents may need to be onshored. At the same time, industrial capacity issues highlight potential near- term difficulties in increasing production to replace Western materiel supplied to Ukraine.
Moreover, concerns over supply-chain vulnerabilities form only one aspect of resilience. There is also now greater focus than for decades on the resilience of critical national infrastructure and of societies to state-based threats, including from physical attack as well as from cyber and broader disinformation threats. However, effectively tackling these challenges requires long-term government attention, including in the education sphere, and a joined-up approach within government and between govern- ment, the private-sector business community and broader society.
The war has illustrated the continuing importance of the combined-arms approach to warfare – including the integration of UAV and counter-UAV capabilities into land units, and also how increasingly pervasive surveillance can pose risk for manoeuvre forces. Furthermore, it has highlighted the importance of long-range precision artillery and also the armour versus anti-armour fight. Fitting active-protection systems to armoured vehicles can reduce the threat from anti-armour systems, but not eliminate it. Urban operations have highlighted the continued importance of capabilities, and training, suitable for this terrain. Meanwhile, the war suggests that both unguided and smart ammunition have complementary roles. Large amounts of both conventional unguided ammunition and precision weapons have been expended. Anti-armour weapons illustrate the benefits but also the costs of precision, with concerns expressed not only over whether Ukraine may run out of stocks of Western supplied anti-armour systems, but also about national stocks and defence-industrial capacity in countries that have supplied such systems to Ukraine.
Neither combatant in Ukraine has secured overall air superiority. Ground-based air defence has proved effective in limiting freedom of action and losses have been inflicted, while Russia’s comparative lack of modern short- and medium-range air-launched precision-guided munitions has been exposed. The importance of ISR has also been highlighted, along-side the ability to rapidly distribute information from the sensor to the shooter. And the vulnerability of helicopters to air defences has been apparent on both sides. But while air forces have looked to the war for lessons in 2022, some key developments in aerospace technology have more direct relevance elsewhere. The unveiling in December of the new US strategic bomber, the B-21, was clearly focused on Asia-Pacific contingencies; it was anticipated that China’s next- generation bomber would also be shown. In areas such as combat-aircraft design and manufacture, a problem for Washington’s allies and partners is that its requirements mean its designs will be at a price point that few of them will be willing or able to accept. In turn, this may lead groups of nations to team up in order to deliver advanced capabilities. However, the more diverse their requirements, the harder it will be to produce systems on time that are affordable and able to meet all their needs.
In the maritime domain, Russia’s navy has been embarrassed by Ukrainian tactics, but it was not really configured to face an opponent with very limited naval capability but adept at using naval guerrilla tactics. Rather, it was designed to hold at bay an opponent with significant naval depen- dence. For all the setbacks, Russia was at the end of 2022 still essentially enforcing a distant blockade of Ukraine’s trade. This underscores global energy and resource interdependence, and the importance of maritime trade flows and sea lanes of communication, as well as the potential of blockades. More broadly, for navies as for land and air forces, Ukraine has brought home the need to consider attrition, magazine depth and sustainment ability. It has also brought home the threat of unconventional tactics and emerging technologies, and critical undersea infrastructure vulnerabilities.
Money counts
In the wake of the disruption caused by the corona-virus pandemic, the global economic climate is again fraught. Surging inflation, commodity-price spikes, supply-chain crises and heightened economic uncertainty resulting from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have derailed an economic recovery that, in some countries, was far from complete. Inflation rates increased globally in 2021 as a result of higher energy costs, a recovery in demand and ongoing pandemic-related supply-chain disruptions.
The war had led some countries in Europe to increase their defence spending, and others elsewere to take the opportunity to revise defence strategies. In 2022, around 20 countries in Europe pledged to increase defence spending, with varying degrees of size and immediacy. Nonetheless, the difficult global economic environment that will persist in the short term will impose constraints on public expenditure, not least the higher cost of debt financing in light of increased interest rates designed to curb inflation.
Global defence expenditure grew in nominal terms in 2021 and 2022 but higher rates of inflation meant expenditure fell in real terms in both years. In recent years, high inflation eroded defence spending in real terms in countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, the Middle East and North Africa and Russia and Eurasia, but this trend is now more widespread. Europe and Asia were the only regions globally to continue to exhibit defence-spending growth in real terms in 2021 with Russia and Eurasia joining them in 2022 as war fuelled above-inflation increases in the region.
For some governments, such as those in Europe and Asia, security challenges continue to sharpen even as the value of their defence investments is being undercut. This makes it more important not only to spend wisely and ensure that procurements deliver on time and on budget, but also to see that full use is made of the possibilities deriving from collaborative equipment development and from defence and mili- tary partnerships.
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