A recent video shows Russian soldiers installing anti-drone netting along a supply route, the latest effort to create hardened logistical corridors in Ukraine:
Very interesting. I’m impressed how you (accurately) generalise the problem as relevant to many different historical periods. Drones as an analogy to skirmishers and light cavalry is intriguing.
The Cold War Red Army had the world’s largest and most varied collection of military engineering vehicles and earth movers but I haven’t seen any reports as to how much of this inventory has survived.
I think they still have a ton of inventory (like all that bridging equipment we saw in 2022), the problem is more manning and integration. Would be curious to see how much of the Surovikin Line was done by army engineers vs. contractors.
I’ve assumed for a while that the Russian straight line trenches were mechanically dug out though tactically unsound it makes for more footage of trench dug out in a given time compared to the better zig zag lines (though using the long straight trench may also reflect the absence of large close up fighting for these trenches)
Very interesting. I’m impressed how you (accurately) generalise the problem as relevant to many different historical periods. Drones as an analogy to skirmishers and light cavalry is intriguing.
Thanks, someone on Twitter shared images of something similar from WWI which is pretty interesting:
https://x.com/ThisDayInWWI/status/1889182616483733649
The Cold War Red Army had the world’s largest and most varied collection of military engineering vehicles and earth movers but I haven’t seen any reports as to how much of this inventory has survived.
I think they still have a ton of inventory (like all that bridging equipment we saw in 2022), the problem is more manning and integration. Would be curious to see how much of the Surovikin Line was done by army engineers vs. contractors.
I’ve assumed for a while that the Russian straight line trenches were mechanically dug out though tactically unsound it makes for more footage of trench dug out in a given time compared to the better zig zag lines (though using the long straight trench may also reflect the absence of large close up fighting for these trenches)
I used the same photo of the Russian logistics corridor as part of my discussion on drones this week. Really good deep dive.
https://justinmc.substack.com/p/new-and-emerging-defense-technologies?r=wmnkc
Interesting.