#6041
#13
The Russia Journal
January 25-31, 2002
Afghan lessons for Russian generals
By ALEXANDER GOLTS
Anyone who follows what top Russian military officials say in the press and
on television has noticed that they suddenly seem to have lost all desire
to comment on the military operations in Afghanistan.
It was a different story when the Americans began their operations. Back
then the top brass was only too eager to predict with a spiteful glee that
the U.S. troops were doomed to fail in a country that had defeated the
armies of the Soviet Union and the British Empire.
Afghanistan seemed to have been specifically invented to teach the insolent
Yankees a lesson. The United States placed its confidence in its
technological superiority, but the Russian generals jumped to point out
that American air power would be useless in Afghanistan where there was
nothing to bomb and where the fanatic Taliban fighters would hide out in
the mountains.
What kind of non-contact war could there be in these conditions? What kind
of "distance-conflict management" could be made to work? The consensus
among the Russian military was that sooner or later the United States would
be forced to begin a large-scale ground operation, and that’s when the U.S.
troops would find themselves mired in difficulties.
These doomsayers in the Russian military were motivated not just by a
dislike of a potential adversary that has become almost second nature after
40 years of confrontation. An American failure in Afghanistan would have
served to help justify the Russian generals in Chechnya. It would have
proven that there are some wars in which heavy losses, a disintegrating
army and a weakened command system are the price to pay for achieving some
higher political aim.
But though they faced a difficult situation, the Americans showed that
speedy victory and minimal losses are possible even in an awkward war. Of
course, new information-gathering technology played an important part in
this victory. The Pentagon launched an unprecedented system of information
support for the operations. Intelligence satellites, AWACS planes and also
pilot-less Globalhawk and Predator aircraft did more than just transmit
vast quantities of intelligence data.
The latest U.S. achievement in military-technological thinking, British
experts say, is that, instead of sending intelligence data back to the
command center, intelligence-gathering planes and satellites sent it
directly to attack aircraft already in the air. According to the Pentagon,
from the moment a moving target such as a column of trucks and armored
vehicles was discovered to the moment it was destroyed, no more than 10
minutes passed. This ability to strike fast seems to have played a major
part in swiftly crushing the Taliban defenses.
While strategic bombers dropped cluster and vacuum bombs on the front
lines, tactical fighters launched from aircraft carriers used "smart" bombs
and missiles to destroy virtually any vehicle moving in the rear. After
several weeks of this kind of bombing the Taliban showed signs of what
American psychological-warfare specialists say is a real schizophrenia-like
state. The Taliban fighters had the impression the U.S. aircraft were
coming after each of them personally, and they ran away.
But the Americans also had to have forces on the ground to consolidate
their successes. Here, the Pentagon used what military analysts call
"surrogate forces" – in this case, the Northern Alliance and Pashtun
detachments active in the south. Both groups were helped by American
special forces – the "green berets" and the Delta anti-terrorist squad.
In the north, they used ultra-modern technology to direct bombs towards
Taliban positions using a laser. This was dangerous work, but quite
straightforward from an operational point of view. As for the American
special forces in the south, their mission can be compared in its level of
difficulty to that of the legendary Lawrence of Arabia almost 100 years
ago, when he persuaded the Arab tribes to rise against Britain’s enemies.
This was a completely new kind of ground operation. No one tried to deploy
tank regiments on Afghan soil, no one stormed Kabul with the help of heavy
artillery, no one covered the country with a network of command posts and
checkpoints. The U.S. army’s entire ground forces amounted to a few hundred
"universal soldiers" able to carry out in-depth intelligence missions,
guide aircraft to enemy targets, reach agreements with the leaders of
rebellious tribes and then coordinate the action of surrogate forces.
Another vital factor in the operation’s success was that the U.S.
leadership set difficult but clear goals for its military. The U.S. armed
forces were to destroy the al-Qaida terrorist organization’s infrastructure
and that of the Taliban regime that supported it, and capture or liquidate
the terrorist leaders, including Osama bin Laden.
Unlike the so-called "humanitarian interventions," the goal of rebuilding
the state system in Afghanistan and creating a new government were seen as
an accessory and not a must-have. From the very beginning Washington made
it clear that American forces would not participate in any peacekeeping
operations in Afghanistan.
It should be no surprise then that Russian generals don’t want to analyze
the U.S. operation in Afghanistan. The bulk of Russia’s arms spending these
days goes to attempts to modernize old tanks and planes. No one has made a
priority of linking these different arms into a single information-attack
system. Instead, the military is going along with what the
military-industrial complex wants and is trying to recreate its Cold
War-era arsenal.
The Russian generals are still trying to build the armed forces using the
Soviet model. Gritting their teeth, they’ve agreed to President Vladimir
Putin’s demands that the country move over to a professional army, but they
still insist that in the event of a future war, they have to have the
possibility of calling millions of people to arms.
In Afghanistan, meanwhile, a few hundred top military professionals carried
out operations on the ground. The U.S. marines were used only to guard
bases and block off areas where operations against al-Qaida were taking place.
Finally, from the very start, the U.S. authorities made it clear their aim
wasn’t to control Afghan territory or establish any kind of order there,
"constitutional" or otherwise. Their aim was only to eliminate those who
hurt the United States.
The U.S. operations in Afghanistan show that, even if Russian military
reform is successful, Russia will still end up with armed forces capable of
winning a past but not a future war.
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