urban warfare soldiers view

9MILITARY REVIEW January -February 2005

THE AMERICAN DEFENSE establishmenthas grown up in a big-war culture where big

threats were met with big-ticket programs. Yet,throughout the Cold War era in Korea, Iraq, Afghani-stan, and elsewhere real soldiers were compelled tofight unpleasantly real wars against enemies whowatched the battles carefully. These enemieslearned with each combat encounter that the surestway to gain advantage is to negate American big-war technologies by moving the fight into complexterrain such as jungles, mountains, and most recently,cities. The enemy’s plan is simple and effective: lureAmerican forces into terrain where Information-Ageknowledge, speed, and precision give way to themore traditional warfighting advantages of mass, will,patience, and the willingness to die.

These enemies realize they will never effectivelydevelop, integrate, and employ sophisticated weap-ons systems. A tradition of tribalism within Islamicmilitaries impedes their ability to create large, cohe-sive, well-bonded, structurally sound fighting orga-nizations. They are willing to accept that they canbest achieve success against the United States byfighting in small, relatively untrained groups using In-dustrial-Age weapons such as rocket-propelled gre-nades (RPGs) and assault rifles.

In Somalia, Lebanon, and Iraq, the enemy alsolearned that America’s vulnerable center of gravityis dead American soldiers. Thus, killing Americanshas gravitated from merely a means to an end toan end itself, and the most efficient killing ground isin cities, where urban clutter allows the enemy tohide. Familiar terrain, the presence of supportingpopulations, and a useful infrastructure gives the en-emy the advantage of sanctuary in the midst of theoccupying power, an advantage impossible to achievein open terrain. He can literally hide in plain sightand become indistinguishable from the indigenousurban masses that shield, protect, and sustain him.

Recent experience also suggests urban warfarewill challenge the American military for many de-cades to come. The complexity of the challenge willonly grow as cities in developing countries (theMiddle East in particular) continue to gather in thepoor and disaffected. Removed from traditional cul-tural, religious, and social bonds that hold their ag-gression in check, restless young males will add morehuman kindling to the growing fires of urban, fun-damentalist insurgencies.

A city is the greatest challenge to any tacticalforce. In cities the red zone—the space separatingfriendly from enemy forces—compresses. The zoneis often thousands of meters in open battle, but onlytens of meters in the urban maze of densely aggre-gated buildings, streets, and back alleys. The tradi-tional advantages of fighting outside the red zone dis-appear as cities compel soldiers to fight the enemyclose. The compartmented nature of the urban junglefragments forces. Short lines of sight limit the ef-fective ranges of organic weapons and allow theenemy to “hug” U.S. forces, obviating the effectiveuse of precision-guided weapons launched fromaerial platforms. Compartmented urban terrain less-ens to a significant degree the advantages of supe-rior situational awareness and electronic-communi-cations dominance.

Soldiers and Marines fight and occasionally die inbrutal, close, and intimate tactical combat in cities,and every tactical action has strategic consequences.Each time a soldier or Marine dies, the United Statesloses another bit of strategic initiative, and probabili-ties for success diminish. Each soldier’s death raisespublic clamor to bring U.S. soldiers and Marineshome. Only a fool would conclude the enemy is un-aware of these connections.

If dead soldiers are America’s most vulnerablecenter of gravity, putting aside for a moment the hu-manitarian aspects of the issue, it seems obvious the

Urban Warfare:A Soldier’s View Major General Robert H. Scales, U.S. Army, Retired

10 January -February 2005 MILITARY REVIEW

welfare of our soldiers should be the number-onepriority for defense planners and policymakers. Per-haps it is a number-one priority, but nothing in today’spolicies, budgets, priorities, and strategic doctrine sug-gests this is the case.

Let us be clear about who does the dying. Sincethe end of World War II, four out of five Americandead have been infantrymen—not just soldiers andMarines—but infantrymen. Infantrymen constituteless than 5 percent of all servicemen, but they dovirtually all the killing and dying. The United Stateshas not suffered a single soldier death from enemyair action since Korea and none from enemy seaaction since World War II. The last serious air-to-air combat action was Linebacker II in 1972. Thelast major ship-to-ship action was in Leyte Gulf in1944. The last soldier to die in action died yester-day.

Remembering how small, undemanding, andunderserved our population of infantrymen really isis important. America’s treasure-house of close-com-bat soldiers is only marginally larger than the NewYork City Police Department. Every Army and Ma-rine infantryman, tanker, and Special Forces soldiergathered in one place would not fill FedEx Stadium.These men (and they are virtually all men) comepredominantly from the white middle class with adisproportionately small representation of minorities.While motives to join the warrior ranks vary, the de-

sire of each soldier to prove himself in hazardouscircumstances is common. In sum, close-combatsoldiers do not choose to join the services for themoney or to get an education.

Russian dictator Vladimir Lenin reportedly saidthat in war “quantity has a quality all its own,” in-ferring that technology, training, and leadership canonly do so much to overcome the inherent advan-tage that mass brings to battle. Close combat hasalways been manpower-intensive. Technology canmake the job safer and more efficient, but the battleand the enemy set the standards for density on thebattlefield. As a rule, the more complex the terrain,the greater the number of soldiers required to fightthere. Cities are notorious for soaking up great quan-tities of soldiers.

The small number of close-combat soldiers andMarines in the Armed Forces today is all the moredifficult to justify given the fact they have skills thatcannot be bought off the street or contracted out.In virtually every conflict since the end of WorldWar II, a shortage of first-rate, professional infan-trymen has threatened the success of military cam-paigns. A protracted campaign drains the supply of“intimate killers,” prompting the inevitable response:quicken the training, hasten the building of units, andreplace those killed or wounded in combat. The re-sult of such haste and lack of foresight is a tragicincrease in needless deaths and maimings.

Soldiers watch over a traffic control pointnear the Fallujah suburb of Al Kharma, Iraq.

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Comparing the costsfor equipping warriors inthe services reveals a di-chotomy. A first-rate pi-lot takes several yearsand at least $8 million totrain, and he fights witha weapon that costs be-tween $50 and $150 mil-lion. Many infantrymengo into close combatwith about 4 month’spreparation, and the to-tal cost for equippingthem is considerably lessthan $100 thousand. Yet,infantrymen die everyday, while fighter pilotsare rarely seriouslythreatened. Today thereare fewer Marine andArmy infantry squadsthan first-line fighter aircraft in active service.

This state of affairs has been accepted becauseof a belief that distant fires and strategic intelligenceso attrit an enemy that a close fight between op-posing close-combat forces would be uneven andanticlimactic. However, recent experience conclu-sively proves this premise no longer holds. Scienceis not responsible for shaping the premise; the en-emy is. He has adapted his style of war to draw usin close to the point on the battlefield where big sci-ence yields to small science. He has developed anoperational fighting doctrine that greatly reduces hisvulnerability to being killed from great distances. Hiseffectiveness begins at the point of contact and di-minishes quickly beyond the red zone.

To gain a fresh perspective on the Nation’s mili-tary needs, we must look at warfare from the bot-tom up (metaphorically at least) by walking point inBaghdad or Fallujah in the company of those sol-diers and Marines who do most of the dying. Bythinking about their tasks from the ground up we canbetter appreciate what they consider important. Bywatching close-combat soldiers in action, we canconnect what they do at the tactical level to strate-gic essentials. What should we do to allow close-combat soldiers and Marines to succeed in today’snew, dangerous, and obscure era of warfare? Howcan we put American technology, intellect, and or-ganizational abilities to work to ensure the safety andsuccess of the young people who perform these dif-ficult jobs?

Initiatives for Close CombatInitiatives for Close CombatInitiatives for Close CombatInitiatives for Close CombatInitiatives for Close CombatSeveral initiatives are likely to help close-combat

soldiers win and survive in direct tactical engage-ments. The key word is “direct.” Remember the sta-tistics cited above and focus on who does the realfighting and killing. We begin at the intimate, viscerallevel where direct killing takes place and the scienceof war gives way to myth, anecdote, and supposi-tion. Gradually, we will elevate our aim and evalu-ate less-direct factors. We must keep in mind thatthe farther we move from the firing line, the lessrelevant systems are to the warrior’s needs and themore expensive they become.

Knowledge of the enemy. In urban operations,the one commodity a close-combat soldier or Ma-rine demands most is knowledge of the enemy wait-ing around the street corner in ambush. Strategicsystems such as orbiting satellites, high-flying drones,and aircraft can sometimes pick up the presence ofsuch an intimate, immediate threat but they have nomeans for getting information to the soldier in timefor him to act on it. The close-combat soldier mustfind the enemy the old-fashioned way—by expos-ing himself to fire to flush out, spot, fix, and kill theenemy.

The close-combat soldier gets advance warningprincipally through reconnaissance by scouts who put“eyes on” the objective to verify the enemy’s pres-ence. Occasionally, back-alley payoffs to snitchesand spies augment reconnaissance. Crowded citiescompound the difficulties in finding an enemy who

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Marines and sailorstend woundedMarines in Fallujah,November 2004.

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hides in plain sight by blending in with the popula-tion. Often, the enemy uses civilians as shields and,on occasion, sacrifices them to American firepowerto gain a psychological advantage.

While technology can help the soldier find the en-emy in the close fight, soldiers have long sought adevice that displays in real time all threats in theirproximate area—information from all sources, stra-tegic to tactical, filtered so they receive only infor-mation pertaining to the immediate situation. In two-dimensional, urban warfare, the enemy has theinformation advantage because of his intimateknowledge of the terrain and the help he receivesfrom civilians. Our soldiers will regain the informa-tion advantage only by making the fight three-dimen-sional. Looking down from a low air perch usingaerial drones or hovering aircraft can even the oddsby allowing the soldier or Marine to see behind streetcorners and into buildings. The enemy can hide in-side urban structures, but aerial dominance robs himof the ability to move about freely and mass.

Astronomers learned the value of linking radiotelescopes into a cohesive array to gain a greaterresolution of objects than that achieved by individualtelescopes. The technique applies to tactical war-fare as well. Available technology can link soldiersso each is a sensor in a field of sensors that collec-tively becomes an expansive sensor array. Such a

field’s detailed ground’s-eye view of the battlefieldwould yield a resolution and definition of the enemyunprecedented in modern warfare.

Maintaining contact. Colonels and generals relyon sophisticated command and control systems tohelp orchestrate the battle, but soldiers and Marinesin close-combat units still require some system tohelp them maintain contact with each other and theirsuperiors. The urban battlefield is lonely and intimi-dating. Enemies appear everywhere, often in unfore-seen circumstances, and buddies within a squadronare often out of touch with each other. Rifle squadsmust rely on eye contact, hand-and-arm signals, andshouted commands. These soldiers should have asystem of virtual touch to give them the confidenceto fight effectively without having to gather in vul-nerable groups.

Leaders at the squad level should also be able tosee their soldiers virtually. Individual monitors at-tached to every soldier could keep a leader informedof each soldier’s position. Combat polygraphs relay-ing biofeedback information could provide informa-tion about a soldier’s physical and emotional condi-tion and help squad leader decide which soldiers arebest prepared emotionally to perform specific com-bat tasks. Collectively, data would tell higher com-manders when a small unit reached its emotional,physical, and psychological point of exhaustion.

Stryker Brigade soldiersprepare to enter andclear a house during ajoint operation with theIraqi National Guard.

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In a perfect world, soldiers or Marines walkingpoint should be able to read their commander’s tac-tical intent. If we expect tactical leaders to makestrategic decisions when alone, they should be givena window on their commanders’ decisionmaking pro-cesses. The essence of indirect leadership is theability of subordinates to observe and become partof the decisionmaking process as plans develop andchange. A device that allows soldiers to listen to andadd to command and staff discussions would givethem a window on their leaders’ thinking and helpthem understand the intent and logic behind orders.

Signature reduction. During the Persian GulfWar, close-combat soldiers succeeded in large mea-sure because they “owned the night.” Light-intensi-fication and infrared night-vision devices allowed sol-diers to consistently engage the enemy without beingseen. Recent experiences in Afghanistan and Iraqsuggest the American advantage in fighting at nightis eroding, particularly in urban combat. Middle East-ern cities are dense and cluttered. Streets and dwell-ings are often brightly lit, eliminating any advantageaccrued from wearing night-vision devices. Light-intensification technologies are now available world-wide. Even the poorest insurgent can avail himselfof these devices by buying or stealing them. In thefuture, we must own more than just the night. Smallunits should be able to hold the spectral advantageacross a much broader span of the sensor spectrumfrom visible light to infrared, and they must own itabsolutely—even when urban noise, light, and close-ness degrade these advantages.

Close-in killing. The closer technology movesto the firing line, the less useful it becomes. The lastmile of the battlefield has always been a place ofmystery, folklore, and misunderstanding. Historically,our enemies have (proportionately at least) paidgreater attention to their soldiers’ effectiveness whenfighting close. American close-combat weapons,principally small arms and antitank guns and missiles,have sometimes been inferior to the enemy’s. Thelast original U.S. Government design for a small armwas the 1903 Springfield rifle, which was essentiallya knock-off of the German Mauser designed 7 yearsearlier. All other American small arms were eitherdesigned by private citizens or purchased abroad.With the possible exception of night-vision devices,Global Positioning Systems, and shoulder-fired mis-siles, an American infantryman has no appreciabletechnological advantage in a close battle against eventhe poorest, most primitive enemy.

We must give our soldiers the same overwhelm-ing dominance in killing the enemy inside the red zone

that airmen, sailors, and Marines have. Weapons ontanks and other armored vehicles are effective fromabout 50 to 200 meters—the ranges most likely tobe encountered in the urban fight. The challenge isto give that lethality to dismounted soldiers, who arethe ones most likely to engage in firefights. The U.S.military needs new small arms that are highly lethaland easy to wield inside urban spaces. Soldiers andMarines need the ability to shoot first in surprise en-gagements using some form of reflective sighting.They need a system that can kill the enemy behindwalls or around corners. A soldier-portable weaponthat can detonate over the enemy’s heads would behelpful, as would a light, wall-buster weapon that killsan enemy inside urban structures.

Protection. Too many soldiers and Marines dieneedlessly because they enter tactical fights with-out adequate protection. What threatens them themost? Since the end of World War II, the greatestkillers of American close-combat soldiers have beenmortars and small arms. In the Global War on Ter-rorism (GWOT), the weapons most feared areRPGs and roadside bombs. The RPG is a simple,diabolical weapon the Germans developed duringWorld War II and the Soviets adapted to give in-fantrymen a chance against enemy armor. As itsname implies, the RPG is nothing more than a gre-nade detonated by a piezoelectric contact fuze andpropelled from an iron tube by a small rocket. Oursoldiers are most afraid of simple roadside minesbecause of their unpredictability and the horrific ef-fect they have on the body.

Recent experience in Iraq reinforces the truismthat in limited wars a mounted soldier’s chance ofdying in the close fight is less by almost an order ofmagnitude than that of a soldier fighting on foot. Ar-mored vehicles are particularly useful when fight-ing in cities. A layer of relatively impenetrable steelprevents all but the most powerful explosive devicesfrom causing harm. Speed of movement and theability to carry communications equipment andweapons gives mounted soldiers dominance in anencounter with back-alley thugs armed with RPGs,mortars, and automatic weapons.

The enemy and circumstances demand that somefighting be done dismounted. Exposed soldiers mustbe better protected, and the best protection is a shieldof knowledge. If a soldier knows with relative cer-tainty what or who is behind the next building, heneeds little additional protection. But, in the GWOT,as in past wars, if he so chooses, the enemy willfind ways to restore the fog of war. There are noguarantees of perfect situational awareness for even



the best-informed soldier walking point in the urbanjungle. That soldier will need better personal armorto shield him from small-arms fire at close range.Once in contact, he will require additional means forlimiting an enemy’s ability to maneuver around him.He should be able to engage the enemy without ex-posing himself to fire. Finally, when he opens fire,he must have some ability to discriminate betweenthe enemy and innocent civilians.

Tactical medicine. The survival rate for soldierswounded in combat today is unprecedented, andmore must be done to keep them alive. Our mostvulnerable center of gravity is dead Americans.Timely evacuation of the wounded is the greatestchallenge in urban combat. We must get a woundedsoldier away from the enemy’s close embrace andthrough (or above) narrow streets before he bleedsto death or dies from shock. The enemy’s embraceon occasion foils even the best evacuation efforts.Soldiers fighting in cities will often find themselvesstranded much like the U.S. Army Rangers inMogadishu, Somalia. We must find better ways tostabilize a wounded soldier stranded on the firing line.Perhaps a portable protective wrap could be devel-oped that would reduce a soldier’s heart rate andslow his metabolism for several hours without caus-ing serious injury.

Physical, intellectual, and psychological fit-ness. As the battlefield becomes more uncertain and

lethal, it also becomes lonelier and enormously fright-ening for those obliged to fight close. Most recentAmerican campaigns have been fought in unfamil-iar and horrifically desolate terrain and weather. Wemust pay greater attention to selecting, bonding, andpsychologically and physically preparing close-com-bat soldiers to perform well in this new era of war.Modern science offers promising solutions. Soldierscan be better tuned psychologically to endure thestresses of close combat. Written tests, assessments,role-playing exercises, and careful vetting reducesthe percentage of soldiers who suffer from stressdisorders after coming off the firing line.

The biological sciences offer promise that older,more mature soldiers will be able to endure the physi-cal stresses of close combat for longer periods,which is important because experience supports thatolder men make better close-combat soldiers. Theyare more stable in crisis situations, less likely to bekilled or wounded, and far more effective in per-forming the essential tasks that attend close-in kill-ing.

War is a thinking man’s game. Senior officers re-turning from Iraq and Afghanistan have concludedit is better to out-think than out-equip the enemy.They tell us that wars are won by creating alliances,leveraging nonmilitary advantages, reading intentions,building trust, converting opinions, and managing per-ceptions—tasks that demand the ability to under-

Marines securea truck loadedwith Iraqi soldierswho fired at themduring the U.S.drive to Baghdad.

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stand the changing nature of war. Yet increasingly,military leaders subordinate this ability to the morepressing demands of routine day-to-day operations.Today’s military has become so overstretched it istoo busy to learn at a time when the value of learn-ing has never been greater.

We ask soldiers and Marines to make judgmentsand command decisions that in previous wars werereserved for senior officers. A corporal standingguard in Baghdad or Fallujah can make a decisionthat affects the strategic outcome of an entire cam-paign. In Afghanistan, sergeants decided where todeliver precision munitions. Their decisions had enor-mous consequences for the strategic mission, yet theintellectual preparation of these junior leaders is nomore advanced today than during the Cold War.Thankfully, these soldiers’ innate creativity,innovativeness, and initiative belie their lack of for-mal intellectual preparation. Even so, it seems clearthey could do even better if service institutions edu-cated them earlier and with greater rigor.

Today’s close-combat soldiers or Marines needmore time to develop to peak fighting efficiency thantheir predecessors did. Years, not months, are re-quired to produce a close-combat soldier with theskills and attributes to perform the increasingly moredifficult and dangerous tasks that wait in the future.At least a year is necessary for small units to devel-op the collective skills necessary to fight as teams.

Cultural awareness. The American soldier’shumanity occasionally gets him killed. Many past en-emies have remarked on the naiveté of U.S. sol-diers new to close combat. Thanks to the oceansthat surround the United States, we are relativelywell protected and have rarely faced massive inva-sions or traumatic intrusions into our homeland. Thatexplains why many U.S. soldiers in a firefight at firstdo not believe someone unknown really wants to killthem. American soldiers like to befriend strangersand even enemies. German and Japanese veteranswere astounded at how quickly American soldierssought to bond with them and forgive their aggres-sions once the battle ended. Children in particularwere often the objects of this innate propensity tomake friends.

Unfortunately, the gulf between West and Easthas never been greater than that between Ameri-can soldiers and Iraqis. A barrier of cultural differ-ences between American and Islamic societiesblocks the American soldier’s proclivity to connectwith alien societies. Few soldiers speak Arabic orhave spent any time in Arab countries or even inthe presence of Middle Eastern peoples. Close-com-bat forces cannot again be sent into a tactical envi-ronment where they are forced to fight as completestrangers. In the war in Iraq, Iraq’s strategic centerof gravity is the will of the Iraqi people. Our sol-diers cannot hope to win such a war without better


An Iraqi woman and her childrencover their faces while their house issearched by New York Guardsmen.

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knowledge of how the enemy thinks and acts.Every American soldier should receive cultural

and language instruction, not to make him a linguistbut to make him a diplomat in uniform who has thesensitivity and linguistic skills to understand and con-verse with indigenous citizens on the street. Soldieracculturation is too important to be relegated to last-minute briefings before deployment. The militaryshould devise, monitor, and assess acculturationpolicy as a joint responsibility.

The military spends millions to create urban com-bat sites to train soldiers how to kill an enemy in cit-ies. Urban sites optimized to teach small units howto coexist with and cultivate trust among indigenouspeoples might be equally useful. Such centers couldexpose young soldiers to a simulated Middle East-ern urban crisis, perhaps near a mosque or busymarketplace. Expatriate role-players could incite lo-cal mobs to violence. The services and joint agen-cies, with State Department, CIA, or allied observ-ers calling the shots during an exercise, wouldprovide an interagency and international presence.

Training. The quality of performance amongtoday’s close-combat soldiers is high. Enemy soldiersrun about shooting wildly while American soldiersmove in tightly formed groups and carry their rifleswith fingers outside the trigger wells. No one ques-tions the value of rigorous training, and no one ap-preciates first-rate training more than close-combatsoldiers. They know good training is better than payand benefits because they, more than anyone, un-derstand that first-rate preparation for war is the bestlife insurance they can buy.

Past performance in combat provides no guaran-tees for the future, however. The unforgiving natureof today’s urban battlefield demands a new set ofclose-combat skills. Urban battles are isolated, com-

partmentalized affairs wheresmall units must be self con-tained, autonomous entities thatperform complex tasks withoutexternal help. Soldiers and Ma-rines will have to be proficient inthe many tasks supporting units,such as intelligence, medicine,fire support, and communicationsunits, once performed.

In Vietnam, two-thirds of allsmall-unit combat deaths oc-curred during the first 2 monthsin the field because the train-ing system of that era mass-produced soldiers unprepared forthe complex, difficult task ofclose-in killing. In the future,small units must undergo far

more rigorous precombat conditioning. No unit shouldgo into a shooting situation until leaders as well asfollowers have experienced bloodless battles first.

Soldiers and Marines will also have to transformthemselves from close-combat specialists to provid-ers of humanitarian assistance and social services.Often, they will have to shift between the two op-posite roles several times during a deployment. Suchsoldiers and Marines cannot be mass-produced.Training regimens for tasks such as these might takeyears rather than months. Think of tomorrow’sclose-combat soldiers or Marines as moving fromapprentice to skilled close-combat journeyman un-der the tutelage of master craftsman squad leaders.Taking a close look at its custom of keeping youngMarines in the ranks only through a few deploy-ments before mustering them out might be in theMarine Corps’ best interest. The Corps might findit more productive to keep Marines in the forcelonger.

Small-unit effectiveness. U.S. soldiers are moreeffective than those from other cultures because theyfight for their buddies rather than for fractured ide-ologies, twisted theologies, failed symbols of alle-giance, or discredited leaders. No one disputes thatfighting in cities today demands a great deal moretraining and collective bonding. The isolation inher-ent in urban fighting puts greater demands on smallunits and requires a degree of small-unit cohesionnever before seen in the American military. Asoldier’s bond to his buddy often lasts long after thedanger has passed, sometimes for a lifetime, but littleis known about how to generate this bonding, andcommanders are not terribly skillful at creating con-ditions for it to occur.

The one ingredient all agree is necessary for cre-ating a closely bonded unit is time. The aging of a

Special Forces supple-ment U.S. Embassysecurity during anevacuation of foreignnationals from Liberia.

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good unit, like a good wine, can-not be hurried. Platoons need atleast a year to develop full bodyand character. The Army’s ef-fort to create individual soldierstability is admirable, but keep-ing a soldier stable is meaning-less if he goes into combat astranger within his unit. Perhapswe need to recast the definitionof stability to embrace the cen-trality of small-unit stability,specifically in close-combatsquads and platoons. The pipe-line is long and the probabilityof death is great. Conventionallogic demands that the Armyand Marine Corps create manymore close-combat units, ofwhich we can never have too many.

The challenge for the future is to develop doc-trine and technology to allow small units to regainthe advantage in the close urban fight and defeat adiabolical enemy who owns the home-field advan-tage. To be successful, small units must be able toconnect with each other inside urban canyons, over-come isolation, and mass and concentrate the forceas much as possible. Small units must find ways toextend the red zone to regain the advantage of kill-ing the enemy outside the range of his organic weap-ons. Only after achieving these objectives canAmerican forces enter a city with confidence thatthey will defeat the enemy while incurring lossesacceptable to the American people.

Supply. Paradoxically, as the American way ofwar has become more technologically complex, non-technological stressors on fighting units have grown.Infantry and special operations soldiers in Afghani-stan and Iraq carry far heavier loads on their backsthan soldiers did during World War II. A soldier to-day is virtually a pack animal, carrying as much as120 pounds of gear into the battle area. Even thisload gives him less than 24 hours of sustainability.Batteries alone weigh more than 20 pounds. A close-combat soldier must become unburdened if he is tofight effectively. His needs must be met just whenneeded and in the right proportions.

Aerial vehicles on call can provide dismountedsoldiers in cities with the essentials of close combatby dropping supplies directly to units in contact.Close-combat soldiers must have the discretion toexpend whatever is necessary to win and that re-supply will follow without enemy interference. Onlythen will soldiers and Marines chance unburdeningthemselves and focus on fighting rather than hump-ing loads that inhibit their ability to fight effectively.

External SupportExternal SupportExternal SupportExternal SupportExternal SupportWith the essentials provided, a close-combat

soldier’s need for additional support diminishes inproportion to the cost and proximity of resourcescoming from outside his immediate control. The pres-ence of outside help rarely contributes significantlyto improving soldiers’ circumstances, and we shouldtreat external sources of support with caution. Mostclose-combat soldiers would gladly trade all thebombers and fighters in the universe for the sureknowledge of who is around the next corner.

Firepower. The sources of external killing powersoldiers favor are not the most expensive, sophisti-cated items in the service arsenals. First choice goesto systems the soldier or Marine commands person-ally, such as the low-tech and ubiquitous mortar, aweapon that is both simple and responsive. Next isclose support artillery to respond to calls for fire fromsoldiers in contact. Outside sources of killing powerthat soldiers and Marines prefer are aerial systems.Most favored are older, slower, low-tech killing ma-chines that can deliver intimate killing power, suchas attack helicopters; the ubiquitous, trustworthy, lowand slow-flying A10 attack aircraft; the Marine Har-rier; and the deadly AC130 aerial gunship, deriva-tive of a 1950s-era Air Force transport aircraft.

Whatever the source of killing power, close-com-bat soldiers judge its effectiveness on four crucialcharacteristics: precision, discrimination, proximity,and latency. The precision problem is virtuallysolved. One-meter accuracy is perfectly fine. Theproblems of discrimination and proximity arise fromthe difficulties in placing air-delivered fires on theright target, particularly a tactical, close-in target.Soldiers and Marines might prefer 2-ton bombs forcollapsing bridges and buildings, but big bombs areof little use when the target is small, just around the


82d AirborneDivision soldierssearch a sus-pected weaponsstorage site inAfghanistan.

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corner, and on the move. Smaller, rather than moreprecise, bombs are the necessary next step in weap-ons development if aerial killing power is to meetthe demands of urban close combat.

The ground warrior’s greatest firepower need isa solution for the latency problem. Simply stated, thecloser in the target, the greater the time needed todeliver firepower to kill it. Technology can help solvethis problem, but the greatest impediment to respon-sive fires is bureaucracy. Too many eyes and handsare involved and too many decisions made beforeaircraft are cleared to deliver a weapon to friendlyforces in contact.

Unresponsive firepower systems are taxed mostseverely when attacking targets on the move. Eventhe most advanced bombing system cannot kill anyobject, even a large one, on the move. Of course,the enemy is aware of this weakness and has learnedthe surest way to avoid destruction from Americanprecision is to disperse and hide or keep constantlyon the move. The enemy knows a safe period al-ways follows being spotted because American com-manders and soldiers use that time to choose theright weapon, gain permission to deliver the muni-tion, and decide the proper method to deliver it. Un-fortunately, these impediments lessen the ability ofsupporting fires to kill the most dangerous enemysystems. The task is left to the man inside the redzone using shoulder-fired missiles, tanks, and infan-try fighting vehicles.

Maneuver. The freedom to move about thebattlefield is essential for success in the openbattlespaces and closed urban battlespaces of acampaign. The more quickly a ground force defeatsan enemy arrayed conventionally in the open, theless likely the enemy can retreat into the urbanjungle to establish a cohesive defense there. Imag-ine the consequences if Army and Marine forcesin Operation Iraqi Freedom would have had com-bined armored and aerial-delivered forces to passthrough and over Iraqi forces and surround and en-ter urban areas. Had American forces possessedthat operational speed, the enemy never would havebeen able to create today’s organized havoc insideIraq’s cities, and the task of destroying both thefedayeen and Ba’athist infrastructures would havebeen far easier and considerably less costly in lives.

Sweeping, rapid maneuver in open warfare can

best be accomplished by transporting close-combatsoldiers and Marines in light, swift, armored vehicles.However, the maneuver challenge changes whenrelatively static urban warfare begins. In cities, theenemy can only move about in small groups with-out risking annihilation by fires from aircraft watch-ing overhead. Mounted maneuver allows armoredvehicles to establish a cordon around a city quicklywithout exposing ground soldiers to enemy ambush.The speed of vehicle movement permits smallunits to strike deep into the urban mass to take outcritical targets and return unharmed. The soldier’sgreatest concern when fighting mounted is thedisorientation and isolation he feels once he leavesthe vehicle.

Getting the Proportions RightGetting the Proportions RightGetting the Proportions RightGetting the Proportions RightGetting the Proportions RightBig science and technology produced the world’s

best aircraft, ships, and armored vehicles and arestill essential to the Nation. To neglect these pro-grams now would only encourage other potentialenemies, such as China and perhaps Russia, to re-kindle a needless, fiscally damaging conventionalarms race.

One can also argue that certain aspects of big-war technologies devoted to winning wars at sea,in the stratosphere, and in space provide usefulcapabilities for prosecuting tactical battles in ur-ban jungles. The argument is simple. If you believeevents in Afghanistan and Iraq are anomaliesthat, once ended, are unlikely to be repeated, thentoday’s defense priorities are about right. If, how-ever, you believe the military faces decades of in-tense conflict against active, adaptive, and fanaticalenemies who consider killing soldiers a viable stra-tegic end, then you must agree a rebalancing ofdefense priorities is of utmost importance. Currentevents appear to prove proportions are not right. Wemust adjust priorities immediately to improve thechances of keeping American ground forces alivein the close tactical fight. More resources for indi-vidual soldiers and Marines will mean fewer deathsand maimings. Paying more attention to thosewho do most of the fighting and dying will havestrategic consequences. Limiting the cost of pros-ecuting wars increases the likelihood we canachieve victory at a cost the American people arewilling to accept. MR

Major General Robert H. Scales, Jr., U.S. Army, Retired, is an independent consult-ant for defense matters. He received a B.S. from the U.S. Military Academy and an M.A.and Ph.D. from Duke University. He has served in various command and staff positionsin the United States, Germany, and Korea. With Williamson Murray, he is the co-authorof The Iraq War: A Military History (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003).

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