The Daily Escape:

First Snow, Cedar Breaks NM, UT – October 2023 photo by Dawn A. Flesher

America is all a-twitter over whether we are going to continue to fund Ukraine. The basic argument NOT to fund them going forward is how expensive it is, and how the money could be better used at home. Paul Krugman disputes this:

“In the 18 months after the Russian invasion, US aid totaled $77 billion. That may sound like a lot. It is a lot compared with the tiny sums we usually allocate to foreign aid. But total federal outlays are currently running at more than $6 trillion a year, or more than $9 trillion every 18 months, so Ukraine aid accounts for less than 1% of federal spending (and less than 0.3% of GDP. The military portion of that spending is equal to less than 5% of America’s defense budget.”

Wrongo isn’t saying that $77 billion is chump change. But if the MAGA types making the argument to spend it at home instead of in Ukraine would actually agree to increasing social spending with it, they’d have a solid argument. But that’s doubtful. It’s difficult to see them agreeing to spending anywhere near that level to improve the economic distress of America’s middle class and poor.

One thing that thinking about this expense highlights is just how expensive our military hardware has become. Take the F-35 fighter jet, which cost about $80,000,000 each. Air and Cosmos International reports that the maintenance costs for the F-35 are $42,000 per flight hour. And it’s reported that only about 26% of all F-35s are “available” at any point in time, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

It’s maybe an unfair comparison but think about how many drones Ukraine could purchase with one hour’s operating expense of one F-35, or with one of the bombs it carries, which cost about $500,000 each. One hour of F-35 operating expense equals about seven switchblade drones. The smallest Switchblade model fits in a backpack and flies directly into targets to detonate its small warhead. Each F-35 bomb’s cost is equivalent to around 90 drones.

America’s military strategy is based on air superiority, followed by massive bombing sorties and artillery fire. The big lesson in Ukraine is that piloted aircraft have been mostly irrelevant. Russia has many more and newer aircraft, and although they’ve bombed much of Ukraine, they haven’t gained an advantage as a result. Basically they’re using jets to launch missiles from positions beyond the range of Ukraine’s Stinger and Patriot missile systems.

Similarly, Russia’s navy hasn’t been decisive vs. Ukraine. Russia has the advantage at sea, while Ukraine’s ancient fleet is bottled up. But Ukraine is managing to ship (some) grain because the Russian navy is hiding from Ukraine’s cheap naval drones.

Ukraine isn’t breaking through Russia’s lines because its military, like Russia’s military, isn’t fit for the purpose. The artillery-based stalemate on the ground would favor Ukraine if it wasn’t for the in-depth layering of land mines by the Russians in the Ukrainian territory that the Ukies are trying to retake.

The days when Russia could advance into Ukraine under a screen of artillery fire, as they did during the first summer of the war, are over. Ukraine is the one advancing now. From Mark Sumner:

“Over the past several months, Russia tried to make advances at Svatove, quickly capturing a series of villages. That attack fizzled within days, and a week later Ukraine recaptured all the territory it had lost. Something similar happened at Kupyansk, where Russia was reportedly massing over 100,000 troops to drive Ukraine back across the Oskil River. Ukraine is still on the east side of the Oskil, and still in Kupyansk.”

At the moment, Ukraine appears capable of successfully capturing areas it targets and holding them against subsequent Russian assaults.

That’s not to say that the militaries built by the US, NATO, China and Russia are useless. Obviously, they have great value. But it’s clear how capital intensive warfare has become. Ukraine is showing us that there is an evolution in military tactics underway right in front of us.

In Ukraine, drones—both aerial and aquatic—have reached a critical mass. They are demonstrating widespread capabilities that make some traditional weapons systems take on more limited roles. And the immediate future in the Ukraine/Russian war will be drone warfare.

Any military in the world will become somewhat obsolete particularly in a land war, without a robust drone and anti-drone program. All are working feverishly to get there. Except perhaps for Turkey, who’s Bayraktar drones are already exported to both sides in the Russia-Ukraine war.

In Ukraine, drones have redefined the front lines. Before, we generally regarded the front line as the area where the infantry of both sides were engaged. But if soldiers with drones and a smart phone can project force sufficient to stop a tank 4-5 miles away, and then pick up another $1,000± drone and do it again a few minutes later, where’s the real front line?

This and more can be done with precision weapons like HIMARS at even greater ranges. But that requires more expense, more setup, and greater levels of support. There’s a vast logistical train behind a weapon like a mobile HIMARS launcher.

Going back to Napoleonic times, artillery has always been called “the king of battle”, because there’s no real defense against it once it’s firing. But this old artillery officer can tell you that it comes with those pesky logistics problems and much more expense and training.

In contrast, what’s needed to support a DJI quadcopter is in the hands of the operator. Early in the war, drones were performing roles that formerly were played by traditional aircraft. Now they’re also performing the roles of artillery and mortars. They are precision systems that deliver value at not just a lower price, but with fewer burdens of transport, maintenance, and training.

Like Ukraine, Russia has a lot to gain from drones since they bypass the two things that Russia does badly: logistics and training. You don’t need to get a million shells to the front lines if you can get a hundred thousand drones—and better than half of them will hit their target.

Drones can’t replace much more of the military equipment in the field, because the legacy equipment still has a big edge in both range and destructive power. But the cost-benefit ratio of drones is incredibly favorable. As battery technology continues to improve, the destructive power of drones will go up without significant incremental development cost.

What we’re seeing in Ukraine is the 2020s version of the asymmetric warfare that killed us in Vietnam and Afghanistan. Guerilla tactics on their home turf were more valuable than all of our expensive weapons systems.

And Russia is getting their ass kicked by the same kind of asymmetry in Ukraine today.

(Many thanks to Brendan K. for his input to this column)