Technology determines tactics: the rapid development of high technology will inevitably lead to great changes in the form of war, which is the law of social production development and the law of human war development. When we look at the forefront of today's high-tech development and overlook the recent wars, we will find that the form of war is undergoing profound changes.
Information dominates the battlefield
People who have been active on the war stage for thousands of years. Always build victory on superior military weapons. However, today, although military weapons are the material basis of war, they have gradually lost their dominant position in the battlefield and will be replaced by information forces based on certain military weapons.
The Gulf War opened the prelude to this transformation. With its powerful information strength, the multinational forces led by the United States gave full play to the advantages of the factory's high-tech weapons and won the final victory of the war.
Command and control. The multinational forces set up a huge computer network system in a short time. The system links all services, participating troops, command levels and operational elements of the Pentagon National Military Command Center to the front command center of the US Central Command through the command center, forming a definite information network. The information power of the front command center of the US Central Command alone has reached 1 more than 1,000 staff officers, 1 more than 1,000 satellite lines of the national defense satellite communication system, 26. Thousands of system software: In the desert storm air raid, multinational forces take off and land 2,000 times a day from more than 30 airports and 6 aircraft carriers in the Gulf, involving air refueling lines 122, 600 restricted navigation areas, 3 12 missile combat airspace, 78 air raid corridors and 92 and 36 air combat patrol points. To this end, the multinational force * * * used more than 70 satellites, 1 18 mobile satellite ground stations, 12 commercial satellite terminals, 8/kloc-0 switches, 329 voice lines and 30 electrical lines, and used 30,000 radio frequencies and 40,000 computers. Such a powerful information force ensures fast and efficient command and control.
In terms of weapons, the US military has equipped every tank, armored vehicle, plane, ship, headquarters and army unit with GPS receivers. 16 GPS satellites in orbit can provide 19 hours of three-dimensional data information every day, which greatly enhances the transparency of the battlefield.
In the electromagnetic struggle. Twenty-four hours before the air battle, the US military used EF- 1 1A and EA-6B electronic warfare aircraft to interfere with the surveillance and warning radar of the Iraqi army, and used EC- 130H electronic warfare aircraft to interfere with the communication system and navigation system of the Iraqi army, which made the Iraqi army lose its reconnaissance and warning ability and interrupted its communication, thus ensuring the surprise attack effect of the US high-tech weapons.
As this war shows, in the modern battlefield, information power has gradually occupied a dominant position. When information dominates the battlefield with the most vivid, active and positive force, many of our traditional concepts and theories have been challenged, and many new concepts and theories have become the basis for meeting the war in the new century:
-information is combat effectiveness. Information is the primary and key combat capability, and the advantage of military weapons is not the real advantage, but the advantage of information over that of military weapons is the real advantage. Strengthening the construction of information power is an important content of national defense construction. Information resources are war resources, national defense resources and combat effectiveness resources. Protecting information resources is not only a time concept, but also a space concept; It is not only a wartime concept, but also a peacetime concept. Protecting information resources from infringement is a part of consolidating national defense and defending the motherland. Starting from this concept, the concept of national defense has expanded, the concept of the motherland has expanded, and information is as important as territory, territorial sea and airspace.
-Using strategies in the use of information power, aiming at the enemy's powerful information ability and the characteristics and laws of information systems in the process of information engagement, will have broader prospects and richer connotations in future wars. Information viruses, "hackers" and electromagnetic microwave weapons will be of great use, and strategic ideas such as concealing truth, showing strength with weakness, static braking and controlling hard with soft will be widely used.
-The main operational objectives in the war have shifted from the effective forces and heavily armed groups in the past to protecting their own information systems and paralyzing each other's information systems. The gain or loss of information target determines the success or failure of engagement; The survival of information targets determines the outcome of the war. Under the condition that information forces dominate the battlefield, the focus of the struggle between the opposing sides will be to destroy each other's information and information systems and protect their own information and information systems. Battlefield commanders must establish a strong sense of information confrontation, actively and flexibly carry out information confrontation and win the confrontation.
A war without a rear.
The breakthrough theory of linear array echelon, which is mature in World War II, emphasizes wide frontal deployment, multi-echelon formation and concentration of main weapons. Break through the tactical terrain of the other side's defense in the main assault direction with a strong assault group, then enter the battle with a fast cluster, break through the combat terrain of the other side's defense, and then implement a strategic breakthrough. This combat mode fully embodies the advantages of mechanized corps and fully demonstrates the characteristics of mechanized war era.
However, with the development of modern high technology, artillery, tanks and other ground combat forces and weapons are losing their dominant position in the battlefield. In the 43 days of fighting in the Gulf War, only four days of ground fighting were experienced, and the artillery and tanks of both sides did not exert their great power. The multinational force advanced more than 400 kilometers in 100 hour without fierce resistance. Last year, the Kosovo war lasted for more than two months, and most of the ground combat forces and weapons of both sides had no chance to speak.
On the war stage, the change of warring protagonists will inevitably lead to the change of combat mode: with the ground and weapon combat forces such as artillery and tanks gradually losing their dominant position on the battlefield, the linear array ladder breakthrough combat mode will gradually withdraw from the war stage.
At the same time, the purpose of the war has undergone profound changes; We can see that the purpose of today's hegemonists to provoke war has shifted from dividing up the sphere of influence in the past to fighting for strategic interests; From colonial rule in the past to seeking economic benefits. As long as hegemonists can gain strategic and economic benefits, they will no longer aim at how much land they occupy and how many people they rule.
The change of the purpose of the war has also caused the change of the mode of operation. The United States has repeatedly claimed that it is not fighting for land. Fighting for values. "It is foreseeable that the war launched by hegemonists in the future will no longer be aimed at occupying a certain region or country, but at achieving certain strategic and economic interests in a certain region or country. The linear array ladder breakthrough combat mode was produced and developed in the former war purpose, and it will be replaced by a new combat mode suitable for the latter war purpose.
Comprehensive assault is a combat mode based on the conditions of modern battlefield engagement and aimed at realizing the purpose of modern war. The Gulf War and the Kosovo War have clearly demonstrated the basic characteristics of this model.
With the development of modern high technology, the modern battlefield has expanded into a five-dimensional battlefield of land, sea, air, sky and electricity, and this all-round battlefield space has led to all-round combat methods. If there is a war in a certain area of the earth, there is no difference between the opposing sides, the front and the flank, and any target may be attacked from any direction, and any direction may become a combat space. Here the linear state disappears and the concept of position changes. Battlefield commanders must establish an all-round way of thinking and an all-round battlefield concept. All-round judgment, all-round preparation, all-round use of strength and all-round safeguard measures can meet the needs of this all-round engagement.
All-round combat space leads to the comprehensiveness of assault style. Electronic warfare, information warfare, missile warfare, air attack, air combat, scientific and technological level and strategic capability are all displayed to the extreme in this five-dimensional space. Here, all services, arms, technologies and specialties exert their strength in comprehensive application and show their strengths in comprehensive coordination. Therefore, the comprehensiveness of the battlefield is greatly enhanced, and the integration of troops is greatly improved.
Air: the main stage of future war
As early as 70 years ago, Du Hei, the founder of air superiority theory, predicted that "the air battlefield is the decisive battlefield". However, the development of human science and technology needs time to compete, which makes the air battlefield always in a position of support and cooperation. Since the plane came out, military strategists have given it the code of action that "victory on the ground is victory". With the development of modern science and technology. This principle will be shaken in the minds of modern military strategists. The air battlefield will become the main stage of future wars.
In the Gulf War, the multinational forces led by the United States carried out joint air strikes. It destroyed and destroyed 80% of Iraq's command and communication system, 95% of its radar, 48 missile positions, more than 40 airports and 150 aircraft, and destroyed 50% of Iraq's military forces. In the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, NATO carried out a strike operation codenamed "Selected Troops Operation" against Serbian troops, dispatched 3,500 planes, destroyed 60-70% of Serbian strategic targets, and forced Serbian troops to stop the war according to NATO's requirements. The US and British forces launched more than 400 air-launched cruise missiles in the "Desert Fox" air raid on Iraq, which destroyed a large number of targets in Iraq and caused a great impact on the Iraqi army. In the invasion of Yugoslavia by NATO group led by the United States, the civil war between air raid and anti-air raid ran through the whole war.
In a series of local wars that have just happened, we can clearly see that the focus of future wars has turned to the air. This is an infinitely vast battlefield, an all-encompassing battlefield, and an extremely unstable battlefield. In this battlefield space, if it is divided according to its combat form. Generally speaking, it can be divided into two forms, namely, electronic and information warfare between hostile parties and warfare between missiles and aircraft.
In the electronic information engagement between the two hostile parties, the two hostile parties carry out radar countermeasures, communication countermeasures and photoelectric countermeasures, as well as reconnaissance and anti-reconnaissance, interference and anti-interference, destruction and anti-destruction, stealth and anti-stealth, guidance and anti-guidance. Through this engagement. Strive for information resources, grasp the initiative of information production, transmission and processing, destroy the enemy's information transmission, and create favorable conditions for containing or winning the war. The engagement between missiles and aircraft of opposing sides is mainly manifested in the medium and long-range precision strike between missiles and high-performance aircraft and their offensive and defensive confrontation. Here is the confrontation between physical and chemical limits, the confrontation between human space technology, the confrontation between the whole system and the confrontation that determines the fate of war.
This is a new form of engagement. Qian Xuesen, a famous scientist in China, said: "From the perspective of human history, the first war was unarmed. Later, with smelting technology, there was a cold weapon war. Then, it was because of the invention of gunpowder that the hot weapon war appeared. The further development of science and technology led to the manufacture of mechanical weapons such as internal combustion engines, and the war evolved into a mechanical war. By the 1950s. With the development of nuclear technology and rocket technology, long-range nuclear weapons have been developed. The great destructive power of long-range nuclear weapons, coupled with the rapid development of information technology and computer technology, has formed the current and future 2 1 century war form: there is more information under nuclear deterrence than war. " Obviously, this "information war under nuclear deterrence" will be mainly carried out in the air battlefield in the new sense. At the same time, it also understands the historical origin and profound connotation of future wars from ground warfare to air combat.
In the future, in this new battlefield space, we must first change the traditional mindset. Only when the commander really shifts his vision and thinking focus to the five-dimensional space battlefield can he adapt to the needs of future high-tech wars. Relatively speaking, ground combat mainly lies in the maneuver of military weapons, and air combat mainly lies in the implementation of scientific and technological means. It can be said that the strategic thinking of the past war is realized through the operation of power, and the strategic thinking of the future war is realized through the application of science and technology.
Operational support has always been an important link to win the war. In the past, the battle was "the soldiers and horses did not move, and the food and grass went first." Later, with mechanized equipment, in addition to grain and grass, there are also operational guarantees such as engineering, communication, chemical defense, technology and oil. In the future air-based warfare, operational support will be manifested as various kinds of support with information as the core. Electronic warfare, information warfare, medium and long-range precision strikes between ballistic missiles and cruise missiles, and high-performance aircraft all need accurate and timely information support. Information is the core and life. Without timely information guarantee, any link of air combat can not be implemented.
Soldiers' war
From cold weapons and hot weapons to mechanized warfare, in the process of fighting between opposing sides, a battle is won through the implementation of several battles; The final victory of the war was won by several battles. In the thousands of years of human war practice, although the scale and style of campaigns and campaigns are different and have their own characteristics, on the whole, this same hierarchical development law from campaign to campaign has been formed. In this kind of war, it is the supreme commanders of both sides who decide the outcome of the war, and the frontline generals who command thousands of troops.
Today, however, technological weapons have made a qualitative leap. Some technical weapons can be used once and engaged once, and at the same time, combat, campaign and even strategic goals can be achieved. With the development of high-tech weapons in the future and the improvement of hit accuracy and damage efficiency of precision-guided weapons, the boundaries between campaigns, campaigns and strategies are gradually blurred in the process of fighting between hostile parties. A battle may be a war, strategy directly guides the battle, and tactical actions directly reflect strategic intentions. The concept and style of decisive battle have undergone profound changes. The decisive battle of a war may lie in the assault of a technical weapon, and the victory or defeat of a war may even directly depend on the tactical actions of some pilots and some missile controllers.
In the 1980s, the war between Britain and Oman, the US air strikes against Libya and Israel's attack on Iraq's nuclear reactors were all achieved by alternately using high-tech weapons that integrated combat, campaign and strategic objectives. The Gulf War in 1990s showed this change more clearly. During the whole strategic air raid, the coalition forces dispatched a total of 8276 fixed-wing aircraft15, attacking power plant 2 15, navy 247, national command authority 429, air defense facilities 436, military support facilities 2756, short-range ballistic missiles 2767 and national guard 5646 alternately. There is no difference between fighting and not fighting, but the strategic goal has been achieved. In the war of aggression against Yugoslavia by the NATO group headed by the United States, there is no distinction between fighting, campaign and strategic action. During more than two months of air strikes, they used various technical weapons to attack various targets of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia alternately in order to realize their strategic attempts.
This change in the course of combat has impacted the practice and concept of our traditional strategic planning and strategic command.
Strategic planning focuses on the selection of assault targets, mainly solving the problem of selecting assault targets according to strategic attempts, using different high-tech weapons to assault different strategic targets, and striving for the maximum assault effect through corresponding assault means. In the past, the step-by-step planning mode from strategy, campaign to battle will gradually change. Strategic command will focus on the use of technical weapons, mainly solving shortcuts, collecting information parameters of assault targets, and organizing and commanding related links around destroying assault targets according to the performance and characteristics of technical weapons to ensure the realization of strategic goals. The past multi-layer and multi-level command system will be replaced by a flat network command system; In the past, the command mode, which focused on organizing and commanding ground forces to maneuver, deploy, attack and transfer, will be replaced by C4ISR system, which focused on the operation and use of technical weapons.
The development of modern high technology leads to the change of war form, which is a historical process. This is a practical process. This is also a gradual process. In the process. It is people who play a decisive role, including their spirit, will, determination and innovative ability, not one or two new weapons. Because the situation in different countries and regions in the world is different. The changes in the form of war are different. Therefore, we should focus on its characteristics and development, constantly explore the guiding laws of special wars, and strive for victory in future wars.