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→Asymmetrical warfare and cyberattacks: What's he saying that I have not been saying for years?
== Asymmetrical warfare and cyberattacks ==
== Asymmetrical warfare and cyberattacks ==
Asymmetrical warfare can involve cyberattacks designed to destabilize governments. Activities include cyber espionage capabilities that target not only government agencies and the military but also corporations such as financial institutions and defense contractors. Asymmetrical warfare as a division of the military will target a nations command and control systems, also known as cyber warfare.<ref>[https://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/01/22/google-vs-china-tip-cyberwar/ Google vs. China: The Tip of the Cyberwar, Fox News, January 22, 2010]</ref> In the corporate world, cyber intruders exploit systems to allow access to corporate intellectual property and secrets. Asymmetrical warfare is difficult to stop or track. Compromised systems may be undetected and lay dormant for years until war breaks out and only then are these systems designed to disable computer networks.
Asymmetrical warfare can involve cyberattacks designed to destabilize governments. Activities include cyber espionage capabilities that target not only government agencies and the military but also corporations such as financial institutions and defense contractors. Asymmetrical warfare as a division of the military will target a nations command and control systems, also known as cyber warfare.<ref>[https://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/01/22/google-vs-china-tip-cyberwar/ Google vs. China: The Tip of the Cyberwar, Fox News, January 22, 2010]</ref> In the corporate world, cyber intruders exploit systems to allow access to corporate intellectual property and secrets. Asymmetrical warfare is difficult to stop or track. Compromised systems may be undetected and lay dormant for years until war breaks out and only then are these systems designed to disable computer networks.
==Outdated Western conventional war==
Former [[British]] [[diplomat]] and [[MI5]] officer [[Alastair Crooke]] observe3d during the 2026 global conflict:<ref>https://conflictsforum.substack.com/p/ways-of-war-are-in-metamorphosis</ref>
{{quotebox-float|The post-war [[Western alliance|western]] approach (especially in the [[Cold War]] context) relied on the ability to outspend any military adversary through the acquisition of high-end, over-engineered and costly manned [[aircraft]] and [[ammunition|munitions]]. Dominance of airspace and heavy reliance on aerial bombardment, i.e. air-war, was the doctrinal end.
The expenditure overmatch (as well as an imputed [[technical]] [[innovation]]) was viewed as the crucial element in the confrontation with the [[USSR]].
Similarly, the impulse in [[naval]] [[war]]fare was toward investment in ever bigger [[Aircraft carrier|carriers]] and their associated tiers of naval support vessels.
In ground warfare, the weighting in the [[Iraq War]]’s ‘[[Desert Storm]]’ was on [[tank]]s ‘punching’ and thrusting through the adversaries’ defence lines -- though this approach was dropped by [[the West]] in [[Ukraine]] following the turn to 21st century [[drone]]-led ‘trench warfare’ on the front line.
The high-end outspend-approach both favoured the [[US]]’ [[Military Industrial Complex]], and together with [[US]] [[dollar]] [[hegemony]], provided [[America]] with the unique advantage of allowing the US effectively to ‘print’ those high-end overmatch supplementary expenses.
Then came the [[Epic Fury|Iran war of 2026]], whose asymmetric model upended conventional doctrines.
Instead of dominance of the air space, [[Iran]] pursued not aerial supremacy, but rather advanced [[missile]] dominance of air space.
Instead of surface-situated [[military]] [[infrastructure]], missile armouries, launch facilities and much missile production were dispersed across Iran’s huge [[geographic]] areas and buried deep within underground missile cities and [[mountain]] ranges.
The key transformation to the asymmetric approach, however, was the advent of easily available cheap tech components. Whilst the West was spending millions of dollars for each interceptor, Iran and allies were spending hundreds.
The advantage of [[dollar hegemony]] has thus slipped away and turned instead to [[liability]] -- the [[inflation|inflated cost]] of US munitions and their high-end engineering has resulted in [[sclerotic]] supply-lines, long production cycles and minimal [[weapon]] inventories.
The supposed tech superiority of US [[weapon]]s is being surpassed too, by ‘garage’ and ‘workshop’ gigs using cheap tech components. They generate innovation which is then picked-up and scaled after informal testing by ‘military authorities’.
This trend is particularly evident in the [[Russian]] army, where initial ‘garage’ tech has been trialled and then implemented across the [[military]] structures. This applies to both tech hardware and to internet [[AI]] [[innovation]].
In the same vein, [[Hezbollah]]’s innovation of its [[fibre-optic controlled drones]] has transformed the war in south [[Lebanon]] – imposing severe losses on [[Israel]]i tanks and troops, to the point to which the [[IDF]] may be compelled to withdraw from the south.
Likewise, asymmetry and innovation in the seaways are upending the traditional western reliance on large heavy [[naval]] vessels and carriers. The latter have become ‘white elephants’ of the [[Persian Gulf]] ‘[[war]]’ as they are driven so far off from Iranian coastline by [[drone swarm]]s and threats of anti-ship missiles that their deck-based strike-aircraft are limited in their attack capabilities by the requirement to [[re-fuel from tankers]] over target.
To see a literal ‘swarm’ of many tens of armed fast speedboats approaching a lumbering conventional naval vessel only serves to underline their vulnerabilities. In any event, Iran has other anti-ship weapons at its disposal.
In short, a US carrier no longer induces fear as once it might have; It now radiates vulnerability.
Iran’s new sea warfare, however, also includes loitering high-speed [[submersible drone]]s (or [[torpedo]]es) that can loiter for up to four days and which are equipped with [[AI]] targeting capabilities. These drones can be launched from underwater tunnels running beneath the [[Hormuz]] surface.
[[Iranian]] [[innovation]] admittedly has been long-planned and developed. Its’ effectiveness has been demonstrated during the conflict with [[Israel]] and the [[US]]. Iran has withstood the Israeli and American [[carpet-bombing]] (albeit whilst incurring heavy damage and casualties), yet Iran continues to have control of the Strait, plentiful missile inventories, and destroyed, unusable US military bases in the Gulf.
That is the [[Iran war]] experience. But the wider [[strategic]] point is that it has demonstrated that the western ‘way of war’ has been eclipsed by cheap innovative tech and careful asymmetrical planning.
The western model can provide devastating damage -- of that there is no doubt -- but its lack of surgical application is also counter-productive in an age of [[mass media]] and [[smartphone]] [[photography]] that testify to [[civilian]] [[death]], destruction and suffering.
The second point is that [[the West]] remains a cumbersome giant that has failed to understand -- let alone anticipate -- the new asymmetric war. Innovation has been stymied by the consolidation of the [[Military Industrial Complex]] into a few [[bureaucratic]] [[monopolies]].
The western way of war is a bust model when ranged against a sophisticated asymmetric opponent.}}
==See also==
==See also==