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by jonstewart 1107 days ago
I think the hypothetical you posit is wrong, as US doctrine places primacy on air power. In Iraq, I & II, air strikes at the outset destroyed much of the Iraqi armor and spurred a lot of desertion.

I’m not a military and/or Iraq war expert so I don’t want to argue definitively, but I don’t think you can say US losses would have been significantly higher had the Iraqi army had heavier weapons and fighting skills — they’d have needed effective air defense, too.

I think the Ru-UKR war shows the vulnerability of contemporary air forces to air defense, however, and that Western/NATO forces themselves lack cost-effective short-range and medium-range air defense systems. The US Air Force fields exquisite weapons (“platforms”) and these may prove useless in a conflict like Ru-UKR. Or, perhaps, they’re good enough to overcome the difficulties that the Sukhoi/MiG-based air forces of either side have encountered. Hard to know.

Range and mobility in artillery systems also seems like a weak point for the US military. The Excalibur precision shell is very expensive but likely cost effective—one shot, one kill. But the US M777 towed howitzer costs ~$3.7M (titanium) while the French Caesar costs $5-6M and can outrange the M777 in addition to driving away immediately after firing.
2 comments
torstenvl 1104 days ago
Excals are not very high precision in my experience, and definitely not "one shot one kill." I don't remember exact data and I'm sure it would be classified even if I did, but... suffice it to say that laser guidance for final targeting is not good for dusty environments. (Ditto for GBU-12s, which were worthless.)

Afghanistan may have been a different story.

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rascul 1107 days ago
> But the US M777 towed howitzer costs ~$3.7M (titanium) while the French Caesar costs $5-6M and can outrange the M777 in addition to driving away immediately after firing.

The US has the M109 which can serve in some of the same roles the Caesar can.

Also, does France have much rocket artillery? That might play a factor in the requirements for other artillery systems.

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