Compass Points - Drones & Arty
Does one eliminate the other?
Compass Points - Drones & Arty
Does one eliminate the other?
June 18, 2025
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Drones of many sizes and types have had immense impact recently on battlefields in Ukraine, Russia, Israel, Gaza, Iran, and more. The Kyiv Post recently reported that Ukraine alone is manufacturing 200,000 drones per month.
Enhancing the design and delivery of drones is not at an end. There are more improvements and more surprises to come.
Are drones the single answer to future armed conflicts? One Senior Policy Advisor, Wilson Beaver at the Allison Center for National Security cautions that as powerful as drones are, they are only one tool in the military toolbox.
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Today, air and sea drones are the current innovations that many believe will replace existing systems, such as manned warships and fighter aircraft. Already, some have called for scrapping procurement of existing warships and fighter jets entirely and focusing the defense budget on researching unmanned systems. Yet ongoing conflicts show that this would be a big mistake.
Consider the Russo–Ukrainian War and the most recent iteration of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia. In both cases, drones have played an outsized role, especially in intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance. In Ukraine, drones have been instrumental in spotting for artillery strikes and conducting kinetic strikes on opposing forces. But they cannot wage war on their own. In the modern land domain, drones are complementary to and force multipliers of infantry, armor, and artillery units.
-- Heritage Foundation
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The limits of the small drones being used in Ukraine are magnified when considering the distances in the Pacific.
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And for drones to play a large a role in a maritime theater like the Indo-Pacific, they would require a much longer range than do the drones deployed in Ukraine, where war is conducted mostly over distances from tens to hundreds of miles. In contrast, a naval and air war in the Indo-Pacific would be conducted across thousands of miles.
. . . We need warships and manned combat aircraft now, and in great quantities, to deter Chinese aggression in the Indo-Pacific.
. . . While drones and autonomous systems have shown that they have an important and (almost certainly) increasing role to play in modern warfare, that role remains one of complementing existing systems, rather than replacing them.
-- Heritage Foundation
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As the United Kingdom continues to expand its military, they have come to the same conclusions that drones are not a replacement for existing weapons but are an important addition. For example, the British are expanding their tubed artillery.
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UK inaugurated a £25 million advanced artillery manufacturing facility in the UK, re-establishing the nation’s strategic capability to produce gun barrels for howitzers. The newly built 94,000-square-foot factory in Sheffield marks a pivotal moment in British defense industry history, as it restores a critical production skill set that had been lost domestically. The facility is set to become operational by the end of 2025 and will initially focus on delivering the M777 lightweight towed howitzer, with future capacity to broaden into other cutting-edge artillery systems.
-- Defense News Army
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Ukraine decided to increase its production of drones, not as a replacement to their existing combined arms weapons and equipment, but as an addition. Combined arms weapons remain crucial. That is why the United Kingdom is manufacturing more cannon artillery, not less. What would cause the British to reopen a howitzer factory? The answer is military leaders around the world are studying the war in Ukraine and realizing the continuing importance of proven weapon systems. Lessons learned in Ukraine, reports Defense News Army, is creating "global demand for robust and flexible artillery systems."
Perhaps the British Generals could pass along the lesson to US Marine Corps' Generals.
When the Marine Corps began its controversial Force Design program back in 2019, it was an attempt to add new technology to the Marine Corps. While new technology is often useful, new technology should always be introduced as an addition to current military systems, never as a rushed replacement.
The Marine Corps made the unfortunate decision to reduce or eliminate proven and crucial units, equipment, and capabilities long before the new technology arrived. It is far better to add new technology as it arrives to existing capabilities that are kept well maintained and ready for use. Regrettably senior Marine Corps leaders used a "Divest to Invest" approach that has badly damaged Marine Corps capabilities. What should have been done is to use instead an"Add and Enhance" approach that still could make the Marine Corps stronger.
Drones are important. But cannon artillery is important also. There is no need for a military force to choose one in place of the other. The US Marine Corps is a flexible, crisis response force that must be prepared to arrive off any troubled shore to deter, assist, and fight. Marines cannot take new technology systems with them to a battlefield today, when the new technology is still years away. For the US Marines, high tech is only important if it makes the global crisis response force of Marines stronger.
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Heritage Foundation - 04/08/2025
Drones Don’t Render Traditional Weaponry Obsolete
By Wilson Beaver
Senior Policy Advisor, Allison Center for National Security, for defense and budgeting at The Heritage Foundation.
https://www.heritage.org/defense/commentary/drones-dont-render-traditional-weaponry-obsolete
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Defense News Army - 06/13/2025
UK Revives Artillery Barrel Production with BAE Systems M777 Howitzer Factory Launch.
Bad example!
“But the Navy’s sea-control task is hugely eased if, like the island of Malta during World War II, the Marine Corps is able to establish and defend key maritime terrain on which are emplaced fires-complexes capable of engaging ships and aircraft 500 or more miles away.”
Recently this article was posted on CP in support of FD2030. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Malta_(World_War_II)
Not really sure the SEIGE of Malta, stated in the above article, is a good example of easing the Navy’s huge sea-control task, nor is it a good justification of FD2030 EABO operations. The operations and campaigns to control Malta took 2 years, 5 months, 1 week and 2 days (11 June 1940 – 20 November 1942) and did not contribute to SLOC control until after Rommel’s North Africa victories.
Initially, British pre-war planning dubbed Malta as indefensible. However, all the strategic twists and turns of the Battle for the Mediterranean did made Malta a “popup” target (not a strategic target) for both the Allies and Axis.
Mussolini had a pre-war invasion plan to seize Malta. He did not invade Malta because he “expected Francoist Spain to join the Axis and capture Gibraltar, which would close the Mediterranean to the British from the west.” When Spain did not close Gibraltar, he used his air force to neutralized and isolate Malta. His Africa campaign was the focus of his military efforts and forces. In addition, the Italian mainland and Sicily airfields, plus the German occupation of Greece and Crete over shadowed the strategic importance of Malta.
In retrospect, Mussolini missed the opportunity to invade Malta, splitting the Mediterranean Sea in two. However, after the Fall of France (neutralizing the French Mediterranean Fleet) and the British Fleet moving to Alexandra to protect the higher priority Suez Canal, the strategic value that Malta provided the Allies was significantly minimized. In addition, the Italian Navy would sortie against the British Fleet in March 1941, not to neutralize Malta, but to control the SLOC and intercept the relief convoys to Greece. The Italian Navy was defeated in the Battle of Matapan and efforts to destroy the relief convoys to Greece was a failure.
An interesting objective of the Italian air campaign was to bomb the Malta population into submission. Italy’s efforts to isolation Malta by blockade with 54,000 sea mines was partly successful as the mines proved, in British words, “troubling”.
At the time, the British could not afford another defeat especially in the Mediterranean and North Africa. In order to prevent another public affairs fiasco and loss of moral, they did station anti-aircraft units and moved to complete the island’s airfield.
After the Italian Army’s North African defeat, Rommel arrived in February 1941 to organize and lead his famed North Africa Campaigns. Rommel’s concerning issue were replacements and sustainment for his Africa Corps.
Rommel strongly suspected that his sustainment conveys were being sunk because of intelligence leaks. He was correct because Churchill was passing the German convoy schedules from breaking the Ultra Enigma code to his theater commanders. I might add, at great risk the Germans might determine the British had broken the code.
With the help of Ultra, aircraft stationed on Malta did contribute to losses of German supplies after costly sustainment convoy operations like Operation Pedestal.
Operation Pedestal (August 1942)
• Merchant Ships Lost: 9 out of 14 sunk.
• Naval Losses:
o 1 aircraft carrier (HMS Eagle)
o 2 light cruisers
o 1 destroyer
• Casualties: Over 500 sailors and airmen killed.
• Survivors: Only 5 merchant ships reached Malta, including the tanker SS Ohio, which was severely damaged but delivered crucial fuel2.
Other Convoy Losses
• Operation Harpoon (June 1942): 4 out of 6 merchant ships sunk.
• Operation Vigorous (June 1942): Entire convoy forced to turn back due to Axis attacks.
“In August 1942, Malta's strike forces had contributed to the Axis' difficulties in trying to force an advance into Egypt. In that month, 33% of supplies and 41% of fuel were lost.” Erwin Rommel left North Africa in March 1943, shortly after the failed German counter offensive at the Battle of Kasserine Pass.
The Allied Invaded French North Africa, Operation Torch, in November of 1942, using three amphibious Task Forces, two in the Western Mediterranean Sea, and one on the Atlantic Ocean side of Africa. We should note all three were out of Malta aircraft support range.
Next, on to the Invasion of Sicily. If Malta was occupied by the Axis forces they would have been easily neutralized before the invasion of Sicily, just like the island of Pantelleria. This island was invaded and occupied by the Allies on June 11, 1943, during Operation Corkscrew. Pantelleria is an island west of Malta with an Italian garrison of 12,000 Italian soldiers with well entrenched pillboxes and 21 gun batteries.
“From 8 May to 11 June 1943, 5,285 bombing sorties were flown by Allied fighter-bombers, medium and heavy bombers, dropping 6,202 long tons (6,302 t) of bombs on the island.” One hour before the British 1st Division landed the Italian garrison surrendered.
Churchill stated that Malta was important as an unsinkable aircraft carrier. The same can be said of almost any WW2 Pacific island with an airfield. Malta did hurt Rommel’s supply lines but did not prevent his Kasserine Pass offensive. The Battle for the Mediterranean was won after a number of British and US offensive land, naval and air campaigns that secured the SLOC. In my opinion Malta did not ease the naval task of securing the SLOC and is a bad example for a Pacific EABO operation. S/F
Missiles are themselves high performance drones, and yet there is little suggestion that missiles will supercede the core branches of the armed services. In the 1950's there was a broad camp of adherents that espoused all missile warfare was the future, and yet the war in Vietnam and dozens of other wars demonstrated that that was premature and a strategy for failure.
In the Ukraine the distances involved over a relatively stagnant combat zone has seen a wide variety of what I call hobby shop drone weapons, but this theater is hardly representative of warfare around the world and over prolonged eras of time. Moreover, a very high percentage of these drones do not succeed in meeting their end purpose for a wide range of reasons.
Although many would disagree, the principal platform that has been rendered obsolete by the efficacy of drones has been the attack helicopter, a platform that I have viewed for a long time as both vulnerable and excessively expensive.
In the end, it is properly trained and supported (Marine) infantry that take the ground.