Public opinion is largely skeptical regarding U.S. military readiness and the implications of arms supply to Ukraine. Many commenters express concern over escalating tensions with Russia, the inadequacy of military resources, and the prioritization of foreign aid over domestic issues. While there's acknowledgment of the importance of supporting Ukraine, a significant portion of the discussion highlights fears about nuclear confrontation, economic inefficiencies, and the risk to U.S. military preparedness.

U.S. Government

U.S. Military

Defense Contractors

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Military procurement has always been a bit messy, with conflicting goals of fiscal prudence, national readiness, empire-building within the military or government, profit-taking, and catering to key constituents.  However, the specific idea of "R&amp;D programs" which result in poor returns and public acrimony is mostly a modern phenomenon.

Procurement itself is a multi-faceted issue, so I'll stick to the R&amp;D /  innovation portion.  Keep in mind that there was always a lot of money (relatively) involved in procurement of ordinary things:  uniforms, food, tools, lumber and other raw materials.  Public outcry over misuse of public funds or profiteering in this regard seems to be perennial.  

With regards to America specifically, there is an inflection point after WWII when peacetime procurement and R&amp;D goes from a relatively small process to an entire industry.  It's no coincidence that Eisenhower spoke about the "military-industrial complex".  

During the 19th century the standard models for military innovation were driven by either internal goals of the military, or the efforts of private inventors who then attempted to sell the military on some new innovation.

An example of the former would be the development of the Dahlgren naval guns.   Young Lt John Dahlgren set out to design a modern, safer, high-powered naval gun as a direct result of the need he saw.  He contracted with private firms using government funds to cast guns of his design, and oversaw the testing of these guns.  Most of the guns were cast by private industry.  Dahlgren received royalty payments on guns made with his designs.

An example of the latter would be the Spencer repeating rifle.  Spencer pressed hard to get his invention adopted by the US Army, but was resisted by conservative forces within the Army and its Ordinance Department.  It eventually became a very popular weapon within the Army and the US Navy.  

In the second half of the 18th century, naval technology advanced rapidly.  Prior to this a "battleship" could be expected to be a minor improvement over previous ones, and would serve alongside older similar ships for decades, maintenance allowing.  But from 1860 onwards, there were several generations of warships that so outclassed the previous, that older ships were rapidly relegated to lesser duties, sold to second-tier naval powers, or scrapped.  Because ships were so expensive, and deemed so crucial to national power, these design debates and procurements became matters of widespread peacetime interest.   The processes themselves often remained highly technical, but the expenditures were debated in press and in legislatures.  The advent of armored steam-propelled ships, breech-loading guns, the Dreadnought-era ships, each produced a wave of national doubt, pride, panic, and spending.  Magazines and journals debated the value of battleships in the era of the self-propelled torpedo, or the battlecruiser concept.  In the USA specifically, naval expenditure was seen in light of America's appearance on the world stage.  

The design, though, was for the most part driven by military experts and executed by a combination of private and military builders.  The main exceptions being some innovations in submarines, and propulsion.   Innovations were designed, built, and tried.  Adoption was slow and conservative.  In this sense, "R&amp;D" was still seen as a risk shared by the government and private inventors.  

Innovation occurred in other areas, of course, but all of those areas seemed highlighted in naval applications.  Larger artillery.  Telegraphic communication.  Wireless communication.  Aerial observation. 

During WWI, the American procurement effort centered in quantity, taking a small peacetime army and making it large and well-trained and supplied enough to fight in Europe.  

During and after WWI the center of innovation changed to aviation.  Rapid advancements in engine power-to-weight ratios, and material science, allowed aircraft to increase in speed, climb, and payload.  As with battleships previously, new generation of aircraft would tend to eclipse older ones.  Even at sea, aviation had a large influence.  For the first time, the see governments and especially the USA begin to enter into ongoing partnerships with private industry for ongoing innovation.  

Government subsidies, in the form of peacetime military contracts and also US Mail contracts for airmail, were crucial to the development of the domestic aircraft industry.  Military requirements drove aircraft design.  From the beginning there were objections and questions from taxpayers and competitors.  There was a major scandal involving Air Mail contracts and the US Army Air Corps in the 1930s.  

In the interwar period, the Air Corps pioneering procurement procedures such as permanent liaisons at manufacturing facilities, a more formal RFP process, contracts that included specification for delivery of spare parts over time, etc.  For the most part these peacetime developments were seen as necessary, though as always "waste" was an issue, both real, and as a political football.  

So, WWII.  America becomes "the arsenal of democracy", and turns its massive and undamaged industry to military production.  And in some ways, never fully stops.

When the war ends, the need for massive production of military goods ends. However, developments during the war suggest that an ongoing technological race exists, which exceeds the pace and scope of all previous ones.  It is seen as crucial to maintain a pace of research and development sufficient to protect the nation in peacetime.  Areas highlighted during or near the end of WWII include jet planes, advanced submarines, sonar, radar, encryption, rockets, and of course nuclear weapons.  

Three things conspire to keep the military expenditures relatively high (although of course a huge drop occurs when the war ends).

First, the aforementioned technologies are all developing quickly, and are all seen as crucial.

Second, the "peace" turns "cold war", making the need for a larger peacetime armed forces.

Third, the more modern the weapons system, the less it seems wise to rely on making weapons and ammo and such just before or DURING a war.  With the speed and range of postwar planes, and later missiles, and with mechanized armies, wars might last days or weeks.  Complicated weapons mean you can't just ask the blacksmith to switch from horseshoes to muskets; it takes advanced factories to make a modern jet, and it takes ltoo long to make them once war starts.  You need them BEFORE war happens.  

The net result is the need to equip a relatively large peacetime army, with relatively NEW technology, refreshed often as tech develops.   Private industry, with rare exceptions, isn't interested in making HUGE speculative expenditures.  Instead, the R&amp;D and procurement process becomes a permanent mode and an expensive one.  

All of the old tensions remain.  Divisions over dogma and policy, empire-building, por-barrel politics, private profit-taking, political posturing.   But now the speed of the cycle and the expense means the public cares more, or is made to care more,

Technology becomes a public obsession, manifested in the race for the sound barrier, for space, the moon, the north pole (by nuclear sub!).  So does failure of expensive weapons systems.  When it takes a decade to prefect a new design, obsolescence is a constant risk.  Costly dead-ends include the B-70, Star Wars, and the Sergeant York air defense system.  Entire generations of weapons get built, barely used, and replaced at great cost because, you can't afford to NOT upgrade if you might be at war with the USSR next year.  The cost is borne by the unrivaled American economy, and sales to other nations.  

Again, R&amp;D is only one part of procurement.   Great amounts are spent on ordinary things like salaries, bases, medical coverage for soldiers and for veterans, etc.  Reducing the number of bases from the WWII peak to today, was a decades-long effort pitting cost savings against "local economy" advocates.  Reagan's 600-ship navy was as much an exercise in economic warfare against the USSR, as it was a true military expense.  The cost of OPERATIONS is huge, in both lives and money.  A peacetime force, even with lots of training, is way cheaper than the price of going to war, especially the kind of long-distance wars the USA has fought since 1917.   The political decisions are huge.  The procurement efforts for all the boring stuff is also huge.  It's just seldom highlighted.

[deleted]

Others already pointed out that factories already operate close to 100%. The whole point of stockpiles is recognizing that you know consumption will exceed capacity.
It’s also important to note that Ukraine is fighting with one arm behind its back according to the NATO model. When generals think about how many shells they would use, they also assume that they would use airplanes and all those related weapons. 

Of course Ukraine doesn’t have that option yet. But NATO never planned on fighting a conventional war that would take years to resolve.

landodk

\&gt;What are the reasons behind the US's inability to replenish its ammunition stocks?

It's not an inability, the US simply had a budget for ammunition and the private sector consequently had set up production capacity to meet that spending. Now that there's more demand it takes time to ramp up production.

The land and buildings need to be available, safety laws respected, equipment purchased, installed and tested, the supplies made, and tolerances increased as the production lines come on line.

Also, you're talking about several firms. The mining, the metalworking firms and the  chemical companies who make the propellant and explosives are all different companies.

Mr_Gaslight

It's a question of manufacturing capacity. Historically "we" be it government og private industry is not willing to have spare capacity. In most management litterature that's "slack" or "waste" that should be eliminated for profit and efficiency.

So sure, you can ramp it up, if you have capacity left over, which you normally do not.

So you'd have to build capacity. That takes time, it takes machine tools, educated workers, foundries, production halls and so on and so forth. That can be built but it takes time, years sometimes. If you're not going to have steady orders, do you as a private company want to do this?

 This has been the issue in Europe for instance, as you say artillery ammo is not complex, but companies won't build out capacity if they can't see how they'll make their investment back.

sp668

No one is providing any reading about this so here ya go.

[This](https://asc.army.mil/web/news-chain-reaction/) one is about the Army ramping up 155mm production. They are planning on more than doubling production, but it just takes a long time; entire factories need to be retooled and reorganized. That's no easy task since these ammo plants are from WW2 era production, and have not seen significant investment in decades. The last major overhaul of ammo production was in the mid 80s. Also, because GWOT did not require a lot of 155mm ammo, the government stopped buying ammo at large rates. It is incredibly difficult for companies to stay profitable when the government is so fickle with ammo procurement.

To illustrate this, take a look at [this article](https://acquisitiontalk.com/2023/02/analysis-of-ammunition-procurement-fy-1999-fy-2023/) and t[his one too](https://acquisitiontalk.com/2023/02/data-on-dod-munitions-and-missile-procurement-fy-2001-to-fy-2023/). The graphs show ammo budgets by type, and you can easily see how difficult it is for ammo producers. Due to the fluctuating budgets, ammo plants must run as efficiently as possible with as few workers as possible. To expand capacity, the workforce also needs to grow; this is no easy task either. 

So to answer your question, ammo production is increasing in a way that we have not seen in 50+ years, it just takes time. Also, the US likely has millions of 155mm ammo squirreled away somewhere in case of WW3 breaking out, but the bean counters are not comfortable dipping into that stock just to fuel a war in Ukraine. There needs to be enough ammo on hand to fuel the opening salvos of a war, and last until wartime production ramps up. Ammo stocks are difficult to find data on or understand, but the US would not put itself in a spot where ammo is in short supply.

DollarTreeButthole

Industrial capacity is built on having people and machines that can make machines that make things.  The US for a lot of reasons decided it was better to be able to have cheap finished good than industrial capacity.  So our corporations moved all of that knowledge and capacity to make things to China.   The only reason we are able to make anything at all is because US corporations haven't completed the transfer yet.

How many tool and die makers do you know personally?  Manufacturing engineers?  I grew up in an extended family mostly of those kinds of people in Western Massachusetts when there was a lit of industry.   Not so much now.   Political decisions matter.

sunshinebread52

Your husband is in the enviable position of having his active military time count twice. Buy it in for federal retirement, and stay in the reserves to increase his reserve time.

Slick-62

If he does not retire from active duty he should buy back his time as he can also get his reserve retirement as well.    This would mean he would retire from civil service with 34 years to calculate his FERS annuity vs 20 years.

He then just needs 6+ years in the Reserves to collect a military retired  pay at 60 years old.

Zelaznogtreborknarf

You can buy back active military years for the federal pension AND also count them towards a reserve pension.

I’m doing something similar.

Submit DD-214 to get a leave service computation date (and RIF) set to his total active duty years.

Go to DFAS to get the paperwork to get a letter from the army stating the FERS buy back amount. Then give that letter to your federal agency HR.

Make payments at your leisure. Interest accrues at the end of your third year starting federal service. It’s &lt;2% annually and you’re better off saving the money in a CD, Fed bonds, or HYSA.

He will end up retiring from both jobs and collecting a pension from both jobs. 

But is it really his pension if you’re the one figuring this all out?

always_a_tinker

When he pays the deposit, his military time converts to federal time under the current retirement scheme, FERS. I did it with 12 years. I left the service after the cold war during the first big drawdown and received a one-time exit bonus. That was in 1992.

Later, I regretted it and was able to rectify that error before it was too late by going fed and making the post-56 deposit. I'm retired now with an annuity.

I will defer to others on the reserve question.

iago_williams

Yes it would be a good idea to buy his service time back. It’s called a buy back because he has to pay for the retirement contributions made into FERS. It’s based on his active duty earnings so it will likely be a notable sum. The time would allow him to qualify for retirement in his GS job earlier.

B0b_a_feet

He needs to stay reserve til 20 to get his retirement from that which will pay out age 60. Also do the federal buy back to increase his federal retirement

El_GOOCE

The process is called the “Post-56 Buyback”.  Make sure he notifies his hiring HR when he’s getting onboarded he wants to do this.  

The buyback is he pays the Federal Government 3% of his base salary when he was Active Duty.  The process is he needs to get a pay summary from DFAS and submit paperwork and a cheque through his agency.  

Here is OPM’s briefing:  
https://www.opm.gov/retirement-center/benefits-officers-center/webcast-presentations/military-deposits.pdf  

In exchange, he’ll gain 14 years towards his FERS Retirement Date.  He’ll accumulate leave at 6 hours per pay period and 8 when he turns 15 years.  

The buyback is cheap for the retirement boost he’ll get.  I bought back 13 years as a Major for $18K.  If he’s enlisted it will be  much less.

If he goes into the Reserves, he’ll need just 6 good years to earn the Reserve pension.  Easily worth it since his AD time gets converted into retirement points.

miauguau44

Buying back time rolls into the fed pension.  

he needs to put a full 5 yrs of civil service to get a pension but thrn thst military time co7nts too

  
say he’s in his late 30s….he can buy back that service time and thrn work till he’s 57 and retire immediately with 30+ yrs of service and 57.

SabresBills69

I didnt know anything about military buy back time. I have 10 yrs in USN When I left federal employment I didnt know this. After 19 yrs is it too late?

Electrical-Map-8119

I like how it’s just assumed the husband is going to get a federal job offer. lol. Good luc

damandamythdalgnd

Munitions production is extremely cyclical. During high intensity warfare a military will burn through rounds rapidly, but during times of peace you need only a tiny portion for training and maintenance. It's far to expensive to keep your factory running at full capacity non-stop. Instead, you scale down production to a minimum necessary to maintain procedures (you need to keep your supply chain intact, need to keep training people on production methodology, etc), but make only a minimal amount of product.

The idea, then, is to stockpile enough munitions to fill short term needs in case of a sudden conflict, during which you ramp capacity back up.

That's what has happened here - we've been drawing down stockpiles of munitions, and have been taking our time ramping up production. There could be good reasons for the delay, such as wanting to take the opportunity to update supply chains, diversify suppliers, or the like.

For a sense of scale, reports in the press say that Ukraine needs 1.5 million artillery shells annually for its war with Russia. During the Vietnam war, the Iowa Army Ammunition Plant was manufacturing in excess of 5 million artillery rounds annually. We've been making only a tiny fraction of that in recent years, but can certainly ramp back up to that level if necessary.

CxEnsign

I assume you’re talking specifically about 155mm rounds. Missiles are also low too, but missiles are just. Lot harder to build at scale. 

But for the 155s, Ukraine is at a weird crossroads of warfare. They still follow a lot of Soviet doctrine, and had a lot of Soviet equipment. Now they have a lot of western equipment but still follow a lot of Soviet doctrine. 

The basic concept of western large scale warfare is to fix and degrade the enemy with precision fires (artillery, rockets, etc), and then engage with maneuver forces (infantry, tanks). The Soviets and now Russians have the opposite concept. They fix the enemy in place with ground forces and then destroy them with overwhelming fires. Like, obliterate grid squares on maps kind of fires. 

The Ukrainians are firing far, far more 155mm rounds than we anticipated, and we’re not at a wartime production footing. They’re simply outshooting steady-state production levels.

SweatyTax4669

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We aren't low on munitions because of the war in Ukraine...  this is the same as saying "I'm low on money because I gave my friend 100 bucks last week and now I only have 50million in the bank but the wife said I can't take any more cash out to give my friend until I take out the trash"

&amp;#x200B;

The US is running low on extra reserved stockpiles, in other words, if we got in a war TOMORROW and we went all out and used ALL of the shit we have, we might run out in 6 months or more, but its better to never run out.

&amp;#x200B;

the US is asking permission to build up more stock piles so they can continue giving them to Ukraine without risking ever touching the accounts that we actually care about.

Dredly

Running "low" on ammunition is relative. The US has the needs of its own military and its own strategic interests to consider and the minimum stockpiles of ammunition necessary to safeguard those. Traditionally, this has been an unofficial requirement to be capable of fighting two major wars at the same time. Even that "requirement" is a subjective one though.

In other words, the US is not running low but it may have a shortfall in what its military leaders believe is necessary to fight a major long term war of attrition should one break out. However, this is offset somewhat by the fact that A) Russia was previously one of the most likely opponents in such a potential war, and B) the US is only running "short" of the certain types of ammunition which Ukraine is making heavy use of. HIMARS rockets, 155mm artillery shells, that sort of thing. Stockpiles of other weapons like air to air missiles, cruise missiles or precision bombs are virtually untouched by comparison.

HolyGig

&gt;Been reading a bit about Russian BTGs, and how though much vaunted, they got chewed up in Ukraine. 

  
The problem is that basically anything talking about Ukraine, supporting any side, still contains a large quantity of both propaganda and nonsense unless it is a classified document. Russian forces have had some troubles, discussion of which draws a mix of propaganda and nonsense from all sides, but the idea of a combined-arms battalion isn't really a matter than anyone questions.

Everyone uses combined-arms battalions for a lot of things these days. This is how most armies do things. Even if administratively, an army keeps tank battalions separate from infantry battalions, they will mix them together on deployments. If they deploy battalion-sized mechanized forces, it will likely involve mixing companies between a tank battalion and a mechanized infantry battalion. In the United States Army, the line battalions of armored divisions all contain a mix between tank companies and mechanized infantry companies by default. 

If a battalion-sized battlegroup is deploying on its own, it will likely have more support troops attached which might be owned by "support battalion" or something like that when they're not deployed. It's not an unusual idea to put together a lot of support stuff attached to the battalion headquarters that is running the battlegroup.

RingGiver

Russian failures in Ukraine were not mainly because of organization. The Russian army was spending less than $20,000 per soldier when they invaded Ukraine, less than Ukraine, 1/5 of China and most of NATO, and 1/15 of the U.S. If they had succeeded that would have been surprising, regardless of how they were organize.

As far as combined arms battalions go, it’s best not to think of this “combined arms” concept at all when evaluating them. If I don’t have combined arms battalions I can still perform combined arms - the tanks and fire support just are allocated by a higher unit. In theory this creates coordination issues, but in practice those exist with BTGs as well. If my BTG needs more tanks from one of the dedicated armored battalions of the Russian army, I am no better off working with them than I would be if my unit was a pure motor rifle battalion.

The real question in heavy equipment allocation is “what is the highest level where we can win with mechanized infantry alone?” The more assets you cram into a unit, the harder it is to properly supply, and the more fragile it is. If my battalion has learned to rely on armor, then every tank loss greatly diminishes our fighting potential. It would seem based on combat in Ukraine that this highest level is the battalion level, so BTGs were not an efficient idea. That said, once again they were not the reason for Russia’s initial defeat.

That's an old problem to choose between ready combined arms battalions or ad hoc battle group. And for the previous 300 years it's usually decided in favor of ad hoc battle group. For example, in early 1990s Russians tested but abandoned this concept, in early 2000s Ukrainians adopted it, but abandoned in a couple of years.

I think the main reasons for this are the following:

1. Combined arms battalion is too small to have all the required arms and services included. You're admitting it yourself. Brigade or division are better in this regard as the smallest combined arm unit.

2.  Combined arms battalion has additional problems regarding training, supply, repair shouldered upon small battalion staff. In US Army there was even problem with personnel management - that's why US heavy brigades have 2 battalion types for 3 combined arms battalions. From organizational point of view it's ridiculous, but it become necessary from the personnel management point of view.

3. Combined arms battalion prevents concentration of support assets. It's good for battalion to have it's own artillery battery. But it's even better to have whole artillery battalion in support - yet it's not possible, if all brigade artillery is parceled between battalions. 

4. Lack of combined arms battalions does not prevent brigade/division commander to form semi-permanent combined arms battle groups, which are doing roughly the same job, yet does not have drawbacks, describe in pp.1-3 above.

EugenPinak

For armored and mechanized forces combined arms are already the standard.

Some countries have standing Combined Arms BNs, like the US ABCT has a mix of "infantry" or "armor" CABs (basically 2-1 mix tanks with armor BNs being 2 tank one infantry company, infantry being the reverse).  Within this context too these companies are usually then aligned into "company teams" which are some kind of combined arms mix to suit missions.

This is useful but only to a point.  Like once you had a lot of smaller specialist components (like engineer units, or air defense) it becomes hard to train and maintain these elements (training works better at scale, as does maintenance), so that makes a formation with all the engineers/air defense/artillery/whatever kind of difficult.  

So even in the CAB concept, there was the Battalion (organic tank, infantry, recon, mortars and sustainers) and then we still had "go to war" augmentation that didn't live with us, but that we trained to use or operate with (in our specific case it was about a platoon per company of combat engineers, engineer breaching and bridging at battalion, plus air defense squads per company)

Most other countries intrinsically recognize that the armor force is a mix of tanks/mechanized forces.  There's an "adhoc" nature to the way these forces are mixed, but it's closer to the vaunted "Task Organization" that the Marines make such a big deal, that basically you have an assortment of available forces that can be assigned to missions in formations suited to the mission at hand.

This is useful in as far as there will be missions or tasks that may call for more or less tank/infantry pure missions, so you can right-size things.  Similarly for things like artillery the ability to mass fires and shift them fluidly (so agile fire direction) often pays off more than giving "organic" artillery to maneuver units (outside of short range systems like mortars) or other circumstances (like the old ACR for the US).

pnzsaurkrautwerfer

Forgive me, but isnt this a Battle Group? 

Using UK forces in Helmand, c.2010-14 as tangential example, multiple BGs were deployed under a Bde each consisting of a Cavalry, Infantry or Marine Battalion/Regiment with amalmagations. And they also cross decked with other elements that were spilt amongst them. For example, the BG I was part of was 4x Inf Coys (Scots), 1x Inf Sp Coy (Gurkha), 1x Light Cav (Lancers) plus med/int/signal/arty. We had 105mm gun pushed down to BG level for Herrick, which was novel. This was a Scots BG, but whilst the Ghurkas deployed, all thier companies were spread amonst the other BGs, 

You had BG operation alreas with Light Inf Coys and Warrior IFV Sqn under one command. Of course there was little difference in function between Mech/Light and there was no armoured as it was COIN, but the principle stands - mission specific ORBAT.

Aaaarcher

From my understanding the battalion tactical groups had more problems than you listed, though everything you listed is big. One major one I saw was like of depth in its combat units or reserves.

Basically all these BTGs infantry and armor units got totally mauled whilst the AA/artillery would be relatively untouched.  To the point the Russians played around as well with combining them, etc.

It speaks volumes that the Russians fell back on their older Soviet style tactics essentially and have thrown away this whole concept.

Still_Truth_9049

What you are describing is like 61 and 62 Mechinzed BNs of the SADF during the bush wars. The organization of the units were as follows:

-two infantry companies, which were equipped with the Ratel-20 Infantry Fighting Vehicle, with a third infantry company possibly attached,

-an armoured car squadron initially equipped with Eland Armoured Cars, later replaced by the Ratel-90 and later the Rooikat Armoured Fighting Vehicle,

-a support company consisting of an anti-tank platoon in Ratel-90s,

-an 81mm mortar platoon in Ratel-81s,

-an anti-aircraft troop and

-an artillery battery equipped with the G5 howitzer. Firepower was further augmented by the addition of the self-propelled version (G6 Rhino).

Then in the late 80s a tank troop was added.

-Trooper5745-

This concept is how the USMC organizes its deployable units in three different sized packages.  The Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU) is composed of a HQ element, an infantry battalion, an artillery battery, an aviation element, an armor element and a logistics element (plus some stuff like Recon, Civil Affairs, etc…).  The MEU is formed about 6 months prior to deployment, goes through a regimented evaluation, and then deploys on Navy ships for about 6 months.  After which, its units separate while the HQ element goes into planning for the next cycle. The MEB (Brigade sized) is the same concept but with a regiment at the center and the MEF (Force) has a full division at the center.  We have 3 MEUs afloat almost all the time while the MEB and MEF are usually formed only in time of war.  The whole point of these structures is to meet the mission of the USMC being an expeditionary force in readiness capable of projecting sustained power anywhere in the world on short notice.  It’s more about self contained sustainability than achieving some multiplier in combat effectiveness.  The Army doesn’t use this structure because they don’t have to and in more prolonged conflicts like Iraq/Afghanistan, the USMC operated outside of the concept as well.   Both forces are very adept at joint coordination and task organization so the benefits of a combined arms approach is not dependent on org structure.

Semi-Chubbs_Peterson

So I have to explain why the BTG exists, it's not actually a bad idea but it has a lot of issues.

So, the Russian army is deeply reliant on conscripts to fill out the numbers in their military. But conscripts take time to prepare and mobilise along with being politically different to deploy outside the nation. There was a fear that they would end up in a war that they either couldn't deploy conscripts to or not have time to do so.

The idea with the BTG was that they could use the cadres that would normally wait to be filled with conscripts as military forces. It would also use the characteristic Russian tactic of using violence of action and sheer firepower to substitute for a lack of deftness.

This was a stopgap, no-one (well no-one sensible) in Russia thought it was amazing but it was what they had. Where it fell apart was the lack of infantry and personnel to handle rear line work so they just didn't have the staying power they needed.

raptorgalaxy

Warnings about inadequate U.S. military supplies amid ongoing support for Ukraine raise concerns about American readiness for future conflicts.

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