Mystics & Statistics

A blog on quantitative historical analysis hosted by The Dupuy Institute

36th Panzer Regiment Tank Losses, January 1944

The 36th Panzer Regiment was the tank component of the 14th Panzer Division, which had been destroyed at Stalingrad. When recreated, the division was supposed to have a three-battalion panzer regiment. However, it only received the I. and III. battalions before transferring to the eastern front in the autumn 1943. As losses accumulated, its remaining tanks and assault guns were concentrated in the III. battalion and the I. battalion was sent out of the theatre to replenish.

On 1 January 1944, the regiment had the following vehicles operational: 10 StuG, 11 Pz III, 11 Pz IV. In short term repair were: 7 StuG, 1 Pz III and 8 Pz IV. However, there is some uncertainty regarding the Pz III tanks, as they are not to be found in the organization chart, except for 6 command tanks in the battalion and the regiment. This is according to the monthly report to the Inspector-General of Panzer Troops (BA-MA RH 10/152).

The battalion war diary can be found in file BA-MA RH39/380. It is not as detailed as the war diary I have used for previous posts on I./Pz.Rgt. 26 Panther battalion. It just contains a narrative and I don’t have the kind of detailed annexes included in the file on I./Pz.Rgt. 26.

From the war diary, I conclude the following losses during January 1944:

StuG: 10 complete losses. One of them was only damaged by enemy fire, but could not be recovered due to nearby enemy units and was fired upon by other German StuG until it caught fire. Another 10 StuG were damaged, either by enemy fire or suffered from technical breakdowns.

Pz IV: 3 complete losses, 6 damaged. As there has been some posts on the effectiveness of artillery versus armour on the blog, it can be worth mentioning that one of the damaged Pz IV was hit by artillery fire.

Pz III tanks are not mentioned at all in the battalion war diary.

There are two comments on repairs in the war diary. On 14 January, it is said that one repaired tank returns and on 27 January, it is reported that 3 Pz IV and 1 StuG returns from workshops. However, this can not be all repairs. On 1 February, the battalion had 5 operational Stug and 2 in short term repair. As it started out with 10+7 StuG, had 5+2 on 1 February, while reporting 10 destroyed and 10 damaged during January, there must have been more repairs. The figures would suggest that 15 StuG were repaired, as there were no shipments of new StuG from the factories, according to the records in BA-MA RH 10/349 (list of deliveries of new AFV). Neither is any transfer of AFV from other units mentioned in the war diary.

It seems that the number of repaired Pz IV is 5, given the number on hand on 1 February.

All in all, this would mean that the battalion started out with 10 StuG and 11 Pz IV on 1 January, lost irretrievably 10 StuG and 3 Pz IV, 10 StuG damaged and 6 Pz IV damaged, while 15 StuG and 5 Pz IV were repaired. It should be noted that these figures are less certain than those given for the I./Pz.Rgt. 26 in previous posts, as the war diary of the III./Pz.Rgt 36 is not as detailed.

Admittedly, it is problematic to compare loss rates between units fighting different enemy formations, but it is still tempting to compare the III./Pz.Rgt. 36 with the I./Pz.Rgt. 26. After all, they fought in the same general area (Ukraine south of Kiev) in similar conditions against similar Soviet units. Clearly, the StuG and Pz IV were far more often directly destroyed by hits from enemy units. On the other hand, there seems to have been significantly fewer cases of mechanical breakdown among StuG and Pz IV. Ten such cases are explicitly mentioned, but in many cases the war diary just says that a tank was out of action, without giving a cause. Most likely, in those cases the cause was enemy action.

Clearly the proportions between destroyed by enemy fire, damaged by enemy fire and lost due to other causes differ considerably between the III./Pz.Rgt 36 and I./Pz.Rgt. 26.

This Picture is TAKEN FROM The SS Panzer corps in July 1943.

 

Peacekeeping Institute?

It appears that the Army is looking at shuttering the rather small Peacekeeping and Stability Operations Institute: https://www.yahoo.com/news/army-push-end-peacekeeping-institute-sparks-wider-debate-100019830.html

Now, I have never had any intersection with this organization, so I have no idea of how effective, productive or useful it is. I gather they are looking at renaming it (because peacekeeping is a bad word?) and cutting it more than 2/3rds. This is minimal savings.

Now, my experience is that DOD, being command driven and mission oriented, tends to forget about missions that are not currently getting “command attention.” I discussed this problem in some depth in my book America’s Modern Wars. We have seen parts of DOD go from ignoring the study of insurgencies before 2001 to recently not being able to properly model conventional combat for training exercises. As outrageous as this last sentence sounds, I can back it up with real world examples, except I really don’t want to embarrass anyone. But let us say, that we have seen multiple examples over the years of DOD being overly focused on the mission de jure at the expense of its other missions. DOD missions range from conventional wars, to counterinsurgencies, to irregular operations, to peacekeeping, nation building, and even border protection. These missions come and go, but they always show back up. It has been the case for over 200 years. The DOD always needs to be ready to conduct all missions. The failures in Iraq, which cost American lives, drives home that point in blood.

Mine Effectiveness (Mines at Kursk III)

There is an interesting statement in Zamulin’s book on Kursk (Demolishing the Myth, page 43) that says:

If in front of the line of defenses it required 350-400 anti-tank mines on average to damage or destroy one tank, then in the depths of the defense that number fell to 150-200 anti-tank mines. Such a difference is explained by the fact that mine emplacement in the depths of the defense occurred along lines of advance already revealed by the enemy.

I think I am reading that correctly, in that it takes 400 mines to damage or destroy one tank. There is no footnote to this passage, so I do not know if such a figure is from studies done in World War II, after World War II, or is just some rule of thumb. But, I have that data to test it here:

Mines at Kursk I

and here:

Tank Losses to Mines (Mines at Kursk II)

So, for the first day of the offensive in the south I have 131 to 154 German tanks lost to mines. So in first echelon of Sixth Guards Army there were 68,987 anti-tank mines (see my Kursk book, page 200). In the first echelon of the Seventh Guards Army there were 32,194 anti-tank mines in front of the III Panzer Corps (the 81st GRD and the 78th GRD, see page 201). This is a total of 101,181 anti-tank mines in the first echelon, opposite the three attacking German panzer corps.

So….101,181/154 = 657 or 101,181/131 = 772. Therefore, based upon this data, it appears that it was more like 657-772 mines per tank damaged or destroyed.

Now maybe I should only count 1/2 of the 71st Guards Rifle Division (GRD) mines, because the 332nd Infantry Division was opposite to half of the division (Kursk, page 378) and maybe 1/2 of the 67th GRD because both the 11th PzD and the 167th ID were opposite to it (Kursk, page 388). This reduces the mines counted against the German armor by 17,756. Now this is probably not really correct, as the mines are going to be biased towards the most obvious areas of attack (which is where the German armor went), but still (101,181-17,756)/154 = 541 or 101,181-17,756)/131 = 637.

So, it appears were are looking at a figure ranging from 541 to 772 anti-tank mines per tank damaged or destroyed.

Now……I can break it down by division attacking sector:

                            Estimated Tanks

                            Lost to Mines

Division               Low       High        Mines                               Range

3rd PzD                —                7            19,530 or less                383 or more per tank

GD PzGrD            —              25            as above                        as above

Panther Rgt         15             19            as above                        as above

11th PzD               —               8           15,981 or less                 1,998 or more per tank

LSSAH PzGrD     15             20           16,476                            515 to 687 per tank

DR SS PzGrD        9             12           as above                        as above

T SS PzGrD           9             12           17,000/2                        708 to 944 per tank

6th PzD      .69 x  20     .79 x 20          17,000/2 + 20,266/2      1165 to 1331 per tank

19h PzD     .69 x  19     .79 x 19          20,266/2 + 11,928/2      1073 to 1238 per tank

7th PzD      .69 x  21     .79 x 21          11,928/2                         351 to 426 per tank

Now, we never attempted to estimate the number of tanks damaged or destroyed by mines after the first day (5 July 1943) because we did not have the data. But this does give us some idea of how many anti-tank mines need to be laid to damage or destroy a tank. I have not done a “literature search” to determine if anyone else has done any other in-depth analysis of this.

U.S. versus China (GDP)

Right now (as of 2017) the U.S. GDP is $19.391 Trillion according to the World Bank. The Chinese economy is $12.238 Trillion. This is 63% of the U.S. economy. No economy has been that close to the U.S. economy since Japan leading up to 1995.

It is a rather amazing growth on the part of China. Back in the bad old days, after we had fought a war with them over Korea, they were threatening to invade Taiwan, they were supporting North Vietnam against our ally South Vietnam, and allied with the Soviet Union as part of the Communist Bloc, the difference was much greater. The U.S. GDP in 1960 was 543.3 Billion, while China’s was 59.716, meaning the U.S. economy was 9 times greater. Now it is only 1.6 times greater.

Of course, the two economies are intertwined, with the United States being China’s largest trading partner. This sort of leads to the odd situation where some in the U.S. and China consider the other to be a rival. But, I can’t think of too many cases where major trading partners were opposing hostile players on the world stage. Still, it is a very uncomfortable arrangement with the U.S. nominally the leader of the free world, while China had been known to run over its people with tanks. They are still very much a dictatorship. So the two nations seem to exist as trading partners who are not really friends and not really enemies. They may be rivals in the long run, or may not. There is, of course, an on-going trade dispute between the two nations.

Now….if were extend those lines on the graph out…..it does look like they will cross at some point around 2050 or so. This of course, leads me back to this post:

Demographics of China

It is projected that by 2050 the Chinese population will decline to 1.36 billion by 2050 (it is currently 1.41 billion) while the U.S. will grow to 402 million by 2050 (it is currently 328 million). For a number of reasons, I don’t think we will see the Chinese economy exceed the U.S. economy by 2050.

Dupuy’s Verities: Initiative

German Army soldiers advance during the Third Battle of Kharkov in early 1943. This was the culmination of a counteroffensive by German Field Marshal Erich von Manstein that blunted the Soviet offensive drive following the recapture of Stalingrad in late 1942. [Photo: KonchitsyaLeto/Reddit]

The fifth of Trevor Dupuy’s Timeless Verities of Combat is:

Initiative permits application of preponderant combat power.

From Understanding War (1987):

The importance of seizing and maintaining the initiative has not declined in our times, nor will it in the future. This has been the secret of success of all of the great captains of history. It was as true of MacArthur as it was of Alexander the Great, Grant or Napoleon. Some modern Soviet theorists have suggested that this is even more important now in an era of high technology than formerly. They may be right. This has certainly been a major factor in the Israeli victories over the Arabs in all of their wars.

Given the prominent role initiative has played in warfare historically, it is curious that it is not a principle of war in its own right. However, it could be argued that it is sufficiently embedded in the principles of the offensive and maneuver that it does not need to be articulated separately. After all, the traditional means of sizing the initiative on the battlefield is through a combination of the offensive and maneuver.

Initiative is a fundamental aspect of current U.S. Army doctrine, as stated in ADP 3-0 Operations (2017):

The central idea of operations is that, as part of a joint force, Army forces seize, retain, and exploit the initiative to gain and maintain a position of relative advantage in sustained land operations to prevent conflict, shape the operational environment, and win our Nation’s wars as part of unified action.

For Dupuy, the specific connection between initiative and combat power is likely why he chose to include it as a verity in its own right. Combat power was the central concept in his theory of combat and initiative was not just the basic means of achieving a preponderance of combat power through superior force strength (i.e. numbers), but also in harnessing the effects of the circumstantial variables of combat that multiply combat power (i.e. surprise, mobility, vulnerability, combat effectiveness). It was precisely through the exploitation of this relationship between initiative and combat power that allowed inferior numbers of German and Israeli combat forces to succeed time and again in combat against superior numbers of Soviet and Arab opponents.

Using initiative to apply preponderant combat power in battle is the primary way the effects of maneuver (to “gain and maintain a position of relative advantage“) are abstracted in Dupuy’s Quantified Judgement Model (QJM)/Tactical Numerical Deterministic Model (TNDM). The QJM/TNDM itself is primarily a combat attrition adjudicator that determines combat outcomes through calculations of relative combat power. The numerical force strengths of the opposing forces engaged as determined by maneuver can be easily inputted into the QJM/TNDM and then modified by the applicable circumstantial variables of combat related to maneuver to obtain a calculation of relative combat power. As another of Dupuy’s verities states, “superior combat power always wins.”

Panther Breakdowns in February-March 1944

In a previous post, I presented information on the actions of the I./Pz.Rgt. 26 Panther battalion in January 1944.

Panther Breakdowns In January 1944

During late January and February, the battalion had usually been attacking. In March, it found itself embroiled in defensive fighting. This would show up in its losses. On 1 February, it reported 30 operational Panthers and 8 in workshops. No less than 24 had been sent off by train for more extensive engine repairs. Eleven Panthers had been irrevocably lost in combat (five due to hits that caused permanent damage, five had been damaged but could not be recovered and one had suffered an accident and could not be recovered). Two Panthers had been lost to engine room fires during march.

The battles fought 1-20 February only cost the battalion one Panther destroyed by enemy action (burned out due to AT round hit). Also, one more Panther spontaneously caught fire in the engine room and burned out. In the same period, no less than 97 Panthers were repaired by the workshop units, a very high damaged to destroyed ratio. Note that these repairs are due to combat damage as well as non-combat damage.

On 12 February, 20 Panthers were operational, 25 in workshop and 14 were to be recovered from various locations.

From 21 February, the battalion shifted to defensive operations and would retreat. This would lead to an increasing number of tanks being irrevocably lost. On 6 and 7 March, eight Panthers were blown up by the battalion. Of these only two had been damaged by enemy fire. The remaining six suffered from mechanical breakdowns.

The report (I./Pz.Rgt. 26 “Zusammengefasster Bericht über Panzerlage”) gives causes for each Panther being put out of action these days. It is clear that of 15 Panthers put out of action 5-7 March, only three had been hit by enemy fire and it seems that none received irreparable damage.

The battalion continued to retreat and on 8 March two Panthers were cannibalized for parts and subsequently blown up. These two (numbers 132 and 332) had not been knocked out by the enemy. They had simply got stuck in the terrain, one of them had also damaged a final drive. Lack of towing vehicles meant that they could not be recovered.

Late on 8 March it was decided to blow up another three Panthers, all of which had technical problems but could not be recovered in time, due to lack of towing vehicles and mounting enemy pressure.

On 9 March, another six Panther were blown up. Three had been hit by enemy fire, but as they were blown up, it seems unlikely that they had received terminal damage before being blown up. Finally, on 14 March two more Panthers were blown up. They both had technical damage.

After the actions in the Uman–Zvenigorodka area, the battalion retreated southwest, to the Kishinev–Balta area. During the retreat, another 19 Panthers were blown up, none of which had been damaged by enemy fire. Instead, demolition was carried out because vehicles had crashed off bridges, suffered technical damage, got stuck in the terrain, but could not be recovered in time before enemy pressure got to strong.

Despite these problems, the repair services repaired 41 Panthers in the period, which indicates that they worked hard.

During the first three months of 1944, the I./Pz.Rgt. 26 lost 60 Panthers irrevocably. Of these 37 were blown up without being damaged by the enemy. Four destroyed themselves by engine room fires. This left 19 being hit by enemy fire. Of these, its seems only 7 were actually destroyed by the hits received.

It seems clear that enemy fire was not the main cause of losses. As long as the Germans could recover damaged tanks, and had spare parts, few total losses occurred. Also, it is obvious that tanks were put out of action mainly by other causes than enemy fire. However, advancing Soviet ground units had much to do with the German tank losses, as such action could prevent recovery and force the Germans to blow up otherwise repairable tanks.

I have previously encountered claims that the Germans kept destroyed tanks on the rosters and thereby their true losses would appear smaller than they actually were. That notion finds no support in the very detailed war diary of the I./Pz.Rgt 26. I cannot find one single such case in the three months I have studied. Instead, it is clear that they far more often had to blow up perfectly repairable tanks.

During the three months discussed here, the workshops of the battalion repaired well over 200 Panthers, perhaps as many as 300, which can be contrasted to only about 7 being directly destroyed by enemy fire. This shows that it can be very problematic to infer tank losses from changes in the number of operational tanks from one time to another. Also, it shows the importance of controlling the terrain after the action has been fought.

All information is from the war diary, with annexes, of the I./Pz.Rgt. 26 (Bundesarchiv-Militärarchiv, RH 39/599).

Really the End of Stealth?

This blog reported in July that the end of stealth might be near.  Further evidence comes with Aviation Week’s interview with Fred Kennedy, the lead of the Tactical Technology Office (TTO) at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) reveals key elements of the debates within the US defense community, specifically about stealth.

“We have been doubling down on the miracle of stealth for forty years. … There are diminishing returns to using the same tactic.  I don’t think there is a lot of advantage to going further into this particular tactic of stealth.”  Rather, DARPA suggests what they call “un-deterable air presence. … You’re going to see me coming, since I won’t be stealthy, and you’re going to shoot at me, but you’re not going to hit anything.  An example is hypersonics.”

Meanwhile, Air Force Chief of Staff General Dave Goldfein is looking at the network approach, sometimes called combat cloud.  ”When you look at — through the lens of the network — and you look at air superiority as a mission, as a family-of-systems approach, you can see why you don’t hear me talking a lot about a replacement, A for B.”

This indicates that several programs which are underway to consider building new stealth aircraft might be facing an uphill battle to convince the Air Force, DARPA and Department of Defense (DoD):

  • Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD)
  • Penetrating Counter Air (PCA)
  • F/A-XX

So, does this mean that stealth is near its end? A few key facts illustrate otherwise:

  1. Significant investment in new stealthy platforms, worldwide.
    1. US F-117 – in service from 1983 to 2008
    2. US B-2 – in service since 1997
    3. US F-22 – in service 2005-Dec, first combat 2014-Sep
    4. F-35 Program – first combat by Israeli Air Force, 2018-May
    5. US B-21 Program – expected to enter service by 2025
    6. British Tempest – concept announced 2018-July
    7. Franco-German Future Combat Air System (FCAS)
    8. Japanese X-2 Shinshin – costly, but may proceed with partners
    9. Korean & Indonesian KF-X – expected by 2032
    10. Turkish & British TF-X – first flight by 2023 ?
    11. Chinese J-20 – in serial production since 2017-Oct
    12. Chinese J-31 – improved version, first flight 2016-Dec
    13. Chinese H-20 – strategic stealth bomber, planned for 2025
    14. Russian Su-57 – in service, combat evaluation in Syria
    15. Russian PAK DA Program – bomber planned for 2025-2030
  2. Research projects by DARPA that leverage existing stealthy platforms.
    1. Gremlins – semi-disposable, air launch and recovery UAVs
    2. Software – System of Systems approach (SoSITE)
  3. Evidence that stealth capabilities by potential adversaries are overstated.
    1. India Air Force claims Su-30MKI tracked Chinese J-20
    2. Russia cancels mass production of Su-57

Clearly then, stealth is a capability that is here to stay, and many new aircraft with incorporate it into their design. The point that DARPA’s Kennedy makes is that potential adversaries know this tactic, and they are investing in ways to counter it.  Stealth is no longer a source of technological surprise, it is mainstream.  It was original and likely the source of significant surprise in 1983!

Tank Losses to Mines (Mines at Kursk II)

This is a follow up post to this post:

Mines at Kursk I

This is excerpted directly from my Kursk book, page 423.

The German tank losses due to mines can be estimated for this day [5 July 1943]. There is a report that appears to record all the German tanks lost to mines on 5 July. The 3rd Panzer Division reported losing six tanks damaged to mines. One other was destroyed, and while the records do not explicitly so state, the assumption is that this one was also lost to mines. The Gross Deutschland reports that it lost 5 assault guns and about 20 tanks to mines. This was the worst loss to mines suffered by any division. The 11th Panzer Division reported losing eight tanks on 5 July. It is unclear, but it appear that all of these were also lost to mines. The Adolf Hitler SS Division reported losing 20 tanks on 5 July, including six Tiger tanks. The Totenkopf SS Division lost 12 tanks, including five Tigers. The record notes that these were “mostly from mines.” The Das Reich SS Division reported 12 tanks lost, including two Tigers. They do not report the cause of loss, but it is also assumed that most were from mines. A comparison of the calculated losses from these divisions (generate by subtracting the number of tanks ready-for-action on the evening of the 4th from the number ready-for-action on the evening of the 5th) compared to the reported losses due to mines shows the following:

                           Calculated losses     Reported losses     Mine loss 

                           (from all causes)      (mine losses)          as a percent

                            5 July                       5 July                     of total loss

3rd PzD                  10                                7                             70%

GD PzGrD              30                              25                             83%

11th PzD                12                                8                             67%

LSSAH PzGrD       20                               20                          100%

DR SS PzGrD        19                               12                            63%

T SS PzGD            15                               12                             80%

                            ——                           ——                            ——

                            106                               84                             79%

 

It is estimated that the Panther regiment lost 19 tanks to mines on this day. In the case of the III Panzer corps, it showed a decline in strength on the first day of 64 tanks. Assuming that the same percent were lost to mines as for the other two panzer corps, then another 51 tanks were lost to mines. We do know that at least 9 Tigers were lost to mines on this day and a total of 16 were lost to mines in the first three days of battle.

Therefore, it is estimated that on the 5th of July, the attacking Germans lost as many as 154 tanks to mines out of 249 damaged or destroyed that day. This amounts to 62 percent of the tanks lost on that day and accounted for 10 percent of the total German tanks lost between 4 and 18 Julty. This is the upper estimate, as the records often report that “most” of the tank losses were to mines. If one assumes that “most” means 75 percent lost to mines, then the figure are less. The XLVIII Panzer corps loss to mines would remained at 40, the SS Panzer Corps loss to mines would lower to 33, the Panzer Regiment von Lauchert to 15, and the III Panzer and Corps Raus to 44, for a total of 131 tanks lost to mines on 5 July.

Of those tanks lost to mines, only one or two, including one Panther, were clearly destroyed by mines. Most of the tanks lost to mines were damaged without loss to the crew. In many case the tanks were repaired and put back into action within a few days. There were also at least four Soviet tanks lost to mines on this day, probably their own mines, and we know of two German Tiger tanks that were lost to their own mines.

One more mine related post to follow.

China versus India

In a blog posts on Indian demographics someone asked “The question is why India (per capita income $6,490-2016) is still so poor compared to China (per capital income $15,000 – 2016).” I have never really examined this, but it is an interesting enough question that I wanted to take a further look at it.

In 1960, the World Bank has China’s GDP at $60 billion. India’s GDP at $37 billion. India’s GDP is around 61% of China’s. Considering that India’s population was smaller, they were clearly at similar levels of development. This is, of course, back in the day when China and India were having border fights in the Himalayas (like in 1962).

Over the next couple of decades, India actually closed in on China. In 1970, India’s GDP was 67% of China’s GDP. In 1980 it was 96%. In 1990, they had separated a little with India’s GDP being 88% of China’s. So for three decades they grew at similar rates. And then as you can see rather clearly from the chart below, China’s economy took off.

By the year 2000, China’s GDP was 2.6 times larger than India’s. India was at 38% of China. By 2010, the disparity widened, with China’s GDP now 3.7 times larger than India’s (27%). As of 2017, the disparity continued to grow with China’s GDP now 4.7 times larger (or 21% for India). This is a pretty significant change over time, with clearly most of the difference developing from 1990 to the present. It has been an amazing three decades for China.

Of course, the last time we saw such amazing growth was with Japan up through 1995. Is China growth permanent and sustainable (like U.S. growth tends to be), or is it a bubble?

See:

Where Did Japan Go?

 

What Does Lethality Mean In Warfare?

In an insightful essay over at The Strategy Bridge, “Lethality: An Inquiry,” Marine Corps officer Olivia Gerard accomplishes one of the most important, yet most often overlooked, aspects of successfully thinking about and planning for war: questioning a basic assumption. She achieves this by posing a simple question: “What is lethality?”

Gerard notes that the current U.S. National Defense Strategy is predicated on lethality; as it states: “A more lethal, resilient, and rapidly innovating Joint Force, combined with a robust constellation of allies and partners, will sustain American influence and ensure favorable balances of power that safeguard the free and open international order.” She also identifies the linkage in the strategy between lethality and deterrence via a supporting statement from Deputy Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan: “Everything we do is geared toward one goal: maximizing lethality. A lethal force is the strongest deterrent to war.”

After pointing out that the strategy does not define the concept of lethality, Gerard responds to Shanahan’s statement by asking “why?”

She uses this as a jumping off point to examine the meaning of lethality in warfare. Starting from the traditional understanding of lethality as a tactical concept, Gerard walks through the way it has been understood historically. From this, she formulates a construct for understanding the relationship between lethality and strategy:

Organizational lethality emerges from tactical lethality that is institutionally codified. Tactical lethality is nested within organizational lethality, which is nested within strategic lethality. Plugging these terms into an implicit calculus, we can rewrite strategic lethality as the efficacy with which we can form intentional deadly relationships towards targets that can be actualized towards political ends.

To this, Gerard appends two interesting caveats: “Notice first that the organizational component becomes implicit. What remains outside, however, is the intention–a meta-intention–to form these potential deadly relationships in the first place.”

It is the second of these caveats—the intent to connect lethality to a strategic end—that informs Gerard’s conclusion. While the National Defense Strategy does not define the term, she observes that by explicitly leveraging the threat to use lethality to bolster deterrence, it supplies the necessary credibility needed to make deterrence viable. “Proclaiming lethality a core tenet, especially in a public strategic document, is the communication of the threat.”

Gerard’s exploration of lethality and her proposed framework for understanding it provide a very useful way of thinking about the way it relates to warfare. It is definitely worth your time to read.

What might be just as interesting, however, are the caveats to her construct because they encompass a lot of what is problematic about the way the U.S. military thinks—explicitly and implicitly—about tactical lethality and how it is codified into concepts of organizational lethality. (While I have touched on some of those already, Gerard gives more to reflect on. More on that later.)

Gerard also references the definition of lethality Trevor Dupuy developed for his 1964 study of historical trends in weapon lethality. While noting that his definition was too narrow for the purposes of her inquiry, the historical relationship between lethality, casualties, and dispersion on the battlefield Dupuy found in that study formed the basis for his subsequent theories of warfare and models of combat. (I will write more about those in the future as well.)