And yet they still didn’t win.
That’s the point. Succesful low-intensity warfare strategies do not involve tanks at all. They are expensive and are not useful.
To choose a different strategy meant leaving the tanks in their base.
Indeed. This can even be observed in a bloodless game of football. It has been statistically shown a team reduced to ten men because of a red card will suffer no adverse effects provided the sending off happens early enough in the game.
That is just the problem. They would have more chance of winning if they went on the offensive with a fleet of old, rusty T-55s. The heavier the tank the more prestige associated with defying it.
No it doesn’t. The failure of the Israelis to successfully defeat Hezb’Allah in 2006 does not mean that the tank failed in its use. Having a different strategy doesn’t mean that you need a completely different set of tools; it means you need a new way of employing the existing set of tools. Or, it can also mean that the Israeli attempt to defeat Hezb’Allah would have been a failure irregardless of the set of tools used, because the Israelis did not have the will power (or maybe even the need) to eradicate each and every insurgent in Lebanon.
You have still failed to show how the tank is not useful, while I have provided various different historical examples in which they were absolutely critical to success. The tank is a tool used as part of a tactic; a strategy is an overall plan on how to meet “end objectives” in a war. For example, the tank was very useful for the Germans in the Second World War, but they lost that war. That does not mean that the tank was not useful; it means the Germans had a very poor strategic perspective on the war against the Soviet Union.
Tanks have been used to great effect in Iraq and Afghanistan. Indeed, in Afghanistan they have been so successful that NATO is asking the partner nations to send in armor. The Canadians were the first to ship armor to Afghanistan; their experiences there persuaded the government to finally replace Leopard 1C2s with Leopard 2A6Ms. The Danes also deployed their Leopard 2A5s, after Canada’s experiences, and other nations have deployed lighter armor, as well. There is no other mobile weapon that can provide the firepower of the tank, with the massive protective and morale value it offers.
Whether a militia would employ a tank is one thing (or any armored fighting vehicle), but denying that they are useful is warfare is completely ludicrous and not grounded in any type of reality.
I am having trouble picturing how the rules are different when looking at history as a whole when it would be non-state vs state. We have plenty of examples of a more centralized power deafeting / assimilating a decentralized culture, with the very nature of decentralization as being at least part of the problem (rome in Gaul, UK in India, etc). On the flip we also have examples of a more centralized power also being somewhat of a magnet of a desire to control / loot if it is deemd weak enough and surrounded by decentralized cultures (barbarians at the gate).
I don’t see how something being an official anarchy/ non state would change that fact so long as there is some centralized power around.
I’m not sure what you are trying to say, or how that tied into what you quoted. I’m not sure why they would have had a better chance of winning with T-55s; I think it would have been the opposite ,as the T-55 would not have been able to survive modern anti-tank weapons.
Tanks are certainly useful in warfare, but not all warfare. You can’t deploy tanks on the oceans, or in the sky. For the same reason, you can’t deploy tanks in low-intensity war.
And why do you keep changing the spelling of Hezbollah?
India was not simply “decentralized”, it was also disunited. There was no more “India” than there was a “Europe”. The proof is that today the common language of India is English. The Indians have nothing else in common.
It was because the Indians were actively attempting to oppress and subjugate each other that the East India Company could take control of it. All it had to promise was some security.
The Spanish did it the same way in Mexico, and all it took was a hundred conquistadors.
You still haven’t made the case why the tank is not useful in low-intensity warfare; you keep repeating that, and ignore all the examples I’ve given you where tactically they have been very useful (and tactically is where it matters, since the tank is meant as a tool to give a force a tactical advantage).
I spell it Hezb’allah. It’s a transliteration of the Arabic. Many are used including hezbollah, hezb’allah and hizb’allah.
You can’t score tactical points without calculating the costs, strategic and economic. We’ve known that since King Pyrrhus.
The point is, tanks haven’t won in low-intensity warfare. Those who fight without them will have a economic and strategic advantage.
Okay, that is an excellent observation, but you still have not applied it to the case of the tank. Tanks have a sufficiently low opportunity cost so that they have been found valuable in a wide array of low-intensity conflicts, including the ones I’ve listed above.
Well, the first sentence is not completely accurate, and the second sentence is completely inaccurate (and is an assertion you continue to make, but continue to fail to back up). Tanks have been very successful in many low-intensity wars, including ones which have been won and ones which have been lost (on the topic of the 1982 Lebanon War, I don’t think Israel was considered a loser in the war; the Israelis were able to meet their objectives); tanks are very successful in Afghanistan. They are so successful that they are considered irreplaceable, and they continue to ask for more. The same is true in Iraq, where both the British and the Americans use them.
Your attempt to disqualify the tank in a low-intensity war is the same as attempting to disqualify the value of an infantryman, based on the fact that several countries have failed to win low-intensity conflicts with infantrymen. This is really not a good analysis of the tactical utility of a tank.
Because we know that war bureaucrats always ask for more of only those things that are needed, not useless things. Bureaucrats are excellent at economic calculation.
Can you please address what I said in the post? You ignore the substantial portion of the post to make some completely unfounded statement. I see that you are not interested in having a serious debate.
What’s serious about military bureaucrats asking for more stuff? They always, always, always want more stuff. That doesn’t mean they are producing anything with that stuff.
So far, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan haven’t produced a victory. Everything that’s been spent there has been a waste.
India may have been a bad example. But still I see no consistent evidence of a change in rules when a country (meaning those who run the state) can summon up a superior amount of resources while still keeping it’s citizens content (or oppressed) enough to apply those resources to accomplish a goal, I see no consistent evidence how a divide and conquer strat couldn’t work in anarchy, I see no consistent evidence for a disunited non state region not having to worry about a “cultural risk” from a more centralized govt.
There is simply no reason to assume a non state won’t act like a “disunited” non country with many people trying to pursue their own interests. There is no reason for me to think that there would not be disenfranchised people in said region (assuming it was of a considerable size) and that a centralized force could make use of them. There is no reason to think that a centralized force won’t at least some times be appealed to as an arbitrator in disputes (even if it is a stupid idea to do such). There is no reson to believe a centralized power in a region won’t become culturally dominant (language, etc)
I am not saying that a state is always preferable/ victorious, I just don’t see the “invincibility of the non-state” or an inherent advantage in matters of military affairs. I do believe it is all quite variable and flexible (barring a couple laws of reality). I also see no reason to assume a military / assimilation situation to be much different in a non state region.
I think the answer is yes. One would wish to have some military forces for defense.
A government IS a take-over. Try to think of a voluntary solution.
That’s a lot of denial.
I accept the line of reasoning that there is nothing inherently superior in a non-state vs state society in every instance the way a state has tried to exert its power over foreigners
I accept the amount of resources one can utilize towards a goal can play a major and even the most significant factor in warfare. It is quite reasonable to assume a centralized state could have this working to its advantage over a non state region.
I accept that if there is a lack of culture or an “inferior” culture in a non state region, it could lead to its downfall if a centralized state spread its culture
I accept that throughout history it is not uncommon for people to have gone to the strongest centralized power to solve disputes
I accept that in a non state picking up the disenfranchised would be somewhat easy to do, if I were running a centralized state.
I accept that “divide, conquer, and assimilate” has been used successfully as a practice by centralized powers for 2000 plus years in no obscur fashion, and I see how it may be reasonable to assume how a state could apply it to a non state setting.
That is now acceptance
Do you accept that in every instance where a state has gone to war against a non-state in the past half-century, they have lost?