There are a few threads woven into this topic.
One thing FCD brings up is the apparent fixation with very expensive hardware. If we peel back the layers of that acquisition approach, a lot of it revolves around the desire for very accurate ordnance.
And why ? Well, a lot of that was the wringer other countries dragged the USA through because of what was seen as indiscriminate use of ordnance in the Vietnam War. And many of the complainers were not those targeted, it was the USA's fair weather allies like Germany who gleefully kicked the USA in the backside to promote their own agendas.
Thus stung, the USA opted for the hugely expensive option of using guided weapons: missiles, glide bombs, and now even 2.75-inch folding fin aerial rockets.
The other part went back to the Korean War, when our former fair weather allies, the Chinese, used human wave attacks that were difficult to defeat with standard infantry weaponry. This led to the desire for more explosive weapons, along with specialties like cannister rounds, that could shred massed troops before they were able to close with defending forces.
Note, the USA could have taken out Fordow by landing troops and close assaulting the facility with a finishing touch of detonating it sky high using combat engineering techniques.
But that implies casualties, something no Western military wants to deal with anymore -- a critical weakness in the warfighting mentality of the West, by the way. "War means fighting, and fighting means killing" (N. B. Forrest) ... the political legacy of the 1968 generation's unrest drives much of this approach.
The upshot is that we try not to engage with ground forces and that we use highly accurate ordnance that can often be shot from a safe distance away. It is a financially costly way to wage war, and makes for an interesting comparison with regimes like that of Putin, who can cynically burn through hundreds of thousands of central Asian boys in order to bring Ukraine to heel in classic Muscovian style.
One thing FCD brings up is the apparent fixation with very expensive hardware. If we peel back the layers of that acquisition approach, a lot of it revolves around the desire for very accurate ordnance.
And why ? Well, a lot of that was the wringer other countries dragged the USA through because of what was seen as indiscriminate use of ordnance in the Vietnam War. And many of the complainers were not those targeted, it was the USA's fair weather allies like Germany who gleefully kicked the USA in the backside to promote their own agendas.
Thus stung, the USA opted for the hugely expensive option of using guided weapons: missiles, glide bombs, and now even 2.75-inch folding fin aerial rockets.
The other part went back to the Korean War, when our former fair weather allies, the Chinese, used human wave attacks that were difficult to defeat with standard infantry weaponry. This led to the desire for more explosive weapons, along with specialties like cannister rounds, that could shred massed troops before they were able to close with defending forces.
Note, the USA could have taken out Fordow by landing troops and close assaulting the facility with a finishing touch of detonating it sky high using combat engineering techniques.
But that implies casualties, something no Western military wants to deal with anymore -- a critical weakness in the warfighting mentality of the West, by the way. "War means fighting, and fighting means killing" (N. B. Forrest) ... the political legacy of the 1968 generation's unrest drives much of this approach.
The upshot is that we try not to engage with ground forces and that we use highly accurate ordnance that can often be shot from a safe distance away. It is a financially costly way to wage war, and makes for an interesting comparison with regimes like that of Putin, who can cynically burn through hundreds of thousands of central Asian boys in order to bring Ukraine to heel in classic Muscovian style.
Fire In The Hole