The Next War: Russian Asymmetric Warfare and what it means for the wars of tomorrow By: Bison Carcelli 2 Abstract With the Global War on Terror beginning to wind down, United States troops are beginning to hand off military responsibilities to many of our allies in the Middle East. As these soldiers return home, they must continue to train and prepare to fight the battles of tomorrow. However, what this battlefield will look like is becoming less certain than we could have ever previously thought. The United States has maintained that the next war will more than likely be between two superpowers with brigade on brigade battles and maneuver becoming commonplace. While the United States was looking towards the next conventional war, its main adversary, Russia has taken initiative to create new ways in which to wage war based on the control of information and small local proxy units. Explored here is how Russia came to be waging what is now known as asymmetric warfare and what the United States has done and needs to do to prepare for future conflicts that may arise. Taking into account ongoing conflicts in Ukraine, we see that Russia will not decisively engage in battle but will use local terrorist groups to accomplish its goals. The use of misinformation and special operations forces allows for Russia to set the conditions necessary for these conflicts to take place, the United States has been slow to recognize this and must adapt to a technologically advanced and irregular enemy threat. 3 Introduction To begin this paper, we must first understand what asymmetric otherwise known as irregular warfare is. The Department of Defense defines irregular warfare as, “A violent struggle among state and non-state actors for legitimacy and influence over the relevant populations. IW favors indirect and asymmetric approaches, though it may employ the full range of military and other capabilities, in order to erode an adversary’s power, influence, and will.”(DOD) Obvious here is the mention of non-state actors using violent means to influence the population. We will cover how Russia has come to favor this type of warfare and what that will mean for the battles of tomorrow. The United States has misinterpreted the buildup of Russian arms to mean that they are prepared to engage in a large scale and decisive war with the West, however through their history we see that Russia most likely has different goals it is pursuing. While the West, meaning the United States and other NATO allies were preoccupied with the Global War on Terror, Russia was adapting its military and its tactics to sew unrest in the greater post-soviet union region and satellite countries in order to broaden its sphere of influence. In this essay we will take a look at how the United States and Russia have developed through history, with attention paid to World War 1, where US troops and Russian troops met for the first and last time in an official capacity. Going through history we will see how Russia was able to play a role in the Korean war without ever admitting that they were officially present in the country during wartime. After we understand the history of Russia and many of its historical accolades, we can begin to understand how Russia operates during war and how they will approach future conflicts. Additionally, this essay will explore how the United States government has perceived this threat and what it is doing to prepare for future conflicts. 4 History Ask anyone during the last seventy years about who the main enemies are to the United States of America and you will likely hear one of three answers. Russia, communists or terrorists. To understand why modern-day forces are training the way that they are, we have to understand how Russia has come to be a chief adversary during our nation's history. Interesting to point out is that the United States has never officially fought against Russian troops except for once in 1918 when US troops intervened in the Russian civil war. This instance will be touched on briefly as it did little to develop the now complex relationships between the United States and Russia. Primarily we will focus on the USSR’s involvement in the Korean War, leading into Russia’s current military operations in the Ukraine as well as some other lesser known conflict areas. The Bolshevik revolution, otherwise known as the October revolution. The war that started it all for the USSR and what is now modern Russia. Prior to the revolution Russia’s society was based upon a class system with a dictator (tsar) and a proletariat upper class and a bourgeoisie working class. The Bolsheviks were communists who believed in the removal of social classes and the installment of a socialist form of government, a government where the working class is not taken advantage of. The ideals of the leader of the Bolshevik party, Vladimir Lenin, spoke to those who labored, felt helpless against what was the capitalist markets that the world was moving towards during the early 1900’s “Uneven economic and political development," says Lenin, "is an absolute law of capitalism. Hence, the victory of socialism is possible first in several or even in one capitalist country taken separately. The victorious proletariat of that country, having expropriated the capitalists and organized its own socialist production, would stand up against the rest of the world, the capitalist world, attracting to its cause the oppressed classes of other countries, raising revolts in those countries against the capitalists, and in the event of necessity coming out even with armed force against the exploiting classes and their states." For "the free union of nations in socialism is 5 impossible without a more or less prolonged and stubborn struggle of the socialist republics against the backward states." (Stalin, pg117) This theme of Russia demonizing the ways of the West, the West meaning Europe and the United States, is common throughout the history of what becomes the USSR and eventually Russia. However, I would like to quickly call attention to the first and only armed conflict between Soviets and the United States, the battles of Arkhangelsk in Russia. The setting of this operation is during World War 1 after the Bolshevik party had successfully overthrown the provisional government that had been established after the admonishment of the former Tzar. The revolutionary Russia had withdrawn from the world war and internal war was rampant. Allied forces were dispatched to aid the Czechoslovakian troops that had been cut off and were integral to the allied war effort. Thirteen thousand Americans were deployed to guard supply depots in the far north and to reignite the Eastern front of the war. The Bolsheviks being made up of a militia did not have the logistical power to be able to conduct a full on frontal assault on the allied forces, therefore they resorted to nighttime raids and few decisive battles. An early example of the USSR’s use of guerilla tactics and asymmetric war ideals that foreshadow much later events in history. Another parallel to be drawn is the Bolshevik tactics of separating the ruling party from the working class through violence and propaganda campaigns. The communists understood that if they, “directed their main blows at these parties; for unless these parties were isolated there could be no hope of a rupture between the laboring masses and imperialism, and unless this rupture was ensured there could be no hope of the victory of the Soviet revolution.”(Stalin, pg 117) History proves for this to be an effective strategy to overthrow the government and ensure a new favorable party takes power. This idea will be explored more in the USSRs influence in the Ukraine during the second half of the twentieth century and their involvement in proxy wars 6 against the West. The Bolshevik revolution was not only important for understanding the origins of the USSR and modern Russia but also the earliest development of Russian war doctrine in fighting more technologically advanced and well-funded enemies. Moving on to World War 2, just 20 years after the Soviet party took power, one of the great wars that still defines warfare to this day the Soviets were forced to defend their homeland. This was unfamiliar territory as the new government focused on offensive operations necessary for securing power in Eastern Europe. Early in 1941 an aggressive axis campaign pierced into Stalingrad, putting the Soviets on their heels. A well beaten Soviet force was again up against a better trained and more well-equipped German force whose one goal was to eliminate every soldier defending the city. Russia learned quickly during the siege, ammunition and weapons were the most important items for soldiers to have if they had any hope of surviving. “Our soldiers made sure they always had a proper store of grenades, mortar bombs, bullets and shells. They always said quite openly that they were prepared to tolerate hunger and cold, as long as they were not left without ammunition”(Stone, pg. 205) The supply of weapons and ammunition is often associated in modern times as the fundamental needs of a fighting force no matter the size or location. This is evident in the US as we have often supplied weapons to allies groups in the Middle East in effort to create the conditions necessary for the outcomes we desire, whether it be new parties of government or interest groups. Moving along through World War 2, the Soviets learned many hard lessons on the realities of prolonged warfare and urban combat, much of which the other Allied powers had already known before the Soviets. Realities such as sustained logistics and technical expertise in weapon systems. Technical expertise is an important factor in modern warfare as the rapid and efficient use of weapons is often what can determine victory or defeat against a foe. While World 7 War 2 set the stage for how we study large scale war, and much of the world practiced their first go arounds with misinformation and espionage, the Cold War is where the United States and the Soviet Union truly began their rivalry. The Cold War began shortly after World War 2 as the United States and the USSR began to realize that they would not be able to expand their powers and coexist amicably. This can be best summarized by George Kennan’s “Long Telegram” “In summary, we have here a political force committed fanatically to the belief that with US there can be no permanent modus vivendi that it is desirable and necessary that the internal harmony of our society be disrupted, our traditional way of life be destroyed, the international authority of our state be broken, if Soviet power is to be secure.” George Kennan was an American diplomat committed to Soviet affairs during the end of WW2 and into the late 1940s. During the writing of his long telegram, Kennan felt that the US government was not taking the threat that Russia posed to the free world seriously enough. In the realm of world superpowers, the sphere of influence is important to overall power as it allows for the country to make trade deals and freedom of movement. This can be best shown through Kennan's final conclusion that the US, “In these circumstances it is clear that the main element of any United States policy toward the Soviet Union must be that of a long-term, patient but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansive tendencies.” Unfortunately, what this meant was the ability to be stronger militarily than the other. Military superiority is an easy way to deter any potential aggression, during the cold war this took the form as a massive buildup of US and Soviet nuclear arms capable of destroying all life on Earth. Mutually assured destruction prevented another all-out war from breaking out. However, this idea that it was the United States duty to maintain constant vigilance over Soviet Russia’s growing influence pitted us against any communist force hostile 8 to Western capitalism. We can see a good example of this during the Korean war as the Soviet Union maintained that it did not officially have a role in the war. While still being a large-scale war, this proxy between two superpowers is an early example of the global power struggles that are ongoing even today. Korea was previously held by the Japanese prior to World War II. After the war the two countries were split up into the North and South with tensions rising between the two, the North being communist Democratic Republic. Between the two countries was because of the United States taking power In South Korea while the Soviets took power in the North. This event is a prime example of other relationships necessary for asymmetric Warfare which will be discussed further on in this essay. At the founding of North Korea, the USSR decided to put Kim Il Sung into power. “Kim's early career involved connections with both anti-Japanese guerrillas and the Soviet Red Army. The Soviets brought him to the North in October, 1945, believing him capable of forming a "pliant, obedient elite" that would not cause any trouble for the Soviet Union.16 In 1946 and 1947, Kim began to use his growing control of the North's army to dominate the Korean Workers' (i.e., Communist) Party and eliminate non-communist opposition. Nonetheless, Kim's group ruled in concert with indigenous and pro-Chinese communists.” (Campbell, pg5) This is a prime example of that sphere of influence that was mentioned earlier in the essay. The Soviets being assured that they had a friendly leader and place in Korea allowed for them to focus on much larger strategic level issues. Asymmetric warfare relies upon these relations that give our adversaries plausible deniability and the extent of their participation in international conflicts. Notably throughout the Korean War the presence of Russian fighter jets (Mig 15) marked with Chinese or Korean identification were often overheard conversing in basic Korean during 9 routine flight but when stressed or in combat, oftentimes the language would switch to Russian. This was a clear indication that not only was Russia providing equipment for the Korean fighters they are also providing manpower as well. Not only was the idea that Russia was involved in the Korean War present due to their involvement with fighter jets, a top secret document that was written by Soviet leader Stalin at the time shows the Soviet leader voicing his opinions that, “America became entangled in a military intervention in Korea and is now squandering its military prestige and moral authority. Few honest people can now doubt that America is now acting as an aggressor and tyrant in Korea and that it is not as militarily powerful as it claims to be.”(Stalin) Taking advantage of America's willingness to go to war can be seen as the way in which a less powerful enemy, in this case the Soviets, are able to grow their power when facing a much larger and more dangerous enemy than themselves. Perhaps even more interesting than this is Stalin's reference to America acting as a tyrant and our military not being as vast and as powerful as we claim for it to be. Further on in this transcript the Russian dictator elaborates that America has over committed itself to Korea it would not be able to go to war with Russia in Europe or China in other hot zones in the world. The transcript has been debated widely in both manners as it shows that Russia also had beforehand knowledge of the North Korean invasion of South Korea. the reason Russia was allowing this invasion can best be summed up with the quote, “(the) document suggests that Stalin gave Kim Il Sung permission to attack South Korea on 25 June 1950 not because he felt the US would not get involved, but precisely because he wanted the US to become entangled in a limited conflict in Asia. Other scholars, by contrast, have emphasized that Stalin secretly approved Kim Il Sung`s plan to attack during the North Korean leader's secret trip to Moscow in April 1950 – only after receiving his assurances that South Korea could be overwhelmed so 10 quickly, in a matter of a few weeks, that Washington would be unable to rescue it.”(Kim) This is knowledge that has been lost to history and there may never be a definitive answer as to why the Soviet Union endorsed the invasion of South Korea. While this conflict was still very much conventional in many ways, for example uniformed forces with distinct battle lines, the presence of a country standing in as a proxy for the struggle between two superpowers is a theme that can be followed through to today. Asymmetric warfare can best be explained through the use of guerrilla tactics and small units taking on much larger more technologically advanced adversaries the misinformation campaigns present during the Cold War and the Korean War are very similar to the threats that America is facing in modern times. A major problem that develops is the control of information, one area that the United States struggled in during the Cold War. Oftentimes, “One of the most popular methods of disseminating disinformation targeted legitimate news outlets. By anonymously sending forged documents—such as embassy communications or military memoranda—to credible publications, the Soviets attempted to create well-timed fake news stories that the public accepted as true.”(Deeks) Public influence is a powerful tool that any adversary can put to use against the United States forces. If an adversary is able to create a strong us versus them, then they can create a large base of support for their cause which in turn makes them that much harder to fight. It is much easier to garner support for a fight that is happening on your land rather than a fighter that is happening in a faraway place that not many people know of. We can apply this to United States intervention Korea as well as the Middle East during the 21st century. Asymmetric warfare relies heavily upon the control over information and while the Soviets early on produced much more misinformation to sway public opinion, the United States was still able to catch on and create its own propaganda. 11 Having an understanding now over the development of the USSR including the October Revolution on the Communist Party in Russia rising to power followed by the Soviet Union's inability to engage in prolonged conventional Warfare, we are now able to begin to understand how one of the United States Chief rivals in terms of both militarily and ideologically, Unable to compete with us in all-out conventional near-peer war. Further understand this we must now move into a discussion over the recently released documents chronicling Russia’s newest strategies should they enter into war. Russian Warfare in the 21st century In December of 2014 President Putin signed to affect Russia's most recent military doctrine. This 13-page release highlights the long-term and overarching goals and perceived threats to modern-day Russia. A document like this is important because it allows subordinate leaders to know the end goals of their decisions. During this section we will go through the Russian document and dissect each part and what it means in terms of greater regional and global conflicts. We will also examine this document on the effects it has had on the United States military preparations for war and the advent of the Asymmetric Warfare Group, created shortly after the publication of this doctrine. The list of external threats to Russia and its interests include thirteen perceived dangers that Russia feel are the most important to prepare for and train against. Listed first is, “capacity power potential Organizations North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and giving it global functions carried out in violation of international law, the approach of military infrastructure countries - members of NATO to the borders of the Russian Federation, including through further expansion of the block”(Putin, pg2) What is being inferred here is the buildup United 12 Nations military exercises primarily focused on the intrusion of Russia into Ukraine following the 2014 Ukrainian revolution. To put Russia’s primary worries of Western involvement in the Ukrainian conflict into perspective, the Ukrainian revolution happened in the Spring of 2014, this document was signed by President Putin in December of 2014, much is still unknown of the extent of Russian involvement during and after the ousting of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych. It is easy to see these two events as separate without one affecting the other, but when we begin to study the events of the Ukrainian revolution and then leading into the war in the Donbas region in Ukraine we start to see that there are powers at play that are more than protestors rejecting their government. The setting of the revolution was President Yanukovych’s reluctance to sign a deal with the UN that would garner closer relations and better trade relations in the future. During this period of civil unrest, the eastern part of Ukraine began to stir with protests that were distinctly pro-Russian with the goal to separate from Ukraine. With the former and legitimate president ousted the Ukrainian Parliament stood up a temporary government aimed at providing regional stability within the country however two areas within the southeast Ukraine seceded from their proper country. New States quickly received Russian support in the form of humanitarian missions that ran into the former Ukrainian territory to provide food and medical supplies that had been lacking due to previous conflict. However, it is now understood and widely theorized that these humanitarian missions in fact contained Russian military equipment and mechanized vehicles with the goal to support protesters and bring in Russian personnel thus giving them the ability to maintain conflict with the new Ukrainian government. Russia has been able to maintain deniability of its presence in the conflict through the use of local groups to do the majority of the fighting, and thus taking the face of the conflict for 13 media. However, it is no accident that the fighters have Russian arms and are being funded by pro-Russian groups. Even if Russian military personnel are apprehended, the government claims that they were accidentally in the area and were passing through for training, an effort to mask their involvement in many Eastern European conflicts. Next, we must discuss another of Russian next generation warfare, the increasing importance of cyber and political factors in the deterrence of war and in also the victory of war. Under the subject of modern war the Russian government has this to say, “ Integrated use of military force, political, economic, informational and other non-military measures nature, implemented with the extensive use of the protest potential of the population, and special operations forces;”(Putin, pg. 4) Obvious here is the persistence of the importance of conventional military and police forces as the strong arms in conflicts. However, the mention of economic, informational and non-military measures leads us to believe that Russia is beginning to shift their focus away from large scale domination over foes to more technologically advanced as less violent means to win wars before they even begin. Talks of protest potential and special operations units have eerie similarities to what has happened and is happening in Ukraine. As stated earlier regarding the ongoing conflicts in Donbass, nonmilitary protests were incited to overthrow the government and cause secession from the greater Ukrainian country. This is a prime example of how Russia is practicing their new doctrine and are in fact quite successful in furthering Russian interests in the Eastern European region. To be noted is that protest potential is one of Russia’s greatest internal fears. “activities aimed at violent change the constitutional system of the Russian Federation and destabilizing the political and social situation a country, disruption of the functioning of the state power, important government, military objects and information infrastructure of the Russian Federation”(Putin, pg. 14 3) Russia’s current regime relies upon is strong economic and authoritarian control over the country to remain in power. Looking back at the dissolve of the Soviet Union, the ruling communist party was failing and the economy was in a deep depression, this made members of the Soviet Union, like Ukraine, Latvia and even Russia began to look outside of the union as it was failing their countries. Mass protests ensued and multiple countries signed separation agreements thus dissolving the Soviet Union. The first democratic election to take place in the new Russian country was won by Boris Yeltsin, who ran as an independent. His resignation in 1999 saw the emplacement of Vladimir Putin as the next president of the newly democratic Russia. President Putin is a member of the United Russia party that has been in power since then. Their power relies on the economic success of the country as the people will be weary to protest if they have jobs and their lives are comfortable enough. The same methods that Russia used to destabilize other countries could in turn be used to set the conditions for an uprising much closer to the motherland. The next element we must discuss is the increased emphasis of Russia on information space warfare. Instead of committing to former theories regarding the massive buildup of conventional force units and tactics, Russia is focusing on modernization and expanding its professional military. We can see this in the development of the, “use of weapons systems and military technology, precision, hypersonic weapons, their means electronic warfare, weapons based on new physical principles, comparable in efficiency with nuclear weapons, management information systems, and unmanned aircraft and autonomous marine vehicles controlled robotic weapons and military equipment; c) the effect on the enemy throughout the depth of its territory simultaneously in the global information space, aerospace, land and sea”(Putin, pg 5) With the world at a a nearly a nuclear stalemate, new methods of causing total destruction must be found. 15 The collapse of society would leave a country unable to defend itself from outside threats, the use of electronic warfare to affect an enemy could leave its defense force crippled without the aggressor having ever fired a shot. Think back to the 2016 election cycle in which President Trump won and immediately after his legitimacy was called into question based on theories that Russia was partially responsible for the outcome of the election. The United States government is based upon the fact that the people democratically elect our leaders, that is what allows for The Constitution to maintain its power over the people. Russia meddling in the election enough to leave people doubting our government is a direct attack on the democracy that allows for our country to function. As with the trials and investigations that took place after the conclusion of the presidential election, Russia was found not to have altered any vote numbers. The integrity of our voting system is still intact, however lesser discussed and unable to be definitively proven is Russian involvement in social media during the election cycle. There is no confusion, I'm not implying that the Russians overtly interfere with our elections however there is evidence that fake social media accounts were created to benefit the Trump Administration. Examples of this include memes targeted at different audiences for example satanic memes of Clinton targeted towards Christian audiences. As well as fake community members posing as concerned citizens posting fake news that adversely affect the campaigns of different candidates. The leaked emails regarding Clinton, supposedly leaked by WikiLeaks were sourced from Russian hackers. Is the next Generation threat that the United States and its allies must prepare for in the future going to be primarily fought through the internet? While conventional military force will never be replaced, the deterrence it creates has opened up the opportunity for weaker Nations to take on these global superpowers. 16 The final threat we must be wary of is the fact that Russia perceives alliances with the Western Powers as eroding and weak. Chronicled in the perceived external threats to the Russian Federation the, “deployment (build-up) of military contingents foreign states (groups of states) in the territories States bordering on the Russian Federation and its allies, as well as in adjacent waters, including political and military pressure on the Russian Federation”(Putin, pg. 3) Without saying that there is a division between Russia and other Western countries Russia is implying that countries creating alliances and preparing their militaries for future wars are a threat to Russia. Since most NATO countries were allies during World War 2, annual military training between countries has been ongoing to maintain relations. Moving forward from the advent of this publication to 2019 NATO countries have decided to go forward with new interoperability initiatives. This renewed interest in NATO interoperability must be a rapid transition so that Russia cannot capitalize on unforeseen cyber weaknesses. The problem with interoperability in modern warfare is, “Interoperability often comes at a price. These costs may be difficult to define and estimate insofar as they consist of military expenditures to enhance interoperability as well as the economic and political costs incurred.” (Hura, pg. 1) As countries are able to advance their cyber and precision warfare abilities at different rates, this could lead to issues where one country is not thought to be contributing as much as they should be. While the United States has always had a larger spending budget than other countries, it has always been given more freedoms in the conflicts it takes part in. This is the cost of being a world leader and protector charged with ensuring that another world war does not take place. If the United States were to withdraw from NATO, then Russia would be able to operate covertly without fear of retribution as no other European country has the vast resources that the United States commits to defense. NATO 17 enemies are beginning to take advantage of the slow responses from the West to defend themselves from less obvious threats, as illustrated earlier, Russia has been able to sway public opinion in the United States and there is nothing stopping them from doing the same to other Western countries. In the next section we will discuss what the United States is doing both in the formal and informal battlespaces. While the United States has begun to make progress in atypical battlespace conflict, we are still a force focused primarily on the waging of conventional warfare. Key to this is Russia’s rapidly advancing military weapons and forces eroding our technological superiority. Additionally, we will explore the tensions that have arisen between the United States and its NATO allies as the US defense budget is vastly larger than any other country in the world. The United States The United States has learned many hard lessons in the years since our victory in World War 2. While earlier we discussed the presence of Russia in Korea during the war, we glossed over United States involvement. This does not serve a purpose in this paper as this was largely a uniformed force on force fight with clear lines drawn between the invader and invaded. Since that war, the United States has not been so lucky to face such a one-dimensional war. Take into account the war in Vietnam, this was the first time the United States was faced with a force that did not adhere to a uniform, to common maneuver tactics, or to direct force on force battles. What was important here, something that the United States did not learn until the Global War on Terror (GWOT) began to unfold, was that these counterinsurgency wars were won at the community level and not through military action alone. During the Vietnam War an Australian 18 Captain wrote, “‘Control over the villages is key to the war’ He conceded the necessity of conventional operations aimed at eliminating Viet Cong main force units, or at least restricting them to areas far from the centers of population. But the Vietnamese village, he maintained, ‘is the closest equivalent to a front line in this war’, and ‘without victory in the villages the war can drag on.’”(Ekins, pg. 16) We see this theme as pervasive to the success of counterinsurgency operations. As the United States has become more familiar with this type of threat during its time in the Middle East. Fast forward to 2007 during the war in Iraq the United States began to learn from its lesson and applied them to begin to defeat terrorist forces and turn the tides of battle in the middle east. “No detailed assessment of the surge is needed here, but it is worth simply repeating that its premise was that the Iraqi population was the “center of gravity” that required protection.”(O’Hanlon, pg. 4) By naming the non-hostile civilians as the primary focus of counterinsurgency operations, US troop leaders know what is most important to the fight against terrorists. There is a fine line to balance as the need for direct action against terrorists is necessary still but not to the point that the local populace is harmed in ways that we cannot remediate. Hanlon additionally states, “This was necessary in order to prevent an escalating cycle of sectarian combat, and also to elicit support from the population so that it would not provide large numbers of additional recruits to the insurgencies and so that it would provide intelligence and other cooperation to government/coalition forces.”(pg. 5) Cooperation between locals and coalition forces is what enables for the more conventional unit to be effective at ousting terrorists from villages in Iraq and then into Afghanistan. With these counterterrorism operations beginning to slow down and the United States beginning to withdraw from active conflicts. We are entering a period of training and 19 reconsolidation for the next battle. The United States has decided that a near-peer threat, namely Russia or China is going to be the next great battle that we must be prepared for. The entirety of this essay has been leading to this section in which I hope to illustrate how previously brought up points show that while modernizing our military and preparing for more capable enemies in future conflicts is important, it is also misguided to think that we will go to war with the Russian military in a conventional way. As shown during the Ukrainian and Korean conflicts, Russia is reluctant to become decisively engaged in all out combat efforts. They would rather operate through proxies and provide equipment and manning as necessary while still maintaining plausible deniability of all involvement. Russia has restructured its military to operate more similarly to other Western nations, structured around the battalion which allows for them to operate quicker and with more adaptability than brigade-based units. By focusing on smaller unit tactics and enlisting the aid of private military contractors and local sympathizers, Russia is able to bolster its forces without having more troops don the uniform. This makes it very difficult to combat these atypical forces as each has a different set of factors upon which they operate. In the recent years of counterinsurgency, the United States has learned to battle enemies which do not follow rules or wear uniforms, this is something that we must not forget. The Asymmetric Warfare Group of the US Army recommends that “Countering the threats posed by Russian New Generation Warfare requires a combination of new thinking in the Electronic Warfare Battlespace, re-adoption of Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs), and elements of U.S. field craft from before the War on Terror.”(New generation warfare, pg. 40) While some of this advice is being practiced, the Army still feels that our “Enemies will employ conventional tactics, terror, criminal activity, and information warfare to further complicate operations.”(FM3-0) Russia is unable to 20 conventionally compete with the United States and its allies in maneuver warfare, however it has had much more experience using terror, criminal activity and information against us. To combat this the United States must realize that smaller more agile units will replace brigade on brigade warfare, the combat of World War two is not going to return. We have woefully been unprepared against our enemies in that aspect. As stated earlier, Russia is known to infiltrate our social media and use it to sway public opinion in ways that indirectly benefit them. This is a prime example of a loss against an adversary who has shaped the battlefield to their desires. Fortunately, the United States has begun to realize this with the creation of the Cyber Command in 2017 with the mission to defend the national cyber domain. CYBERCOM has released that it will use more aggressive techniques in the 2020 election to prevent Russian misinformation from circulating in America. This is a first line defense of our democracy as it maintains the legitimacy of our government and ensures a stable democratic society. In a recent article written by J. Kane, a US intelligence officer, he states, “The closest that Russia will get to that would be paramilitary or special purpose forces that invade a Baltic country in order to immediately seize territorial control and then withdraw to be replaced by information warfare complemented by coup-like elements in order to maintain the aggression’s initiative.” Battling forces like this lends itself to being much more similar to a counterinsurgency situation that prolong decisive battles. The United State rather needs to prepare itself for small unit combat with near peer technological capabilities, and if we are able to combat effectively with technologically capable enemies, the final space we need to control is information in order for us to win over the long run. If the enemy controls information then they have no reason to physically hold ground, it becomes ground that cannot be won back through conventional means. 21 Conclusion While I in no way claim to be an expert on the complex international and strategic relations that are used to develop these overarching preparations for future combat operations. Given what has taken place in the world more specifically the Baltics with renewed aggression from Russia I feel that the United States military is not placing enough emphasis on the development of our asymmetric capabilities and our chief adversaries have been and will continue to be reluctant to enter into decisive battles with western forces. This is mainly due to the fact that NATO has created a robust military industrial supply chain that enables them to participate in prolonged battles without resources becoming a primary concern. Unfortunately, what the West does not have is the authoritarian control that allows for them to participate in unpopular conflicts without the need for public support. Public support has become a weapon in next generation warfare and the West needs to become more proficient in the use of information and misinformation as a tool to win wars. Conventional forces will always have a place in wars, however the ways in which war are fought will not be the same as it was during the previous world wars. Large scale battles are most likely going to be a remnant of the past, private militaries and small-scale revolutionary groups backed by larger formal militaries to boost their technology will require more precise and technologically advanced equipment to deter. 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