The Future of War?

[gwillybj]

BANANAS!

[Tattila the Hun]

Originally posted by gwillybj
BANANAS!

Works against indian Evil Organizations.

[Zkribbler]

Originally posted by Solver
Probably various unmanned and remote controlled vehicles will become big. Such as replacing bomber/fighter aircraft with unmanned versions. Why risk losing a pilot? An army that has moved to unmanned / remote-controlled vehicles could have the opportunity to do large portions of their campaign without even risking casualties.

I think there was always be infantry. Armies need some poor schlubs to wade in, root out the enemy, take the ground, and hold it.

But I, like Solver, think the units to fill the role of heavy calvary-now-tanks will be unmanned drones, like Preditors. They are mobile and have much striking power. They don't have the vunerability that current tanks do, because they're much faster and they're hard to detect.

[Kuciwalker]

UAV's have two weaknesses - either they're autonomous or they require a radio link to function. Neither can be fully avoided.

[SlowwHand]

Paintball. Bombs even. Get spattered, go to the side. You're out of the game.

[LordShiva]

Originally posted by Tattila the Hun


Works against indian Evil Organizations.

Silly Finn. Bananas will fight on Mother India's side always.

[Heresson]

perhaps, but only the civ which first posesses the knowledge of Frog Domestification, thus allowing it to build giant armies of banana-eating frogs, has chances to survive!

[LordShiva]

Teh Mexican Staring Frog of Southern Sri Lanka

[Heresson]

it's coming right for us!

[Sprayber]

Originally posted by Lonestar
Except no walkers, walkers are potentially the most stupid "war machine" idea to ever come out of the woodwork,

Wouldn't you be scared of this during a battle? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walking_truck

[Heresson]

yes. I would laugh to death.

[Sava]

The answer to how the future of war will play out, as far as war being a tool of political power is concerned, has to do with the proliferation of nuclear weapons. States that have nuclear weapons will not go to war against each other because there is no scenario in which one side can gain an effective advantage over another without ensuring its own survival. War as it exists in the post-Cold War era is primarily a question of nuclear powers exerting their will upon non-nuclear powers. However, although a country like the United States or Russia possesses the ability to destroy another nation, no country has demonstrated the ability to exert political control over another country. The War in Iraq is a prime example.

The key to understanding this question is not to focus on tactics or technology. All of that is irrelevant. If war were a question about pure destruction, there is no doubt that the United States could dominate any country it wanted. But war is no longer a tool for destruction. It has become a tool for political control. The tactics of armed guerilla resistance in urban settings has proven to be too difficult a task for even the world's hyperpower. The US could turn Baghdad into a sheet of glass, but it cannot stop the people from fighting. Stopping the flow of arms into the region is more difficult than disabling/destroying an organized modern army.

War is essentially obsolete, however armed conflict will still exist between non-nuclear powers. Nuclear powers will also be able to project their military might on countries without nuclear arms, but will be unable to invade and occupy those nations. The world has progressed to the point where aggressive offensive military action will not be tolerated by the world community (for the most part... i.e. when it is in the West's interest to respond to conflict).

The threats to security that exist in the future come from the ability of governments to exert control over their own people. It is the next logical step since it has become apparent that governments cannot exert control over other nations.

[Bosh]

So what will conventional war looks like in the future?

I don't know about conventional war, but I think we'll see a whooooole lot of the kind of tactics that the Hezbollah used last summer. Wierd mix of positional and guerilla warfare and surprisingly effective...

[SlowwHand]

I'm not too worried about a glass figurine.

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Bosh
I don't know about conventional war, but I think we'll see a whooooole lot of the kind of tactics that the Hezbollah used last summer. Wierd mix of positional and guerilla warfare and surprisingly effective...

I'd hate to see what you'd call ineffective.