Britain facing battle to control the skies
Army chief warns over ‘limited opportunities’
BRITISH military chiefs admit their troops may be outnumbered or outranged if they are called upon to defend Europe – but will use “limited opportuni- ties” to launch devastating assaults on enemy forces.
Major General James Martin, who would lead Britain’s main battle force in the event of a war involving Nato, was speaking ahead of the biggest war games on European soil in a decade.
He said yesterday: “Even if you went back to the Cold War, Nato always assumed it was going to be outnumbered, out-ranged. In some cases, facing better technology.
Vital
“We don’t assume we have air superiority or supremacy.
“We now assume that we will have limited windows of opportunities to do what we want to do. That’s the difference between fighting a peer adversary versus fighting a counter insurgency.”
He said the point of doing this exercise in Germany was that it’s “vital to have troops in Europe”, sending a message to adversaries. Nato allies must be “ready to fight” to deter Russia – or any other adversary – from attacking another European nation.
And military chiefs are watching closely tactics they see in Ukraine.
British commanders training in Germany yesterday told how they are devoting more time to avoid detection from drones seeking out targets.They fear they are changing the way air forces seek to gain control of the skies.
Lessons are being learnt from both Ukraine’s counter-offensive in Kharkiv and Russia’s use of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and artillery.
One of the main lessons is that they need to find ways to move even quicker and to be able to strike even harder from multiple locations.
They say they want to operate in smaller, nimble groups on the battlefield to make themselves harder to detect.
Exercise Cerberus, in Sennelager, Germany, is using a simulator to test commanders on their decision making and tactical nous.
Maj Gen Martin, commander of Britain’s 3 Division, observed: “We expect our opponent is going to outnumber us, in some cases out range us, certainly have more material than us…what the Ukrainians are seeing at the moment. “But by converging your combined arms effect, all those different parts of your force and multi-domain effects so it’s not just about the land, it’s about the air, cyberspace – that can give you a decisive advantage and those windows of opportunity are fleeting, but when you take them and if you get them right then you can overcome a superior opponent.” With the threat of drones growing, plus UAVs, Maj Gen Martin stressed the British Army must be even more disciplined when hiding tanks and artillery and limiting detectable radio transmissions. Brigadier Nick Cowley, commander of 16 Air Assault Brigade, said the idea was to ensure “our electronic footprint and our physical footprint will be as small as possible”.