Watching Trump move an entire carrier task force off the coast of Venezuela could not help but remind me of numerous instances where indigenous, less-developed nations overcame highly technical more powerful attackers, Vietnam being just one example. Sometimes putting lots of money and sophistication into “better” systems may not be the right path.
Recently, I happened to watch a video on how the development of the corvette (1), a small, inexpensive, un-warship-like vessel probably won the Battle of the Atlantic for England because it allowed the British to surround convoys with 6-10 escorts thus forcing u-Boats below the surface. The Admirals looked askance at the idea of these ungainly little boats when they would have much preferred fancy destroyers, true greyhounds, but much more expensive and requiring many more months to build. A case of quantity over quality.
That reminded me of the infamous Millenium2 game held between the Blue (U.S.) and Red (Iran). The purpose was to demonstrate how the U.S. naval task force using well-defined tactics could bring Iran to its knees in short order. The Red team was led by General Van Riper, known and picked perhaps for his iconoclastic approach to problems. The game was refereed by the “white” team who also controlled the rules of the game so when Riper asked if he could shoot down Osprey helicopters, C-130s or use chemical weapons, he was told no he could not. So Riper decided on a novel approach. He would “preempt” the “preemptors” and attacked “once U.S. forces were within range. Van Riper’s forces unleashed a barrage of missiles from ground-based launchers, commercial ships, and planes flying low and without radio communications to reduce their radar signature. Simultaneously, swarms of speedboats loaded with explosives launched kamikaze attacks. The carrier battle group’s Aegis radar system — which tracks and attempts to intercept incoming missiles — was quickly overwhelmed. 19 ships were sunk. It was over in five minutes. The scandal had only begun. The Blue team had no clue what to do next so the white team changed the rules and resurrected the sunken task force. The Red team was so hobbled that the Blue handily went on to meet all of the objectives the Defense Department wanted to prove. JFCOM and the Office of the Secretary of Defense were determined to validate the principles and concepts that would support the advanced technological military transformation that Rumsfeld and his senior aides had been insisting upon.
That debacle brings up the importance of dissent. As we watch the epitome of oleaginous, obsequious, and ambitiosus behavior during Trump cabinet meetings, one cannot help but wonder if Trump has any concept of team, only of rivals. Micah Zenko’s Red Team: How to Succeed by Thinking of the Enemy delves deeply into the necessity of dissent to overcome organizational complacency.
Red teaming is a structured process that allows institutions to better understand their own shortcomings, predict the actions of adversaries, and test unstated assumptions through three primary techniques: simulations, vulnerability probes, and alternative analyses Rooted in the historical role of the Catholic Church’s Advocatus Diaboli (Devil’s Advocate)—a designated dissenter tasked with providing point-by-point objections to official claims to ensure rigor—modern red teaming is essential for organizations operating in competitive environments characterized by rapid change and incomplete information. At its core, the practice exists to solve the critical institutional problem that "you cannot grade your own homework."
Cognitive biases hinder objective self-assessment. Individuals are universally susceptible to biases like confirmation bias (favoring findings that support existing beliefs) and relying too heavily on initial impressions, making it inherently difficult for analysts or employees to evaluate their own judgments objectively
Organizational biases arise from the rigid, hierarchical structures prevalent in large institutions, employees often adopting the norms and preferences of their bosses and their institutional culture, perceiving that offering dissent is either futile or "potentially career damaging". As one expert noted, no one ever got fired for silence. This reality prevents organizations from reliably self-generating dissenting viewpoints that reach senior leaders. A prime historical example of this failure is the military structure that produced the failed Operation Eagle Claw, where planners reviewed and critiqued their own product without external, independent observers, leading to mission failure
Red teams act as "surrogate adversaries" to test physical defenses, computer networks, and internal processes . Examples include white-hat hackers conducting cyber penetration tests on networks or investigators smuggling radioactive material across borders. Another alternative is to commission a separate team to challenge the underlying assumptions of conventional products, often providing a "speculative and/or unorthodox views" that mainline analysis cannot.
All this assumes a “Boss buy-in” in order for the Red Team to have adequate freedom and resources, not to mention a willingness to hear and act on “bad” news.
The case studies examined reveal the profound impact of red teaming—or the lack thereof—on critical operations. Among other case studies, Zenko analyzed the Millenium2 war game noted above . The exercise was meant to test ambitious military transformation concepts. General Riper successfully simulated an asymmetric saturation attack, sinking 19 U.S. ships in minutes, demonstrating the vulnerability of expensive systems to unconventional massed attack. However, the controllers subsequently directed that the virtual fleet be "refloated," proving that the "end state was scripted" to ensure a predetermined outcome. .
In the intelligence community, high-stakes decisions rely heavily on independent critique. The search for Osama bin Laden utilized three separate red team probability estimates to assess the likelihood of his location, giving decision-makers a necessary "dose of realism" before authorizing the raid
Conversely, the disastrous 1998 bombing of the Al Shifa factory occurred because the critical underlying intelligence was never subjected to independent alternative analysis, resulting in officials having "a high degree of certitude" based on fatally flawed information. (2)
Similarly, in homeland security, the pre-9/11 FAA Red Team repeatedly documented security failures, including the ability to smuggle prohibited items onto aircraft. Despite consistent warnings, FAA officials disregarded their findings, leading to the conclusion that the program was "grossly mismanaged" and created a "substantial and specific danger to public safety"
Back to swarming and the evolution of warfare and why high-tech may lose to low-tech.
The shift in modern warfare away from relying exclusively on expensive, sophisticated platforms toward prioritizing quantity over individual quality represents a profound challenge to traditional military doctrine. This revolution is driven by the proliferation of cheap, expendable One-Way Attack (OWA) drones (otherwise known as kamikaze) or loitering munitions. These systems, designed for single-use, kamikaze-style attacks, have introduced a new strategic logic termed "affordable mass precision," arguing that the sheer volume of attacks can achieve decisive military effects that were previously obtainable only through high-end, costly equipment
Because OWA drones are cheap to build, operate, and expend, deploying them at scale imposes a disproportionate cost on the adversary who must use sophisticated and expensive countermeasures to defend against them. (See the Millineum2 war-game for example.) For instance, reports highlight that a single $500 drone can successfully destroy a $10 million tank, illustrating an astounding cost ratio of 20,000:1. Crucially, this financial dynamic makes defense economically inefficient: defeating a $500 drone with a missile costing millions is effective in the immediate engagement but is not sustainable in a protracted conflict. This represents a huge problem for the United States that has invested enormous sums for aircraft carriers and sophisticated jets that planners may be reluctant to deploy because they are so time-consuming and expensive to replace (see the corvette example as well as Hitler’s fear of losing the Tirpitz and Bismarck.)
This economic shift compels military planners and less developed countries to adopt the strategic concept of "affordable mass precision," utilizing large numbers of cheap, "good enough" drones (or cheap tanks in Stalin’s case) to overwhelm defenses
Numerical mass, involving hundreds or thousands of drones, effectively compensates for any shortcomings in individual platform sophistication, thereby achieving a decisive aggregate effect. This quantitative strength allows swarms to saturate even advanced air defenses, imposing costs wildly disproportionate to the drones’ price. Consequently, expensive, exquisite platforms previously necessary for high-impact missions are increasingly recognized as vulnerable to destruction early in a conflict. The democratization of power enabled by these low-cost, attributable systems lowers the barrier to entry, allowing smaller militaries or even non-state actors to contest air and maritime spaces once dominated solely by high-end systems.
Modern militaries must abandon the traditional assumption that air-power is synonymous with expensive platforms or sensors, and instead prioritize cost distribution, redundancy, and mass production. The capability to produce thousands of cheap, attributable systems is now considered a prerequisite for maintaining operational continuity and sustaining combat power in high-intensity conflicts. Ultimately, cheap drones and loitering munitions, when used effectively in large numbers, fundamentally disrupt traditional defense economics and enable lesser-value weapons to destroy or disable far higher-value targets. That would place the task force off Venezuela in a vulnerable situation.
Then again, perhaps Trump is even more devious and wants his own Gulf of Tonkin (3) moment as a prelude to massive bombing and regime change. For someone with no experience in war who doesn’t read and who thinks he knows everything, that’s a dangerous attitude.
(1) The WWII Corvette (most notably the Flower-class) was a small, quickly-built, and inexpensive warship based on a commercial whaler design. Lacking the speed and armament of destroyers, the corvettes used sonar and depth charges to force German U-boats to submerge and keep them pinned down long enough for the convoy to escape. They provided the necessary numbers of escorts to keep the vital supply lines to Britain open, ultimately becoming the "workhorse" that helped defeat the U-boat threat. They were miserable ships to serve in: crews were constantly seasick, cold, rolled even in calm seas, cramped, but incredibly reliable and seaworthy. They were based on whale ship design, simple but sturdy and reliable averaging 240 days at sea versus 180 for destroyers. The fast destroyer remained tactically superior; strategically, it was irrelevant. (For a superior novel about corvettes during WWII read Nicholas Monsarrat’s The Cruel Sea based on his own experience.)
(2) https://jacobin.com/2016/10/bill-clinton-al-shifa-sudan-bombing-khartoum
(3) The "Gulf of Tonkin" refers to a fabricated naval attack that the U.S. government used as a pretext to escalate its involvement in the Vietnam War. The USS Maddox, a U.S. destroyer, was performing an intelligence patrol off the coast of North Vietnam. It was fired upon by three North Vietnamese torpedo boats. The Maddox returned fire and damaged the boats.
Two days later, the U.S. government claimed that the Maddox and another destroyer, the USS Turner Joy, were attacked again at night during a storm. This second attack never happened. Nervous sonar operators mistook the sound of their own ship's propellers and stormy weather for enemy torpedoes. The commander on the scene later messaged Washington expressing doubts, stating the "attack" was likely just freak weather and over-eager sonar men.
Despite the doubts and lack of physical evidence (no wreckage, no bodies, no enemy ships seen), President Lyndon B. Johnson and Defense Secretary Robert McNamara presented the second attack to Congress and the American public as a confirmed, unprovoked act of aggression.
This led to the immediate passage of the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which gave the President nearly unlimited power to wage war in Vietnam without an official declaration of war from Congress. The Johnson administration used a non-existent battle to secure a "blank check" for a war that would ultimately kill 58,000 Americans and millions of Vietnamese.
Sources:
Just a moment... (n.d.). Just a moment... https://warontherocks.com/2015/11/millennium-challenge-the-real-story-of-a-corrupted-military-exercise-and-its-legacy/
Robinson, Nathan J, “Bill Clinton’s Act of Terrorism.” Jacobin, 10.12.2016
Scharre, P. (2018). Army of none: Autonomous weapons and the future of war. W. W. Norton & Company.
Yagil Henkin (2014) On Swarming: Success and Failure in Multidirectional Warfare, from Normandy to the Second Lebanon War, Defence S udies, 14:3, 310-332, DOI: 10.1080/ 14702436.2014.901663
Zenko, M. (2015). Red team: How to succeed by thinking like the enemy. Basic Books.
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