Preemptive strike: Russia has figured out how to resist the United States in case of a threat of war

Russian military scientists have developed a concept for countering the American “multi-domain operation” - a strategy that the Pentagon has been actively developing in recent years. The essence of the concept is a preemptive massive strike by all available means. It can be applied “in the context of the threat of a local war hanging over the Russian Federation,” writes Air force.

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The concept was published in the latest issue of the quarterly journal Aerospace Forces: Theory and Practice, which is published by the Air Force Academy. Zhukovsky and Gagarin. The issue was published in December 2020.

Countering a “multi-sphere operation”—as the publication calls the American strategy—at the initial stage “is possible by conducting an air operation and disrupting an integrated massive air strike by inflicting unacceptable damage on the enemy through the integrated use of elements of the reconnaissance-strike system of a group of forces,” the article says.

In other words, in the event of a real threat of war, according to Russian military scientists, it is necessary to strike at “critically important objects” of the NATO group, using aviation, unmanned aerial vehicles, missiles, electronic warfare equipment, as well as new hypersonic vehicles - then the enemy will not will be able to attack.

Five domains

The American doctrine of “multi-domain operation,” which the authors of the article propose to counter, was born several years ago in the United States. This term was first mentioned in open sources at the beginning of the last decade.

The term “multi-domain operation” is a copy of the English name multidomain operation. It does not yet have a generally accepted name in Russian; it is often called “multi-sphere” or “multi-domain”.

The essence of the term is that the United States and its allies, in the event of an open war, will simultaneously and coordinatedly act in all available “domains” - on land, sea, in the air, as well as in cyberspace and space.

That is, troops in all five “domains” will operate under one operational command, in the closest possible connection and with an intensive and constant exchange of information.

Previously, each branch or branch of the armed forces conducted its own operation in one theater, acting in close connection, but still separately.

“Multi-domain operation” is a tactic of waging war against an enemy of approximately equal strength. So this doctrine is actually designed to deter or counter Russia or China.

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It differs from the concept of waging local wars that dominated the Pentagon in the late 1990s and early 2000s. This concept has an impact on army building, the development of new weapons, and strategic planning.

In addition, the “multi-domain operation” replaced (at least in terms of frequency of mention in the military press) the concept of “Prompt Global Strike” - according to this doctrine, one side could, using strategic non-nuclear means, achieve superiority over the enemy by striking at its nuclear forces .

One of the consequences of the development and implementation of the concept of “multi-domain operation,” as the American military-analytical site Fas.org writes, may be the enlargement of tactical formations in the American army - the creation of divisions, corps and armies instead of brigade combat groups.

Air Strike

The authors of the Russian concept proceed from the fact that a multi-domain operation will, in any case, begin with a strike from hypersonic missiles, then operational-tactical and cruise missiles, drones will be used, and at the very end - manned aircraft, fighters and bombers.

“Applying an IMVU [massive air strike] will make it possible, already in the first hours of the conflict, to neutralize domestic objects of command and control of the aviation group, nuclear missile forces, aerospace defense systems, energy, communications, military and public administration, reconnaissance and combat control, as well as the most combat-ready military formations,” the article says.

The proposal of the authors of the Russian concept is “simultaneous deep destruction of critical objects that ensure an integrated massive air strike, located in the first and second echelons of the defending enemy.”

Artillery and tactical missile systems, aircraft, helicopters and drones are supposed to be used.

The authors propose to compensate for the general lack of funds in Russia for carrying out a truly massive strike by rational use of what is available, as well as by creating an intelligence and information transmission system.

The article mentions once a new Russian high-precision strategic non-nuclear weapon - the authors believe that Kinzhal hypersonic missiles can be used for a preemptive strike on the most important targets.

The concept does not speak of the use of nuclear weapons, but there is also no unequivocal statement about its non-use.

At the same time, the material proposes to “move from a policy of deterring a potential enemy with nuclear weapons to a policy of intimidating him from inflicting unacceptable comprehensive destruction by all types of weapons as part of preventive actions” (in essence, to create a new doctrine).

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New idea

The publication “Aerospace Forces: Theory and Practice” was founded by the Air Force Academy named after Professor N.E. Zhukovsky and Yu.A. Gagarin and the Russian Ministry of Defense, distributed electronically.

On the one hand, this is an official publication of the Ministry of Defense, on the other hand, it is a scientific journal, and the materials published in it are not necessarily accepted and approved military documents.

This article is a scientific work, its authors are teachers of the academy, associate professors, professor of the Department of Ground Forces Vladilen Stuchinsky and doctor of sciences Mikhail Korolkov.

Nevertheless, as Konstantin Bogdanov, a researcher at the Center for International Security of the IMEMO RAN, told the BBC in an interview, it is still possible to draw conclusions about changes in Russian military thought on the basis of this publication.

“If you look at the work to repel a massive aerospace attack, which has been the bugbear of the last 20-25 years for our military, you won’t see the outline of these preemptive actions,” says Bogdanov. “The main part of the defense was entrusted to multi-layered theater air defense and missile defense, for example, tactical and ballistic missiles, and fighter aircraft, which were also involved in the destruction of cruise missiles, UAVs, and, in extreme cases, AWACS-type aircraft.”

In this article, according to Bogdanov, the concept of a counter-preemptive strike is carried out, which incapacitates the enemy's grouping.

The expert believes that the fact that such a concept was considered in a theoretical scientific work indicates “growing confidence in the strike potential of the armed forces”: “This indirectly indicates that appropriate long-range high-precision weapons have appeared that can be used for this type of task.”

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"Fog of war"

According to Ilya Kramnik, a military expert at the Russian International Affairs Council, the concept of a preemptive strike proposed by the authors of the article is dangerous in the current political conditions, when there are fewer and fewer channels of communication and dialogue between Russia and the West.

After the termination of several arms control treaties, the parties lost any idea of ​​​​what was happening in the opposite country. “We’re getting this fog of war,” he said.

On the one hand, such concepts themselves, when published, create an escalation of tension in relations between Russia and the West, Kramnik believes, on the other hand, they are dangerous in conditions of an erroneous assessment of forces.

“This news instills false confidence in the possibility of solving certain problems between Russia and the West by military means. But there is no such solution. And what is stated here is also not a solution, since we all understand perfectly well, realizing the potential of both sides, that any successful operation on either side with a very high probability could entail an escalation up to an exchange of strikes of strategic nuclear forces,” Kramnik believes.

NATO's total military potential is much greater than Russia's, and a preemptive strike will not be the final victory, he warns: “We will still face an enemy with much superior power. Roughly speaking, this is a Pearl Harbor situation - the Japanese hit, but then what?”

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