“We are living in phase zero of a major conflict.” Expert warns

The first part of the interview with Andrew Michta is available at this link.

In the second part of the interview, Michał Górski speaks with Prof. Andrew Michta about the situation in the Strait of Hormuz and the impact of the war with Iran on domestic politics in the United States. The discussion also addresses US ammunition stockpiles and operating across multiple theatres. Why might dominance of the electromagnetic spectrum be so important in contemporary conflicts around the world? Why do the Americans want to change their current nuclear doctrine? Read on.   

Michał Górski: US President Donald Trump clearly has a problem with Iran and with how to bring the conflict with Tehran to an end. The entire situation is having an impact on domestic politics, reflected, among other things, in Congress and in the dispute over the US defence budget and the so-called supplemental budget. What is the political situation surrounding the administration in Washington?

Prof. Andrew A. Michta, Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security: The political situation in Washington is exceptionally tense because of the approaching elections. The old decorum has disappeared – congressional hearings are seeing increasingly acrimonious exchanges between politicians and officials.

If the Democratic Party wins a majority in the House of Representatives, I assess the likelihood of an attempt to impeach President Donald Trump as very high. At the same time, within the Democratic Party itself there is strong pressure from its radical wing, the so-called democratic socialists.

As regards the war in the Middle East and the Strait of Hormuz:

• The ongoing conflict is becoming a serious burden on the administration. Even President Trump's previously isolationist supporters within the MAGA movement, such as Tucker Carlson and Marjorie Taylor Greene, are turning against him, reminding him of his promise to end the "never-ending wars";
• The conflict in the Middle East is depleting US stocks of ammunition and air and missile defence systems. It has forced the redeployment of key missile defence systems and units – for example, the withdrawal of some Marine Corps forces from Japan – from other theatres of operation, weakening deterrence in the Pacific and Europe;
• At the same time, the Secretary of Defense has requested an enormous defence budget – as much as $1.5 trillion – as well as a supplemental budget of nearly $70 billion for operations in the Middle East alone. Although the way policy is being conducted is controversial, the effort itself to radically increase defence spending is at least a decade overdue and, in my view, a positive step.

Let us stay with the subject of dwindling ammunition stockpiles. Recent analyses, including those by CSIS, indicate enormous consumption of missile and air-defence capabilities in the Middle East. NATO’s eastern flank states are facing long queues for equipment they have ordered. Is there any way to mitigate this risk?

The key lesson from current conflicts is that the widespread use of drones and unmanned systems has completely changed the character of the battlefield.

The modern battlefield has become completely transparent. The mass use of drones has paralysed traditional military mobility – units cannot move without the risk of being immediately detected, targeted and destroyed. The situation resembles the stalemate of the First World War following the mass introduction of heavy machine guns such as the Maxim, which, in combination with artillery, made battlefield mobility impossible. Heavy machine guns tore apart infantry attacks and dominated the battlefield through zones of sustained fire. Mobility in that war was restored only with the invention of the tank, which later became a key platform in the Second World War and defined land mobility in most conflicts of the twentieth century.   

So what should be the key priority today?

The key challenge today is restoring mobility and the ability to manoeuvre. The solution is not simply to produce more expensive interceptor missiles, but to restore mobility through dominance of the electromagnetic spectrum – electronic warfare (EW). This means creating an effective “electromagnetic dome” over the area of operations through manoeuvre in the electromagnetic spectrum, primarily in the 4–6 GHz bands, which should make it possible to neutralise drone guidance systems, including their autonomous capabilities. This would restore the necessary manoeuvrability to land forces.   

Until that breakthrough is achieved, air defence, counter-UAS and missile defence will continue to rely primarily on “shooting an arrow with an arrow”, in which the cost calculus of using NATO missiles to intercept and destroy enemy drones and missiles is unsustainable.

The West’s greatest structural problem, however, remains its diminished industrial base. After years of consolidation, the defence industry has lost production lines, engineers and manufacturing capacity. Rebuilding those capabilities will take years, and geopolitics is not giving the West the luxury of time. We may pay a very high price for those years of a “holiday from history” and the serious neglect that accompanied them.  

We are living in phase zero of a potential major conflict. If the West – and in particular the eastern flank states, with Poland at the forefront – does not move from declarations to the hard work of building industrial and infrastructure capabilities, as well as political influence in Washington, the cost of restoring the strategic balance could prove extraordinarily high.

How should we interpret the announced changes to US nuclear doctrine, the Nuclear Posture Review (NPR), and the greater emphasis on low-yield tactical nuclear weapons?

This stems from the limitations of America’s conventional capabilities and the need to offset those shortfalls. Compared with the Cold War period, the US armed forces are now almost half the size.

At this point, it is worth highlighting the principal features of the new strategic reality:

• Two near-peer adversaries: For the first time, the United States must plan nuclear deterrence against two nuclear powers simultaneously – Russia and China, the latter rapidly expanding its arsenal – while also taking account of regional threats from North Korea, which is developing missile technologies with support from Russia.
• Modernisation of the Triad: The Minuteman III missiles need to be replaced by the Sentinel system, new ballistic-missile submarines need to be introduced, as do new strategic bombers. Complicating matters is the fact that the Sentinel programme is already several years behind schedule, and its costs are expected to be far higher than originally planned. 
• Integration of capabilities: Conventional precision-strike capabilities, cyber defence and nuclear deterrence are becoming closely integrated.
• No No First Use doctrine: The United States consistently maintains its position of not making a declaration that it will never be the first to use nuclear weapons. At the same time, the decision to employ nuclear weapons remains unequivocally in human hands, despite the increasing integration of artificial intelligence (AI) into conventional systems. 

Thank you for the interview.

The first part of the interview, concerning changes within NATO and Poland’s foreign policy, is available here.