The West is Learning the Wrong Lessons about Airpower in Ukraine

– Western experts continuously make inappropriate comparisons between Russia’s air campaign in Ukraine to the US air campaign in Iraq in the 1990s and against in 2003;

– Such experts ignore the primary difference where Iraq lacked modern integrated air defenses while Ukraine began in 2022 with significant defenses;

– These same experts ignore the significant losses US military aviation suffered in contested airspace such as over Vietnam where the US lost over 10,000 aircraft or the necessity of US military aviation to use stand-off strikes in Syria because of the presence of modern air defense capabilities;

– While Western experts laud the performance of the US-made Patriot missile system, the fact that interceptors cannot be made in large enough quantities detracts from its overall efficacy;

– Russia’s use of military aviation in Ukraine reflects the realities both on and above the battlefield, realities that would effect Western air forces were they in Russia’s place;

References

NEO – The West is Learning the Wrong Lessons about Airpower in Ukraine (July 23, 2024):
https://journal-neo.su/2024/07/23/the…

Business Insider – Russia’s showing NATO its hand in the air war over Ukraine (July 13, 2024):
https://www.businessinsider.com/ukrai…

The Mitchell Institute – US Fixed Wing Aircraft Losses of the Vietnam War 1962-1973 (June 2018):
https://mitchellaerospacepower.org/us…

CNN – ‘Their tactics have changed’: Russia’s bid to blow apart Ukraine’s power grid (April 2024):
https://edition.cnn.com/2024/04/14/eu…

Al Jazeera – Saudi Arabia may run out of interceptor missiles in ‘months’ (January 2022):
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/1…

CNN – Exclusive: Russia producing three times more artillery shells than US and Europe for Ukraine (March 2024):
https://edition.cnn.com/2024/03/10/po…