Rockets!
How Hamas’ surprise attack epitomizes democratized warfare
The eastern world, it is explodin’,
Violence flaring, and bullets loadin’
You’re old enough to kill, but not for votin’
And, even the Jordan River has body’s floatin’
But you tell me, over and over and over again, my friend,
That you don’t believe we’re on the eve of destruction…
Over the weekend, the Iranian-backed, Palestinian terrorist group Hamas launched a series of surprise attacks against Israel.
This is the worst attack against Israel since the 1973 Yom Kippur War (or Ramadan War as it’s also known).
If you need a background on Hamas, the creation of Israel as a state, or the history of the conflicts, then I suggest this quick overview from BBC.
What I want to talk about is how this attack is representative of a trend in warfare towards its democratization.
Hamas used cheap systems en masse to overwhelm Israeli intelligence and defense capabilities. For example, Hamas relies on Qassam rockets, a cheap, home-made weapon that is generally inaccurate and more of a nuissance than anything. In 2021, Hamas launched around 4,500 of these rockets over the year. Israel, had little problem intercepting these using its Iron Dome air defense system, shooting down around 90% of the Qassam rockets.
However, on the morning of October 7th (50 years and 1 day after the Syrian-Egyptian invasion that started the Yom Kippur War), Hamas fired more than 5,000 rockets in around 20 minutes. That’s more than 4 rockets every second. This high-mass, high-volume attack succeeded in overwhelming Israel’s air defenses by forcing the Iron Dome system to fire all of its rockets and entering a ‘down state’ to be rearmed.
Hamas also used a massive fleet of armed drones. These included small first-person view drones (often quadcopters) dropping grenades on surveillance towers, cameras, etc, as well as larger fixed-wing kamikaze drones.
Coordinated attacks with these systems blinded Israeli surveillance, allowing Hamas to execute its cross-border assaults and even succeeded in destroying an Israeli Merkava IV main battle tank.
So, what does all of this mean for the U.S. and Allied militaries?
I think it means that this sort of democratized warfare seeking to offset vulnerabilities through massed effects is here to stay. These are the sorts of capabilities that the Replicator Initiative (announced by Dep Sec Def Kathleen Hicks last month) is designed to provide and mitigate against, underscoring the initiative’s importance.
Replicator, pt 2
If you haven’t been able to tell, I’m bullish on Replicator. I think it’s an intelligent program that will provide commanders the ability to execute distributed operations while still massing effects. This ability will be critical for our success in future wars.
It also highlights the criticality of effective counter-measures against these proliferated and democratized weapons.
Therefore, we must…
Keep building!
Andrew