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>WW II was probably the last conflict where all sides basically removed the gloves and fought with everything they had where everything on both sides included some very scary options.

I think that would actually be the Iran-Iraq War: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93Iraq_War

Tank combat, air combat involving a wide range of aircraft, bombing raids, ballistic missile strikes, naval combat, trench warfare and chemical weapon use all took place during the war from 1980 to 1988.

Yes, you are correct; I forgot about how brutal that conflict was.

Only known case of a helicopter killing a jet in that war iirc!

> in the Gulf wars, the US took out the iraqi airforce in no time and after that basically tanks rolled in pretty much without opposition

I acknowledge the hedge of "pretty much" and use this moment to commemorate the Battle of 73 Easting, Toujours Pret.

"G Troop lost one M3 Bradley to Iraqi IFV fire and one soldier, Sergeant Nels A. Moller, the gunner of the Bradley, was killed. The Bradley's TOW launcher was inoperative, and the 25mm Bushmaster Cannon had jammed. While the crew was attempting to get the cannon back in action, an Iraqi BMP-1 which was thought to be disabled with a tank shell punched through its armor, fired and hit the vehicle's turret with 73 mm cannon fire. Moller died instantly and the remainder of the crew evacuated the damaged vehicle."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_73_Easting

A Bradley is not a tank.

Also, the real story is that a squad of Apaches in the air was ambushed and destroyed early in the Iraq war from ground fire. Half crashed and half made it back, but with too much damage to fly again.

The Bradley, as I've read, is a hallmark of the deficiencies of DOD committee planning. Well, until the F-35.

There's a dated but entertaining dramatization of this failure from the movie Pentagon Wars: https://youtu.be/aXQ2lO3ieBA.

I ve seen some write ups and basically the Allies go caught out by the Iraqis and almost got completely overrun.

As Wellington said ” It has been a damned serious business. It has been a damned nice thing – the nearest run thing you ever saw in your life.”

No, a loss of a single APC is a miraculously low number for just any armour on armour battle imaginable.

Even a WWII era armoured force would've been able to inflict higher losses than Iraqi army of the Gulf War period.

> No, a loss of a single APC is a miraculously low number for just any armour on armour battle imaginable.

This is true

> Even a WWII era armoured force would've been able to inflict higher losses than Iraqi army of the Gulf War period.

This isn't. The gun on the T55 tank used by the Iraqis couldn't penetrate the armour of a M1 Abrams. No WWII tank was anywhere near as well gunned as a T55.

The Iraqi army in Gulf War 1 was actually pretty good. They were well armed and experienced (they'd fought the Iran/Iraq war). Airpower was the big difference though.

> They were well armed and experienced

1. Quite the opposite. Look for the accounts of some of tank battalions being sent to the field without food, ammo, and fuel, and only being deployed at the very last moment in a hurry. I am not talking about their reserves here, but their main force.

They also had new officers up to a colonel rank simply having no real military training.

Both of these has been quite usual for the Iraqi army. I has been the case since Iran-Iraq war.

2. Saddam was regularly purging his own armed forces.

Though, I heard that he gave amnesty to officers he purged a day before the invasion, and ordered them back into ranks, but you can imagine how that panic move went.

3. Saddam was sitting still for nearly a year, while US was building up more, and more forces in Saudi Arabia. His officers knew they will loose, and they saw Saddam being paralysed with fear all that time, and getting crazier by the day.

That greatly demoralised his few remaining competent officers, some of whom cashed out his treasury, and flew to places like London.

> The gun on the T55 tank used by the Iraqis couldn't penetrate the armour of a M1 Abrams.

Certainly, nothing at the time could've penetrated M1 front armour, but skirts and side armour even of the latest tanks are vulnerable to WW2 era weapons.

It would've been a universally correct decision for a tank force commander to push for flanking attacks, envelopments, and close up skirmishes, rather than allowing a superior force engage them in a frontal attack from outside of their return fire range.

Iraqi army did few lacklustre offensive attempts, with January 29 attack by their 5th Iraqi mechanised being the most serious one, but still botched. From then on, their morale collapsed, and it was a turkey shoot.

I was saying that if US were to attack a force with WW2 era level of preparedness, experience, and tactics, they could've taken more losses.

if US were to attack a force with WW2 era level of preparedness, experience, and tactics, they could've taken more losses.

It would have still been difficult for the Iraqis to do much. The Iraqi T-72 tanks (the best they had) didn't include night vision systems. Also the M1 could engage far outside of T-72 effective range.

Preparedness and tactics go a long way. But the equipment disparity was overwhelming.

Drones will change the equation I think for small state actors. You just need minimally capable drones to win economic exchanges (I lose 1000 $1000 drones to destroy your $25,000,000 plane/tank, I win).

The US will probably develop some countermeasures, but so much of the military complex is invested in impressive looking tanks/aircraft/ships and will have substantial political inertia.

The surface Navy is practically obsolete. They are deploying laser point defense that allegedly doesn't suck, but that won't stop a fleet of 1000 drone subs that just need one or two torpedos to hit, or a barrage of antiship missles.

If the US doesn't sell, other NATO countries and Russia/China will.

Radio jamming won't stop laser mesh network communication. They can lie in wait in bushes and activate right under forces.

At least if modern warfare (conventional) devolves into starcraft-esque massive drone vs drone flotilla conflicts, it might cut down on human troop life loss, and maybe even "collateral damage".

But that never seems to happen.

Agree that we should have a serious discussion about our navy. Really have doubts about the utility, other than being huge (symbolic) symbols of power. But perhaps due to their size they will be able to mount significant countermeasures.

>>Basically, in the Gulf wars, the US took out the iraqi airforce in no time and after that basically tanks rolled in pretty much without opposition. I don't think any US tanks were lost at all. Much of the conventional troops ended up surrendering.

Smart men. No doubt US psy-opps played a part, they must've understood weeks ahead and talked among themselves that it is over, and no worth dying for Saddam (who is not even in our tribe :)) . No doubt top Generals were probably contacted offered X and Y if they surrendered. Giving a General a suitcase of cash is much cheaper than the bullets spent, without adding equipment and lives lost.

Ethiopia vs Eritrea, or some of the other African wars come to mind as peer-vs-peer competitions.

Maybe India vs China in the 60s.