Logistics, How Did They Do It, Part I: The Problem | Hacker News Reader

Logistics, How Did They Do It, Part I: The Problem

acoup.blog

176 pointsherodotus45 comments

We can see this today with Russia's early Ukraine campaign. The attacking armored forces moved fast at first, but outran their logistics tail. Large military operations have reasonably well defended rear bases, a moving attack front, and a "communications region" in between. The communications region is vulnerable; the attackers don't yet have full control of that region. Both air and ground attacks on the communications region were used in Ukraine. If the tip of the spear can be slowed down, the attackers are forced into a battle that uses more resources. If the defender can prevent those resources from moving forward, the attackers run out of fuel and ammo. Towards the end of the attack on Kyiv, Ukrainian troops were finding "lost orcs", Russian soldiers separated from their units. Some were just disarmed and told "Russia is that way, start walking".

So, having failed at a complicated, fast campaign, Russia has moved to a simpler form - bring up many troops and artillery and slowly pound the opposition into rubble. It's like WWI. That kind of war can go on for years if enough resources are available. It seems to be working for Russia.

> So, having failed at a complicated, fast campaign, Russia has moved to a simpler form - bring up many troops and artillery and slowly pound the opposition into rubble. It's like WWI. That kind of war can go on for years if enough resources are available. It seems to be working for Russia.

"Working" to the extent a country with a GDP smaller than California's is in a war of attrition against NATO.

To be fair, the US has made a habit of losing against countries with GDPs closer to Ukraine than to Russia.

There’s gotta be some like inverse square law for how difficult a war is to win against a smaller and smaller nation.

I think to make it make sense you have to define what “winning” means. It’s usually not the same thing for different sides of a war.

When we say the US lost the war in Vietnam, we obviously don’t mean the Viet Cong rolled tanks down Pennsylvania Avenue. The Mujahideen didn’t hold a giant missile parade in Red Square. For those groups, winning didn’t mean taking the enemy superpower’s capital, it just meant making the war costly enough for long enough that the enemy (who had far less skin in the game, it not being their country) gave up and went home.

For an occupying force, the victory condition is much more onerous—you must occupy a country (potentially far away) and pacify the local forces who have a lot of skin in the game and can make this whole ordeal very costly for you for a very long time even if they have no hope of being a threat to your homeland. And you must do this indefinitely. At some point it’s just not worth it.

Zelensky doesn’t need to hold a victory ball in the Grand Kremlin Palace, he just needs to make the war so costly, with no breakthrough in sight, that Russia can’t or won’t sustain it.

Smaller nations rarely win wars. Consider the success rate of the various Native American groups against the US.

The better metric is how interested you are in pursuing a war for the length of time necessary--it's a lot harder to get people to care about a war halfway across the other world than it is when it's prime farmland just next door.

(Note that the author here also has a series that touches on this topic--the Fremen Mirage.)

Imo, while they are trying hard to make it war against NATO, NATO is not fighting back beyond supporting Ukraine. Had NATO actually committed to push Russia back, it would be all over at this point.

True but then none of us would be alive to comment about it.

I don't think it would became nuclear war.

Russia has a "smaller" GDP than California, but check the price of electricity in western Europe today. Few industries in Germany can survive energy prices tripling. It won't be much of a war of attrition with "NATO" if a bunch of NATO members drop out and pursue a separate peace.

It’s too bad when countries like Germany haven’t learned to live within their means. Decades of mismanagement have a price.

Every country borrows billions a year nowadays. No country lives within their means, we’re all transferring future power to China and Gulf countries through the means of letting them produce for us on credit.

Which every politician profits from. “The state will pay!” as said Macron, borrowing an additional 600bn until 2048.

EU countries and the US mostly borrow from their own citizens.

If all the countries are borrowing from China and Gulf countries, then they don't really have to repay it. The combined military of NATO is more than enough to resist China and the Gulf's ability to recoup a default. Of course it would require an alternative manufacturing center or China would just repo all that shit.

I underestimated how much of warfare was about grain shipments until I read Caesar's Commentaries on the Gallic Wars. Now it's all I think about whenever I see pre-modern armies depicted in media, is where they get their bread and corn.

Are there any computer or table top war games that deal in a somewhat realistic way with logistics?

The Operational Combat Series[0] is famous within the hex-and-counter wargame community for its logistic systems. It deals only with mid-twentieth century conflict. Supply point counters are brought near the front by land,sea, or air transport, and then consumed by troops to fight.

More recently, the Levy and Campaign series[1] tries to seriously address the kind of pre-modern logistical problems that are discussed by the OP. You have to feed your troops, and can get food by hauling it with you (in which case you need to acquire the necessary transport) or by ravaging the local countryside (which has other side effects).

Generally speaking, there just aren't many pre-modern tabletop wargames (World War II is by far a more popular topic), and most of the ones that do exist are "tactical" games that deal only with single battles, and so bypass all the logistical issues.

This thread[2] on boardgamegeek may be of interest, there are probably other similar threads there, too.

[0]: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgamefamily/80/series-operatio... [1]: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgamefamily/72536/series-levy-... [2]: https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/2265815/games-about-logisti...

Regarding OCS, supply is broken down mainly into ammo and fuel. No ammo = no combat. No fuel = no movement. OCS makes you commit to operations you plan to perform in the future as you have to build up supply in an area (and then have a logistics network to "throw" the supply to units) to launch operations. The opponent is also doing this at the same time.

This one [1] is famously detailed. There are 23 pages in the manual dedicated just to logistics. A famous example of the level of detail is that Italian troops require an extra portion of water supplies to cook pasta.

As per the linked article:

> Reviewer Luke Winkie pointed out that "If you and your group meets for three hours at a time, twice a month, you’d wrap up the campaign in about 20 years.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Campaign_for_North_Africa

192 pages total. Wow.

https://web.archive.org/web/20220608080417/https://www.spiga...

It's an open question how many actual complete games of this have been played. It certainly didn't get the level of playtesting by the designers that most other games did; they just didn't have time.

Advanced Squad Leader has more pages of rules, especially when you add the campaign options.

Eve Online. Try fighting a war without freighters full of fuel, ammo, and replacement ships. Its a full time job by itself.

> Its a full time job by itself.

Indeed, the game is a full time job.

Battletech, both the tabletop and the last PC game, do a decent job. The former mainly in some of the added rule books (I think Tactical Ops and Strategic Ops in the last edition, before there was one called Tactical Handbook) which even go as deep as covering things like Depot and Factory modifications to military hardware (in that case Mechs) that is generally speaking pretty much in line with how modern military systems are managed. There are some more abstract systems using pool points for ease of book keeping.

The PC game takes some short cuts for ease of use (improvements to the base dropship the merc unit is using) and is assuming spares and consumables are readily available. It is covering the basic principals rather well so.

Logistics (moving trucks with supply, building FOBs, resupplying troops, etc) are essential in Squad. It's a multiplayer action game and the closer that I got to "I feel like I'm in a modern combat and suffering from PTSD." You may also like Foxtrot, it visually isn't realistic but economy and logistics are everything. And Wargame: Red Dragon which is a RTS game and the closer that I got to understanding modern combat meta, equipment and tactics.

War is sad but it's funny that many of the things that I saw on Wargame are also happening on the Russia x Ukraine war. Like suicidal helo rushes, combats quickly protracting, bloody urban combats, advanced tanks being wrecked by cheap ATGM, artillery spam, counter-artillery duels and ammo reserves quickly running out. Though no game ever gets closer to the scale that is real war.

I'm not sure I'd say realistic per se, but Hearts of Iron 4's (WW2 grand strategy game) new logistics system is pretty good IMHO. You need to manufacture enough of each war machine (with the necessary raw materials), then handle supply through railways, supply hubs (and trucks/horses from then on, depending on terrain, type and number of divisions and of course if you have enough trucks) and convoys if supplying overseas.

It's worth a note that this was introduced with the latest DLC, and the AI currently is hopelessly broken as it does not understand the importance of defending your railway lines connecting your supply depots.

> Are there any computer or table top war games that deal in a somewhat realistic way with logistics?

ISTR that the big strategic/operational tabletop games of the 1980s often had semi realistic depictions of at least the importance of logistic (at least supply); things like WWII European (or Pacific) Theater of Operations from SPI, Avalon Hill’s Empires in Arms (which I just learned has a still-actuvely-maintained official computer version), etc.

Shadow Empire is a post-apocalyptic 4X/Wargame (with bits of leader and faction management à la Crusader Kings thrown in for good measure).

The logistic parts involve building and maintaining a strategic on-road/rail logistic network (that moves everything necessary for production too, not just food/fuel/ammo for the troops),

and a comparatively simplified, but still critical in success/failure, operational logistics range spreading outwards following terrain from the road and rail hexes. (Limited air supply is available too.)

https://www.wargamer.com/shadow-empire/review

A sillier video-review : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSHuHCrW4KE

Its predecessor, which I hear also has some of this and some kind of 4X mode :

http://armchairgeneral.com/advanced-tactics-gold-pc-game-rev...

(Also would explain why ShEmp still seems to be very WW2-like ?)

Foxhole entrenched is a game to look at

Foxhole was also the first thing that popped into my head. I'm not sure how "realistic" you can call it, but there are certainly some interesting interactions/dynamics displayed when it comes to logistics.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/505460/Foxhole/

I don't think it's a war game per se, but wars can occur in Dwarf Fortress. And there can definitely be some very detailed logistics involved.

Completely different kind of logistics, both in scope and in focus. in Dwarf fortress, it's about equipping, training and supporting a double- or low triple digit number of soldiers operating in or very near their base.

The logistics we're talking about concern the problem of having about a hundred or even a thousand times more soldiers move large distances away from their base, and avoid having them starve.

I'm surprised nobody is mentioning Shadow Empire. In my first major war my ineptitude at laying out truck routes was a far worse enemy than the actual enemy. And then the actual enemy, intentionally or not, managed to cut my rail lines a couple times and turn my tank wedge into a wagon fort for a while, luckily I was able to reconnect before they ran out of ammo.

Oof, did I get ninjaed here ! :p

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32247015

War in Europe - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_in_Europe_(game)

A couple of times I watched friends play a game that had been going on for a few years at that point. Some of the various charts were pinned to 4x8ft sheets of insulation board.

I'm not sure about realism, and it's WW2 instead of premodern, but the board game Race to the Rhine is basically all about logistics.

An interesting case of logistics deciding outcomes is the North Africa campaign in World War II. It's discussed in Daniel Yergin's "The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money & Power" in some depth, and there are a few other sources.

Essentially, this is where the code-breaking efforts of Bletchley Park had a major result. The reason that Rommel had such shortages of fuel, according to Yergin and other sources, was that Enigma intercepts allowed the Allies to destroy several critical fuel convoys, limiting Rommel's maneuverability:

https://www.e-education.psu.edu/egee120/node/242

> "General Rommel was committed to a war of movement and boldness. In addition to his talent for tactics, he could also improvise. One thing he could not do, however, was fake the fact that mobile warfare was absolutely dependent upon ample supplies of fuel. Fuel supplies had to be delivered along very long supply lines."

> "The grand strategy failed due to a number of reasons including, Allied attacks on German fuel supply lines, the fierce Russian resistance, and Allied code breakers. Clearly, the bitter lesson learned by Rommel is illustrated by his statement, "The bravest men can do nothing without guns, the guns nothing without plenty of ammunition, and neither guns nor ammunition are of much use in mobile warfare unless there are vehicles with sufficient petrol to haul them around."

In particular see: https://www.nytimes.com/1974/12/29/archives/the-ultrasecret-...

> "During the campaigns in North Africa, Ultra kept Gen. B. L. Montgomery informed fairly exactly of Gen. Erwin Rommel's order of battle and, in some cases, of his plans. It also enabled the British to know when supply ships would sail from Italy - and to sink them, thus eventually starving Rommel of vital fuel."

My grandfather was shipped into North Africa after Rommel's defeat as part of the US Navy SeaBees construction battalion, to prepare for the Allied invasion via Italy. Ever since I learned about this, I've wondered whether without those Enigma intercepts and those sunked fuel tankers, how things might have turned out.

SPI's "Panzerarmee Afrika" is a "beer & pretzels" wargame where supply dumps and supply counters are pretty critical. Also it has some units with 60 and 80 movement points, making it lively.

And Russia has unlimited gas. Gas decuples human work, same as IT decuples human brains.

I’m worried for Europe. Russia will lack a lot of things, but it’s a race on natural resources.

Also coal. But oil is better than both, and cannot be effectively embargoed for a country as big as Russia.

And the Mid to North African pipeline projects will be supercharged now, but how long will they take ?

(At least, the first German methane vaporization terminal should be up and running this winter ?)

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32052302

Finally, not «unlimited» - this shows yet again (and we knew this for nearly 70 years now), that it was foolish to rely medium-term on fossil fuels - only viable if your goal was medium-term survival as a polity against industrialized polities - and I have the suspicion that the oncoming decade of industrial recession and freezing will push public opinion even more towards short-, rather than long-term comfort and survival...

I would love to have this wonderful blog recorded as a podcast.

Not technically a podcast, but if you want to listen to them, someone has recorded themselves reading (most of) the posts: https://www.youtube.com/c/AGreatDivorce/videos

Dr. Bret Devereaux does regularly go speaking in other podcasts !

https://www.idlethumbs.net/3ma/episodes/empires-and-imperial...

Think about how much work goes I to supplying a basketball or baseball stadium for a single game for a comparative headcount (less the animals).

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