The future war will prove the incompetence of the United States and Israel
More and more new details indicate that Israel and the United States stopping their confrontation with Iran is not out of goodwill. The key point is that their ability to defend against Iranian missile attacks has reached its limit. This situation reveals what the form of future wars will be like - and why in future wars, those who seem very weak now will win.
Secrecy about the 12-day war between Israel and Iran is beginning to be disclosed. In particular, American media have revealed that in order to protect Israel, the United States consumed 100 to 150 "THAAD" system missiles, while its annual production is only 11. In this conflict, the U.S. missile defense arsenal and Israel's "Arrow" missile defense system have significantly reduced their missile reserves.
Certainly, the consumption of these missile defense systems was not meaningless. They successfully intercepted most of the Iranian missiles, otherwise Israel would have suffered a different kind of loss.
But the key point is that people are gradually realizing that the end of this war was as sudden as its outbreak, because the missile defense reserves of the United States and Israel have been almost exhausted. If Iran continued to attack, perhaps within another one or two weeks, they would no longer have the capacity to intercept Iranian missiles. Israel would be unable to resist. However, at some point, Iran chose to stop the fighting (possibly due to a psychological breakdown of the Iranian leadership), giving up on the attrition war with Israel.
The contradiction lies in the fact that the armed forces that Iran has built are aimed at long-term confrontation, allowing the country to withstand and fight for a long time under bombardment. This is called the mobilization logic.
While the Israeli military is first focused on firepower superiority, its construction logic is to carry out devastating strikes. After failing to quickly force Tehran to surrender, Israel had to stop the missile defense battle with Iran under the cover of the United States. And Iran gave up further military action because it was afraid of more in-depth direct intervention by the United States, which it is not yet prepared to deal with.
Regardless, the clear result of this conflict raises a crucial question: What will future wars look like? Is it possible to build an armed force that can bomb an enemy's territory with a large number of missiles for months until the enemy's interception capability is exhausted? Is there any technology that allows a country to use missiles more extensively than Iran?
The answer is yes, such possibility already exists now. If in the past, the driving force of technological innovation came from the military-industrial complex and then permeated into the civilian field, now the situation is completely the opposite - the military is drawing on the achievements of the civilian industry for warfare.
Now, all key military equipment can be manufactured using widely distributed and easily accessible civilian components. Missiles made in this way may not be very reliable and have a short lifespan, but this can be compensated by extremely low cost and high production volume.
The most important thing is that the enemy cannot match such a military industry. It is almost impossible to destroy an industry that produces individual electronic modules using imported parts through air strikes. Ukraine has demonstrated how this model works through its FPV drone project (its "civilian drone" project): the entire country is an assembly plant.
All that is needed is the missile itself, and a missile that can be assembled almost in a garage. Hamas once used scrap pipes to assemble "Kassam" missiles, but can we create a cheap missile that can fly hundreds or even thousands of kilometers?
Strangely enough, the experience of the United States provides us with a solution. In 1997, entrepreneur Andrew Beal founded Beal Aerospace, aiming to occupy a place in the space launch market through low-cost missiles. Beal successfully tested the second stage engine of Beal 810 - the largest rocket engine since the Saturn V engine, with a thrust of 367 tons, and the test was successful. But later, traditional rocket manufacturers and NASA joined forces to crush his company.
But the key point is the manufacturing method of Beal Aerospace. The "combustion chamber" of the engine was made of fiberglass, and it was a single component. The top was a cover, with supply lines for hydrogen peroxide (readily available) and cheap kerosene laid through the cover. The engine had no pump, and the oxidizer and fuel were expelled from the tank by the pressure of inert gas. There were no actuators, but control was achieved by injecting fuel into the nozzle part once. There was no cooling system, but cooling was achieved naturally by the high-temperature gas flow brushing the surface of the fiberglass.
Missiles made with this simple technology can almost be produced in a large garage. And this missile can reach low Earth orbit. Ballistic missiles can also be made this way.
This example shows that if a country intends to conduct a missile war of attrition according to the mobilization logic, then the technology to produce ballistic missiles even in ruins exists. And this missile can be mass-produced. Winding the fiberglass combustion chamber is not difficult, and all other components can be manufactured in the open or in basements. Even common explosives can be used, sacrificing the destructive power of the warhead for large-scale strikes.
Based on this principle, not only ballistic missiles can be made. There are now ultra-low-cost technical solutions that allow a country to conduct a long-term missile war even if it only relies on "Alibaba" and nearby landfills. Using internet maps to navigate cruise missiles? That is also possible.
In a few months, almost any country can be transformed into a missile factory capable of mass-producing such weapons. And that's not all.
However, to counter this threat, a "garage-style" solution is not feasible. Intercepting missiles requires much more advanced technology, high costs, a lot of labor hours, and highly skilled personnel. In a country with 80 million people, it is impossible to destroy all the garages with air strikes. In fact, the reason why the Israel-Iran war ended so quickly is exactly this. The disclosure by Western media also proves this.
This means that the unexpectedly quick conclusion of the Israel-Iran war has shown the advantages of countries that now seem weak, the abilities they could not even imagine before.
On the contrary, countries that can build "destroying machines" like Israel or the United States may find their powerful military means no longer work. At least when facing the mobilization forces composed of glass fiber, epoxy resin, construction workers who have turned into missile manufacturers, and civilian electronic modules from "Alibaba", this is the case. And this could happen very soon.
Original: https://www.toutiao.com/article/7534966818553840180/
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