Not long ago, multiple new sources reported that an American armored brigade combat team was “smashed” by drone operators from the Ukrainian Army’s 412th Separate Unmanned Systems Brigade, known as “Nemesis.” Nemesis performed exceptionally, using its modern tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) against U.S. formations that were not entirely prepared to counter them.
Some commentators immediately took to the internet to proclaim that this was “proof that NATO warfare is OBSOLETE”, alternately using florid vocabulary such as “pummeled”, “annihilated”, “destroyed”, and “wiped out”, in turn. But these comments are missing the point.
Train as You Fight
This exercise, titled “Combined Resolve 26-07,” simulated an intense battle in a large-scale combat operations (LSCO) environment. As with other rotations at the Joint Multinational Readiness Center (JMRC), the “blue force” (BLUFOR) and the “opposition force” (OPFOR) were constituted of a number of multinational elements. And yes, the Ukrainians performed impressively.
And that makes sense – they have been fighting, and continue to fight, a high-intensity war that is at the cutting edge of military technology and tactics. For over a decade – and most especially over the past four and a half years – the world has watched the Ukrainians innovate rapidly and dare greatly. Necessity, once again, has shown itself to be the mother of invention.
At the same time, it is crucial to keep something in mind: this occurred at one of the U.S. Army’s Combat Training Centers (CTCs), whose entire purpose is to test units in a simulated, largely free-play environment under conditions that are about as close to combat as can be safely replicated. That is, units that train at CTCs are supposed to be put through the wringer – it’s actually quite a big deal when a training unit gets the better of the assigned OPFOR.
So yes, the Nemesis Battalion was more than ready to both fight aggressively and to keep themselves “alive” in an exercise against forces that are still modernizing and figuring out how they will approach the battlefields of today and tomorrow. The Ukrainians – who have been fighting off the full onslaught of the Russian bear for over four years now – really are that good.
But are the Americans that bad?
A Living, Thinking Opponent
In the simplest terms, no.
At the unit level, there is no land force in the world today that collectively holds as much real-world tactical experience as the U.S. Army – of course, with the exceptions of the Ukrainian and Russian armies. Experience – both individual and collective – matters a great deal, since war is not just a question of technical expertise or familiarity with the latest doctrinal developments.
Take, for example, the various high commands of the Second World War. No one would dispute that there were transformational changes in technology, tactics, and doctrine between the First and Second World Wars – but that did not make Irwin Rommel’s experience as a young infantry officer leading trench raids and mountain ambushes or George Patton’s experience with the lumbering, rudimentary tanks of 1917 irrelevant. The modes of thinking, the familiarity with chaos and confusion, the understanding of how to run and work through organizations – all of this translated to their efforts in World War II, even if tanks had become faster and more powerful, the MG42 outclassed every machine gun of the previous war, and aircrafts’ strafing runs, bomb payloads, and reconnaissance capabilities changed the character and texture of the fight.
The whole point of pitting an American unit against a living, thinking opponent in a free-play training scenario – in this case, Nemesis – is to force real-time decision making, test systems and processes, and cultivate useful experience. Losing in training is an experience that leaders and organizations go home with, and it provides an impetus to learn and innovate. Add that to the real-world experience still broadly possessed in American units, as well as in those of many NATO allies, and what you have are organizations that are able to capitalize on what they do well, understand where they fall short, and use that to grow.
Accepting the Results, Learning the Lessons
What would have been far worse would have been to have designed the exercises to ensure tactical success for the training Americans, or worse, to have lied about the failures. For all the “airbrushing,” “pencil-whipping,” and “dog-and-pony shows” that go on in every military (or any big organization, for that matter), the reality is that Western militaries and societies are willing to look at themselves honestly and speak frankly about the implications of what they observe – so they can fix the actual problems.
Contrast this with the Russians, whose full-scale of invasion of Ukraine in 2022 showed just how unready and untrained their forces were. Among a litany of failures, equipment didn’t work, leaders had little to no idea of what their mission was, and logistical sustainment was non-existent – the Russian army was truly rotten. Or, as another example, consider the corruption scandal in the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force (PLARF). For years, the PLARF saw serious embezzlement, graft, and fraud – fuel tanks were found to be filled with water. And even though the Chinese have copied the Americans’ free-play CTC model and doubtless have some real professionals among their ranks, does anyone really believe that the PLA or the Chinese Communist Party would deem it politically acceptable to admit that a brigade got its ass kicked during a training exercise – let alone by a foreign nation’s army?
Failure is Part of Success
Thus, the news of Nemesis’s shellacking of an American brigade should, in no way, cause one to sniff at the U.S. Army’s quality (especially not in a relative sense – winning a fight often comes down to “you should see the other guys”). Headlines and tweets talking about American units getting “obliterated” by Ukrainians obscure the reality of what happened during Combined Resolve 26-07, as well as what the American military and its allies took from that experience. Everyone still has learning to do – and the U.S. and Europe are fortunate to have partners like the Ukrainians. More than that, American and European militaries are unique in that:
- They train units in free-play scenarios that they take seriously enough to fund and resource so as to replicate combat as closely as possible.
- They are willing to let units *FAIL* in training.
The willingness to see shortcomings – and even failure – in training is critical. To, again, look back to World War II, the U.S. Army’s Louisiana Maneuvers – free-play force-on-force exercises conducted on a massive scale in 1940, after which more than a few commanders were relieved and the potential of others, such as Patton and Eisenhower, recognized – were essential to getting the Army ready for combat on a scale, at a speed, and with technology that it had not yet seen.
In sum, don’t forget to read between the lines when you see things about Western militaries “falling behind.” Western militaries have modernization at the front of their minds, and of course, actively engage their Ukrainian counterparts to learn from them. Despite the inertia of bureaucracy and entrenched market actors, the direction of movement is clear. God willing, enough progress will be made down that road to prevent conflict, or win it, if necessary, but the road is being tread.
MAJ Francis Ambrogio is an armour officer in the U.S. Army. He is a graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and has served in a variety of armoured and light/mountain formations in the U.S., Asia, and Europe, including the JMRC.
The views and opinions presented here are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the U.S. Army, the U.S. Department of Defense, or the U.S. government.
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