Ukraine says it destroyed 15 manned Russian aircraft in the 18 days to March 6, forcing it to heavily reduce combat sorties.
Lt Gen Kindsvater answered questions on this and broader issues of aerial warfare.
1. How do you assess the Russian air force’s performance in Ukraine since 2022?
Very poor. The reasons are unclear — are they hesitant to really get involved, or are they preserving certain assets as a strategic reserve for a fight with NATO?
But their lack of effectiveness and failure to accomplish what most modern air forces do for a living can be attributed to identifiable factors:
- No air staff and planning capacity or capabilities for joint planning with other Russian armed services
- a lack of ability to adapt to the war they are in
- poor training and poor pilot experience/proficiency, and
- a complete misuse of equipment, or fundamentally poor equipment.
It’s possible to discern other serious problems. The Russian air force has not only failed to learn the lessons of Desert Storm in 1991 and aerial campaigns since then, but even the lessons of World War II.
The global conflict of 1941-45 marked the first time that air and land forces worked together and realized the synergies resulting from the proper integration of new technology; the benefits were so great that they effectively resulted in 1+1=6. In the end, they were able to achieve operational maneuvers to achieve mass at the right time and place.
So we can say with confidence that it’s a terrible learning organization, although the reasons for that are less clear. Endemic corruption may be part of that problem, as some analysts have suggested.
I would also mention some current reasons for their failures of execution:
- maybe limited precision munitions that actually work;
- poor coordination between ground forces and other forces to allow for joint maneuver and execution;
- poor pilot ability due to a number of reasons, and, perhaps
- a hesitancy to reveal just how bad they are after years of investment in new aircraft, and when Russian strategic comms suggest they are modern and professional (this could be due to far more corruption inherent in their system than we predicted.)
2. Do you expect F-16s will make a difference for Ukraine? What kind of difference?
Over time, they will make a difference, but the Ukrainians must integrate them into joint force maneuvers and joint force mass.
If they don’t, F-16s are not going to “solve world hunger,” i.e., produce instant solutions, like the politicians seem to think.
If Ukraine trains, equips, recruits/retain properly, then its force will become more and more Western and NATO-like.
There is a lot of room for change. Right now , we are witnessing World War I-like trench and artillery warfare because all of the fundamentals of warfare are wonky and the possibilities of applied modern capabilities have not been exploited.
3. When was the last US war where airpower played such a limited role?
World War I. During World War II, the breakthrough came from the newfound systemization of army and air force communications (radios, planning, etc.), which allowed for our maneuver dominance and ability to mass in that conflict.
4. Will the percentage of airpower represented by unmanned drones increase, and how can we expect that to look? (drone swarms, manned aircraft ever further from the front lines?)
Yes, this will be a dramatic change. Everything is now a sensor: command and control (C2) is moving closer to the edge of the battlefield, the ability to quickly adapt and quickly understand battlefield dynamics and then make rapid decisions — this is where future warfare is going
Lieutenant General (Ret.) Scott Kindsvater is a Distinguished Fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA.) A senior US Air Force officer, he was Deputy Chair of the NATO Military Committee where he served as military advisor to the Secretary General. He is President and Strategic Advisor at Kindsvater and Associates, LLC providing expert knowledge of crisis management, resiliency, and campaign planning, as well as safety and workforce development.
Europe’s Edge is CEPA’s online journal covering critical topics on the foreign policy docket across Europe and North America. All opinions expressed on Europe’s Edge are those of the author alone and may not represent those of the institutions they represent or the Center for European Policy Analysis. CEPA maintains a strict intellectual independence policy across all its projects and publications.
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