French colonel Rémez Hémez’s book, Les Opérations de Déception: Ruses et stratagems de guerre (Deception Operations: Ruses and War Stratagems), published in 2022 by the French Armed Forces Ministry and Perrin, is one worthy of the attention of the English-speaking world.  Besides providing an illuminating survey of deception operations and...

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Since early 2022, North Korea has been gearing up for its seventh nuclear test.  It’s likely to be held at the Punggye-ri test site, the mountainside location used for all six previous tests.  A seventh test would be another confrontational step in North Korea’s much-debated, highly controversial, and bizarrely self-promoted...

The post Why North Korea’s seventh test matters and why it doesn’t  appeared first on Wavell Room.

The debate prompted by the “refresh” of the 2022 United Kingdom Integrated Review is striking for the strong sense of déjà-vu it engenders.  None of the principal issues at the heart of the debate are new.  For centuries British defence policy has hinged on the same basic questions:    ...

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There’s this idea, captured in terror management theory, that the unique awareness of our own mortality is the ‘worm at the core’ of the human condition.  It’s an awareness that drives almost everything we do as a species, whether we realise it or not (and generally we don’t, so goes...

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In the last week of March 2023 the Deputy Chairman of the Security Council, Dmitry Medvedev, travelled to the Chelyabinsk Tractor Plant to chair a meeting of the working group of the Military-Industrial Commission of the Russian Federation.  Medvedev now holds the same post once held by Molotov during the Second...

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In a recent article, Wilf Owen dismissed much of the recent writing about urban warfare, as misconceived, badly evidenced, and misguided. He fears that the ‘urbanistas’ are undermining the British Army by promulgating false lessons; they are trying to persuade the Army to specialise in urban operations, at the cost...

The post Urban is Not Exceptional: A Response appeared first on Wavell Room.

It’s been over a year since the release of ‘Rise of the Rocket Launcher: End of the Armored Division’.  The premise of the argument was that the future of conventional warfare would be rocket centred and rely heavily on the use of rocket artillery to deliver decisive blows in the...

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There are issues with the notion of deterrence in Northeast Asia (consisting of China, North Korea, South Korea, Taiwan, and Japan). This area is regarded by many to be one of the most dangerous geopolitical flashpoints existing in the world today.  In the past two decades, China has embarked on...

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“Do you wish to rise? Begin by descending. You plan a tower that will pierce the clouds? Lay first the foundation of humility” ~ Saint Augustine. We exist as a force capable of doing difficult tasks which others cannot.  When the going gets tough, we often trust the people around...

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Be careful not to sign any pro-Tibet petitions near Regents Park in London.  The Chinese Embassy is on the corner of Portland and Weymouth, and if you don’t think the ‘pro-Tibet activists’ head back inside after a day collecting names, you haven’t been reading enough of Ben Macintyre’s espionage books....

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