Talk:Battle of annihilation/Archives/2017/April

Not accurate
"Since World War I, the paradigm of armies maneuvering in the empty countryside for weeks and then meeting in a battle lasting (usually) a single day no longer applies (at least to wars between major powers). Instead, armies are deployed in more-or-less continuous lines stretching perhaps hundreds of miles. Thus, the battle of annihilation may be considered to be mainly of historical interest, except for secondary campaigns."

I don't think this is accurate since World War II. Judging from the Gulf War, Second Iraq War, Afghan Warn etc. The modern armies have become smaller again and are more heavily dependent on maneuver again and sudden annihilation of enemy resistance by overwhelming force. Good examples are the Highway of Death and Battle of Baghdad. This is naturally only the modern "pitched battles" where state operator is forced against major nation, where as smaller nations usually still favor WWII tactics against each other and insurgents like ISIS favor more guerrilla-like approach, with many small skirmishes. Also any conflicts where major nation fight major nation remains to be seen, as there has been none since WWII, but you could speculate that they would consist of sudden annihilation of major components of enemy forces, either by nuclear or conventional missiles, air/drone strikes and fast maneuvers by mobile elite forces, followed by mopping up by the regular forces, and only in the case neither can gain fast upper hand, would it break down into "rock throwing match" by the rubble piles of what were the former major powers with anything they have left against the remaining local resistance. So my educated guess is that "battle of annihilation" remains very much in play, one way or other, "the maneuvering weeks in empty countryside" just replaced with planning in advance and deploying the troops. 188.126.80.5 (talk) 22:58, 23 April 2017 (UTC)-Yorak