Small drones remove Hamas leadership tweezers, destroy secret tunnels… Strategy to minimize the burden of urban warfare
Various analyzes are emerging regarding the reason why Israel’s deployment of ground troops to the Gaza Strip was delayed more than originally expected. The delay in deploying ground troops may be the result of various political, diplomatic, and military variables. However, given that Israel was gnashing its teeth at the atrocities committed by Hamas at the beginning of the war, it appears that cool-headed considerations at the level of military strategy played the biggest role.
In terms of objective military power, Hamas, an armed political faction, is no match for the Israeli military. Israel’s standing army, comprised of conscripts and professional soldiers, is primarily responsible for responding at the beginning of a war. Israel’s real strength can be said to be its reserve forces. Although it varies slightly depending on the rank and branch of service at the time of discharge, Israeli reserve forces serve for more than 30 to 45 days a year, and are deployed to the Gaza Strip or the Lebanese border area once every three years to perform actual combat missions. After being discharged in his early 20s, he worked in the same unit with his friends, seniors and juniors while serving as a reserve force until he was 45, so his bond and teamwork were strong. The performance of Israeli soldiers’ personal firearms, gun-attached optical equipment, body armor, and communication equipment is quite excellent, and the command, control, and communication system of front-line units is also excellent. On the other hand, Hamas members fight with crude weapons without receiving proper military training. Taking this into consideration, it seems that if Israeli ground forces push into the Gaza Strip, they will be able to eliminate the likes of Hamas in one fell swoop. However, the reason Israel is hesitant to enter the Gaza Strip is because it is well aware of how dangerous the urban fighting that will unfold the moment ground forces enter is.
The horrors of urban warfare have already been proven in several wars. Let’s turn the clock back and think about the battle that took place in Mogadishu, Somalia in 1993. At the time, the U.S. military mobilized its elite forces to capture Mohamed Farah Aidid, a warlord based in Mogadishu. Looking at the units deployed at this time, the US Army’s 75th Ranger Regiment, the 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment also known as ‘Delta Force’, the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, the Navy’s Special Warfare Development Team ‘Devgru’, famous for the operation to kill Bin Laden, and the Air Force The 24th Special Tactics Battalion was brilliant. These units were equipped with state-of-the-art special warfare equipment at the time, and the combat ability of each member was truly outstanding. However, they struggled against the armed fighters mobilized by Aidid, that is, armed gangs who had not even received military training, and suffered great losses. Although the movie ‘Black Hawk Down’ portrayed the battlefield situation at the time well, it was evaluated as not being able to depict all of the horrors experienced by U.S. soldiers at the time.
The fact that even gang-level fighters pose a great threat in urban warfare was revealed in the battles of Fallujah and Mosul during the Iraq War. The battle in the urban area, taking place against the backdrop of countless buildings and alleys, is like hell that even the world’s most American soldiers can’t help but struggle with. This is because every time you take a step forward, you never know where bullets and rockets may fly or an improvised explosive device may explode. It is not difficult to tell who is an enemy and who is a civilian in a crowd of people.
Street fighting is a fight in which the defender has an advantage over the attacker. Defenders can decide where to fight, and can even use the terrain of the battle area to lay traps in advance. They can even use civilians as tools for defensive operations in urban areas they control. Although it is a clear violation of international law, looking back on history, communist and totalitarian forces or self-proclaimed jihadists (Islamic jihadists) frequently used this method. They hide among civilians and avoid the enemy’s eyes before making a surprise attack, or they even dress women and children in bomb vests and use them as a means of suicide bombing. In this process, when civilians mobilized for hostilities die, their bodies are distributed as propaganda materials to criticize the other side’s cruelty and create anti-war public opinion.
Under these conditions, the success of the operation cannot be guaranteed even if the US military, not the Israeli army, or even the special forces of each country are brought in. This is because the regular army enforces a communist law that complies with international and domestic law, but there is no taboo against terrorist groups such as Hamas, which uses fleeing residents as ‘human shields’. Of course, Israel has been fighting these people for decades. Since they know very well what tactics Hamas will use when Israeli ground forces enter the Gaza Strip, they will also be preparing a ‘Plan B’ accordingly. Therefore, it is highly likely that this street fighting in the Gaza Strip will unfold in a different way than before.
The traditional method of occupying a city center is very simple. First, check where the enemy has set up a defense line and then apply intensive bombing and artillery fire. Afterwards, tanks, armored vehicles, and infantry are deployed to search and clear each building. However, such urban warfare tactics are extremely vulnerable to enemy booby trap attacks. Taking control of a single building can result in dozens of casualties in the blink of an eye. Let’s look at the case of the Ukrainian army that fought a fierce battle with Russia in Bakhmut. At that time, the Ukrainian military secretly planted several bombs on the pillars of the building and detonated them when the Russian troops entered the building and took a break. As a result of this incident, a company-sized Russian army was buried alive at once.
In that regard, it is noteworthy that Israel has recently deployed various types of ‘drones’ prior to deploying ground forces. The drones currently operated by the Israeli military in the Gaza Strip range from as small as an adult’s fist to as large as a portable gas stove. These drones fly throughout the Gaza Strip and enter buildings through doors and windows to conduct search operations on behalf of people. Videos captured by drones equipped with electro-optical and thermal imaging cameras are transmitted in real time to the rear drone control center. There are various types of drones used by the Israeli military. Among these, there are two models confirmed to have been used in the search operation in the Gaza Strip: the ‘Xtender’ developed by Skyroad of the United States and the ‘Rotem-L’ by IAI of Israel. Thanks to the extensive use of these drones, Israel successfully eliminated Hamas’ high-ranking political leader, air warfare commander, special forces commander, and several high-ranking commanders at the brigadier general level.
Black smoke is rising from the Gaza Strip following an airstrike by the Israeli military. Recently, the Israeli military has been destroying Hamas leadership and major military facilities one after another using small drones. NewsisThe Extender, used by Israeli special forces for reconnaissance, can search throughout buildings without making much noise. It is equipped with an autonomous flight function and artificial intelligence (AI) software to prepare for situations where communication is lost underground. It is also possible to map the explored interior and transmit the information to the user. You can check for armed enemies inside buildings or underground facilities and attack them with precision-guided bombs, or send other suicide drones to eliminate them. The Rotem-L, which the Korean Army Special Operations Command purchases and uses in small quantities for ‘decapitation operations’ purposes, is also a very effective street-only drone. This drone, which weighs less than 6kg in total, is equipped with electro-optical and thermal imaging cameras and can also carry 1kg of explosives. It flies for up to 45 minutes and collides with enemies it finds, causing great damage.
Israel had already deployed small drones into the Gaza Strip on October 8, the day after the Hamas raid. Israeli military units operating drones are collecting information on the deployment and movement of Hamas troops inside the Gaza Strip, the presence of civilians, as well as information on the Gaza Strip’s underground tunnel network, which has barely been updated since 2014. The main forces of the drone reconnaissance mission are the Israeli military’s elite Sayeret Matkal, Unit 5515, and the Navy’s Sayeret 13. Since the start of the operation, they have been finding secret Hamas facilities and elements hiding throughout the Gaza Strip and thoroughly destroying them.
The Israeli military’s drone operations are yielding results one by one. They are effectively eliminating high-ranking Hamas officials hidden among the residents. Zakaria Abu Ma’ammar, a member of Hamas’ highest decision-making body ‘Political Bureau’ and the Minister of the Interior, and Joad Abu Shumala, the Minister of Economy, were killed in an airstrike after their location was discovered by an Israeli military drone reconnaissance route. Mohammed Deif, commander of the Al Qassam Brigade, a Hamas armed organization that commanded this attack on Israel, also lost his entire family in the airstrike and escaped with his life alone. Murad Abu Murad, the head of the aviation system who attacked the music festival venue on the first day of the war and committed massacre, and Ali Qadi, the commander of the sabotage commando unit, were also killed after being tracked by a drone.
Secret military facilities that Hamas has built extensively throughout the Gaza Strip are also being destroyed one after another. Hamas has built spiderweb-like tunnels in the northern Gaza Strip and the Gaza City area. A small entrance is created in a house or vacant lot connected to an underground tunnel and a homemade rocket is launched into Israel from there. These exits are quite small and numerous, making it very difficult to keep track of them all. The Israeli military is using drones equipped with high-resolution optical and thermal imaging cameras to search narrow alleys and buildings to find the entrance to Hamas’ secret tunnel. The Israeli military is destroying the tunnel itself by bombing it with large bombs weighing up to 2,000 pounds, wherever they find it. These tactics are working, and the number of Hamas rockets fired from the Gaza Strip toward Israel is decreasing rapidly every day.
There are observations that Hamas, which has built large-scale tunnel facilities in the Gaza Strip, received related technology and equipment from North Korea. The photo shows the 4th Tunnel in Yanggu-gun, Gangwon-do, which was discovered while being dug by North Korea to infiltrate South Korea. Provided by Yanggu-gunThe Korean military must carefully look at and learn from Israel’s urban warfare execution system, in which high-performance small drones, special forces, and air raid assets are linked in almost real time. In case of emergency, the Korean military must conduct urban warfare on the narrow battlefield of the Korean Peninsula, especially in densely populated urban areas. In this process, weapons of mass destruction that North Korea has accumulated in huge underground facilities must also be recovered or destroyed. In particular, the underground facilities dug by Hamas are known to have been made with North Korean technology and equipment. Therefore, the lessons learned from the preceding operations conducted by Israel before deploying ground forces will be a very important reference for the Korean military.
The Korean Army’s Dronebot Combat Team is training. provided by the armyThe Korean military is said to be preparing for future drone warfare by creating a unit called the ‘Dronebot Combat Team’. The Dronebot Combat Team is testing various types of drones by creating functional units such as an aerial reconnaissance battalion, special mission battalion, electronic warfare battalion, and robot company. My analysis is that this is a very wrong direction. This is because there is a high possibility that it will be just a ‘show’ rather than actual practice. Now, drones are not ‘special equipment’ that is operated by a separate unit, but have become ‘general purpose equipment’ that can be freely used for various missions such as reconnaissance and strike even in the lowest echelons such as infantry squads. It must be clearly recognized that, rather than expensive drones that cost hundreds of millions of won per unit because they are so-called military standards, commercial drones costing millions of won that can be easily obtained on the market and used in conjunction with a smartphone or tablet PC have become the mainstream. This is a lesson learned from the Israel-Hamas war and the Russia-Ukraine war.
The Israeli military’s advance operation before deploying ground forces is likely to serve as a model precedent for preventing large-scale casualties that can occur in urban warfare with small, low-cost drones and for carrying out effective urban and underground operations. I hope that the Korean military will actively study these precedents and boldly reform the organization and equipment of drone forces.
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Shin In-gyun, CEO of Independent Defense Network
Source: Donga
Mark Jones is a world traveler and journalist for News Rebeat. With a curious mind and a love of adventure, Mark brings a unique perspective to the latest global events and provides in-depth and thought-provoking coverage of the world at large.