does Shock and Awe actually work?

During World War II Nazi Germany crushed Western Europe in the early days using their Blitzkrieg tactics that was basically working their military of airplanes, tanks and infantry to correct precision to get the best results.

They failed to crush England in this way and nearly had the Russians defeated after they arrived at the gates of Moscow in 1941!

There have been no wars as big as the Second World War since, but the modern day Blitzkrieg (or lightning war whatever you want to call it) is very similar to the Shock and Awe thesis written by Harlan K. Ullman and James P. Wade in 1996.

Shock and Awe is a designated doctrine to completely paralyze the enemy and destroy their will to fight, a bit like the Blitzkrieg invasion of Poland except with late 20th and early 21st century weapons.

The idea for a country like Iraq would be to incapacitate its command and destroy its infrastructure and physically and emotionally break the enemy having him surrender or his remaining forces being crushed.

Ullman said this before Operation Iraqi Freedom:

""You're sitting in Baghdad and all of a sudden you're the general and 30 of your division headquarters have been wiped out. You also take the city down. By that I mean you get rid of their power, water. In 2,3,4,5 days they are physically, emotionally and psychologically exhausted."

During the buildup before the Iraqi invasion it was repeated that they would be employing Shock and Awe, Iraq was to be an easy test for the US military applying Shock and Awe, the Iraqi's had barely any air power, gaining air superiority would be very easy, defeating ground forces would be challenging but hitting high command and points of communication across the country would divide enemy forces and convince them resisting wouldn't be fighting but be suicide.

Following the theory the invasion begun:



Limited bombing to try and instantly take out Saddam Hussein commenced, these failed however, one area the Dora Farms was hit with two F-117's backed by four Tomahawk cruise missiles, this resulted in one civilian killed and another four wounded and it was then revealed Saddam had never visited the area since 1995!

On the 21st of March 2003, the main bombing campaign by the US and their allies began. Its forces launched approximately 1700 air sorties (504 using cruise missiles). Coalition ground forces had begun a "running start" offensive towards Baghdad on the previous day. Coalition ground forces seized Baghdad on 5 April, and the United States declared victory on 14 April.

So in comparison it took shorter than the invasion of Poland by the Nazi's, a lot less people were killed in the invasion to ratio than the invasion of Poland.

The shock and awe air bombing campaign didn't seem to break the Iraqi people, many continued with their daily lives, working and shopping, as the bombs and missiles continued to fall around them. According to some analysts, the military's attack was perhaps too precise. It did not trigger shock and awe in the Iraqis and, in the end, the city was only captured after close combat on the outskirts of Baghdad.

Ullman was one to criticize the way the invasion was carried out, the initial invasion did not instantly crush the Iraqis will to fight like the theory, the coalition having to seize the city of Fallujah in April of 2004 is a perfect example of how the rapid dominance theory failed in that war!