Russia and Iran are using Ukraine and Israel as “battlefield laboratories” to probe at Western military vulnerabilities, experts told a House Foreign Affairs subcommittee Wednesday.
“Together, Russia and Iran are using Ukraine and the Middle East as battlefield laboratories to improve their weapons and develop techniques to overcome U.S. and allied defensive systems,” Dana Stroul, director of research at the Washington Institute, told lawmakers at a hearing on the “Despotic Duo.”
“Iran is extracting from Russia lessons in combined strike packages as well as insights into the strengths and weaknesses of Western-origin air and missile defense systems,” Stroul said in her written statement.
And the US certainly isn’t rapidly developing new done and anti drone warfare in response to battlefield analysis.
Wars have always been about testing new technology. You don’t gain an advantage by using the same technology as the other guy, so you throw all your new stuff on the battlefield and see what happens. Hence everything from chemical warfare to liquid-fueled rockets.
But you can go much further back and find things like Egyptians bragging about testing their newly-built chariots (developed from their former Hyksos conquerors’ chariots) for the first time in battle and winning.