Concrete Hell: Urban Warfare From Stalingrad to Iraq
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Occasionally, the commander could discover viable alternatives to the conduct of a deliberate urban operation. Oftentimes, the mere threat to a capital or key city was enough to compel its surrender. In the Franco-Prussian War, the French surrendered after the Prussians had laid siege to Paris but before an actual assault was mounted. Other times, the attacker could attempt a demonstration or ruse, or conduct a turning movement to entice the garrison of a city to fight in the open. A final technique attempted by armies whenever possible was to use surprise to capture a city before a defense could be organized. Attacking from an unexpected direction or by an unexpected means could achieve this.
British General James Wolfe used several techniques to achieve success and capture the French Canadian city of Quebec in 1759 without attacking it by the most obvious means. First, he achieved surprise and attacked from an unexpected direction by moving his army stealthily upriver from the city, conducting an amphibious landing by night, and scaling the supposedly inaccessible Heights of Abraham. By the morning of September 13, 1759, he had positioned his army in a double rank on the Plains of Abraham west of the city and astride Quebec’s supply lines. The brilliant and unexpected maneuver unnerved the French commander, Marquis de Montcalm, who decided to attack the British in the open without waiting for reinforcements. In the ensuing battle, British firepower routed the attacking French, destroyed French military capability and morale, and resulted in the city’s capitulation on September 18. In 1702, the Austrians also used surprise and an unexpected approach to capture the northern Italian city of Cremona by infiltrating elite troops into the defense by way of an aqueduct. In 1597, the Spanish captured the city of Amiens in northern France using a ruse. A small group of Spaniards disguised as peasants approached the city gateway, at which point they pretended that their cart had broken a wheel. In the confusion that followed, they rushed and captured the gate. These techniques entailed risk-taking and required boldness, imagination, and unique circumstances to be successful but avoided a costly and lengthy fight against the city’s defenses.
Bypassing the urban area was a viable technique; however, it had disadvantages. It required that the attacker tolerate the urban garrison in his rear and that he maintain sufficient forces to contain the threat of forays by the city garrison. Another effect of bypassing large important cities was that it often extended the political viability of the opposition and the duration of the campaign, thus jeopardizing the chance of a quick and decisive victory. The mounted Mongol armies that invaded the Chin Empire in northern China in 1211 were not very adept at the nuances of siege warfare and were forced to bypass important large, fortified population centers. The Mongols’ inability to conduct effective sieges was a major factor in the Chin’s ability to resist and sustain their empire for over two decades after the initial onslaught. Though rarely defeated in open battle, the vaunted Mongol cavalry did not fully conquer the Chin until 1234, after being aided in their efforts by allied Chinese generals and armies who provided experience in siege warfare.
Cities dominated the focus of war for most of history, playing a central role in the earliest campaigns in recorded history. The first battle in history of which there is any significant historical record was between the Hittites and the Egyptians in 1274 BC. The battle was fought outside the city gates of Kadesh, an important transportation hub in what is today modern Syria. Capturing or destroying the enemy’s major cities, and most importantly, their capital city, was the surest way to achieve victory in the ancient world. The Ancients also understood that the failure of such an attack could equal strategic defeat in the war. Therefore, the method of attack against a city was the subject of careful study and high-level discussion. Commanders very carefully considered whether to attack a city, how to attack a city, and conversely, how to defend one, before entering into battle. Attack against a city, a siege operation, was very meticulously planned before operations began.
For most of military history the importance of cities to warfare was demonstrated by large-scale siege operations. Even in ancient times, siege operations had developed into a finely honed and highly technical operation. Alexander the Great’s assault on Tyre in 332 BC utilized massive engineering efforts, amphibious landings, naval and land bombardments, and 150ft (45m) siege towers. Roman siege operations were likewise characterized by elaborate planning, sophisticated engineering efforts, and specialized equipment. The Romans and other ancient military forces were also very patient in their conduct of the operations and were often willing to invest years in order to successfully capture a city – capturing a city could be that decisive.
Engineering and engineers were central to planning urban operations. Engineering was the central component of ancient urban warfare. Cities were protected by walls and towers. Professional engineers designed these protective capabilities and chose where they would be built to offer the best protection for the city. Conversely, the attacker required professional engineers to evaluate the city’s defenses and develop a plan for attack. Central to that plan would be engineering equipment and capabilities. Ancient engineers developed specialized equipment and techniques to aid in the attack of the city. Equipment and techniques included battering rams, covers, ramps, tunnels, towers, ladders, and a variety of throwing machines.
Though some of the ancient specialized urban warfighting equipment was relatively simple, like battering rams, other pieces of equipment were very sophisticated and represented the cutting edge of technological capability of the time. Siege towers, which served a variety of purposes – from protected firing platform, to escalade launch vehicle, to battering ram support system – were particularly feared and complex. They could be over 100ft tall; they were usually completely mobile on their own set of wheels; they were protected against fire attacks, and all but the most powerful missile weapons; and they included their own bridge platforms (for passing troops from the tower to the wall) and firing systems (catapults and ballistae). In the Roman period, armies employed ballistae, a term which most people associate with the concept of a large-scale crossbow for firing large arrows. Ballistae were tactical powered weapons which could be mounted on city walls. However, most often they fired not arrows but small stones weighing up to 3lb, which could be extremely dangerous. The Romans used the ballista in the attack to suppress the enemy on the defensive city walls to allow friendly troops and towers to get in close for an assault. They were also mounted on siege towers and wheeled right up to the walls of the city.
One of the characteristics of urban warfare during the ancient period that still holds true in modern operations is the issue of time. Ancient commanders realized that there were essentially two approaches to urban warfare. One approach was a quick, decisive action to capture the city. This could be accomplished by deploying the main force of the army before the city could be prepared for defense; or, it could be accomplished by deceit. Often allies within the city might be persuaded to compromise the city’s defenses.
The ancients demonstrated another characteristic of urban fighting that has remained consistent through history: the burden borne by the civilian population. Unlike open battle, where the civilian population had little direct experience of the operation and only indirect experience of the consequences, the civilian population of an urban area involved in battle was directly involved in both the operation and its consequences. This characteristic of urban combat remains valid into the 21st century. Civilian casualties in city battles could be extraordinarily high. At both Tyre and Jerusalem, after the battle the entire city populations were either killed or enslaved.
The importance of urban operations did not abate in the Middle Ages. Medieval warfare revolved around campaigns designed to capture cities. Attack techniques remained relatively consistent with ancient practices. One of the most successful warrior kings of the period, Henry V of England, famous for his battlefield victory at Agincourt, conducted many more sieges than battles, and they were much more decisive in his campaigns against France.
His two-year siege of Rouen, 1417–19, demonstrated how urban warfare in the medieval period was often time consuming, and the death from starvation of many women and children within the city demonstrated that fighting for cities was as brutal as ever.
As Europe entered the Renaissance, an age of scientific discovery, explorations, and invention, combat to control cities remained as critical as ever to warfare. The invention of gunpowder did not change the centrality of cities to warfare but it did change the design of cities. Ancient and medieval cities were typically surrounded by high vertical walls which forced attackers to tunnel underneath, or use towers or ladders to climb over them. Gunpowder and cannon made quick and easy work of vertical stone walls, and cities responded by lowering and widening the walls. The invention of artillery was one of the most important weapon advances in military history and was a direct response to urban fortification. Artillery was initially designed specifically to deal with the walls of medieval castles and walled cities. It was so effective that it quickly caused the demise of the castle and resulted in drastic changes in the design of fortified cities. Large numbers of artillery pieces were used to attack cities. However, artillery was not normally used against the city itself. The primary purpose of artillery was to create a breach in the surrounding wall. Secondly, artillery was used to suppress enemy fire, including enemy artillery, during the approach to the walls of the city and the final assault through and over the city walls. Artillery was not commonly used against the population or structures of a city unless a commander specifically decided to compel the city’s surrender through bombardment.
Engineers remained at the forefront of siege warfare and led the response to the new gunpowder technology. Cities lowered their walls and backed the stone fronts with thick earthen embankments. Defenders mounted their own cannon on the wide top of the walls. The engineers carefully designed the trace of the walls so that each wall front was enfiladed by cannon firing from walls on its flank. The resulting design resembled a star and for several hundred years many of the major cities of Europe were surrounded by star fortifications. Engineers in the early modern period were also responsible for designing assaults on fortified cities. Engineers evaluated the defenses, carefully studying distances, angles, outlying fortifications, the thickness of walls, and lie of the surrounding terrain. Based on this, the engineer designed the siege assault plan. The generals commanding the troops made all the command decisions, but those decisions were based on the recommendations of the engineer.
The most famous engineer of this era was Sebastien Le Prestre de Vauban, the chief engineer for Louis XIV of France. Vauban was commissioned as an engineer lieutenant in 1755 and by 1759 he had participated in ten major siege operations. In subsequent years he supervised the successful assault on over 20 cities. He was an expert in both the attack on and the building of fortifications. In his career he improved the fortifications of over 300 cities and supervised the building of 37 new fortresses. His greatest contribution to the art of city combat was the creation of a formal siege methodology. His methodology consisted of choosing the point of attack; emplacing long-range artillery; building a series of protected approach trenches; emplacing close artillery batteries; building more covered trenches to approach the wall of the city; and then, once the supporting artillery silenced defending artillery and created a breach, the infantry assaulted the city’s defensive wall from the cover of the approach trenches. Vauban’s siege tactics remained the standard for attacking a city almost until the 20th century.
Engineers supervised two types of specialty troops necessary for urban operations: sappers and miners. The engineers generally had exclusive control of the use of miners but had to share the direction of sappers with the artillery. Often this unclear chain of command caused delays in the execution of siege operations. Sapping, the digging of trenches under almost constant fire, was extremely dangerous work. Vauban instituted a system of cash rewards based on progress and danger. With these incentives, Vauban’s sappers could complete 480 feet of trench every 24 hours.
Mining remained an essential element as long as cities were defended by prepared positions and fortresses. Mining could take one of two forms. In one form, a deep mine was started well outside the fortification and dug to its foundation. Barrels of explosives were then positioned against the foundation and detonated. The result, if done properly, was the destruction of the wall and the creation of a huge crater, which became the entry point of the following infantry assault on the city. The other type of mining was called “attaching the miner.” This technique was a direct mine into the base of the fortress wall. The miners quickly burrowed directly into the base of the wall as the enemy above was suppressed by fire. The miners then branched left or right under the wall. Once properly positioned, explosives were placed in the mine under the wall, and detonated, bringing down a section of wall. The infantry assault then entered the city over the rubble resulting from the collapsed wall. Mining was often used when artillery proved ineffective. Engineers, sappers, and miners were absolutely critical to successful siege operations. There were never enough of them, and delays ensued when engineers were not present, or too few in number. The failure of Wellington’s first siege of Badajoz in 1811 is attributed in part to a chronic shortage of engineers. Mistakes by, or the absence of, engineers could cause significant friendly casualties. Thus, the importance of cities to warfare was recognized in the effort and cost undertaken by armies to develop and train specialized troops to meet the particular requirements for successful operations against cities.
For a short time, from the middle of the 18th century to the early part of the 20th century, the genius of Frederick the Great and Napoleon relocated decisive battle from the walls of the city to the open fields of the countryside. During this period siege operations continued to be important, but decisive battles most often occurred in the open field where commanding generals matched wits and tactical acumen using a combination of firepower and maneuver to overcome their opponents. Beginning with Frederick and Napoleon, and spurred on by admirers and biographers, the 19th century was a century of decisive open-field battle. In the 19th century decisive combat on the open battlefield represented the ultimate art of warfare.
Through the 19th century the confluence of technology and the changing nature of cities were also making urban combat and sieges less common. Beginning at the end of the 17th century, many cities began to change their design, and the fortress city became less common. This process was gradual; but by the beginning of the 20th century, the fortress city was recognized as obsolete and had essentially disappeared. This was the result of several factors. For several hundred years after the Middle Ages, city populations were relatively stable, but urban populations began to increase rapidly in the late 18th century. The walled cities began to experience significant crowding and suburbs of the city began to expand beyond the city walls, making the effectiveness of the walls questionable. Additionally, during the 18th century, cities in the interior of stable nation-states were not deemed sufficiently threatened to maintain their expensive fortification. Countries such as France intentionally allowed specific city fortifications to erode. Finally, by the time of the Franco-Prussian War in 1870, modern rifled artillery was able to reduce most city fortifications from a range of nearly two miles.
At the same time that artillery technology was improving, advances in small-arms technology occurred. Rifled repeating arms made small groups of infantry much more lethal. Small-arms technology radically changed infantry tactics. In an urban area, these developments had the effect of turning individual buildings manned by small groups of soldiers into miniature fortresses. Groups of buildings became mutually supporting defensive networks. These man-made defensive networks were much less homogenous than the city wall and hence a much more difficult target for the artillery. Additionally, the lethality of infantry meant that the integrity of the urban defense was not destroyed by a breach of the walls. Defenders now had the capability of defe
nding effectively throughout the depth of the urban environment – a technique impossible when infantry tactics relied on massed close-knit formations to achieve effective firepower. By the end of the 19th century, the pressure of urban population growth, the effectiveness of rifled artillery, and the firepower of breech-loading rifles and machine guns led to the obsolescence of the protective city wall, and resulted in the capability to defend from within individual city buildings and blocks of buildings. The tactical challenge of the fortified building moved the urban battle from the city wall to the city streets.
Commanding generals continued to pursue the objective of the open-field battle into the 20th century. However, decisive open battle was less common as armies got much bigger, warfare became global, and technology added many more dimensions to warfare including mechanized fighting vehicles and airplanes. The size of armies and the complexity of war made decisive single open-field battles a thing of the past. World War I demonstrated that the lethality of the battlefield literally overwhelmed the capacity of armies to maneuver and attack decisively. This had the interesting effect of making urban battle essentially irrelevant. Those small towns and cities which happened to be in the way of World War I combat, particularly after 1914, were simply obliterated by the massive and sustained artillery bombardments which typified all operations in the war. The first two years of World War II, the years of the Nazi Blitzkrieg, seemed to indicate that sweeping gigantic battles of maneuver – Napoleon on a grand scale – might be the new major characteristic of modern war. But in fact, World War II marked the end of a relatively short period in military history where open-field battle dominated the employment of military force. Discrete field battles occurred in World War II. Most often those battles took place in and around cities and proved to be operationally decisive. World War II commanders, seeking to fight in the open whenever possible, bypassed major urban areas with their armored spearheads whenever possible. However, eventually, either the city could not be bypassed, as at Stalingrad, or the presence of the bypassed enemy could not be tolerated. Then warfare reverted to combat in the city. Since World War II, warfare has returned to its historically traditional locale, the urban battle space, with increasing frequency. This is because, as modern armies try to be more and more precise in their application of violence they focus more and more on what is absolutely critical, and the urban centers are natural strategic and operational decisive points.