Almost ten years ago, Popular Airsoft had for its feature story Readings on Urban Combat, citing an airsoft player who wants to keep on going to CQB games since he believes that cities will be the main battlefields and that will entail a lot close quarters battles.

Probably with all that we see in the news these days, most of you will agree that urban combat will be more predominant in the following years given that more people move into cities.

The Chief of the U.S. Army, Gen. Mark Milley, agrees with this according to Military.com reporting on the Future of War Conference 2017. He adds that urban combat in the future will happen in megacities. That means urban centers with over 10 million inhabitants and there are many cities nowadays that can meet that criteria with the 8 in the top 10 located in Asia.

Jakarta, Indonesia, One of the top 10 Megacities.

If urban combat in regular cities is already a very hazardous way of conducting warfare, just imagine urban combat in the magnitude of megacities. Mosul in Iraq is already a large city with around a million people up to its outermost boundaries, and the fighting happening there is taking months before it can be concluded. Just imagine 10 Mosuls in one urban area for a megacity, and that will heavily task any regular army, which will mean large casualties.

Even for a high-tech military, urban combat can be a great leveler and advantage will always go to small, highly motivated, and well-equipped units. With smartphones allowing people to send videos and photos quickly, it is hard for a military unit to move in urban centers without being detected. As Gen. Milley , emphasizing on the units to be even more mobile than ever before, said, "Smaller units will have to disperse more widely; they will have to in order to survive. If you stay stationary for any length of time, say more than a couple of hours, you are probably going to get killed."

He added that more senior leaders will be put at the lower level, just like in the Special Operations forces where majors command companies while in the regular army, it takes captains. It may just mean an increase in the number of special operations units.

U.S. Army soldiers urban combat training in Camp Zafar,Herat, Afghanistan.
(U.S. Navy Photo by Mass Communications Specialist 1st Class Stephen Hickok)

Fighting in megacities will be very dangerous as they provide a myriad of ready obstacles and hiding places for the enemy. Each corner, each floor, each rooftop, even each manhole can provide the enemy an opportunity to wear down the army with IEDs or well-placed snipers. Fighting up skyscrapers will even challenge the most physically fit soldier. Casualties will really run high, and experts in urban combat believe it can be from 40% to 50%, apart from that civilian casualties can run into tens of thousands, that soldiers will have to be more discriminating when firing to keep civilian casualties down.

But then, we have not ruled out technology with the rise of drones and robots used in military applications. Perhaps more investments will be put in semi-autonomous or autonomous drones to get into more dangerous situations in urban combat. If military wants to minimize casualties and structural damages in megacities, then it might want to look into robot armies.

As for airsoft players, it might be time to look into more indoor, CQB games. It might look like future warfare will hit even closer to home, especially in cities that we are familiar with though we wish it will never happen. It is still best to be prepared.

Top photo: Fort Bliss Urban Combat Exercise (Wikipedia)