Island battles : how the modern system works within a small tactical depth

Sammanfattning

Most of today’s land warfare theories tend to emphasize the importance of depth in both offensive and defensive maneuvers. The common idea is to avoid the enemies’ frontline troops striking deep in their territory against support units. There is not much written about the absence of depth in the tactical perspective. This study aims to identify which parts of Biddle´s modern system causes resource-effective victories in land-battle where tactical depth is limited. The study aims to test the theory in the scope of small tactical depth, in specific islands is examined. The study is conducted as a comparative case study of the battle of Saipan during WWII and the Falklands war, where both the offensive (The U.S.A and U.K) and defensive (Japan and Argentina) actions are examined. The cases fit the least similar design and are combined with the congruence method to identify causal relations. The study conducts a qualitative text analysis where the findings are later compared and discussed. The study finds that the principle small unit independent maneuver most strongly contributes to a resource-efficient victory as an attacker. The values for the dependent and independent variables within the cases do not correlate with the theory, thereby the study struggles to find overall congruence between the theory and the cases. The study suggests further studies regarding the phenomenon, both theory- and case-oriented.