Ambush

As I have been saying for several weeks, it is obvious that the opening shots of Civil War 2 have been fired. We are in the early stages of phase 2 of a communist insurgency:

Phase II (guerrilla warfare phase) is the first level of armed violence. Irregularforces engage in sabotage, interdiction of communication and logistics links,assassination, and selective attacks against government forces. Insurgents expand their secure base areas and, where possible, link them to form strategic enclaves of political autonomy.

The ambush as a tactic has been around for thousand of years, dating back to ancient warfare. Ambushes give a commander a way to attack the enemy with the element of surprise. The ambush is a tactic that has been in use for over 3,000 years, and tactics have remained largely unchanged for over a thousand years. 

Miguel and JKB posted a link to a film of an ambush that was executed by Antifa/BLM forces in Provo, Utah. Here is the link to that video of the incident. 

The basics of an ambush are relatively simple to understand. Let's start there, and then we can discuss how to defeat one.

An ambush is a tactic where a force uses a concealed position to engage an enemy with surprise and firepower. The side that initiates an ambush sets the time and place for it by enticing the enemy into the ambush, or observes the enemy's routine and sets the ambush accordingly.

In a military setting, there are different ambushes. There are tactical and strategic ambushes, the Army also classifies them as near (hand grenade range) and far ambushes. We can ignore them for this purpose, and I will explain why later. 

The area where the ambush will be carried out will be an area where the ambushers have concentrated their firepower to inflict the maximum effect on the force to be ambushed. That area is referred to as the "kill zone." 

The goal of an ambush is to entice or catch the target in the kill zone, and then hold that target within the kill zone for as long as possible, or at least as long as it takes to inflict the desired casualties on the target. 

So how do we defend ourselves from an ambush? The first way is to be unpredictable. Don't be where an enemy can set up an ambush and wait for you. The ideal course of action is to avoid being in the kill zone in the first place. Follow the advice here for my thoughts on that. 

Unfortunately, this isn't going to work for the ambush that we saw above. The ambushers don't care about any particular target. They are simply looking for any random person to come along in a vehicle and then attack them. 

In the above case, a vehicle enters the kill zone and is held there by crowds of "protesters" in the street. The ambushers are counting on the fact that Americans are reluctant to run over pedestrians in order to escape. 

Now the Army has some suggestions on how to defeat an ambush, but they are not really practical for our purposes. They want troops who are trapped in the kill zone to engage the enemy with suppressive firepower so that follow on troops who are not in the kill zone can outflank and engage the ambushers. 

Since we are not at the point where platoon sized engagements are practical, we have to find a better way. 

The key to defeating an ambush is to minimize the ambushers' advantages while maximizing your own. 

The ambushers have four main advantages:
1 they selected the ambush site
2 they have surprise on their side
3 they are not afraid to use force
4 we cannot use excessive force to defend ourselves, lest we wind up in jail

Our biggest advantages are:
1 we have mobility
2 the ambushers are tied to the kill zone and the protest area

So the first two things to mitigate their advantages while taking advantage of our own:
1 we have to move clear of the kill zone
2 we have to seize the initiative 

The simplest and easiest way to accomplish both is to floor it. We are in a vehicle, we are mobile, and they are not. We are limited to almost no weapons use, because the ambushers are (for whatever reason) not being prosecuted for their actions. Not so much for our side. Use force, and there is a good chance that you will lose everything in the legal shit storm that follows. 

Expect things to continue getting worse as time goes on.