Volume: 2 Issue: 1 (2024) Serial Number: 2

Conventional Western operational doctrine has long treated the operational pause as a regrettable, primarily logistical interruption between phases of decisive action — a moment when the attacker has exceeded the culminating point and must consolidate. The RussoUkrainian war from February 2022 through the end of 2023 has rendered that minimalist conception inadequate. Drawing on peer-reviewed scholarship in Survival, the Journal of Strategic Studies, Defence Studies, the Journal of Slavic Military Studies, Contemporary Security Policy, the Scandinavian Journal of Military Studies, and Small Wars and Insurgencies, together with RUSI tactical reports and a granular reconstruction of the campaign's first twenty-two months, this article — written in early 2024 with the benefit of two full campaign years of evidence — introduces the Operational Pause Function Typology (OPFT). The OPFT is a three-category analytical framework that classifies operational pauses as regenerative, shaping, or exhaustion-imposed. It is operationalised through seven coded pause episodes spanning the spring 2022 reset around Kyiv, the early-Donbas culmination of summer 2022, the Kharkiv-Kherson autumn 2022 transfer of initiative, the Russian Kherson withdrawal of November 2022, the Russian winter operational pause of 2022–2023, the Ukrainian shaping pause preceding the June 2023 counteroffensive, and the Ukrainian exhaustion-imposed pause of October–December 2023. The study finds that across these episodes the burden of strategic exhaustion was transferred not principally through casualty arithmetic but through pause-management — that is, through one belligerent's capacity to convert the other's compulsory regeneration into a shaping window. Three hypotheses are tested: that operational pauses can serve as deliberate exhaustion instruments; that pause-frequency correlates with shifts in strategic initiative; and that Russian pauses functioned distinctly as exhaustion-impositions rather than as voluntary recoveries. The doctrinal implications are that operational art under modern attrition demands explicit pause-design as a planning category and that NATO operational doctrine should integrate pause-aware metrics into the next doctrine review cycle.

For two decades the western combat-casualty paradigm has rested on the so-called golden hour: the assumption that a wounded service member can be evacuated to a Role 2 or Role 3 surgical facility within sixty minutes of point of injury. The Russo-Ukrainian war, together with the broader pivot to large-scale combat operations against near-peer adversaries, has demonstrated that this assumption no longer holds. Evacuation-chain disruption — caused by contested airspace, electronic-warfare denial, mass casualty surges, and tactical fluidity at the line of contact — routinely extends the prehospital interval to twenty-four, forty-eight, or seventy-two hours. Prolonged Field Care (PFC), defined as field-medical care provided by combat medics and physicians beyond the doctrinal evacuation window, has accordingly migrated from a Special Operations niche to a general-force requirement. This article is written in early 2024 with the benefit of two campaign years of evidence from Ukraine and the consensus update of the Committee on Tactical Combat Casualty Care, and it addresses a specific gap in the existing literature: although consensus guidelines for prolonged casualty care have matured between 2017 and 2023, no validated bedside scoring instrument exists to track the stabilization status of a polytraumatized patient across the multi-domain interventions that PFC requires. The article introduces the Polytrauma Evacuation-Lapse Stabilization Index (PELSI), a novel five-domain bedside score covering hemodynamic stability, hemorrhage control, oxygenation, thermoregulation, and infection prophylaxis. Each domain is scored from zero to two against operationalized clinical criteria, yielding a composite score of zero to ten. The PELSI is operationalized through a structured monitoring protocol with measurement intervals at zero, six, twelve, twenty-four, forty-eight, and seventy-two hours. The article reviews the underlying evidence base, specifies the scoring criteria, and discusses the doctrinal implications of pause-aware casualty stabilization for NATO and partner forces entering the 2024 doctrine review cycle. Three hypotheses are tested: that the PFC interval has structurally lengthened beyond the golden-hour window; that polytrauma stabilization in PFC depends on multi-domain rather than single-axis interventions; and that a bedside composite score offers actionable decision support that single-domain monitoring cannot replicate.

The defence industry of the Western Balkans, anchored by Serbia's Yugoslav-era industrial base and by smaller producers in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Montenegro, and North Macedonia, has experienced sustained export growth across the 2019–2023 window. The literature on the macroeconomic impact of arms exports on GDP, anchored in Defence and Peace Economics, has matured substantially in the same period, but no published study has yet derived an arms-export multiplier specifically calibrated for the small open economies of the Western Balkans. This article, written with the benefit of the SIPRI Arms Transfers Database update for 2023 and the most recent national accounts releases for the five reference countries, addresses that gap by constructing the Western Balkan Defence-Export Multiplier (WBDEM), a country-specific GDP-elasticity-of-arms-exports metric calibrated to the small-open-economy structure of the region. The WBDEM is operationalized through a four-step procedure that decomposes the arms-export shock into direct, indirect, and induced components and adjusts the elasticity for the conducting economy's domestic-absorption capacity, import-content of intermediate inputs, and labor-market frictions. The article reviews the underlying evidence base, presents WBDEM estimates for the five Western Balkan economies, and discusses the policy implications of the results for industrial-policy planning across the region. Three hypotheses are tested: that arms exports exert a measurable positive multiplier on the GDP of small Western Balkan economies; that the multiplier is heterogeneous across the region with Serbia exhibiting the largest absolute coefficient; and that the multiplier's magnitude is conditioned by the import content of intermediate inputs in the defence supply chain rather than by arms-export volume in isolation. The doctrinal and policy implications are that defence-industrial policy in small Western Balkan economies should integrate the WBDEM as a planning instrument and that NATO and EU partners engaging with regional defence-industrial cooperation should weight their offset and procurement strategies against the WBDEM-derived absorption profile of each partner economy

Western operational doctrine has long classified the conduct of war across four domains — land, sea, air, and space — and added cyberspace as the fifth domain following the 2010 NATO Lisbon Summit. The accelerating convergence of neuroscientific research, algorithmic computation, and large-scale information operations has, between 2017 and 2023, generated empirical and conceptual pressure to recognise the cognitive domain as a distinct operational space alongside the existing five. The Russo-Ukrainian war that opened in February 2022 has supplied the most consequential case for that pressure, and the parallel cognitive-domain operations of the People's Liberation Army of China have generated a second consequential body of evidence. This article, written with the benefit of two campaign years of evidence from Ukraine and the consensus formation around NATO's cognitive-warfare exploratory concept, addresses a specific gap in the existing literature. Although peer-reviewed scholarship on cognitive warfare has matured substantially during 2017–2023, no published study has produced a structured, operationalised assessment instrument by which a state-actor's preparedness in the cognitive domain can be measured. The article introduces the Cognitive-Domain Operational Readiness Index (CDORI), a novel five-axis assessment framework covering information-environment surveillance, cognitive force protection, offensive cognitive-operations capability, algorithmic detection and counter-deepfake capacity, and doctrinal-and-organisational integration. Each axis is scored from zero to two against operationalised criteria, yielding a composite total of zero to ten. The CDORI is applied to three coded cases — NATO collectively, the Russian Federation, and the People's Republic of China — for the 2017–2023 window and yields composite scores of 6, 8, and 7 respectively. Three hypotheses are tested: that the cognitive domain has structurally crossed the threshold of doctrinal recognition during the analysed period; that cognitive-operations capability is unevenly distributed across the three reference state-actors with Russia exhibiting the highest composite score; and that the principles of the art of war require formal extension into the cognitive domain to retain analytical adequacy under contemporary conditions. The doctrinal implications are that the principles of mass, manoeuvre, surprise, and economy of force require explicit cognitive-domain reformulation in the next NATO doctrine review cycle.

Medium-caliber autocannon barrels operate under thermo-mechanical loading regimes that combine high transient gas temperatures (1800–2700 K), peak chamber pressures of the order of 350–450 MPa, and cyclic mechanical contact between projectile driving bands and the rifled bore. Under accelerated firing regimes — bursts of 100–300 rounds at firing rates exceeding 200 rounds per minute — the resulting thermo-mechanical degradation accumulates non-linearly across the bore, thread, and chamber regions. The published 2017–2023 evidence base on gunbarrel degradation has matured substantially during this window, with sustained progress in coupled thermo-mechanical finite element modelling, validated material-testing data for 30SiMn2MoVA gun steel, and quantitative laws of bore-diameter evolution under continuous firing. Despite this maturation, no published study has supplied an integrated bedside-applicable degradation index that combines the three principal degradation mechanisms — thermo-mechanical fatigue, thermochemical-mechanical erosion-wear, and low-cycle fatigue — into a single composite remaining-service-life predictor specifically calibrated for medium-caliber autocannon geometries. This article, written with the benefit of the 2022–2023 cohort of validated thermomechanical models and the parallel maturation of the experimental literature on 30SiMn2MoVA degradation, fills that gap. The article introduces the Composite Bore Degradation Index (CBDI), a normalised 0–100 index constructed from three weighted sub-indices: a thermo-mechanical sub-index drawn from peak temperature and von Mises stress fields, an erosion-wear sub-index drawn from the diameter-change-rate law, and a low-cycle fatigue sub-index drawn from cumulative damage at the rifling start point. The CBDI is operationalised through a numerical workflow that combines coupled thermo-mechanical finite element simulation with the experimentally derived parameters of 30SiMn2MoVA steel and is applied to a generic 30 mm autocannon geometry across three accelerated firing scenarios. Three hypotheses are tested: that the dominant degradation mechanism in medium-caliber autocannons under accelerated firing is multi-mechanism rather than single-mechanism; that the CBDI's three sub-indices contribute non-uniformly to remaining-service-life prediction with the thermo-mechanical sub-index dominating in the first 2,000-round window; and that the CBDI offers actionable predictive accuracy that single-axis degradation metrics cannot replicate.

Combat-vehicle fleets operating in expeditionary, contested, or otherwise logistically isolated theatres routinely face spare-part availability shortfalls that ground a substantial share of the fleet for weeks or months while replacement components transit a vulnerable conventional supply chain. The published 2017–2023 evidence base on metal additive manufacturing has matured to the point at which selective laser melting (SLM) of nickel, titanium, aluminium, and tool-steel alloys produces parts whose mechanical performance approaches or matches that of conventionally machined counterparts, while the parallel maturation of ruggedised SLM platforms suitable for forward deployment has reduced the operational threshold for in-theatre fabrication. Despite this maturation, no published study has supplied a structured techno-economic decision instrument that determines, for a given combat-vehicle spare part, whether in-theatre SLM production is preferable to conventional resupply under specified logistical-isolation conditions. This article, written in early 2024 with the benefit of the 2022–2023 cohort of SLM process-parameter optimisations and the parallel maturation of military-logistics-with-AM scholarship, fills that gap. The article introduces the Critical Spare-Part Additivability Index (CSAI), a five-criterion 0–10 composite score covering geometric complexity, material-and-process compatibility with available SLM systems, mechanical-load criticality, conventional-supply lead-time penalty, and unit-cost ratio. The CSAI is operationalised through a structured decision workflow and applied to six representative combat-vehicle spare-part categories. Three hypotheses are tested: that in-theatre SLM production yields measurable techno-economic advantages over conventional resupply across a substantial sub-set of combat-vehicle spare-part categories under logistical-isolation conditions; that the CSAI's five criteria are non-redundant and contribute differentially to the additivability assessment; and that the CSAI offers actionable decision support that single-criterion suitability assessments cannot replicate. The doctrinal implications are that NATO and partner nations should adopt the CSAI or an equivalent structured instrument as part of the 2024 doctrine review cycle for forward-maintenance and contested-logistics operations.

Defence offsets — additional economic, industrial, and technological benefits that an arms-importing state extracts from a foreign original equipment manufacturer (OEM) as a condition of combat-system procurement — have, since the 1980s, become a near-universal feature of the international arms trade. The published 2017–2023 evidence base on offsets has matured substantially during the analysed window, with sustained progress in the systematic-review literature, in country-case-study scholarship, and in the political-economy analysis of offset persistence under supply-driven arms-trade conditions. Despite this maturation, the buyer-state policy maker continues to face a recurrent decision problem that the existing literature does not resolve: for a given combat-system procurement of a given absolute value, should the offset arrangement be configured as a direct compensation (co-production, sub-contracting, licensed production, technology transfer directly related to the procured platform) or as an indirect compensation (counter-purchase, foreign direct investment, technology transfer in unrelated sectors), and how should the comparative fiscal efficiency of the two models be evaluated? The article introduces the Offset Fiscal Efficiency Index (OFEI), a five-dimension 0–10 composite metric that scores any offset arrangement on technology-absorption depth, industrial output multiplier, time-torealisation, capability sustainability, and cost-recovery ratio. The OFEI is operationalised through a structured comparative workflow and applied to seven country cases — South Korea, Türkiye, India, Brazil, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, and Poland — across the 2017–2023 window for both direct and indirect compensation models. Three hypotheses are tested: that the fiscal efficiency of direct offsets dominates that of indirect offsets across the OFEI dimensions for buyer states with sufficient absorptive capacity; that the comparative advantage of direct over indirect offsets is conditioned by the buyer state's pre-existing industrial base, with mid-tier industrial economies exhibiting the largest direct-over-indirect differential; and that the OFEI offers actionable comparative decision support that single-dimension fiscal-efficiency metrics cannot replicate. The doctrinal implications are that NATO and partner-nation procurement frameworks should adopt the OFEI or an equivalent structured instrument as part of the 2024 procurement-policy review cycle.

Carl von Clausewitz's distinction between absolute war (the warlike element taken to its ultimate expression, in which the spirit of fighting is unencumbered by any external constraint) and real war (war as actually fought, conditioned by friction, political restraint, and the trinity of people, army, and government) has structured western strategic theory for nearly two centuries. This review article surveys the published 2017–2023 evidence base on hybrid warfare, grey-zone competition, cognitive warfare, and the contemporary applicability of Clausewitzian theory, and synthesises the published critiques and defences into a single epistemological revision of the absolute-war concept. The article — written in early 2024 with the benefit of two campaign years of evidence from the Russo-Ukrainian war and the parallel maturation of Chinese cognitive-domain operations — addresses a specific gap in the existing literature: although the published 2017–2023 review and analytic literature has produced substantive critiques of hybrid warfare as a conceptual category, no published study has supplied a structured theoretical framework that operationalises Clausewitzian theory specifically for grey-zone phenomena. The article introduces the Clausewitzian Grey-Zone Operationalisation Framework (CGZOF), a five-test theoretical instrument that determines whether a given grey-zone action qualifies as war in the Clausewitzian sense and where on the absolute-war / real-war / grey-zone continuum it sits. The five tests are: (1) political instrumentality, (2) trinity engagement, (3) friction generation, (4) violence threshold, and (5) continuum positioning. The article applies the CGZOF to the principal grey-zone-action cases documented in the 2017–2023 literature — the Russian operations in Ukraine (2014–2022 sub-period), the Russian invasion of Ukraine (2022–2023), the Chinese cognitive-domain operations in the Indo-Pacific, and the Russian information-operations campaign — and concludes that Clausewitzian theory, with the absolute-war concept properly understood as a regulative ideal rather than as a phenomenological description, retains substantial analytic adequacy for the contemporary strategic environment.