True sense of a game changer

In 1632, the largest and most important battle in the history of the Thirty Years' War (1618-1648) took place in the small town of Lützen, south of Leipzig, Germany. The Swedish king Gustavus Adolphus, a hero of the Protestant religion, and the mercenary commander Wallenstein, who saved the Catholic religion from destruction, and a field marshal of the Holy Roman Empire clashed. In this battle, Pappenheim was killed, and the Protestant side was victorious, but due to Gustav's death, the Protestant side also suffered a loss that was tantamount to defeat.

It was a very large battle at the time for both sides' forces, each with their current division size. However, at that time, the Catholic side had only 60 cannons. The number of cannons on the Protestant side was even less. By modern standards, armed with 60 cannons is a lot. Still, considering the firepower and rate of fire of the cannons at the time, it would be far less than the firepower of a modern artillery company of about six field guns. Nevertheless, even with this firepower, more than 3,000 people were killed in a single day, and even the commander faced a tragic death.

The power and role of cannons in warfare in the 20th century have developed beyond imagination. After the invasion of Normandy in 1944, Allied forces launched several offensives to break through the German defenses. However, the German battalion thwarted the attack of the British tank regiment, destroying more than 40 British tanks in a single day with only four 88mm guns and two 75mm assault guns.

The power of naval guns was greater. The Germans launched several successful counterattacks, but each time they were repulsed by naval guns firing from ships anchored at sea before pushing the Allies out to sea. The Allied bridgehead, covered by naval guns, was impenetrable. Even the bravest and most experienced soldiers could not hold out when naval artillery began to fire around them.

The 155mm shells are making headlines in the Ukrainian war, where all kinds of advanced weapons, such as drones, javelins, and the High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) run rampant. Ukrainian forces are consuming 1 million shells, which is three times the annual output of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Russia is also reaching out to North Korea as it runs out of ammunition. At this point, the real game changer seems to be the shells, no, the shell production capacity. The take-home lesson seems to be that we must stick to conventional weapons, or the basics, as much as we do advanced weapons.