Urban Warfare Project

Since the October 7, 2023 Hamas terrorist attacks in Israel, John Spencer has conducted research during seven trips to the country, and has had the opportunity to visit Gaza City. His firsthand experience gives him a deep and nuanced understanding of the vast tunnel network that runs underneath Gaza. In this episode, he shares his observations from this research. He also describes the wa...

In January 2018, Mossad operatives infiltrated a secret warehouse in Tehran, Iran, broke into dozens of massive safes, and in just under seven hours extracted more than one hundred thousand documents and over half a ton of material detailing Iran’s covert nuclear weapons program. The raid, code-named Operation Stealing the Reality, was the result of two years of planning. In this episode...

In 2005, then Colonel H. R. McMaster commanded the 3d Armored Cavalry Regiment during the Battle of Tal Afar. At the time, the city was a key stronghold for al-Qaeda in Iraq and a staging ground for fighters and suicide bombers crossing into northwestern Iraq from Syria. Operation Restoring Rights was launched to clear insurgents, restore order, and protec...

In this episode, John Spencer is joined by Captain Ryan Danowitz of the El Segundo Police Department. Drawing on his eighteen years of policing experience and research conducted through California’s Law Enforcement Command College, Captain Danowitz explores how artificial intelligence and autonomous vehicles could reshape urban policing. He discusses how these vehicles might enhance det...

In this episode, John Spencer is joined by Major Floren Herrera of the Armed Forces of the Philippines. A graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point and recipient of the prestigious Nininger Award for Valor at Arms, Major Herrera led troops during the 2017 Battle of Marawi—one of the most intense urban battles in recent Philippine military history. He shares the story o...

By its very nature, urban warfare involves the presence of civilians. And when cities become battlefields, it may be necessary to evacuate noncombatants from them—either due to humanitarian imperatives or because military objectives require it. But an array of legal obligations and other considerations arise when civilians are evacuated. And because discussions of evacuations are closely...

According to US military doctrine, legitimacy is one of the twelve principles of joint operations. But that concept—legitimacy—is a complex one. How is it defined? How should we understand the ways in which the laws of war, rules of engagement, national policies, and civilian harm mitigation measures overlap—and how they differ? How can rules of engagement and...

In what has become a holiday tradition, the Urban Warfare Project Podcast turns its attention to an important question: What items should be on a military force's urban warfare holiday wish list? To do so, John Spencer is joined once again this year by two urban warfare scholars to discuss the unique capabilities, ideas, and initiatives they would like Santa t...

When thousands of Hamas militants invaded southern Israel on October 7, 2023, there were only 110 police officers on duty spread across hundreds of square kilometers, concentrated in four police stations and several other posts. Despite their relatively small numbers, these officers played a critical role that day. On this episode, John Spencer is joined by Is...

Cities' complex man-made terrain, the presence of civilian populations and infrastructure to support those populations, a complicated information environment, and a range of political and other factors make planning for brigade and division urban operations extremely difficult. Too often, militaries rely on a limited set of options—such as the deliberate assault or an effort to bypass ci...

From ancient Jerusalem to today's urban battlefields in Ukraine and Gaza, we can find many examples of urban conflicts that have been heavily influenced by their underground components. But how should military forces categorize subterranean spaces and consider the different functions of underground structures? How does this subterranean dimension influence the conduct of military operati...

A strongpoint is a heavily fortified battle position tied to a natural or reinforcing obstacle. It is used to create an anchor for the defense or to deny the enemy decisive or key terrain. Throughout the history of urban warfare, buildings turned into strongpoints have played an outsized role. Multiweek battles have even been fought over single buildings used ...

What do engineers bring to urban operations? How do the basic capabilities resident in engineer units—like those in the US Army—enable maneuver forces to achieve their objectives when operating in cities? For commanders, what are the most important considerations to account for when employing engineers in combined arms operations, and what effects can they expect from specific engineer t...

John Spencer is joined on this episode by retired General David Petraeus. He served thirty-seven years in the US Army, culminating his career with six consecutive commands as a general officer, including five in combat. He served as the commander of coalition forces in Iraq during the troop surge there, commander of US Central Command, and commander of coaliti...

In this episode, guest host Jayson Geroux is joined by retired Lieutenant Colonel Louis DiMarco, a professor of military history at the United States Army Command and General Staff College. Dr. DiMarco is the author of the influential 2012 book Concrete Hell: Urban Warfare from Stalingrad to Iraq. In the conversation, he discusses how he became interested in urban warfare and describes t...

Many will be familiar with the major facts about the October 7 Hamas terrorist attacks against Israel. Over 1,200 people were killed and another 240 kidnapped and brought to Gaza as hostages. But what do we know about the specific sites—more than twenty in total—that the attackers selected as targets? What about the specific tactics they employed? And since many of the sites targeted we...

In this episode, John Spencer is joined by retired Colonel Kevin Felix. He served 30 years in the US Army, with his last assignment as chief of Army Capabilities and Integration Center's Future Warfare Division. He describes the Army’s different approaches for thinking about and studying the future of warfare, including major efforts beginning in 2014 to focus on global urbanization, inc...

During the 2022 Battle of Mariupol, approximately three thousand Ukrainian defenders, vastly outnumbered by Russian forces, were quickly surrounded in a steel plant with their backs to the Sea of Azov and little hope of anyone coming to their rescue. Running out of ammunition, short of medicine, and with casualties mounting, they were in desperate need of resupply. A bold plan was concei...

Over several dozen episodes, the Urban Warfare Project Podcast has explored many of the unique challenges of urban warfare. But what is urban warfare, exactly? The simple answer is that it's simply combat that takes place in the man-made terrain of cities. But going deeper, what are the variety of urban patterns and urban functions, for example, and how do they influence the conduct of m...