Modelling Effects

Major Tom Mouat

What are we talking about?

• COIN, OOTW, EBT, EBA, EBO, Non-Kinetic effects, Hearts & Minds, Soft Effects, Shaping Operations...

• Training, morale, efficiency, cohesion, will-to-combat, leadership, motivation, public support, political will...

Attack the Network

What are we talking about?

• An area lacking in predictable outcomes.• Hostages.

• An assumption of rational behaviour.• General Butt Naked1.

• An area lacking in numerical quantification.• The AT-11 Sniper Missile problem.

• An area of constant flux.• Network links and nodes.

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Butt_Naked

"Gentlemen, we have run out of money. Now we must think"

Winston Churchill

Wargaming

"A wargame is a warfare model or simulation in which the flow of events is shaped by decisions made by human players representing the opposing sides, during the course of those events."

Peter Perla

Ex Agile Warrior 11 – Insight #10Wargaming is a powerful tool which is currently not well understood and therefore somewhat neglected.

The wargame includes four essential elements: • It must be genuinely adversarial.• It must be Umpired.• It must involve a deliberate element of uncontrollable chance.• Scenarios should be fought through as often as time permits.

We currently treat wargaming as an unstructured review of our plan or available courses of action - it is, more often than not, a self-analysis or talk-through to identify weaknesses or confirm our comfort with our own decisions and reasoning. We need rapidly and radically to re-address our understanding and use of this very powerful tool and to resource it appropriately.

Modelling Effects

• Lists of factors• +1 for digging a well.• +1 for medical inoculations.• +1 for Flaming Pigs1.• +1 for Dancing Pigs2.

• Very often single sided...• Very often hidden in a Black Box.• Need to be calibrated.

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_pig2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dancing_pigs

Prediction and Role-Play

• "forecasts based on the results of role-playing sessions can make accurate predictions of human responses to conflict or change.1"

1. http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=72&source=rss

How good are we at forecasting how others will behave in conflicts?

Obscure conflicts

What we would expect from random chance ?

3 possible answers:33% probability of getting it right by guessing

6 answers =17%

Average

4 answers =25%

Using judgment is often WORSE then guessing !

Average

Using Game Theory fares no better..

Average

But a role play achieves substantially better forecasts

Average

The Bottom Line

• A proper opposition generates an action / reaction feedback loop that produces insights vastly more powerful (and accurate) than a single opinion, however well informed.

So - how can we use Role-Play?

• Vignettes.• Confrontation Analysis.• Matrix Gaming.

• In all cases – people role-play the "enemy".• Should not be restricted to people "like us".

Vignettes

• Live Role-Play of formal meetings.• JMC Meetings, Shuras, etc.

• Live Role-Play of incidents.• Negotiation Training.• Encounter events.

• Stand-alone.• Controllable.

Confrontation Analysis

• Based on Game Theory.• Applied to Bosnia operations.• Developed by Prof Nigel Howard.• Taken forward by Mike Young (DSTL).

• A little opaque and quite scary.• Needs an expert facilitator.

http://www.slideshare.net/michaeljyoung3/130823-introduction-toca06

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201012/cmselect/cmdfence/950/950vw06.htm

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Firstly, we help you understand the scenarios by structuring in important key decisions

The Dilemma Explorer program in action

Matrix Game - Keeping it Simple

• Take it in little steps.• Describe what you want to do.• Give reasons why it would work.• Allow the opposition to give reasons why not.• Assess the difficulty and the reasons why.• Come to a judgement.

• Requires an open mind…• Deceptively easy to do.

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"War with Japan had been re-enacted in the game rooms at the Naval War College by so many people and in so many different ways, that nothing that happened during the war was a surprise … absolutely nothing except the kamikaze tactics toward the end of the war; we had not visualized these."

Admiral Chester Nimitz

http://www.usnwc.edu/Research---Gaming/War-Gaming/Documents/RAGE/Gaming.aspx

Conclusion

• A Military Judgement Panel. • with only military is probably rubbish.

• We already have what we need.• The problem isn't the technology.

• Wargames and Role Play.• Better at predicting outcomes than anything else.

Major Tom Mouat MBEMSc psc ato simSO2 DS Simulation and ModellingCollege of Management and TechnologyDefence Academy of the United KingdomShrivenham, Swindon, Wiltshire, SN6 8LA

Tel: +44(0)1793 784136Mil: 96161 4136Email: tmouat.cmt@defenceacademy.mod.uk

www.da.mod.uk