Computer war games: how to estimate decisions made by C & C trainees.

Now that the Russian military is cash-strapped and can afford only a limited number of field training exercises, computer war games (CWG) are of special importance for operational training of C & C agencies and elements because they make it possible to upgrade career-area skills of officers and rehearse modern C & C methods. Estimation of decisions made in the process by members of missile forces and artillery (MF & A) C & C authorized personnel presents the hardest part of it.

Modern theory and methods of estimating the results of CWG training are numerous on the one hand and, on the other, there are no sufficiently studied and generally accepted methods and templates to estimate decisions being taken. This can be put down first of all to objective difficulties involved in formalizing the process of estimating the decisions of commanders (persons in authority): the complexity of initial operational-tactical situations; considerable uncertainty of input data; the numerous criteria used in estimating the trainees' decisions and the need for reducing the decision-making values to one generalized value. Moreover, existing methods of processing the results of CWG training are not quite adequate for dealing with uncertain input data; the many criteria used in estimating decisions made by authorized personnel of C & C agencies of MF & A during war games are either not taken into account or taken into account without due consideration. This, as a rule, reduces estimation objectivity.

In order to achieve the main objective of CWG--to train C & C authorized personnel of MF & A and pinpoint their errors--the CWG headquarters should have tools to promptly and objectively estimate the decisions taken; to estimate the quality of work by C & C agencies generally and by individual members of its authorized personnel; to estimate the performance of trainees on a stage-by-stage basis. Meeting these requirements calls for careful preparations of CWG, designing appropriate methods of estimating the performance of C & C agencies and individual members of the authorized personnel who undergo training.

Analysis of the subject shows that a set of methods for estimating decisions should include: a general method for estimating the quality of decisions made by the trainees; a method of a priori estimates of decisions made by authorized personnel of C & C elements of MF & A in the course of CWG; a method of a posteriori estimations of decisions made by authorized personnel of C & C elements of MF & A in the course of CWG. The quality of performance by individual members of the authorized personnel and functional groups can be estimated proceeding from the results of their solutions to individual problems (groups of problems) and the trainees are generally estimated based on the results of mathematical modeling of combat operations.

It follows from the foregoing that estimation of decisions and actions of the trainees in a CWG can be in the shape of sets of estimations of solutions to individual problems (groups of problems), of decisions made in planning for combat employment of MF & A and of mathematical modeling results. At the same time, the estimation of mathematical modeling (if the mathematical models used make it possible to obtain interim results) can be done at any required point in time.

Decision-making processes are distinguished by the number and volume of problems that trainees tackle in a certain sequence and connection between them. Precious few of these problems have been completely formalized at the moment (for example, the problem of calculating MF & A effective combat strength, the size of basic load of artillery ammunition and calculation of MF & A fire capabilities). Solving the remaining problems is a creative process that relies directly on the trainees' job-related standard of training and experience, for which reason they are estimated on the a priori basis.

C & C trainees think it would be appropriate to arrange the problems they solve in CWG into the groups of: planning effective engagement of the enemy by MF & A in operations (combats); planning effective engagement of the enemy by MF & A when the troops perform operational missions; planning for a march, transport movement, movement to contact and deployment of MF & A for conduct of operations; planning for change of position and maneuver of MF & A in the course of operational missions; planning for reconnaissance; planning for combat support; planning for missile strikes and artillery fire.

A posteriori estimations of decisions made by C & C authorized personnel of MF & A in CWG are based on indicators of existing mathematical models of subsystems and current indices of MF & A combat employment effectiveness in operations.

Analysis of trainees' decision-making in CWG shows that it is possible to use fuzzy description of decision-making tasks. In our opinion, it would be wise to use methods of fuzzy information processing and methods of modeling like the linguistic approach method, in estimating decisions made.

The linguistic approach to estimating decisions on combat employment of MF & A boils down to determining linguistic criteria on the basis of linguistic variables determined in advance and building a fuzzy pattern of conclusion (fuzzy relationship between the variables). In this case each solution of problems in the planning for combat employment of MF & A (each version of planning for the functioning of MF & A subsystem) is given a qualitative (linguistic) mark.

Analysis of existing modeling methods for describing the process of estimating solutions made in the process of CWG shows that the most promising method that permits the fullest account of all internal interconnections is logical-linguistic modeling.

Based on it, it is possible to estimate the quality of decisions made by trainees in CWG in general form, neglecting singularities of problems being estimated. It is necessary to use appropriate methods to specify a priori and a posteriori estimations of decisions made by the trainees.

A priori estimation of decisions made by authorized C & C personnel of MF & A of armies in CWG examines the results of MF & A combat employment decisions made by the trainees. To determine the required quality value of decisions made by the trainees use can be made of the following membership function:

[mu](v) = [min.[j[member of]J]][[[mu].sub.j](v)][G.sub.j]; [summation over (j[member of]J)][G.sub.j] = 1; [t.sub.j] [less than or equal to] [T.sub.j.sup.prob], j [member of] J,

where [mu](v) is a membership function of the current value of quality of planning for combat employment of MF & A;

[[mu].sub.j] (v) is a membership function of the current value of quality of group j of problems combat employment of MF & A;

[G.sub.j] is a coefficient of the importance of group j of problems of planning for combat employment of MF & A;

[t.sub.j] is the time it took to solve group j problems of planning for combat employment of MF & A;

[T.sub.j.sup.prob] is the time allotted to the trainees for solving group j problems of planning for combat employment of MF & A;

J is the set of groups of combat employment of MF & A problems.

The suggested method enables us to specify the process whereby to determine membership functions for every group of problems in accordance with the indices used in estimation. For example, a group of problems related to planning for effective engagement of the enemy by MF & A in an operation (combat) uses the following indices to estimate the decisions: the extent of correspondence to the need for computed weapon assets in accordance with the operational-tactical missions, sectors and areas of responsibility; degrees of redundancy of forces and fires; controllability of forces in a newly created force grouping (the extent of splitting).

The a posteriori estimation of C & C trainees of army MF & A consists in estimating (comparing) their plans of combat employment based on the results of mathematical modeling. This enhances the validity of estimation of C & C trainees by taking into account the dynamics of combat (interaction of functional subsystems of reconnaissance, command and control, effective engagement, support and enemy countermeasures).

Estimation of combat employment plans is based on decisions made at the stage of planning for the functioning of MF & A subsystems: reconnaissance, command and control, effective engagement and support. To this end, we take indicators of the selected system for input data, whereas indicators of the other subsystems are selected and normalized to match the computed units. This organization of the modeling process makes it possible a more complete estimate of the quality of decisions made by C & C trainees in planning the functioning of MF & A subsystems.

Thus, comparative estimation of decisions made by C & C authorized personnel and the drafting of recommendations for upgrading these decisions include: the assignment of problem (formulation of basic characteristics of decisions to be made of C & C trainees); planning for variants of computation experiments (determination of the operational-tactical background, operational-tactical scenarios of MF & A combat operations, forecasts of enemy combat operations); the development of an integrated information model (training team versus supporting team); determining the values of indicators essential for estimation of decisions related to variants of combat operations under consideration; analysis of values of the indicators essential for decision estimations; estimation of decisions for every team of C & C trainees; the selection of the best decision arrived at by the trainees; analysis of mistakes made by the trainees and the drafting of recommendations for upgrading their decisions.

The suggested methodological approach makes it possible to upgrade the quality (validation and speed) of estimation of decisions made in various forms of operational training of C & C agencies, such as team war games, command post exercises and during the course of solving individual problems of combat employment of MF & A in army (corps) operations.

Maj. A.N. NEKRASHENKO

Candidate of Technical Sciences