Measuring the "Will to Fight" in Simulation
Abstract
It is recognized by military historians and students of warfare that behavioral elements within each fighting force morale, leadership, etc. have a significant impact on battlefield outcomes. Such so-called "soft factors" can influence the battle towards victory or defeat. History is replete with examples of smaller, well-disciplined forces taking the fight to the enemy and being victorious. However, these elements of combat performance are seldom modeled explicitly in simulations at the campaign level. The Joint Warfare System (JWARS) is one of the few models that incorporate explicit behavioral soft factors that can influence battle outcome. During the Unified Vision 04 (UV04) wargame conducted by the US Joint Forces Command (JFCOM), the JWARS model was used in conjunction with a political-economic model to represent the interplay of morale and cohesion as it affected the enemy force "will to fight". Following the wargame, the Joint Experimentation Analysis Division conducted a series of examinations on the sensitivity of the JWARS model to various morale settings to further inform the analytical team as to the utility of this approach in future wargaming and modeling efforts. This paper describes the JWARS soft factors implementation and the results of that series of sensitivity experiments.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Nov 30, 2005
- Accession Number
- ADA444603
Entities
People
- Paul J. Bross
Organizations
- Lockheed Martin