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Comment by stcredzero | Hacker News Reader

JWARS was an amazing simulation system that the US defense department had in the 1990s. They could simulate entire theaters of war down to individual soldiers at 10000x speed.

The problem with good, accurate simulations in the defense department, is that higher-ups who do not like the results that come out of them will have them killed politically. This is what happened to JWARS. (This is also what happened to the war game where a 3rd rate power sank a US aircraft carrier. http://wakeupfromyourslumber.com/node/3793 )

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The troublesome thing is when unpredictable things happen far outside the boundaries of the expected battlespace.

Who would have guessed that a small band of Islamic fundamentalists would

- overstay their (legal) visas

- do some flight training

- hijack commercial aircraft to use as giant suicide bombs

In hindsight, it looks logical, but on Sept 10, 2001, who was thinking of this?

In the war game where the US carrier was sunk, no one expected one side to switch off their electronic communications and go back to motorcycle couriers.

http://wakeupfromyourslumber.com/node/3793

Tom Claney. In 1994. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debt_of_Honor

Good point, and you're absolutely right.

I'm guessing, however, this was not part of mainstream military doctrine or scenario planning.

Reminds me of what I read about pre-WWI. The German army used to stage huge tactical mock battles. The only rule was the Kaiser's side had to always win.

My understanding is that this is still generally true of all war games. Deemed bad for morale otherwise.

You should read about MC02. When the wrong side wins, they just change the rules and start over.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Challenge_2002

Well, if you keep losing your war games, you should probably keep playing until you win.

I recall reading a story where someone kept winning against the US side in a war game, and instead of changing tactics, the guys running the US side just kept adding more and more restrictions to what the opposite team was allowed to do, until they finally lost. (Wish I had a link to the story. [EDIT: jmhobbs has it, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6770236)

Huh, kind of like Ender's Game, except for the loss part.

> the US side just kept adding more and more restrictions to what the opposite team was allowed to do, until they finally lost.

I just finished watching a documentary about a German "aggressor" squadron that inherited a bunch of Mig-29s through the reunification of Germany. When they take part in exercises, they generally have lots of restrictions placed on them. (To make sure the students can "complete" a full course of scenarios.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQByetpFgKM#t=104

I would love to know more about this. Do you have any resources for me to look at? I haven't found anything good, just short mentions of JWARS and a very long video lecture of a terrible production quality

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