Intelligent Weapon Power Scores for C5ISR Combat Force

Modeling and Evaluation of Weapons Systems –

Intelligent Weapon Power Scores

One of the most complex problems is to create a mathematical model of combat between two military forces. This is further impacted by the increasing impact of changes in technology and new-age combat systems that are emerging continuously. Traditionally, weapon systems were modeled to include four key capabilities in defining a score or a number to indicate key capability of the weapon system. For example, weapon power scores described in our book Strategic Decision Making – Applying the Analytic Hierarchy Process, Springer UK, 2004. The capabilities that were considered are - lethality, self-protection, operability and integration of combat systems with other systems. However, we have seen a remarkable evolution of technical systems in the last three decades with extreme capabilities in information and information processing i.e., computing, becoming the key in the modern combat systems. We describe this trend as law of increasing intelligence of technical systems. In the light of this law, we propose that weapon systems capability needs to be evaluated and scored by including three new capabilities – that is – information processing, decision-making and system learning. This leads us to propose a new metric and methodology termed intelligent weapon power (iWPS) scores to evaluate any weapon system on a same capability plane. This concept of iWPS can be used for static force comparisons, in war simulations, war games and combat scenario evaluation for the new world.

Weapon Power Scores

There exist various techniques for force comparison taking into account quality or effectiveness of weapons besides the quantity of weapons held by opposing forces. These were commonly referred to as Fire Power Scores (FPS) methodologies. Basic idea in FPS methodologies is to assign a numerical value to different weapons indicating their war-making capability. The aggregated product of quantity and fire­power scores of various weapons in a force gives the Force Strength (FS) of the force. Various firepower score methodologies have been developed on the basis of expert judgment, historical data analysis and combat simulation. Some of these methodologies are Weapon Effectiveness Index (WEI)/Weapon Unit Value (WUV) which is based on expert   judgment, Potential Anti-Potential (PAP) Method which uses combat simulations, and Operational Lethality Index (OLI) based on historical data analysis, etc.

                Most of the FPS methodologies for so called static analyses give less importance to other factors such as self-protection capability of weapon system, ability to operate in all weather conditions and at night time, etc., We proposed augmentation of FPS with survivability of the weapon system to give a realistic picture of combat potential of a force. The new score was termed Weapon Power Score (WPS). Later in our book Weapon Power Scores were modified and extended to incorporate other factors such as on-board self-protection capability, operability and ability to communicate with other weapon systems through Command, Control, Communications, and Intelligence (C3I) links.  Expert judgement has been used for the evaluation of WPS.

The evaluation of WPS involves assigning a numerical value to each weapon system of Armed Forces of Adversaries indicating its combat effectiveness. The methodology to evaluate WPS of various weapon systems is given  below. WPS is defined as

WPS = Operational Lethality Index (OLI) ´  (1+Self Protection Index (SPI)) ´

            (1+ Operability Index (OI)) ´ (1+Integration Index (II))                                     (1)          

               

Lethality of a weapon is expressed as Operational Lethality Index (OLI). In this method, empirical formulae are provided for determining these indices. The method divides all weapon systems into two broad categories, namely mobile fighting machines and non-mobile fighting machines.  For non-mobile weapons the OLI is defined as a function of various factors such as Rate of Fire, Number of Potential Targets per Strike, Range Factor, etc. For mobile fighting machines, the OLI is calculated by adding the separately calculated OLIs of all of the weapons on the mobile fighting  machine and  multiplying this result by several performance factors. The methodology  is valid only for land warfare with close air support for army operations.

Besides lethality, it is observed that other factors such as on-board self-protection, operability and capability to get integrated with C3I system also plays important roles in weapon effectiveness. Weapon capability is enhanced if the weapon has characteristics that improve their  ability to survive in the battle. The characteristics may include on-board radars, decoys/chaff, Electronic Counter Measures (ECM), Electronic Support Measures (ESM),  armour protection etc. There are certain on-board systems that enhance the self-protection capability of the weapon system. This is reflected in the Self-Protection Index (SPI). The SPI  takes value in the range (0,1), is added to 1 and the result  is multiplied with OLI. The multiplication indicates that the lethality of the weapon system is considered to be contributing to effectiveness and the extent to which the weapon system has on-board self-protection capabilities improves its effectiveness. The value of SPI for various weapon systems also takes into account the environment in which the weapon system will be operating. Thus, for example, SPI for infantry weapons is considered as 0.85 as it has been observed the infantry casualties in a battle are usually 10% to 15%.  The effectiveness of a weapon system also depends upon its ability to operate in adverse weather/environment conditions and night-time operations. This is reflected in the Operability Index (OI) of the weapon system.  The OI indicates the ability of the weapon system to operate in adverse weather and night-time operations. The value of OI is chosen from the interval (0,1), added to 1 and is multiplied to the product of  OLI and (1+ SPI) indicating the fact that a weapon which can operate only under ideal conditions will have effectiveness as OLI ´ (1+ SPI) (i.e., OI = 0). However, if the weapon can operate in extreme conditions as well then its effectiveness  is enhanced i.e., OI > 0 indicating the flexibility of the weapon system. Another factor enhancing effectiveness of weapon system is their ability to get integrated in the C3I system. This factor depends upon the communication links of the weapon system with various Surveillance systems and Command and Control systems. This is represented as the Integration Index (II) of the weapon system. The value of II is also chosen from the interval   (0,1).

 
For the new network centric combat force - the so called C5ISR force (Command Control Communication Computers Combat Intelligence Surveillance and Reconnaissance) force we propose the Intelligent Weapon Power Score (iWPS) which augments the WPS with three more capability assessment - information processing, decision making and learning and foresight. The new iWPS is a function of 7 capabilities

This is as per the law of increasing intelligence of technical systems (Reference] , the combat systems are embedded with more and more intelligence to become increasingly capable, agile, autonomous and collectively synergistic.  In the new network-centric warfare scenarios, the weapon power will have three more capabilities – information processing, decision-making and learning. The intelligent weapon power score (iwps) needs to model these three new capabilities along with the four key capabilities of the weapon power scores. 

Will post more details once the paper is published ....