Simulation and Wargaming

4An Analysis‐Centric View of Wargaming, Modeling, Simulation, and Analysis

Paul K. Davis

RAND Corporation, Santa Monica, California, USA

Background and Structure

This paper evolved from a presentation in a 2016 workshop on wargaming sponsored by the Deputy Secretary of Defense as part of an initiative to use wargaming to help foster innovation (Pournelle 2017). The presentation was to a working group charged with addressing how wargaming can support the Department of Defense (DoDo) larger analytic process. Doing so has always been a challenge. Analysis organizations often look askance at wargaming because of its lack of rigor and reproducibility. Wargamers often see themselves as doing something distinct from modeling and analysis, although acknowledging a larger cycle of research that includes analysis and experiments as discussed in the classic reference on wargaming by Perla (1990). A long awaited book by Matthew Caffrey describes important applications of wargaming over the centuries, including significant contributions to both military planning and force development (Caffrey 2019). An interesting literature also exists on recreational wargaming (e.g. Dunnigan 2003; Herman and Frost 2009).

The chapter is structured as follows.¹ Section 2 makes distinctions and defines some terms. Section 3 describes the model‐game‐model paradigm – an analysis‐centric view that is only one way to connect gaming to other analytic processes, but an important one. Section 4 describes a 2016 ...