The Convergence - An Army Mad Scientist Podcast

[Editor’s Note: Army Mad Scientist continues our series of blog posts and podcasts in the run up to our Game On! Wargaming & The Operational Environment Conference, co-hosted with the Georgetown University Wargaming Society, on 6-7 November 2024 — additional information on this event and the link to our registration site may be found at the end of this post (below). In today’s episode of The Convergence podcast, Army Mad Scientist welcomes back COL Arnel P. David, a frequent contributor to the Mad Scientist Laboratory and returning podcast guest, to learn how NATO is injecting new technologies into wargaming to integrate and build staff proficiency across the Alliance’s 32 member nations’ militaries — Enjoy!] [If the podcast dashboard above is not rendering correctly for you, please click here to listen to the podcast.]  COL Arnel P. David is the Director of the Strategic Initiatives Group at NATO Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE). He is a distinguished military graduate from Valley Forge Military College, completed a Master of Arts from the University of Oklahoma, a Master of Military Art and Science in the Local Dynamics of War Scholars Program at the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, and is a distinguished graduate of the Joint Advanced Warfighting School (JAWS) where he was a National Defense University Scholar and completed a Master of Science in Joint Campaign Planning and Strategy. COL David is a PhD candidate with King’s College London.  He is the cofounder of Fight Club International, a global gaming network seeking to improve the efficacy of warfighting across the spectrum of conflict and competition — find information on Fight Club‘s current online Tactical Decision Game at the end of this post. Army Mad Scientist sat down with COL David to discuss his views on wargaming in the U.S. Army and NATO, how technology is shaping its evolution, and how to push it to the forefront of Professional Military Education (PME). The following bullet points highlight key takeaways from our conversation: NATO SHAPE recently stood up a wargaming department. They are creating and prototyping games at the strategic level that can incorporate many of the 32 member countries as well as counter-terrorism games.This nascent team is just beginning to build out its wargaming capability and is looking for experts to contribute to its mission.  The aforementioned wargaming department is crowdsourcing input to help better understand “what Multi-Domain Operations(MDO) looks like.” They plan to take the information they collect and use it to construct games that will help explore the crowdsourcing prompt. Additionally, the best ideas will be evaluated and briefed out to Senior U.S. Army and NATO leaders.  A mixed-method approach to wargaming is best. The wargame itself is not the end state; rather, the post-game analysis and the lessons learned from multiple iterations is what is important. For wargames that focus on the Balkans, NATO incorporated large-language models (LLMs) to create psychometric profiles on different ethnic groups in the region to help better unde...

[Editor’s Note: Army Mad Scientist continues our series of blog posts and podcasts in the run up to our Game On! Wargaming & The Operational Environment Conference, co-hosted with the Georgetown University Wargaming Society, on 6-7 November 2024 — additional information on this event and the link to our registration site may be found at the end of this post (below). In today’s episode of The Convergence podcast, Army Mad Scientist interviewed Sebastian Bae, Senior Wargame Designer at CNA, adjunct assistant professor at Georgetown University teaching graduate wargame design, and designer of the phenomenally popular Littoral Commander: Indo-Pacific — the single most cited game in the host of responses we received from our Calling All Wargamers crowdsourcing exercise last spring.  In this fascinating conversation, Mr. Bae explores how wargaming can help better prepare our Soldiers and Leaders for a complex Operational Environment — Read on!]   Sebastian Bae is a Research Scientist and Senior Game Designer at CNA’s Gaming & Integration program — working in wargaming, emerging technologies, the future of warfare, and strategy and doctrine for the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps. He is the game designer for Littoral Commander: Indo-Pacific, a commercially available, professional military educational wargame exploring peer conflict and future technologies. Sebastian also serves as an adjunct assistant professor at the Center for Security Studies at Georgetown University, where he teaches a graduate course on designing educational wargames. He has taught similar courses at the U.S. Naval Academy and the U.S. Marine Corps Command & Staff College. He is also the faculty advisor to the Georgetown University Wargaming Society, the Co-Chair of the Military Operations Research Society Wargaming Community of Practice, and a former Non-Resident Fellow at the Brute Krulak Center for Innovation and Creativity. Previously, he served six years in the Marine Corps infantry, leaving as a Sergeant. He deployed to Iraq in 2009. Army Mad Scientist sat down with Sebastian Bae to discuss his views on wargaming in the military, his thoughts on the various technology evolutions, and  how the Department of Defense can better harness this unique tool. The following bullet points highlight key takeaways from our conversation: “Wargaming is sort of like golf –it is often the refuge of the “wealthy” — the senior leaders — and it does not get lots of play at different echelons typically.” Wargaming capabilities are rarely pushed down to the lowest echelons and tactical level. They tend to be concentrated at the Combatant Command-level, creating a unique challenge as the games often only serve a specific viewpoint on any given problem. Integrating different types of wargames throughout different echelons allows Soldiers to practice decision making at all levels of their careers.This is critical because a Soldier’s decision space and perspective changes as they move from echelon to echelon. Ideally, the games should evolve as the Soldier moves up through their career path to represent the changes in their decision-making requirements.  Establishing a wargaming ecosystem consisting of both microgames and larger wargames creates an opportunity to explore topics outside of the typical kinetic, combat-centric wargames, such as Medical Services and CASEVAC, water distribution, and maintenance, that may be better suited for smaller games that can be played in 20-minutes. Additionally, a war...

[Editor’s Note: Army Mad Scientist first introduced Andrew Olson to our community of action with his insightful submission to our Calling All Wargamers crowdsourcing effort entitled Civilian Harm Mitigation and Response (CHMR) Considerations in Wargaming LSCO.  In today’s episode of The Convergence podcast, we sit down with Mr. Olson to learn more about CHMR — now a DoD priority with the implementation of DoDI 3000.17 on 21 December 2023 — and how incorporating it into the Army’s wargaming activities can help our Leaders understand how it “supports U.S. national security interests… furthering strategic objectives to achieve long-term strategic success, enhancing the effectiveness and legitimacy of military operations, and demonstrating moral leadership.”  CHMR helps ensure we retain the moral high ground when executing military operations, are more precise with our application of lethal force, and are more effective at the operational level — all essential components of achieving victory — Enjoy!] Andrew Olson is an Associate Research Analyst at CNA, specializing in wargaming. He has experience with a variety of educational and analytical approaches, with a particular interest in wargaming policy challenges, climate change wargames, and emerging technologies wargames. He has facilitated wargames for the National Academies, U.S. Marine Corps, U.S. Navy, Pew Charitable Trusts, U.S. State Department, and the Joint Staff, among others. Prior to joining CNA, Mr. Olson worked for the Department of State examining technology cooperation challenges. He has managed several print publications, including the Science and Technology section of the Georgetown Journal of International Affairs, and served as lead researcher and lab manager for a biological research lab examining the genetic foundations of empathy. Mr. Olson holds a Master of Science in foreign service from Georgetown University and Bachelor of Arts degrees in biology and political science from Westmont College in Santa Barbara, California. Army Mad Scientist sat down with Andrew Olson to discuss CHMR, its evolution within wargames, and its impact on Army planning. The following bullet points highlight key takeaways from our conversation: Civilian Harm Mitigation and Response (CHMR) is not a constraint – it is how we win. Effective CHMR is a part of how the U.S. can achieve its strategic and operational outcomes. Wargaming provides Leaders with the opportunity of exploring unfamiliar scenarios in a fail-safe environment. Future conflicts are likely to include the possibility of civilian harm – integrating CHMR into wargaming is essential in allowing our decision-makers the space to understand the full consequences of their decisions and actions.  CHMR is not a single inject to tack on at the end of a wargame – it must be a consistent approach that is incorporated into the development of commanders’ guidance, mission planning, courses of action, and targeting plans. Diffusing CHMR throughout every step of a wargame forces every player to account for civilian harm in decision-making at all levels and steps of mission planning and execution. The importance does not fall on CHMR simply being injected into every step of a wargame, but in making informed decisions towards a strategic outcome, of which C...

“I don’t think America, or the West in general, is prepared in any sort of way to fight a static war like we’re seeing over there in Ukraine.” [Editor’s Note:  One of the twelve key conditions driving the Operational Environment (OE) in the next ten years is its increased lethality.  According to the TRADOC G-2‘s recently published The Operational Environment 2024-2034: Large-Scale Combat Operations: “LSCO will be increasingly lethal due to the intersection of sensor ubiquity, battlefield automation, precision strike, and massed fires.” We’ve seen an increase in the production, employment, and success of Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) on the battlefield in recent years. These systems were integral components of the Azeri victory in the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War – specifically the Turkish Bayraktar TB2 and Israeli Harop – and are proving vital in the on-going Russo-Ukrainian war.  Indeed, during this latter conflict, the ever evolving Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS)/Counter-UAS (C-UAS) fight has led to rapid adaptations on both sides as they seek to achieve battlefield advantage.  Yet any advantage achieved is fleeting — as observed by Daniel Patt, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, “The peak efficiency of a new weapon system is only about two weeks before countermeasures emerge.” In our latest episode of Army Mad Scientist’s The Convergence podcast, we sat down with Wolfgang Hagarty to learn first-hand about the on-going war in Ukraine, its rapidly evolving UAS/C-UAS fight, and the overarching impacts of technological innovation on the changing character of warfare — Enjoy!] Wolfgang Hagarty — a United States Marine Corps veteran — joined the Ukrainian Armed Forces (UAF) in 2022 as an intelligence officer.  He took part in the UAF’s Kharkiv offensive as well as the Kherson offensive.  He became a team leader and focused primarily on the UAS/C-UAS fight as well as Electronic Warfare (EW) and counter-EW.   Army Mad Scientist sat down with Mr. Hagarty to talk about his experiences fighting in Ukraine,  his opinions on the rise of UAS, and his thoughts on the evolution of Large-Scale Combat Operations (LSCO).  The following bullet points highlight key takeaways from our conversation: First-Person View (FPV) drones have become a very cost-effective way for Ukraine to achieve precision strikes. Their ubiquity on the battlefield initially arose from Ukraine’s shortage of artillery shells.  The UAF soon realized dismounted infantry teams could find and finish Russian targets with precision strikes using fewer drones than conventional artillery firing masses of ordnance.    To counter Russian reconnaissance UAS, like the larger Orlan-10and -30, the...