Modeling and analyzing army air assault operations via simulation

It is very important to use combat simulation in personnel training and preparing them for different war scenarios. Simulation modeling and analysis methodologies gives an opportunity to staff officers and commanders to measure the effectiveness of their plans and take necessary precautions. In a simulated environment, different combat scenarios can be tried without actually deploying the units to the combat area and getting 'losts, costs, and risks'. As one of the most complicated and decisive operations on the road to victory, 'air assault operations' are high-risk, high-payoff operations that, when properly planned and vigorously executed, allow commanders to take the initiative in combat areas. In this study, we develop a simulation system called the Air Assault Operations Simulation Model (AAOSM) that allows planners to: (1) analyze air assault operations early in the decision process and refine those models as their decision process evolves, (2) perform 'bottleneck analysis' of the preplanned operations, and (3) perform 'risk management' of the operation before conducting the real operation. AAOSM is developed by using the ARENA simulation programming language. The outputs of the model are analyzed using statistical methods. The factors that have significant effect on air assault operations are identified. The possible scenarios are also evaluated for different weather and terrain conditions and for various refueling and maintenance configurations.