From the Simulation & Training Journal, 25 August 2011 (by yours truly).

Preparing for an era of uncertainty
As the U.S. military leaves Afghanistan and places less emphasis on COIN operations, how will it prepare for the next unpredictable conflict?


The reduction of U.S. combat forces in Afghanistan certainly does not mark the end of the counterinsurgency (COIN) mission there. However, it does signal a need to think about how military training and simulation requirements might change in the coming decade. With U.S. and NATO forces likely to face unexpected opponents operating in unexpected ways in unfamiliar settings, simulation-based training needs to emphasize creativity and adaptability, as well as hone more conventional skills.

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Part of the answer is to shift training from its current mission-determined preoccupations with COIN to more generic, full-spectrum war-fighting skills that are likely to be useful in a variety of settings. A second requirement, however, is to also develop training and simulation assets that encourage the kind of critical thinking and flexibility that will allow military personnel to adapt quickly to a range of inherently unpredictable mission requirements.

Here, a certain paradox presents itself. While few in the military would reject the importance of critical thinking skills, military training systems are not always designed to truly encourage them. Training (including simulation-based training) is often about standardization, not original and out-of-the-box thinking. It revolves around doctrine, even though the very notion of prepackaged, doctrinally based solutions may reinforce the dysfunctional tendency to use cookie-cutter approaches in very different operational contexts. Training may suggest there are right and wrong ways of achieving a desired solution, when those on the ground may actually find themselves faced with a difficult series of “least worst” trade-offs where definitive outcomes are elusive. Post-Cold War missions often pose complex moral and political choices, where it is far from clear what the right thing to do is.

What are the implications for simulation design? A number of possible considerations can be identified, many of which stress the value of integrating uncertainty into the training process.

Training and simulation materials ought to be designed to encourage students to ask the right questions, not to impart unvarying “right answers.” Post-simulation debriefing should place at least as much emphasis on how participants decided upon a course of action (and what assumptions were embedded in this) as on the course of action itself....
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