The Sierra Project—A Study of Limited Wars?

[Erich G. Simmers]

Hello, folks:

I was reading Austin Long's The "Other War": Lessons from Five Decades of RAND Counterinsurgency Research (PDF), and I came across reference to a study in "limited wars" in 1958:

Counterinsurgency had not entered the lexicon of defense planners at RAND in this period. he first attempt to address the problem came in 1958, with a set of war games at RAND known as Sierra (Paxson, 1958). hese war games sought to explore the possibility of limited war in Asia in light of the U.S. experience in Korea and the French war in Indochina. Sierra envisioned the fighting as semiconventional, mirroring the later stages of the French conflict in Indochina. Large enemy formations and the possible use of atomic weapons were considered and evaluated in several scenarios. (Long 5-6)

The citation references a RAND presentation noted in Long's annotated bibliography:

Paxson, Edwin W., The Sierra Project—A Study of Limited Wars: Presented to the Air Staff in Washington, B-41, 1958.
An early simulation study of limited wars. Focuses on semiconventional conflict similar to the late stages of the Viet Minh war against the French in Indochina rather than counterinsurgency. (Long 81)

I am intrigued, and I'd like to track it down. Has anyone heard of this? Was there a text that I could read? Are there any documents that are publicly available?

Thanks!