Decision Support Systems - Technical Prerequisites and Military Requirements

TL;DR

This paper discusses the development and evaluation of decision support systems for military command and control, emphasizing technical prerequisites, operational requirements, and their potential impact on military operations.

Contribution

It presents a conceptual basis for military decision support systems and evaluates their influence on command and control, integrating operations research and international insights.

Findings

Derived technical and operational requirements for decision support systems.

Evaluated how these systems can enhance military command and control.

Discussed integration of simple to complex simulation models.

Abstract

Decision Support Systems in the sense of online alternative course of action (ACAO) development and analysis as well as tools for online Development of Doctrine and Tactics Techniques, and Procedures (DTTP) for support to operations make it possible to evaluate and forecast the command and control processes and the performance capabilities of the friendly and enemy forces and other decision relevant factors, support the military commander (brigade and higher) and his staff in their headquarter by increasing their ability to identify own opportunities, support all phases of the command and control process, use computer based, automatic and closed models, that can be adapted to the current situation. Objective of the paper is to present the results of studies conducted in Germany on behalf of the German Ministry of Defense with the objective to work out the conceptual basis for decision support systems and to evaluate, how this technique will influence the command and control system of the army of the federal armed forces. In addition, international works are considered as well. In this paper, technical and operational requirements are derived and described in detail that have to be met in order to support the warfighter by integrated means of applied Operations Research ranging from simple optimization algorithms to complex simulation federations comprising different systems.