U.S. Navy Fundamentals of War Gaming

by Francis J. McHugh

Overview

The classic text, U.S. Navy Fundamentals of War Gaming, provides an in-depth introduction to the basics of military gaming and offers historical insights into the development of war gaming methodologies. It covers the evolution of gaming tools such as ancient adaptations of chess and the development of Kriegspiel to teach military tactics to Prussian officers. The employment of gaming by various military powers, before and during the World Wars, is explored and culminates with the introduction of computer support and simulations in the U.S. Navy.

Also presented is a comprehensive treatment of the various forms of war gaming, from manual games to computer-assisted games; from one-sided to multi-sided games; and from free-play games to rigid-style games. McHugh addresses every aspect of gaming imaginable, including data requirements, design, execution, and analysis. Even the use of probabilistic tables to emulate stochastic processing and the use of flow diagrams for decisions are included.

McHugh was a member of the Naval War College staff when that institution became the forerunner of all U.S. military services for applying gaming technology to educate officers and to evaluate tactical situations, operations, and strategy. He traces the history of gaming at the College from Lt.William McCarty Little in the late 1800s to the employment of the NEWS (Naval Electronic Warfare Simulator) in the twentieth century.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781626364905
Publisher:	Skyhorse
Publication date:	07/01/2013
Series:	US Army Survival
Sold by:	SIMON & SCHUSTER
Format:	eBook
Pages:	256
File size:	5 MB

About the Author

Francis J. McHugh was born in Johnston, Rhode Island, in 1908. For almost fifty years, McHugh was associated with the War Gaming Department at the Naval War College, an association that was only interrupted during World War II when he served in the U.S. Army 125th Combat Engineers. He was known nationally and internationally for his lectures and writings on war gaming. He died in 2005.

Table of Contents

Chapter I Introduction to War Games 1

Simulation 1

Conflict Situation 1

War Games 2

Models 3

War Game Models 4

Other Elements 5

War Game Director or Controller 6

Control Group 6

Players 7

Spectators 7

The Purpose 8

Specific Purpose or Purposes 8

Types 10

General Purpose 10

Scope and Level 10

Number of Sides 12

Amount of Intelligence 13

Methods of Evaluation 13

Basic Simulation Techniques 16

Mixed Simulation Methods 17

Other Methods of Classification 18

The Value of War Games 19

Limitations 22

Game Theory 24

Chapter II History of War Games 27

Chess 27

Military or War Chess 27

Vogue of Military Mathematics 28

Introduction of Additional Features 28

Early War Games 30

New Methods of Evaluation 34

German War Games, 1880 to World War II 35

Japanese Use of War Games 39

Allies, World War II 40

War Games in the United States 41

Gaming at the Naval War College 56

Chapter III Rules, Procedures, and Data 69

The Conflict Situation 69

Conduct of the Game 72

Kinds of Rules 75

Amount of Detail 75

Models 76

Basic Game Cycle 76

Moves 77

Function of the Rules 81

Evolution of the Rules 81

Data 85

Umpires 88

Probability 91

Expected-Value Models 93

Stochastic Models 93

Choice of Models 94

Chapter IV Manual Games 95

Advantages 95

Limitations 97

Simulation Requirements 98

The Duel Game 101

Naval War College Board Games 102

Submarine Tactical Game 112

Hexagonal Grid Systems 115

Naval War College Chart Games 115

Command and Staff Department Manual Game 118

The School of Naval Warfare Strategic Game 120

Naval Command Course Manual Game 122

JCS Politico-Military Desk Games 123

Landing Force War Game (LFWG) 125

Tacspiel and Theaterspiel 127

Monopologs 128

Other Manual Games 129

Chapter V The NEWS and NEWS Gaming 131

History of the NEWS 131

The War Gaming Department 133

General Description of the NEWS 133

Area of Operations 137

Forces 137

Command Centers 139

Command Headquarters 143

Umpire Area 144

Communications, Control, and Equipment Rooms 149

The NEWS Damage Computer 152

System Capabilities 153

Equipment Limitations 155

Scaling Factors and Other Gimmicks 156

Manual Techniques 157

Types of NEWS Games 158

Curriculum Games 159

Fleet Games 165

Game Design and Rules 167

Rules 169

Programming 170

Participants 172

Briefings and Rehearsals 172

Critiques and Post Game Reports 173

Demonstrations 173

Chapter VI Computers and Computer Games 175

Rigid Umpiring 175

Rigid-play Games 177

Development of Computing Devices and Systems 179

Binary Representation 181

Digital Computers 185

Stored Programs 186

Developing a Program 186

Programming Languages 188

Computer Processing 188

Computer-Assisted Games 190

Computer Gaming 192

Time-Step and Event-Store Games 194

Some Advantages and Disadvantages of Computer Gaming 196

Navy War Games Program Computer Games 197

Strike Warfare Model Mark II 198

Anti-Air Warfare Systems Interaction Model 199

Sea Warfare Intermediate Model (SWIM) 199

SSBM Detection Model 200

Embarkation Planning Support Model 201

Supporting Arms Model 202

Ship-to-Shore Model 202

Sealift I 202

Barrier Submarine Computer Game 203

Appendix A Chance Devices 207

Appendix B Probability Distributions 213

Appendix C A Glossary of War Gaming Terms 223

Appendix D References 231