Flawed Wargames Imperil National Security
By Paul K. Van Riper
July 08, 2024
The Marine Corps’ current use of wargames is incomplete, faulty and commandeered by recent military leaders to justify their foregone decisions about how to structure the Corps.
With decades of experience supervising the conduct of wargames, as well as participating in a multitude of games, I am troubled that military leaders make critical decisions on the structure and equipping of operational forces based on games that ignored critical warfighting functions.
In an article published in the Marine Corps Times this March, writer Irene Loewenson reported that personnel who ran the Marine Corps Force Design 2030 (Force Design) wargames admit they did not test all seven Marine Corps warfighting functions, including logistics and command and control. Nonetheless, former Commandant General David Berger cited the results of these wargames as support for a fundamental overhaul of the Marine Corps.
I know of no other case where the Marine Corps made important decisions on its future force structure without fully examining the effect on all seven warfighting functions: command and control; fires; force protection; information; intelligence; logistics; and maneuver.
https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2024/07/08/flawed_wargames_imperil_national_security_1042809.html
