Military force structure and realignment "sharpening the edge" through Dynamic Simulation

A unique approach is developed for analyzing force structures of the armed forces of the United States. With this approach new ways of measuring combat readiness are available to ensure that the armed forces remain ready to fight during the defense drawdown of the 1990s. As part of the approach, a symbolic network representative language was developed which combines the continuous variable features of system dynamics and the discrete event features of conventional simulation techniques. This network representative language, referred to as Dynamic Simulation (DYNASIM), is built to integrate with the network SLAMSYSTEM environment. The contribution of this research is a prescribed method for the strategic analyst to develop an influence diagram which can be used to analyze force structures within the combat logistics domain. DYNASIM's format structure enables the user to focus attention on the development of the model, rather than the computational aspects of simulation.