Mystics & Statistics

A blog on quantitative historical analysis hosted by The Dupuy Institute

Walls

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Walls are all the rage now. According to various articles, Ukraine is planning on building a wall along its border with Russia. This is some 1200 miles and costs $200 million. It is not a wall, it is a actually a 2 meter (7 foot) tall fence, with a tank ditch 6 meters wide and 2-3 meters deep.

See:

http://www.rferl.org/contentinfographics/the-great-wall-of-ukraine/27573891.html

https://www.rt.com/news/258837-ukraine-fence-russian-border/

http://uatoday.tv/politics/lsquo-great-wall-of-ukraine-rsquo-russian-border-fortification-less-than-10-built-478829.html

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/10/27/the-great-wall-of-ukraine.html

(Note: The Daily Beast article may not link).

We actually did do a chapter on the effectiveness of border barriers in America’s Modern Wars (Chapter Ten: Sanctuaries, Border Barriers and Population Resettlement). In our 83 examples there were 13 in which the counterinsurgency force utilized border barriers. Thus, barriers were present in approximately 16% of our cases.

  1. Indochina War (1946-1954)
  2. Algerian War (1954-1962)
  3. Vietnam II (1961-1964)
  4. Vietnam War (1965-1973)
  5. Namibia (1966-1989)
  6. Rhodesia II (1972-1979)
  7. Polisario Rebellion (1973-1991)
  8. Cambodia (1978-1989)
  9. USSR in Afghanistan (1979-1989)
  10. Kashmir (1988 – present)
  11. Second Intifada (2000-2005)
  12. Hamas War (2006)
  13. Hezbollah War (2006)

We conducted a statistical analysis of the relationship between outcome and the presence or absence of border barriers among the 83-case MISS dataset using Fisher’s Exact Test (see below).

 

Outcome by Presence/Absence of Border Barriers
Outcome Yes No Total
Blue 2 40 42
Gray 2 9 11
Red 9 21 30
Total 13 70 83

 

When we test the hypothesis about a nonrandom relationship between insurgency outcome and the border barriers factor in the two-by-three table above using Fisher’s Exact Test, the p-value is 0.0090. The data suggest strong evidence that the two factors may be associated.

We also tested the more specific hypothesis that the odds of a Blue outcome are different in the absence vs. the presence of border barriers by ignoring the gray observations in the testing procedure. The p-value from the Fisher’s Exact Test is 0.0045 in this case, which can be considered strong evidence in support of this hypothesis.

Thus, it appears that the tests confirm that border barriers have not been significant in combating insurgencies, based on the outcome. This is not unexpected, although it could perhaps be considered counterintuitive. Overall, the insurgents won 69% of the time when there was a border barrier vice 30% of the time when there was not one. We suspect that there is another factor in play here (for example: border barriers are usually built in response to large, intractable insurgencies).

Third-Party Insurgencies

Not a whole lot of analytical work has been done on third-party insurgencies. A third-party insurgency is a conflict where an external state or trans-national organization played a major role in initiating, sustaining, bringing to victory, or otherwise supporting a rebellion or insurgency. Kind of like what is going on in Donetsk and Lugansk in Ukraine.

We did do a little work to examine if the level of outside support results in insurgent victory. It was been the perception of the number of counterinsurgent theorists that significant outside support is important for an insurgent victory. Our analysis, based upon an examination of 89 cases was that it was in fact, not a primary driver of insurgent success. To provide a table from page 79 of America’s Modern Wars:

Outcome by Type of Outside Support
Outcome Primarily Indigenous Some Considerable Not Applicable Total
Blue 11 20 9 2 42
Gray 5 6 0 0 11
Red 7 18 5 0 30
Total 23 44 14 2 83

This table compares the amount of outside support (primarily indigenous, some, and considerable) to the outcome (blue = counterinsurgent victory, red = insurgency victory, and gray = outcome is not a clear victory for either side). Outcome compared to type of outside support produced no discernable pattern. The counterinsurgents or intervening force tended to win more often then not, no matter what the degree of outside support was for the insurgency. Our statistical test indicated that there was no correlation here.

There was no correlation whether we tested to our entire dataset of 83 cases, limited the test to only those 62 cases that were clearly insurgencies (did not include the peacekeeping operations and interventions in our larger dataset), or only those 36 case that were insurgencies against outside intervening forces. If there was a consistent trend in this data, it was that insurgencies with considerable outside support lost more often than insurgencies that were primarily indigenous. This is counterintuitive, but it made of cases that include almost every major and not-so-major insurgency since World War II. But there appears to be little correlation between the degree of outside support for an insurgency and the outcome of the insurgency.

Of course, the purpose of the third-party insurgency may not be to obtain clear victory, but for lesser political purposes, including disrupting an opponent or forcing concessions from them.

Revitalizing Wargaming

In case you missed this: http://warontherocks.com/2015/12/revitalizing-wargaming-is-necessary-to-be-prepared-for-future-wars/

Three major actions are called out at the end of the article:

  1. Our first initiative, currently underway, is to establish a wargaming repository to better understand and guide existing wargaming efforts and to share derived insights across the defense enterprise.
  2. Our second initiative is to form a Defense Wargaming Alignment Group (DWAG). It is important that wargames be allowed to thrive outside of the planning, programming, budget, and execution (PPBE) process so that natural bureaucratic forces cannot subvert them.
  3. Finally, because we rely so heavily on our allies and partners in almost everything the Department of Defense does, the department will examine how to better include our close allies and partners in our wargaming efforts and how to best share results.

The article ends with the statement:

Innovation thrives in a culture that embraces experimentation and tolerates — better yet, encourages — dissent and risk-taking. We must create an environment in the Department of Defense that encourages exactly this type of thinking. Building a reinvigorated wargaming enterprise is a major step toward that goal.

Are They Channeling Trevor Dupuy?

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Continuing the RAND description of their hex boardgame:

Ground unit combat strengths were based on a systematic scoring of individual weapons, from tanks and artillery down to light machine guns, which were then aggregated according to the tables of organization and equipment for the various classes of NATO and Russian units. Overall unit scores were adjusted to account for differences in training, sustainment, and other factors not otherwise captured. Air unit combat strengths were derived from the results of offline engagement, mission, and campaign-level modeling.

This looks like some kind of firepower or combat power score, or perhaps Trevor Dupuy’s OLIs (Operational Lethality Indexes). As they say “systematic scoring” one wonders what system they used. Know of only one scoring system that is systematic (meaning the OLIs, which are based upon formulae). The subject is probably best summarized in Dr. James Taylor’s article on “Consistent Scoring of Weapons and Aggregation of Forces:” http://www.dupuyinstitute.org/pdf/v2n2.pdf. This is the same James Taylor who wrote the definitive two-volume work on Lanchester equations.

I do note with interest the adjustment for “differences in training, sustainment, and other factors.” That is always good to see.

Also noted:

Full documentation of the gaming platform will be forthcoming in a subsequent report.

Look forward to reading it.

Lanchester equations have been weighed….

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There have been a number of tests of Lanchester equations to historical data over the years. Versions of Lanchester equations were implemented in various ground combat models in the late 1960s and early 1970s without any rigorous testing. As John Stockfish of RAND stated in 1975 in his report: Models, Data, and War: A Critique of the Study of Conventional Forces:

However Lanchester is presently esteemed for his ‘combat model,’ and specifically his ‘N-square law’ of combat, which is nothing more than a mathematical formulation of the age-old military principal of force concentration. That there is no clear empirical verification of this law, or that Lanchester’s model or present versions of it may in fact be incapable of verification, have not detracted from this source of his luster.”

Since John Stockfish’s report in 1975 the tests of Lanchester have included:

(1) Janice B. Fain, “The Lanchester Equations and Historical Warfare: An Analysis of Sixty World War II Land Engagements.” Combat Data Subscription Service (HERO, Arlington, VA, Spring 1977);

(2) D. S. Hartley and R. L. Helmbold, “Validating Lanchester’s Square Law and Other Attrition Models,” in Warfare Modeling, J. Bracken, M. Kress, and R. E. Rosenthal, ed., (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1995) and originally published in 1993;

(3) Jerome Bracken, “Lanchester Models of the Ardennes Campaign in Warfare Modeling (John Wiley & sons, Danvers, MA, 1995);

(4) R. D. Fricker, “Attrition Models of the Ardennes Campaign,” Naval Research Logistics, vol. 45, no. 1, January 1997;

(5) S. C. Clemens, “The Application of Lanchester Models to the Battle of Kursk” (unpublished manuscript, May 1997);

(6) 1LT Turker Turkes, Turkish Army, “Fitting Lanchester and Other Equations to the Battle of Kursk Data,” Dissertation for MS in Operations Research, March 2000;

(7) Captain John Dinges, U.S. Army, “Exploring the Validation of Lanchester Equations for the Battle of Kursk,” MS in Operations Research, June 2001;

(8) Tom Lucas and Turker Turkes, “Fitting Lanchester Equations to the Battles of Kursk and Ardennes,” Naval Research Logistics, 51, February 2004, pp. 95-116;

(9) Thomas W. Lucas and John A. Dinges, “The Effect of Battle Circumstances on Fitting Lanchester Equations to the Battle of Kursk,” forthcoming in Military Operations Research.

In all cases, it was from different data sets developed by us, with eight of the tests conducted completely independently of us and without our knowledge.

In all cases, they could not establish a Lanchester square law and really could not establish the Lanchester linear law. That is nine separate and independent tests in a row with basically no result. Furthermore, there has never been a test to historical data (meaning real-world combat data) that establishes Lanchester does apply to ground combat. This is added to the fact that Lanchester himself did not think it should. It does not get any clearer than that.

As Morse & Kimball stated in 1951 in Methods of Operations Research

Occasionally, however, it is useful to insert these constants into differential equations, to see what would happen in the long run if conditions were to remain the same, as far as the constants go. These differential equations, in order to be soluble, will have to represent extremely simplified forms of warfare; and therefore their range of applicability will be small.

And later they state:

Indeed an important problem in operations research for any type of warfare is the investigation, both theoretical and statistical, as to how nearly Lanchester’s laws apply.

I think this has now been done for land warfare, at last. Therefore, I conclude: Lanchester equations have been weighed, they have been measured, and they have been found wanting.

Really…..Lanchester?

RAND described the combat system from their hex boardgame as such:

The general game design was similar to that of traditional board wargames, with a hex grid governing movement superimposed on a map. Tactical Pilotage Charts (1:500,000 scale) were used, overlaid with 10-km hexes, as seen in Figure A.1. Land forces were represented at the battalion level and air units as squadrons; movement and combat were governed and adjudicated using rules and combat-result tables that incorporated both traditional gaming principles (e.g., Lanchester exchange rates) and the results of offline modeling….”

Now this catches my attention. Switching from a “series of tubes” to a hexagon boardgame brings back memories, but it is understandable. On the other hand, it is pretty widely known that no one has been able to make Lanchester equations work when tested to historical ground combat. There have been multiple efforts conducted to test this, mostly using the Ardennes and Kursk databases that we developed. In particular, Jerome Braken published his results in Modeling Warfare and Dr. Thomas Lucas out at Naval Post-Graduate School has conducted multiple tests to try to do the same thing. They all point to the same conclusion, which is that Lanchester equations do not really work for ground combat. They might work for air, but it is hard to tell from the RAND write-up whether they restricted the use of “Lanchester exchange rates” to only air combat. I could make the point by referencing many of these studies but this would be a long post. The issue is briefly discussed in Chapter Eighteen of my upcoming book War by Numbers and is discussed in depth in the TDI report “Casualty Estimation Methodologies Study.” Instead I will leave it to Frederick Lanchester himself, writing in 1914, to summarize the problem:

We have already seen that the N-square law applies broadly, if imperfectly, to military operations. On land, however, there sometimes exist special conditions and a multitude of factors extraneous to the hypothesis, whereby its operations may be suspended or masked.

 

 

Series of Tubes

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RAND has published a report on its analysis of “NATO’s Eastern Flank” (meaning the three Baltic states). The PDF can be obtained here: http://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR1253.html  Of particular interest to us is Appendix A: Methodology and Data (page 12).

RAND is using a hex board game with counters that appears to have strength and movement factors on them. This is Tactics II…Avalon Hill…..SPI. RAND does have their own combat model, JICM (Joint Integrated Contingency Model), so why are they using a hex board game? According to their article:

RAND developed this map-based tabletop exercise because existing models were ill-suited to represent the many unknowns and uncertainties surrounding a conventional military campaign in the Baltics, where low force-to-space ratios and relatively open terrain meant that maneuver between dispersed forces—rather than pushing and shoving between opposing units arrayed along a linear front—would likely be the dominant mode of combat.

The problem is that JICM does movement down to having a series of “places” that are connected by “links.“ These links are tubes of variable width, connecting between each “place”. So for example, there might be a tube between St. Petersburg and Talinin. All combat would occur up and down this tube, but there could be no real movement out of the tube. This is a limited and somewhat inflexible movement system that has been used in a few other models (SOTACA comes to mind).

Now, I gather RAND has the whole map of the world set up for JICM as a “series of tubes.” According a 1995 report, there were nearly 1000 “places” and 2000 “links” for the entire world. This does not give a lot of fidelity, as the map of Korea shows at the top of the post. I suspect the fidelity is such that there are few tubes in an area as small as Estonia.

Estonia is small. It is 17,505 square miles. This is smaller than West Virginia (24,038 sq. miles), and it is a lot flatter. But, somehow, they have managed to maintain an independent language of over a million speakers (1.2 million actually). This language has managed to survive for over a thousand years! I am always impressed by that. Their capital is only about 100 miles from several points along the Russian border. This is about the distance between Washington DC and Richmond. Now granted, it took several years to cover that distance during the American Civil War, but there was a significant Confederate Army in the path. Therefore, to examine scenarios, I suspect they needed a map of considerably more fidelity than JICM and its “series of tubes.”

Other Oil Producers

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The graphic is pulled from an article on Russia and Saudi Arabia agreeing to hold production at current levels. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-02-16/saudi-arabia-and-russia-agree-oil-output-freeze-in-qatar-talks

Holding production at current levels, of course, does not cause the price of oil to go up, but may limit the amount it will decline. Added to that, Iran is still increasing production and Iraq might if it could ever regain control of Mosul and surrounding areas. There is still considerable pressure to further reduce the price of oil.

I am no expert on the oil market, so I will leave making more precise incorrect predictions to those experts. But I gather the price of oil will not be climbing stratospherically upwards for the next year or two. This puts significant economic, budgetary, and of course, political pressure on a number of major oil producers. Russia is not alone in this regard.

Our focus has been on Russia, but there are a number of other countries clearly being impacted by the long-term decline in oil prices. The countries on that list that get my attention are:

  1. Saudi Arabia
  2. Iraq
  3. Iran
  4. Venezuela
  5. Nigeria
  6. Algeria
  7. Bahrain (which is not on that list)

Pay Cut

Latest estimates for ISIL strength: Pay cut

A few things that caught my attention:

“U.S. intelligence estimates of the number of Islamic State fighters, which for the first 17 months of coalition operations ranged from 19,000 to 31,000, had been revised to 20,000 to 25,000 – a level he said the group would struggle to maintain.”

“”They have been able to replenish their forces at roughly the same rate as we’ve been able to kill their forces. That’s hard to sustain,” he said.”

It does not state, but I wonder how much of the pay cut for Jihadists is due to declining oil prices. Also, do they have health care and a retirement plan?