On studying the effect of information warfare on C2 decision making

The goal of practitioners of information warfare is always concerned with affecting the decisions made by the enemy. With a clear understanding of how the enemy makes decisions, it is easier to target the processes which are involved in making those decisions. The purpose of this thesis is to demons...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Dishong, Donald J.
Other Authors: Jones, Carl R.
Language:en_US
Published: Monterey, California. Naval Postgraduate School 2013
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/10945/30847
Description
Summary:The goal of practitioners of information warfare is always concerned with affecting the decisions made by the enemy. With a clear understanding of how the enemy makes decisions, it is easier to target the processes which are involved in making those decisions. The purpose of this thesis is to demonstrate whether information warfare, when directed at a command and control decision maker, can be administered in quantified amounts which can be used to change what would normally be a good tactical decision into a bad one. This thesis uses a software package called Tactical Tic-Tac-Toe (T4), to simulate command and control decisions being made in an information warfare environment. The three measures of effectiveness of winning battles, winning missions (aggregate battles), and increasing one's won-to-loss ratio are used to evaluate the quality of the decisions being made. Fog of War, Tactical Delay, Area Delay, and Communications Delays are combined to determine their effects on command and control under these measures of effectiveness. Clearly the data shows that delaying one's immediate opponent from grasping the tactical picture serves to greatly enhance the chances of increasing one's effectiveness. Further, delaying the enemy's understanding of 'pieces' of the strategic picture (which might not be viewed as immediately tactically important), also dramatically increases effectiveness.