STABILITY & RECONSTRUCTION OPERATIONS

The US armed services are increasingly involved with a variety of complex peacekeeping and post-conflict operations. For example, waging a successful counter-insurgency campaign requires reducing or eliminating local support for the insurgents by convincing people that it is in not in their interest to support or join an insurgency.

To perform these operations successfully, leaders must apply the full range of nonmilitary as well as military capabilities at the tactical, operational, and strategic levels. Nonmilitary activities include information operations (especially psychological operations and media affairs), humanitarian efforts (food and medicine), civil reconstruction projects (water, sewage, and electricity), and efforts to restructure civilian government institutions.

The effect of these activities can be very difficult to predict and gauge. Aptima has developed training and decision support tools to help military personnel function effectively in these new environments. We provide:

Training for effective leadership of multicultural teams
Training in the use of nonmilitary information sources in decision making
Tools for field collection of cultural data
Decision support tools for assessing urban threat levels and the effects of alternative courses of action on noncombatant attitudes and behaviors

Examples of our work:

Training for Humanitarian Assistance and Peacekeeping
Developed new methods to train Army warfighters to conduct coalition peacekeeping operations

Training for Humanitarian Assistance and Peacekeeping

Visualization of Threats in Urban Environments
Helped determine when conditions are right for emergence of sudden, nonlinear events, and the likely consequence of hypothetical actions <more>

Visualization of Threats in Urban Environments

Cultural Identity Modeling
Used agent-based model to better understand the dynamic interplay between group identity and individual attitudes and beliefs

Cultural Identity Modeling

Technology Effectiveness Eval for DARPA
Used modeling and simulation to access force multiplier effects of various technologies for ground troops conducting S&R operations

Technology Effectiveness Eval for DARPA

Army National Guard Training
Developed multi-media training to prepare Guard officers to respond to potential homeland security and natural disaster scenarios <more>

Army National Guard Training

Simulation-based Training for Medical First Responders
Worked with Massachusetts General Hospital and Beth Israel Hospital to facilitate training of civilian EMS units <more>

Simulation-based Training for Medical First Responders

Anticipatory, Culture-based Modeling
For DARPA, forecasted the likelihood of hostile activity and violent conflict by groups within nation states <more>

Anticipatory, Culture-based Modeling

Publications:

Beaubien, J. M., Shadrick, S. D., Paley, M. J., Badugu, S., Ennis, C. W., & Jacklin, S. (2007). Using deliberate practice to train military-civilian interagency coordination. Proceedings of the Interservice/Industry Training, Simulation and Education Conference (I/ITSEC). Arlington, VA: NDIA.
Shadrick, S. B., Schaefer, P. S., & Beaubien, J. M. (2007). Development and content validation of crisis response training package Red Cape: Crisis Action Planning and Execution. Research Report No. 1875. Alexandria, VA: U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral and Social Sciences.

For more information, contact:

Michael Paley
202.8422.1548 ext. 317
paley@aptima.com