What does the future of wargaming look like? and how does AI factor in?

For the last couple of weeks I ran a course at the Center for Digital Technology and Management (CDTM) looking into the intersection of wargaming and AI, with the support of the Bundeswehr Cyber Innovation Hub (thanks Jana Hermann!).

Wargaming is a method that puts decision makers in interactive environments to (1) educate and prepare them for specific, high-stakes scenarios and to (2) analyse potential courses of action and paths that can unfold from the intial scenario. Its main applications lay in military, ranging from strategy to tactics, but also in civil use cases.

We learnt from experts at the Bundeswehr University Munich about the history of wargaming and its current applications in large-scale coordination projects (thanks Christian Nitzl Eva-Maria Kern). Andrew W. Reddie taught us about the america perspective on wargaming and walked us through one of the most frequently played wargame that he is developing at his chair. Kenneth Payne briefed us on his research on competing AIs in the military context as well as on ongoing efforts to introduce AI to wargaming in research projects. Experts from HENSOLDT shed light on the tactical elements of wargaming, where it intersects with system simulations and how cybersecurity factors in as a new important dimension (Thomas Harnisch Teodora L. Michael Teutsch Lucas Kusterer). Finally, we also welcomed General (ret.) Chris Badia for some candid, fireside discussions.

Last week's hackathon was the culmination of this journey. We put Centreling teams together with expert professionals from different branches of the armed forces (George C. Marshall Center - Matthias Döring, Bundesmarine, BWI GmbH, The German Wargaming Center - Philip Schäfer) for half a day of co-development. We saw amazing ideas being spun up, spanning novel wargaming scenarios, automated analysis, and synthetic personas for high-stakes scenarios and simulations. More importantly, though, we created connections and bonds between innovative minds and representatives from the armed forces.

thanks everyone for coming out and our jurors for supporting (Philip Mayrhofer Dr. Bernhard Gold Jürgen Eckel Jana Hermann).

Exciting to see where this goes.

Originally posted on LinkedIn by Felix Doerpmund · View the original post