Unfortunately, in my research, some of the claims about Van Riper basically making shit up are unable to substantiated, but there are a number things which stress credibility.
One aspect, though this is more on the journalists, that strains credibility, is the idea that the US Navy is not prepared for saturation attacks by anti-ship cruise missiles. This is the raison d'etre for the Ticonderoga CG and Arleigh Burke DDG. Because the Soviets were prepared to throw more and more capable missiles at US CBGs.
An aspect which seriously strains Van Riper's credibility is that the naval boondoggle occurred on Day 1. Millennium Challenge 2002 was a 17 day exercise involving all branches of the military, special forces, and some of the intelligence community. It is an absolute waste, especially for something which was intended (as described by General Buck Kernan) to gather useful analytic data for future simulations to call it off after the first day because the REDFOR won. That Van Riper would go to the media is curious to me. He is a Lt. General; he should know that forces get to respawn and try again in wargames. The idea that he was forced to lose because "the US military must be invincible" seems preposterous since REDFOR units and aggressor squadrons regularly maul their BLUFOR counterparts in exercises. Though I cannot ascertain why, (some have chalked it up to super butthurt), Van Riper's motives seem suspicious.
Now, while allegations of Van Riper pulling REDFOR tactics out of his ass are sadly baseless with regards to legitimate published material. However, it is not baseless to say that he used artificially gamey tactics on his own part (though these results were legitimate) in the form of, since certain units were only available for a few days in a particular location, Van Riper did things like hit those areas with persistent (3-day) chemical agents.
In conclusion, ignoring hearsay, it is difficult to find the conclusions drawn by journalists about Van Riper's tactical acumen well-considered. There is also more information that casts into doubt the honesty of Van Ripers account; more context is necessary to make an honest assessment.
Finally, fuck Malcom Gladwell - pseudoscientific hack and master of the obvious. And fuck War is Boring.
Thank you
How do wargames work? Whenever I hear about them I picture some virtual reality type shit
Wow. What an actual cool and informative analysis.
Bump for more modern war game discussion.
>>27942387
Whenever the US Government conducts domestic terrorism they stage war games as an alibi.
Most especially 9/11 but other times as well.
>>27942349
>Malcom Gladwell
>War is Boring
Can you give us the articles or specific pieces of writing that you're disputing?
>>27942441
Steel can't melt fire beams
>>27942484
Beams melt steel fire can't.
>>27942484
Gotta pay that /pol/ toll.
>>27942387
You have Part A of the US military fight Part B.
Whichever side represents non-US forces is usually handed a MASSIVE advantage (numbers, tech, intel, magic-teleporting-waterwalking-bike-messengers, or some combination thereof), and they have to attempt to defeat the side that represents US forces.
The idea is you basically give REDFOR unlimited creative license and a massive upper hand, and tell BLUFOR to stop them.
This makes commanders of both sides think outside the box, trains troops to fight against overwhelming odds with an actual hope of winning, and of course how to defend against oddball attacks.
That being said, the results (good or bad) are usually taken WILDLY out of context.
>hurr the Chinese can overwhelm a CBG with Silkworm missiles! Never mind that the parameters of that particular wargame gave the Chinese forces magical floating launchers that could fit on a single 2x4 floating through the ocean and were completely unmanned, 100x as many Silkworm missiles as the entire Chinese military possesses, magical teleporting bike-messengers that can totally walk on water so REDFOR could circumvent 100% of the US' massive lockdown on communications capability, and magically all the Aegis destroyers were completely incapable of detecting missiles they've been historically able to detect for the last decade with near-100% efficiency!
>>27942461
Malcom Gladwell's book "Blink," where I would also argue that the Van Riper example defeats his central thesis.
War is Boring editors like the scenario
https://medium.com/war-is-boring/the-u-s-navy-s-big-mistake-building-tons-of-supercarriers-79cb42029b8#.dwb9pbk2s
Some articles
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2002/sep/06/usa.iraq
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/war_stories/2003/03/wargamed.html
Some of what I make reference to, when I talk about unsubstantiated stuff that makes Van Riper look bad are allegations that his attack was conducted by an imaginary fleet of 5000 pound speedboats carrying 5000ln Styxes and that "motorcycle messengers" were really just Van Riper using BLUFOR comms channels.
I draw mostly on the briefing beforehand
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/news/2002/07/mil-020718-dod02.htm
And Gen. Kernan explaining the results and addressing some specific points raised by the journalism
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/news/2002/09/mil-020917-dod01b.htm
>>27942605
But where do they actually fight? Is it just a pretend thing?
