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Tailoring Deterrence for China in Space
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Year: 2021 Publisher: Santa Monica, Calif. RAND Corporation

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The space-based capabilities of the United States have become integral to economic prosperity, to the defense of both the United States and its allies across all domains, and to facilitating cross-domain joint military operations. The U.S. government thus views the protection of these capabilities and the deterrence of any activity that could degrade them as vital to national security. Concurrently, China regards space capabilities as both a key enabler in terrestrial conflict and a means of bolstering its overall strength, and views United States activity in space as an obstacle to these goals. Accordingly, China may be motivated to exploit any evident U.S. vulnerabilities in the space domain to further its own objectives. Deterring China in space is therefore a priority for the United States Department of Defense and its allies and partners. The authors of this report consider deterrence concepts and examine how a deterrence strategy could be tailored to recognize the unique characteristics of the space domain and the particular objectives of China in space. To accomplish this, they review literature on classical deterrence theory and identify some key features that are particularly relevant to deterrence in the space domain. They then build a foundation for tailoring deterrence for China in space by examining Beijing's goals and approach to space deterrence as stated in openly available Chinese primary-source materials and identifying the implications of these findings for the United States and its allies and partners in the Indo-Pacific.

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Book
Space Competition and the Dynamics of Conflict: Using Game Theory and Artificial Intelligence to Gain Strategic Insight
Authors: --- ---
Year: 2022 Publisher: RAND Corporation

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Competition between great national powers has often played out in space. As it becomes increasingly militarized, understanding the long-term effect of nation-state investments in space security and subsequent use of products from those investments becomes strategically important. In 2014, the RAND Corporation began to develop a game-theoretic model to assess strategic implications of U.S. and a competitor nation's investments in space capabilities. In projects since, RAND researchers have built on traditional game theory to provide a context-rich assessment of how nation-state investments may play out over a range of possible futures. Although previous research using this model explored the effect of investments on deterring horizontal escalation of a terrestrial war into outer space, the authors focus here on the dynamics of space competition. They describe strategic interaction patterns, where possible; the conditions that give rise to them; and how investments shape those conditions. In many cases, they have yet to discover correlations between conditions in the game and resulting dynamics and strategic interaction patterns. To create a context-rich assessment of space competition, they developed a complex model using sophisticated artificial intelligence (AI) methods. Although they found that this complexity adds context to their assessments of how investments may play out, it also hampered their ability to isolate the conditions that gave rise to different strategic interaction patterns. This report should be of interest to not only space policy decisionmakers but to anyone contemplating using AI models to perform exploratory research.


Book
First Mover Typology for the Space Domain: Building a Foundation for Future Analysis
Authors: --- ---
Year: 2023 Publisher: RAND Corporation

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The concept of first mover advantage (FMA) is used often by military planners without clarification about what it means to move first or what sort of advantage such a first move is expected to provide to the mover. In space, there is often a perceived offense dominance that provides a first mover advantage to an adversary. To help build an understanding of when and whether exploitation of this concept should be considered in a broader military strategy, as well as when an adversary may consider such exploitation, the authors of this report seek to provide more-explicit definitions of what these first moves are and what objectives are sought with each. Furthermore, they seek to provide an explicit definition of advantage that distinguishes between the expected outcome should a mover wait versus the expected outcome should they move first. This foundational typology is intended to be a base for further analysis. The authors' recommendations reflect the nuanced view required to determine whether engaging in a first move indeed provides an advantage.

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Building U.S. Responses to Russia's Threats to Use Nonstrategic Nuclear Weapons: A Game Theoretic Analysis of Brinkmanship
Authors: --- --- --- ---
Year: 2023 Publisher: RAND Corporation

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Russia launched its war against Ukraine in early 2022, expecting a rapid victory. Ukrainian resistance in the ensuing months not only dispelled any notion of that outcome but has raised the possibility that Ukraine might win the war. Russian President Vladimir Putin has staked everything on this invasion, and he is unlikely to accept defeat without exhausting significant resources at his disposal. This dynamic between Ukrainian momentum and Russia's desperation has raised concerns that Russia might resort to nuclear escalation to turn the tide of the war. Given this reality, U.S. policymakers and planners must consider appropriate responses. In this report, the authors attempt to identify such responses and levers using a game theory approach to the situation. They do so by first providing an overview of Russia's nuclear doctrine and capabilities, considering its discourse on nuclear escalation and declaratory policies relevant to the possible use of nonstrategic nuclear weapons (NSNWs). They then look at Russia's nuclear escalation through the lens of game theory, examining which potential levers for shifting decisionmaking and outcomes exist in the game. Finally, they assess how a particularly relevant historical example, the Kargil War, sheds light on possible U.S. responses for avoiding escalation without conceding to adversary demands.

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Book
How civil institutions build resilience : organizational practices derived from academic literature and case studies
Authors: --- --- --- --- --- et al.
ISBN: 0833095196 0833092014 9780833095190 9780833092014 Year: 2016 Publisher: RAND Corporation

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"In an effort to support U.S. Air Force space community resilience objectives, researchers conducted a review of the academic literature defining and describing resiliency in various domains, and case-study reports about how organizations build resilient missions. This report summarizes key findings from this review that have broad application to any organization seeking to enhance resilience, which includes the space community. This report presents the approaches taken by three different types of communities to develop and maintain resilient operations. The discussion presented in this report illustrates three methods for building resilience, each illustrated by the approach of one community; resilience through withstanding an adverse event (impact avoidance and robustness), resilience through adaptation and flexibility, and resilience through recovery and restoration. These approaches are broadly described in this report as: withstand, adapt, and recover. Communities seeking to develop more resilient operations can gain insight from applying the various methods described in the literature, and applying lessons derived from similar operational environments and how they addressed resilience. Recognizing that any given organization can incorporate all three of these approaches in various parts of an overall resilience plan, this report seeks to highlight organizations that will be most likely to emphasize one of these approaches over another"--Publisher's description.


Book
Increasing flexibility and agility at the National Reconnaissance Office : lessons from modular design, occupational surprise, and commercial research and development processes
Authors: --- --- --- --- --- et al.
ISBN: 0833082035 0833081020 9780833082039 9780833081025 Year: 2013 Publisher: [Place of publication not identified] Rand Corporation

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To help the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) become more flexible and agile in an increasingly uncertain world, RAND sought answers to two key questions. First, would the NRO benefit from building modular satellites? RAND researchers developed a method for evaluating whether a system is a good candidate for modularity and applied it to systems both inside and outside the NRO. The authors found that NRO space systems do not appear to be strong candidates for modularization. Second, what lessons might be drawn from how chief executive officers, military personnel, and health care professionals (among others) respond to surprise? RAND developed a framework to categorize professionals' responses to surprise and then conducted discussions with representatives from 13 different professions, including former ambassadors, chief executive officers, military personnel, and physicians. The authors observed that all interviewees used common coping strategies. The authors also found some differences in response to surprise that depend on two factors: time available to respond and the level of chaos in the environment. The report concludes with recommendations on actions that the NRO can take to improve the flexibility of its hardware and the workforce.


Book
RAPAPORT (Resilience Assessment Process and Portfolio Option Reporting Tool) : background and method
Authors: --- --- --- --- --- et al.
Year: 2016 Publisher: Santa Monica, CA : RAND Corporation,

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Resilience is the ability of a system, architecture, or organization to maintain critical capabilities during and following a threat or disruption. Assuring resilience can be a costly endeavor, and it requires innovative approaches in a financially constrained environment. Often these innovative approaches lead to modifications of non-materiel aspects of a system or organization; such aspects include emergency response planning, organizational culture or structure, and training. The impact of these modifications is challenging to quantify. This report is the result of a project that sought to identify non-materiel solutions for improving the resilience of the U.S. space enterprise and to develop an analytical approach for evaluating the impacts of the potential improvements. The authors conducted a review of industry methods for evaluating the materiel elements of space resilience and used concepts from those methods to develop a process for evaluating the non-materiel resilience of a system. The process and the tool they developed for performing resilience calculations and presenting the results -- Resilience Assessment Process and Portfolio Option Reporting Tool, or RAPAPORT (available at www.rand.org/t/TL184)-- have broad applications to any organization seeking to enhance resilience"--Publisher's description


Book
Leveraging Commercial Space Services: Opportunities and Risks for the Department of the Air Force

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The expanding global commercial space industry offers new opportunities — such as technological advances in small satellites, lower launch costs, and innovative satellite applications — that could help the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) meet its mission requirements more efficiently and give it access to a broader innovation pool. The Department of the Air Force (DAF), particularly the U.S. Space Force (USSF), is increasing its partnership activities with the commercial space industry to take advantage of these opportunities. As the DAF makes investment decisions to leverage commercial space capabilities, it needs a better understanding of opportunities, risks, and challenges it might encounter. To help the DAF evaluate these potential benefits and risks, RAND researchers examined two space-related markets that together represent the widest variation in market and firm maturity: the commercial space-based positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT) market (an emerging market) and the commercial satellite communications (SATCOM) market (an established market). This variation between the two markets is useful for identifying distinct and cross-cutting themes that could be generalized to other commercial space markets not analyzed in this research. In this report, the researchers describe their analysis and provide findings and recommendations for the DAF.

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Book
Enhancing space resilience through non-materiel means
Authors: --- --- --- --- --- et al.
ISBN: 0833095153 0833093134 9780833093134 Year: 2016 Publisher: Santa Monica, Ca : Rand Corporation,

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"Space is now a congested, contested, and competitive environment. Space systems must become more resilient to potential adversary actions and system failures, but changes to space systems are costly. To provide a complete look at resilience and possibly realize some benefit at lower cost, the Air Force asked RAND to identify non-materiel means--doctrine, organization, training, leadership and education, personnel, facilities, and policy--to enhance space resilience over the near and far terms. The authors developed implementation options to improve resilience based on a notional space protection operational concept: enhancing the capability of space operators to respond, in a timely and effective manner, to adversary counterspace actions. Operators need actionable information, appropriate organization and tactics, and dynamic command and control, supported by appropriate tools and decision aids, relevant training and exercises, and qualified personnel brought into the career field. The authors also recommend that Air Force Space Command develop a formal, end-to-end, space protection concept of operations (CONOPS) that captures all elements needed to improve resilience. In addition, the CONOPS could potentially follow the tenet of centralized control and decentralized execution in certain situations, such as when responding to adversary counterspace actions. For the near-term options, the rough order of magnitude (ROM) nonrecurring engineering (NRE) cost of implementation is estimated to be between $2.5 million and $3.6 million. For the far-term options, the ROM NRE cost is estimated to be between $109 million and $166 million, with the ROM recurring cost between $4 million and $5.4 million per year"--Publisher's description.

Keywords

Astronautics, Military --- Space security --- Organizational resilience --- Air Forces --- Military & Naval Science --- Law, Politics & Government --- History --- Resilience of organizations --- Outer space security --- Security of outer space --- Astronautics, Naval --- Military astronautics --- Naval astronautics --- Organizational change --- Security, International --- Space control (Military science) --- United States. --- Operational readiness. --- 2000-2099 --- AF (Air force) --- Air Force (U.S.) --- U.S.A.F. (Air force) --- United States Air Force --- US Air Force --- USAF (Air force) --- AB --- ABSh --- Ameerika Ühendriigid --- America (Republic) --- Amerika Birlăshmish Shtatlary --- Amerika Birlăşmi Ştatları --- Amerika Birlăşmiş Ştatları --- Amerika ka Kelenyalen Jamanaw --- Amerika Qūrama Shtattary --- Amerika Qŭshma Shtatlari --- Amerika Qushma Shtattary --- Amerika (Republic) --- Amerikai Egyesült Államok --- Amerikanʹ Veĭtʹsėndi͡avks Shtattn --- Amerikări Pĕrleshu̇llĕ Shtatsem --- Amerikas Forenede Stater --- Amerikayi Miatsʻyal Nahangner --- Ameriketako Estatu Batuak --- Amirika Carékat --- AQSh --- Ar. ha-B. --- Arhab --- Artsot ha-Berit --- Artzois Ha'bris --- Bí-kok --- Ē.P.A. --- EE.UU. --- Egyesült Államok --- ĒPA --- Estados Unidos --- Estados Unidos da América do Norte --- Estados Unidos de América --- Estaos Xuníos --- Estaos Xuníos d'América --- Estatos Unitos --- Estatos Unitos d'America --- Estats Units d'Amèrica --- Ètats-Unis d'Amèrica --- États-Unis d'Amérique --- Fareyniḳṭe Shṭaṭn --- Feriene Steaten --- Feriene Steaten fan Amearika --- Forente stater --- FS --- Hēnomenai Politeiai Amerikēs --- Hēnōmenes Politeies tēs Amerikēs --- Hiwsisayin Amerikayi Miatsʻeal Tērutʻiwnkʻ --- Istadus Unidus --- Jungtinės Amerikos valstybės --- Mei guo --- Mei-kuo --- Meiguo --- Mî-koet --- Miatsʻyal Nahangner --- Miguk --- Na Stàitean Aonaichte --- NSA --- S.U.A. --- SAD --- Saharat ʻAmērik --- SASht --- Severo-Amerikanskie Shtaty --- Severo-Amerikanskie Soedinennye Shtaty --- Si͡evero-Amerikanskīe Soedinennye Shtaty --- Sjedinjene Američke Države --- Soedinennye Shtaty Ameriki --- Soedinennye Shtaty Severnoĭ Ameriki --- Soedinennye Shtaty Si͡evernoĭ Ameriki --- Spojené obce severoamerick --- Spojené staty americk --- SShA --- Stadoù-Unanet Amerika --- Stáit Aontaithe Mheirice --- Stany Zjednoczone --- Stati Uniti --- Stati Uniti d'America --- Stâts Unîts --- Stâts Unîts di Americhe --- Steatyn Unnaneysit --- Steatyn Unnaneysit America --- SUA --- Sŭedineni amerikanski shtati --- Sŭedinenite shtati --- Tetã peteĩ reko Amérikagua --- U.S. --- U.S.A. --- United States of America --- Unol Daleithiau --- Unol Daleithiau America --- Unuiĝintaj Ŝtatoj de Ameriko --- US --- USA --- Usono --- Vaeinigte Staatn --- Vaeinigte Staatn vo Amerika --- Vereinigte Staaten --- Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika --- Verenigde State van Amerika --- Verenigde Staten --- VS --- VSA --- Wááshindoon Bikéyah Ałhidadiidzooígí --- Wilāyāt al-Muttaḥidah --- Wilāyāt al-Muttaḥidah al-Amirīkīyah --- Wilāyāt al-Muttaḥidah al-Amrīkīyah --- Yhdysvallat --- Yunaeted Stet --- Yunaeted Stet blong Amerika --- ZDA --- Združene države Amerike --- Zʹi͡ednani Derz͡havy Ameryky --- Zjadnośone staty Ameriki --- Zluchanyi͡a Shtaty Ameryki --- Zlucheni Derz͡havy --- ZSA


Book
Disrupting Deterrence: Examining the Effects of Technologies on Strategic Deterrence in the 21st Century

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The authors examined potential effects that emerging technologies could have on U.S. national security policy and identified long-term effects that these technologies might have on effectiveness and stability - two major aspects of deterrent relationships. They did this by pursuing several phases of analysis. First, the researchers selected a specific set of eight technology areas from the numerous technologies that could play a role in shaping the practice of deterrence. They then took several complementary steps to assess the problem of deterrence, competitors' views of it, and possible criteria for evaluating the effects of technologies. In parallel with these research efforts, they conducted in-depth assessments of each of the eight technology areas. Finally, they employed four discrete lines of analysis - four "lenses" - to generate possible causal relationships between the eight technology areas and deterrence outcomes. This report highlights two overarching findings of this analysis. First, collections of emerging technologies - especially in the realms of information aggression and manipulation, automation (including automated decision support systems), hypersonic systems, and unmanned systems-hold dramatic implications for both the effectiveness and stability of deterrence. Second, an emerging transition to new ways of warfare, empowered by these same emerging technologies, poses more general risks to U.S. deterrent policies than does any single technology or set of technologies. This research was completed in September 2020, before the February 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. It has not been subsequently revised.

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