Landmarks in defense literature

Achtung-Panzer! By Major General Heinz Guderian, Translated by Christopher Duffy with Introduction and Notes by Paul Harris. (Arms & Armour Press £16.99. ISBN 1-85409-138-7, 220 pages)     

A multiserver queue with markovian arrivals and group services with thresholds

We consider a multiserver queueing system in which arrivals are governed by a Markovian arrival process. The system is attended by K identical exponential servers. Under a dynamic probabilistic service rule which depends on two threshold parameters, this model is studied as a Markov process. The steady-state probability vector is shown to be of (modified) matrix-geometric type. Efficient algorithmic procedures for the computation of the steady-state probability vector and some key performance measures of the system are developed. Some numerical examples are discussed. © 1993 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

A finite capacity GI/PH/1 queue with group services

We consider a finite-capacity single-server queue in which arrivals occur one at a time, according to a renewal process. The successive service times are mutually independent and have a common phase-type distribution. The customers are served in groups of size at least L, a preassigned threshold value. Explicit analytic expressions for the steady-state queue-length densities at arrivals and at arbitrary time points, and the throughput of the system are obtained. The Laplace-Stieltjes transform of the stationary waiting-time distribution of an admitted customer at points of arrivals is computed. It is shown to be of phase type when the arrival process is also of phase type. Efficient algorithmic procedures for the steady-state analysis of the model are presented. These procedures are used in arriving at an optimal value for L that minimizes the mean waiting time of an admitted customer. A conjecture on the nature of the mean waiting time is proposed.     

Optimal nonmyopic gambling strategy for the generalized Kelly criterion

We consider the optimal wagers to be made by a gambler who starts with a given initial wealth. The gambler faces a sequence of two-outcome games, i.e., “win” vs. “lose,” and wishes to maximize the expected value of his terminal utility. It has been shown by Kelly, Bellman, and others that if the terminal utility is of the form log x, where x is the terminal wealth, then the optimal policy is myopic, i.e., the optimal wager is always to bet a constant fraction of the wealth provided that the probability of winning exceeds the probability of losing. In this paper we provide a critique of the simple logarithmic assumption for the utility of terminal wealth and solve the problem with a more general utility function. We show that in the general case, the optimal policy is not myopic, and we provide analytic expressions for optimal wager decisions in terms of the problem parameters. We also provide conditions under which the optimal policy reduces to the simple myopic case. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 44: 639–654, 1997     

Moral Advantage,Strategic Advantage?

This article argues that Man is a moral being and strategy inherently is a human project. It follows that strategy has to have a moral dimension. All human beings have a moral compass, acquired by social–cultural necessity. The compass has survival value. The problem is that the human race does not possess only one such compass. Since will is key to strategic performance, and because that will requires as fuel a sufficient confidence in the justice of a cause, in principle at least one belligerent's moral armament may be usefully superior to another's. One can claim with confidence that strategic advantage can be secured by some moral advantage.