Unsolved murders and the investigative failures of the Nigerian police force: Security and sociopolitical implications

This article focuses on the systemic failures of the Nigerian police force to unravel the mysteries surrounding homicides in the country, along with the security, social and political implications of the ongoing trend. The article draws on documented pieces of evidence of high-profile murders, along with the causes of the upsurge in murder incidences and the inhibitive factors relating to the investigative procedures of the police. The suitability of the theory of subaltern realism and the concept of third-world security predicaments in explaining the peculiarities of Nigeria’s internal security challenges is examined, along with the problems of the legitimacy of political regimes and weak borders. There is a need for the National Assembly of Nigeria to exercise its constituted powers in reawakening and supervising investigations into dormant cases of murder through its committees on police affairs, public safety and national security. The police should check its organisational failures, which may be related to using the wrong investigative approaches, low levels of information, limited resources, corrupt practices, and pressure to obtain quick results.     

Health Insurance,Health Conditions,and Veteran Health Care Utilization

Abstract

The utilization of health care services by veterans has received much attention in recent years. However, the impact of the large array of factors affecting the veterans’ demand for health care services remains understudied. These factors include individual socio-demographic and economic characteristics, the availability of various sources of health insurance, and the prevalence of medical conditions. We use public data to analyze how veterans’ utilization of health care services varies with these factors. We also analyze how the reliance on VA services varies when alternative sources of health insurance are available to veterans. Based on the estimated relationships, we use a micro-simulation model to forecast future health care utilization, both inside and outside of VA.     

Multiple-facility loading under capacity-based economies of scope

Multiple-facility loading (MFL) involves the allocation of products among a set of finite-capacity facilities. Applications of MFL arise naturally in a variety of production scheduling environments. MFL models typically assume that capacity is consumed as a linear function of products assigned to a facility. Product similarities and differences, however, result in capacity-based economies or diseconomies of scope, and thus the effective capacity of the facility is often a (nonlinear) function of the set of tasks assigned to the facility. This article addresses the multiple-facility loading problem under capacity-based economies (and diseconomies) of scope (MFLS). We formulate MFLS as a nonlinear 0–1 mixed-integer programming problem, and we discuss some useful properties. MFLS generalizes many well-known combinatorial optimization problems, such as the capacitated facility location problem and the generalized assignment problem. We also define a tabu-search heuristic and a branch-and-bound algorithm for MFLS. The tabu-search heuristic alternates between two search phases, a regional search and a diversification search, and offers a novel approach to solution diversification. We also report computational experience with the procedures. In addition to demonstrating MFLS problem tractability, the computational results indicate that the heuristic is an effective tool for obtaining high-quality solutions to MFLS. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 44: 229–256, 1997     

From rivals to partners: AirSea Battle and the US air force–navy relationship

AirSea Battle (ASB) has generated significant publicity, controversy, and debate among scholars, analysts, commentators, and observers of US defense strategy. However, a research gap exists concerning formal analysis of the impact of the operational concept on the relationship between the US Air Force (USAF) and the US Navy (USN). The impact of the ASB operational concept on the USAF–USN relationship is examined across the issue areas of strategy, budgets, weapons procurement, and training. These four issue areas represent important areas of historical conflict and competition between the Air Force and Navy. The conclusion is that ASB is ushering in a new era of Air Force–Navy partnership that advances the inter-service dynamic from “jointness” toward integration. The emergent USAF–USN partnership therefore represents a significant development in US defense politics and defense strategy.     

Case Study Commentary and Analysis: The Moral Sword of Damocles

Case summary, by James Cook (Case Study Editor):

In the final issue of the 2015 volume of the Journal of Military Ethics, we published a case study entitled “Coining an Ethical Dilemma: The Impunity of Afghanistan’s Indigenous Security Forces”, written by Paul Lushenko. The study detailed two extra-judicial killings (EJKs) by Afghan National Police (ANP) personnel in an area stabilized and overseen by a US-led Combined Task Force (CTF). To deter further EJKs following the first incident, the CTF’s commander reported the incidents up his chain of command and used the limited tools at his disposal to influence local indigenous officials directly. Apparently, the ANP unit took no notice. In his commentary on the case study, Paul Robinson considered moral compromise in war more generally. Coalition troops in Afghanistan, for instance, have encountered not just EJKs but also sexual abuse of minors, killing of non-combatants, kidnapping, torture, and widespread corruption. What should the soldier on the ground do if indigenous personnel violate Laws of Armed Conflict (LOAC) with impunity? Refusing to serve will not right or prevent moral wrongs, while staying on to fight the good but futile fight will mire the soldier in moral compromise. “?… [S]oldiers faced with this dilemma have no good options. The systemic failings surrounding them mean that it is probable that nothing they do will help”. In a concluding note, I suggested that while an individual soldier may indeed have no good options, as Paul Robinson suggests, that soldier’s military and nation at large are obliged to do what they can. At least, they must keep to the moral high ground so as not to give indigenous security forces an excuse to misbehave, and determine the nature of crimes such as EJKs: are they outlaw acts or in fact endorsed by the indigenous culture and perhaps even government? Below Colonel Dave Barnes, himself a veteran of Operation Enduring Freedom, analyzes Paul Lushenko’s case study at “?…?the local, tactical level: If a commander is in this situation – where her unit witnesses an EJK or other war crime – what should she do?”     

Reactor-grade plutonium and nuclear weapons: ending the debate

The claim that reactor-grade plutonium cannot or will not be used to produce nuclear weapons has been used to justify non-nuclear-weapon states’ large stockpiles of plutonium that has been separated from highly radioactive spent fuel. However, by using reduced-mass plutonium cores, it is possible to manufacture reliable nuclear weapons with reactor-grade plutonium. These weapons can have the same design, size, weight, and predetonation probability as weapons using weapon-grade plutonium and would require no special cooling. The increased radiation from reactor-grade plutonium could be easily managed by shielding and operational procedures. Weapons using plutonium routinely produced by pressurized-water reactors could have a lethal area between 40 percent and 75 percent that of weapons using weapon-grade plutonium. In the past, both Sweden and Pakistan considered using reactor-grade plutonium to produce nuclear weapons, and India may be using reactor-grade plutonium in its arsenal today. Despite claims to the contrary, the United States used what was truly reactor-grade plutonium in a successful nuclear test in 1962. The capability of reactor-grade plutonium to produce highly destructive nuclear weapons leads to the conclusion that the separation of plutonium, plutonium stockpiling, and the use of plutonium-based fuels must be phased out and banned.     

Optimal interdiction policy for a flow network

This paper analyzes the problem faced by a field commander who, confronted by an enemy on N battlefields, must determine an interdiction policy for the enemy's logistics system which minimizes the amount of war material flowing through this system per unit time. The resource utilized to achieve this interdiction is subject to constraint. It can be shown that this problem is equivalent to determining the set of arcs Z* to remove subject to constraint from a directed graph G such that the resulting maximal flow is minimized. A branch and bound algorithm for the solution to this problem is described, and a numerical example is provided.     

Compromise allocation in multivariate stratified sampling: An integer solution

The problem of determining the sample sizes in various strata when several characteristics are under study is formulated as a nonlinear multistage decision problem. Dynamic programming is used to obtain an integer solution to the problem. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.