Regular and irregular forces in conflict: nineteenth century insurgencies in South America

ABSTRACT

In the decades following independence from Spain, ‘civil wars’ ravaged the newly established polities in South America. Former vice-regal capitals inherited a larger portion of the colonial administration and had larger economic resources and a hegemonic project they were able to have permanent and professional armed forces, capable of leading the offensive and giving battle following the European rules of military art. The central hypothesis of this work is that there is a necessary relationship between the shape of these asymmetrical conflicts, their outcome and the political territorial configuration of each country in post-revolutionary Spanish America. When permanent armies took over from local militias, the capital kept the integrity of its territories and there was a tendency towards political centralization. When this did not happen and the militias managed to find a way to defeat their centralizing enemies, the local powers had an opportunity to renegotiate their participation in the political body, and sought to maintain their independence, which was manifest in federal agreements, otherwise a process of territorial fragmentation began. More than a difference between regular and irregular forces there was one between intermittent, and permanent mobilization.     

Buy now,pay later: American military intervention and the strategic cost paradox

This paper explores the notion that US efforts to evade the political costs of war paradoxically contribute to the subsequent exacerbation of costs over time. Leaders seek to purchase political capital in the short term by limiting the costs and requirements of military operations, but in doing so cause strategic and political liabilities to mount in the long run. While identification of such behaviour is not new, insufficient attention has been devoted to explaining its causes, dynamics, and manifestations in relation to key decisions on and in war. Evidence derived from studies of recent American discretionary campaigns is analysed to advance an argument with respect to this pattern of self-defeating strategic behaviour.     

The Gravity of Arms

The aim of this paper is to investigate the determinants of international arms transfers in a gravity model framework. By distinguishing between the decision to export arms (extensive margin) and the value of the arms exported (intensive margin), while also considering its interdependence, is what differentiates this paper from previous research. A theoretically justified gravity model of trade augmented with political and security motives is estimated using a two-stage panel data approach for 104 exporting countries over the period from 1950 to 2007. In addition to the usual gravity variables related to the economic mass of the trading countries and the trade cost factors, the model is extended with political and security factors. The level of democracy in both trading partners, political differences between trading partners and voting similarity with the United States in the UN General Assembly of the countries engaged in trade are the main political factors, whereas the existence of conflicts, military pacts, and embargoes are taken as security motives. The key result indicates that both political and security motives are an important determinant of an arms trade, but their effects on the extensive margin of exports (the decision to order a transfer) differs from their effect on the intensive margin (average value of exports). Moreover, the relative importance of the factors under study has changed since 1989. In the post-cold war period, countries that are less democratic are more likely to export arms, military pacts are less relevant and embargoes play a role.     

On the roles of free play in army exercises and the Russians

The article outlines the essential role of free play elements in various types of exercises for the development of in-depth and practical military professionalism. It thereafter argues why such use of free play contradicts the military science founded Russian Way of War.     

Estimating failure time distribution and its parameters based on intermediate data from a Wiener degradation model

Instead of measuring a Wiener degradation or performance process at predetermined time points to track degradation or performance of a product for estimating its lifetime, we propose to obtain the first‐passage times of the process over certain nonfailure thresholds. Based on only these intermediate data, we obtain the uniformly minimum variance unbiased estimator and uniformly most accurate confidence interval for the mean lifetime. For estimating the lifetime distribution function, we propose a modified maximum likelihood estimator and a new estimator and prove that, by increasing the sample size of the intermediate data, these estimators and the above‐mentioned estimator of the mean lifetime can achieve the same levels of accuracy as the estimators assuming one has failure times. Thus, our method of using only intermediate data is useful for highly reliable products when their failure times are difficult to obtain. Furthermore, we show that the proposed new estimator of the lifetime distribution function is more accurate than the standard and modified maximum likelihood estimators. We also obtain approximate confidence intervals for the lifetime distribution function and its percentiles. Finally, we use light‐emitting diodes as an example to illustrate our method and demonstrate how to validate the Wiener assumption during the testing. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2008     

布尔函数的Walsh谱绝对值分布及其性质研究

提出并研究了布尔函数的Walsh谱绝对值分布.指出布尔函数Walsh谱绝对值分布在仿射变换下的不变性,计算了n(n≤5)元布尔函数的Walsh谱绝对值分布,研究了Walsh谱绝对值分布与Walsh谱支撑和Walsh谱中非零取值个数以及其他一些密码学难题的联系,最后研究了布尔函数的Walsh谱绝对值分布的大小.     

关于半鞅向量随机积分的两个结果

首先利用半鞅Girsanov定理与闭图像定理证明了:若{Xn}是带滤基的完备概率空间(Ω,F,F,P)中的一列半鞅,其中滤基F=(Ft)t≥0满足通常条件,且{Xn}在关于P的Emery拓扑空间中收敛于X,则当概率测度Q相似文献   

攻角对双三角翼旋涡特性影响的数值模拟

采用数值方法研究了双三角翼上涡流运动随攻角的变化规律.计算取层流假设,研究了攻角在5°～30°,76°/40°后掠双三角翼绕流的流场结构随攻角的变化,并对双三角翼上涡破裂现象对流场结构及气动力性能的影响进行了分析.结果表明,双三角翼上的多涡结构存在强烈的相互影响,较大的攻角会导致涡破裂在翼面上发生,严重影响了双三角翼的气动力性能.     

基于结构光的柱体工件直径测量

为实现柱状工件直径的实时快速非接触测量,利用结构光原理,对柱体直径的视觉测量方法进行了研究.详细介绍了结构光法测直径的原理和步骤,以及激光平面的标定和坐标变换求解空间二次曲线方程及特征参数的方法.实验证明该方法测量速度快,精度适中的特点,适用于大批量产品在线测量,亦适用于恶劣环境下的测量.     

一种应用于移动机器人的路径跟踪控制方法

针对移动机器人的路径跟踪复杂性问题,设计了一种易于实现的控制系统,其中的跟踪策略改进了传统的视线导航算法,使机器人光滑趋近到期望路径,控制器的设计采用基于模糊逻辑的变速度控制和角速度滑模控制,减小了角速度的抖振,并使控制具有一定的智能化特点.实验结果表明,设计的控制系统即可以保证路径跟踪的精度,同时避免了运动控制的不稳定性.