Spaghetti: systems thinking and the US Army

In the mid-2000s, the United States Army was embroiled in counterinsurgency missions in Iraq and Afghanistan that required deeper understanding of local social systems. The Army turned to systems thinking and design thinking to model and understand the world, define problems, and develop approaches to strategic and operational challenges. However, the Army’s approach as expressed in publications and doctrine encourages the development of complicated, unsupported, and unfalsifiable hypotheses. The risk is that the Army will act on incorrect assumptions and develop plans that are fragile.     

一类多对二随机格斗中的最优射击策略

射击策略的选择在随机格斗中是一重要战术问题,当一方武器面临多个武器目标时,如何确定射击目标顺序的研究,显然是具有实际意义的。依据发射间隔服从负指数分布的多对一随机格斗中最优策略应满足的条件,推出求解此类多对一格斗最优策略的方法。进而研究了射击间隔服从此类分布的多对二随机格斗中处于劣势一方的射击策略选择问题,得出寻求最优射击策略的一般方法。     

非高斯码元检测的马尔可夫链蒙特卡洛算法

针对实际超低频接收机不仅受非高斯噪声的影响,还受接收机内部和外部环境中高斯噪声影响的问题,对噪声采用非高斯分布和高斯分布的混合模型建模,根据混合模型的性质,设计了一种利用马尔可夫链蒙特卡洛方法的超低频信号码元盲检测算法。盲检测算法在贝叶斯层次模型下,采用Gibbs抽样和M-H抽样更新参数,同步估计信道衰落系数和噪声模型参数,并实现对信号码元的检测。算法迭代效率快、精度高。通过与最优检测算法性能比较,盲检测算法性能优异,对超低频信号接收具有重要的现实意义。     

混合攻击机机群在空战中的最优控制策略

研究了混合攻击机机群在对由截击 -歼击机机群组成的敌国土防空系统进行突防过程中的最优控制方法 ,以攻击机的最小突防损失为战效指标 ,给出了其最优控制策略。     

高超声速飞行器发展战略研究

提出了发展高超声速武器的迫切性 ,分析了当前美、俄两种最新性能导弹PAC Ⅲ ,9M96E的气动布局及操纵控制形式 ,指出这是一种很有创意、能大幅度提高导弹作战性能的设计思想和技术途径。研究了我国在研、预研高超声速导弹对气动技术的需求。     

面向大规模集群并行I/O的用户层配置优化策略研究

近年来,大规模并行场景下的I/O性能越来越受到应用科学家的关注。影响应用I/O性能的关键因素主要有三个层次：包括应用的I/O接口实现、体系结构和文件系统组件的性能以及应用的I/O参数配置。本文从应用I/O配置优化的视角,分析了大规模集群并行I/O的配置调优空间,在此基础上,给出了一套大规模集群并行I/O性能特征测试分析方法,基于该方法,在某国产超级计算集群上开展了一系列I/O测试分析来刻画系统的I/O性能特征,进而指导并行应用程序的I/O配置优化。基于优化后的配置参数,在两类典型的并行I/O场景中,针对某类生产应用程序,8192进程下的重启动数据写操作时间下降了15%,4096核的程序作业加载时间从10分钟缩短到了5s。本文提出的I/O配置调优空间及优化方法,可以推广应用到其它同类系统平台,对于大规模集群上的用户层并行I/O配置调优具有借鉴意义。     

面向大规模集群的并行I/O用户层配置优化策略

影响应用I/O性能的关键因素主要有三个层次:包括应用的I/O接口实现、体系结构和文件系统组件的性能以及应用的I/O参数配置。从应用I/O配置优化的视角,分析了大规模集群并行I/O的配置调优空间,在此基础上,给出了一套大规模集群并行I/O性能特征测试分析方法。基于该方法,在某国产超级计算集群上开展了一系列I/O测试分析来刻画系统的I/O性能特征,进而指导并行应用程序的I/O配置优化。基于优化后的配置参数,在两类典型的并行I/O场景中,针对某类生产应用程序,8192进程下的重启动数据写操作时间下降了15%,4096核的程序作业加载时间从10 min缩短到了5 s。     

Enhancing Political Cohesion in NATO during the 1950s or: How it Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the (Tactical) Bomb

This article argues that the perceived need by NATO to nurture political cohesion within the Alliance during the 1950s resulted in the adoption of strategic concepts that were out-of-step with the military environment in which it was operating. It maintains that the Alliance acquiesced to American leadership on nuclear issues which led to the development of tactical nuclear capabilities at the expense of conventional war-fighting capabilities for the defence of the European Central Front. This resulted in a strategic concept that enhanced political cohesion but was militarily unviable.     

Flexible capacity strategy in an asymmetric oligopoly market with competition and demand uncertainty

This article studies flexible capacity strategy (FCS) under oligopoly competition with uncertain demand. Each firm utilizes either the FCS or inflexible capacity strategy (IFCS). Flexible firms can postpone their productions until observing the actual demand, whereas inflexible firms cannot. We formulate a new asymmetrical oligopoly model for the problem, and obtain capacity and production decisions of the firms at Nash equilibrium. It is interesting to verify that cross‐group competition determines the capacity allocation between the two groups of firms, while intergroup competition determines the market share within each group. Moreover, we show that the two strategies coexist among firms only when cost differentiation is medium. Counterintuitively, flexible firms benefit from increasing production cost when the inflexible competition intensity is sufficiently high. This is because of retreat of inflexible firms, flexibility effect, and the corresponding high price. We identify conditions under which FCS is superior than IFCS. We also demonstrate that flexible firms benefit from increasing demand uncertainty. However, when demand variance is not very large, flexible firms may be disadvantaged. We further investigate the effects of cross‐group and intergroup competition on individual performance of the firms. We show that as flexible competition intensity increases, inflexible firms are mainly affected by the cross‐group competition first and then by the intergroup competition, whereas flexible firms are mainly affected by the intergroup competition. Finally, we examine endogenous flexibility and identify its three drivers: cost parameters, cross‐group competition, and intergroup competition. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 64: 117–138, 2017     

Global strategic studies: a manifesto

This contribution reflects on the state of strategic studies today and the criticism it has received in recent years, as being outdated and irrelevant. The authors formulate some premises for reinvigorating this field of inquiry by widening its scope and research agenda to do more justice to the wide variety of actors, perspectives and practices observable in the enterprise of strategy in our contemporary globalised world.