Right Intention and the Ends of War

The jus ad bellum criterion of right intention (CRI) is a central guiding principle of just war theory. It asserts that a country’s resort to war is just only if that country resorts to war for the right reasons. However, there is significant confusion, and little consensus, about how to specify the CRI. We seek to clear up this confusion by evaluating several distinct ways of understanding the criterion. On one understanding, a state’s resort to war is just only if it plans to adhere to the principles of just war while achieving its just cause. We argue that the first understanding makes the CRI superfluous, because it can be subsumed under the probability of success criterion. On a second understanding, a resort to war is just only if a state’s motives, which explain its resort to war, are of the right kind. We argue that this second understanding of the CRI makes it a significant further obstacle to justifying war. However, this second understanding faces a possible infinite regress problem, which, left unresolved, leaves us without a plausible interpretation of the CRI. This constitutes a significant and novel reason for leaving the CRI out of the international law of armed conflict (LOAC).     

Rethinking Military Virtue Ethics in an Age of Unmanned Weapons

Although most styles of military ethics are hybrids that draw on multiple ethical theories, they are usually based primarily on the model of Aristotelian virtue ethics. Virtue ethics is well-suited for regulating the conduct of soldiers who have to make quick decisions on the battlefield, but its applicability to military personnel is threatened by the growing use of unmanned weapon systems. These weapons disrupt virtue ethics’ institutional and cultural basis by changing what it means to display virtue and transforming the roles soldiers perform and the nature of the military profession itself. I argue that in light of these challenges to virtue ethics, at least as it is traditionally understood within the armed forces, soldiers operating unmanned weapons require a more heavily rule-based approach to military ethics.     

坦克搭乘输送平台海上射击目标决策方法

通过粗糙集方法分析影响坦克对岸滩目标射击效果的各种因素,建立坦克搭乘输送平台海上射击的知识表达系统,将射击效果作为决策属性,将已有数据或作战经验作为条件属性,依粗糙集理论方法挖掘射击决策规则,最后约简得到一些简单的射击决策规则,为单坦克射击决策提供依据。     

Ordering and controlling the dimensions of strategy

Colin Gray’s dimensions of strategy, built upon the earlier work of Clausewitz and Howard, has theoretical, practical, and pedagogic value for the Strategic Studies community. This paper further develops the theory, arguing that the dimensions can be controlled or managed to improve strategic performance. The dimensions are divided into two categories: “internal” and “external” to the process of strategy. The paper describes the dynamic process by which the internal dimensions, which can be controlled, are used to exert influence over the external dimensions that are beyond the control of the strategist. It is argued that six dimensions hold the key to strategic success: politics and the five dimensions concerned with warfighting. This conclusion validates the Clausewitzian paradigm with its emphasis on policy and battle.     

Timing of information acquisition in a competitive environment

This article investigates the impact of timing on sellers' information acquisition strategies in a duopoly setting. Market uncertainty is captured by a representative consumer who has a private taste for the product's horizontal attribute, and both sellers can acquire this information either before (ex‐ante acquisition) or after (ex‐post acquisition) observing their own product qualities. We identify several conflicting effects of information acquisition that vary significantly in its timing and market characteristics. In the monopoly scenario, information acquisition is unambiguously beneficial and ex‐ante acquisition is the dominant option, because it helps a seller not only design the proper product but also craft better pricing strategy. By contrast, when there is competition, information acquisition eliminates the buffer role of market uncertainty and leads to the fiercest production or pricing competition, which makes the subsequent effects of acquisition detrimental, and a seller's payoff is nonmonotonic in terms of its acquisition cost. Moreover, compared with the ex‐ante information acquisition, ex‐post information acquisition normally generates higher sellers' equilibrium payoffs by postponing the timing of acquisition and maintaining product differentiation. Nonetheless, ex‐post information acquisition also provides the seller with greater acquisition incentive and occasionally makes him worse off than that in the ex‐ante scenario. Thus, in a competitive environment, having the option of information acquisition and flexibility in its timing can be both detrimental and irresistible. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 63: 3–22, 2016     

A strategic model for state compliance verification

The theory of directed graphs and noncooperative games is applied to the problem of verification of State compliance to international treaties on arms control, disarmament and nonproliferation of weapons of mass destruction. Hypothetical treaty violations are formulated in terms of illegal acquisition paths for the accumulation of clandestine weapons, weapons‐grade materials or some other military capability. The paths constitute the illegal strategies of a sovereign State in a two‐person inspection game played against a multi‐ or international Inspectorate charged with compliance verification. The effectiveness of existing or postulated verification measures is quantified in terms of the Inspectorate's expected utility at Nash equilibrium. A prototype software implementation of the methodology and a case study are presented. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 63: 260–271, 2016     

培养军校学员战斗精神的几点思考

战斗精神是军事人才必备的素质,军队院校要把培养学员战斗精神作为自己的神圣职责。军校学员战斗精神的培养主要应从以下几个方面着手,即：把政治理论教育作为培养学员战斗精神的基础环节,把军事训练作为培养学员战斗精神的主要渠道,把严格的日常管理作为促进学员战斗精神生成的主要手段;营造良好的校园环境激发学员的战斗精神。     

柔性长鳍扭波推进数学模型分析

以"尼罗河魔鬼"鱼的柔性长背鳍扭波推进模式为研究对象,通过观察活鱼的游动模式,提取影响扭波推进的运动学要素,建立了描述柔性长背鳍扭波推进时动态曲面的数学模型。研究了鳍条仰角与摆动规律对鳍面的影响。最后,用细长体理论分析并计算出推力分布。研究表明,鳍条仰角在φ=85°的情况下所形成的鳍面与垂直鳍条所形成的鳍面相比,其最大偏离值与鳍长之比为1.7%,可以用垂直于基线的鳍条制作模型;鳍条按正弦规律摆动时所形成的扭波波形鳍面与实鱼鳍面相似。     

采用终端滑模控制实现交会对接逼近段姿态跟踪

针对交会对接逼近段追踪器的姿态控制问题,采用反馈线性化理论推导了非线性姿态动力学方程的相变量模型.基于导出的姿控模型,引入模型误差和随机噪声,结合终端滑模控制理论,给出了能够在有限时间内完成姿态跟踪,并使状态跟踪误差收敛的控制律的设计方法.对具有扰动项的系统,仿真结果仍能满足交会任务对时间的要求,且姿态角跟踪误差趋于0,说明控制律对相变量系统的姿态跟踪控制具有较好的鲁棒性.     

kittel型反铁电相变的自由能

根据kittel型反铁电相变对称性的变化 ,选择轴矢量 R作为序参量是合适的。由Landau理论 ,相变温度附近的自由能F就可以写成 R幂级数展开的形式。令 F R=0 ,可得到关于序参量的方程 ,从而获得相变温度与自由能的关系