The article entitled, “When War Games Meet Video Games,” revealed the new tools of the military. The US Joint Forces Command (JFComm), a division of the Department of Defense designed a combat simulation game called Urban Resolve. The game that enables military leaders to prepare for battles and improve their defenses. This game allows 30 people to play at one time. “These players consist mainly of retired military leaders and contractors who consult for the Department of Defense.” The game “pits two opposing teams of soldiers against one another in a fight for control over a city under siege and its capable of modeling a behavior of the nearly one million entities-the soldiers, civilians, cars, tanks, and so on- that might exist in such a conflict.” The simulation focuses intensely on the military movements that it skimps on graphics. The graphics make it look like a video game from a previous generation but that does not have any bearing on the main purpose of the game. The scenarios are realistic and encourage players to think critically about how to act in situations that develop within the game. “For instance, military leaders could use Urban Resolve to predict what would happen if they destroyed the electricity source in a particular city. Such a tactic might have the desired effect of preventing the rebels from communication with one another. Or it could backfire and harm hundreds or thousands of civilians-something the military would like to minimize.”
“The tests focus mainly on helping military leaders determine which types of sensors-CIA agents, spy planes, listening devices and so on- are best for tracking enemy forces that are hiding in a modern city. These future testing phases, scheduled for 2005 and 2006, will focus on confining the enemy forces in a part of the city, and on directly battling the enemy, respectively.”
Because of Urban Resolve, the military has become increasingly better at doing their jobs.” This tool could on day give the United States military the upper hand in urban conflicts akin to the ones currently taking place in Iraq.” Realism is not the only reason military leaders like the simulator. It also gives them a chance to peek into the future by introducing weapons and tools that do not yet exist into their battle scenarios.
Urban Resolve is versatile. “The soldiers and the buildings in the system could be replaced with almost any characters in any scene. This could help law enforcement agencies determine the best possible ways to deal with crowds. For the police in the United Kingdom might use it to anticipate the sort of behavior to expect from fans after a particularly tense soccer match.
This reveals that Urban Resolve is a good tool that could benefit the defense of our country. It could one day give the United States military the upper hand in urban conflicts akin to the one’s currently taking place in Iraq. It allows us to optimize the way our military is used so we do not have to destroy our young men and increase the number of lives that are saved.
