FCS and PfM
A quick geeky post about portfolio management [1] thinking. I guess this is my version of a casual Friday?
Last night on CNN’s Situation Room (transcript), we get this summary of the Future Combat System’s (FCS) non-line-of-sight cannon (NLOS-C):
In other words, given the cost constrains we face, is this the best way to spend your limited resources. Mathematically, it’s equivalent to the knapsack problem (a more light-hearted explaination). Strategically, it’s about aligning your resources with your ends. In both cases, the tricky part is defining your ends (in a decision analysis framework to support PfM, this equates to the challenge of defining your objective function).I get it that this is the best damn howitzer money can buy. But $10 million, is it worth it when look at all the other things you have to buy?
MG Charlie Cartwright replies:
In operations research speak, he means that we ought to include the percent of soldiers placed at risk in the analysis’ measure of effectiveness (MoE).Well I guess I would ask you when I only put two soldiers in harm’s way and double survivability versus five soldiers in harm’s way, that’s a pretty good option for the American public.
Jamie McIntyre:
Given the above framework, UAVs would seem to dominate NLOS-C. But now we get an additional criteria for the objective function:But the question is, are this better, cheaper technologies to hit over-the-horizon targets than a 27-ton tracked vehicle the size of a tank? Why not more unmanned attack planes. They put no one at risk and are several million dollars cheaper.
MG Cartwright:
So now organic fires are part of the objective function. Of course, this flies in face of the capabilities-based assessment philosophy that values solution-agnostic acquisitions. If one wanted to keep playing the game, he would ask what other solutions organic to the squad or platoon can deliver non-line-of-sight precision strikes.What [NLOS-C] gives them is the organic piece to that squad and platoon that’s down there in the fight.
[1] Portfolio managment (PfM) was one of those fads that hit DoD during Rumsfeld’s tenure. The movement created a string of directives, most prominently DoD 8115.01.
