The role of modeling and simulation in sizing military networks

The world is entering an age where knowledge, technology, and economic wealth often coalesce to form information power bases. In fact, information is becoming a new center of gravity-a strategic asset, inviting attack and requiring protection. In the past, warfare has been described in four operational environments: air, land, sea, and space. Now, information is recognized as the fifth operational environment, and information dominance across the spectrum of conflict is crucial to military success. The conflicts in Southwest Asia, Somalia, Bosnia and Haiti have shown that information technology has significantly altered traditional concepts for military operations. That same technology is improving our situational awareness on a global scale and augmenting our ability to generate military options before crises erupt. Once military force becomes necessary, information technology provides numerous options for prosecuting the conflict. In recognition of the importance of information technology, the military has commenced an effort to define its information architectures. The purpose of having architectures is to document complex, structural artifacts associated with enterprise elements. The Army Enterprise Strategy in compliance with DoD directives define three architectures, technical, operational, and system, for the military. Architectures are developed or updated using various techniques, which is performed following a strategic plan. DoD directives mandate the use of IDEF to assist in defining various aspects of military architectures. When constructed properly, IDEFO, IDEFIX, and IDEF3 models can be complementary to software engineering paradigms such as developing information systems