Artillery Simulation as a Pedagogical Tool in Military Education

Abstract

This study investigates the possibility of using computer-based simulators and war games as a part of the ballistics and artillery courses offered to officers and cadets at the Swedish Defence University. The idea is to enhance the learning process by allowing the students to experiment with physically justified exterior-ballistics models and demonstrate how artillery can be used in combat to achieve military objectives. The pedagogical effect of two types of exercises is investigated: one focusing on the physics of exterior ballistics and the other being a war game where artillery warfare can be exercised. The students are shown how different forces and moments affect the trajectory of a shell in-flight and what possibilities and limitations different artillery systems offer. In the war game, the students get to practice command and control in a tactical scenario against an intelligent opponent, an opponent in the form of another student. The main result of the study consists of a self-report survey and lessons learned by the author. The survey revealed that both the officers and the cadets thought that this type of interactive learning was a good compliment to more traditional education and that they perceived that their understanding of exterior ballistics and artillery tactics was enhanced by working in the simulator. This initial successful outcome gives reason to further explore how other learning objectives can be achieved by expanding the scenarios and focusing on other factors, such as logistics or deployment of artillery locating radar. Furthermore, the war game was limited to a fix situation, scenarios with multiple objectives several ways of completing those objectives should be considered to better reflect the complex environment encountered in ground warfare.