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Non-Lethal Weapons Employment in VBSS

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Non-Lethal Weapons Employment in VBSS UNCLASSIFIED, UNLIMITED DISTRIBUTION Employment of Non-Lethal Capabilities for Visit, Board, Search, and Seizure Operations: Naval Postgraduate School Wargame Dr. P. Dobias1, Dr. J. Appleget2, Mr. F. Cameron2, Lt Cdr A. Tahir2, LT F. Sen2, LTJG S. Unlu2, and LTJG M. Gencay2 1Defence Research and Development Canada DRDC CORA, 101 Colonel By Drive, Ottawa, ON, CANADA [email protected] 2Naval Postgraduate School 1 University Circle, Monterey, CA, USA ABSTRACT Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) in Monterey, California offered to develop a wargame for the Maritime Command Pacific (MARPAC) Operational Research Team (ORT) addressing Maritime Interdiction Operations, in particular Visit, Board, Search, and Seizure (VBSS) operations. The results provide input for the work of North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Systems Analysis Study (SAS) 094 (Non-Lethal Weapons Concept Development). SAS 094 co-operates with NATO Defence Against Terrorism Non-Lethal Capabilities (DAT NLC) program on organizing a NATO Non-Lethal Technology Exercise (NNTEX) focused on evaluation of the employment of non-lethal capabilities (NLC) during VBSS operations. The wargame would provide alternative look on the problem. The students developed a table-top board game for VBSS operations. A secondary seminar wargame was conducted for the Force Protection (FP) part of the scenario rather than developing another board game. Both parts of the scenario (VBSS and FP) revealed a certain degree of scepticism toward NLC. The VBSS game provided some interesting insights into the preferences toward particular NLC; the most popular selection (and most used) was a multi-shot “Blunt trauma gun”. However, the game has also shown possible risks of trading lethal capability (e.g., a submachine gun for a blunt trauma gun). For the FP seminar wargame the participants favoured employment of rigid-hull inflatable boats (RHIB) and/or maritime helicopter to NLWs. A quick survey administered at the end revealed that the somewhat reserved attitude toward NLC might be due to a lack of exposure. Majority of participants would prefer employing some warning to outright engaging the target. This reinforces potential benefits of NLC designed to warn the approaching vessels, or disrupting their ability to navigate. This would include long-range acoustic devices (LRAD), optical warning devices, and some of the participants desired artificial wave generators. In addition, the study demonstrated the utility of turn-based table top games as analysis and planning tools. The inclusion of a certain degree of randomness, and consideration of enemy perspective provides interesting insights that would be lost if the approach were limited to the discussion of friendly courses of action. Therefore it is recommended to pursue this approach further. STO-TM-SAS-094 PAPER NBR - 1 UNCLASSIFIED, UNLIMITED DISTRIBUTION UNCLASSIFIED, UNLIMITED DISTRIBUTION EMPLOYMENT OF NLW FOR VBSS OPERATIONS: WARGAME 1. INTRODUCTION 1.1 Background Maritime Command Pacific (MARPAC) Operational Research Team (ORT) was approached by the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) in Monterey, California with an offer to develop a wargame on a topic of common interest as a part of the NPS Operational Research program. The selected problem was the Maritime Interdiction Operations, in particular Visit, Board, Search, and Seizure (VBSS) operations. This topic provides input for the work of North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Systems Analysis Study (SAS) 094 (Non-Lethal Weapons Concept Development) [1]. SAS 094 co-operates with NATO Defence Against Terrorism Non-Lethal Capabilities (DAT NLC) program on organizing a NATO Non-Lethal Technology Exercise (NNTEX) focused on evaluation of the employment of non-lethal capabilities (NLC) during VBSS operations [2]. The wargame would provide alternative perspective to the exercise. In addition, the wargame it related to the ongoing phasing in of the Advanced Naval Boarding Party (ANBP); it might serve as a training and capability assessment tool. The initial intent (and expectation) was that the students would conduct a seminar wargame akin to the land Concept Development Assessment Game done by SAS 094 in 2014 [3]. The intended scenario (Section 2.1) included components of both the VBSS operations and ship's force protection (FP) in congested areas. However, after the discussion with the students and the advisors a more attractive option was devised. The students would develop a table-top board game addressing the VBSS operations. This wargame would include a schematic drawing of the target ship, and capability cards for each lethal/non-lethal system employed (Section 2.3). In addition, there would be pre-determined probabilistic tables for the likelihood of injuries and incapacitations. The students’ analysis team would act as the boarded vessel’s crew (White/Red team) and would provide courses of action (COA) for the crew. This could be eventually replaced by probability-based action cards for the crew. The mother ship support was not considered because of time limitations. However, these could be easily added. The FP component of the scenario would be analysed using a seminar wargame approach. While there was a consideration of developing second board game, because of time constraints it was not feasible. There is a proposed outline for such a game in the Appendix. The reasoning behind separating the VBSS and FP components of the scenario was that they happened at different scales (spatial and temporal), and therefore keeping them together would make the game unnecessarily complicated. The two components could be then possibly combined, if it were desired by users. 1.2 Objectives The objectives of the wargame were twofold: • To assess costs and benefits of NLC employment during VBSS; and • To assess costs and benefits of NLC employment for force protection. Secondary objectives included development of wargaming capability that could be used to train planning procedures, and to assess potential benefits of new capabilities. 1.3 Scope Two options were gamed. The NLW-equipped boarding party (BP) was designated as a hybrid option since they retained their lethal capability (albeit somewhat reduced due to mandatory trade-offs, as will be discussed in Section 2.3); the baseline option was designated lethal. Because of time constraints, and in order to keep the game development unclassified, a simplified subset of NLC PAPER NBR - 2 STO-TM-SAS-094 UNCLASSIFIED, UNLIMITED DISTRIBUTION UNCLASSIFIED, UNLIMITED DISTRIBUTION EMPLOYMENT OF NLW FOR VBSS OPERATIONS: WARGAME was employed. All the information on NLC was obtained from open source (Internet - in particular manufacturers’ web sites). The employed NLC and their base characteristics are in Table 1. Similarly, the employed tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) were generalized; it was assumed that the initial insertion of the boarding party would be generally compliant. Table 1: Non-Lethal Capabilities NLC Type Weight Blunt trauma gun Kinetic 7 lbs / 3.2 kg Pepperball gun Kinetic 8 lbs / 3.6 kg TASER Muscular incapacitator 1 lb / 0.4 kg Rubberball grenade Kinetic 1.5 lbs / 0.7 kg Stun grenade Acoustic/optical 2.4 lbs / 1.1 kg Smoke grenade Chemical/optical 2.4 lbs / 1.1 kg Malodorant Chemical 1 lb / 0.4 kg Tear gas Chemical 2.4 lbs / 1.1 kg Pepper spray Chemical 1 lb / 0.4 kg Baton Kinetic 1 lb / 0.4 kg Handcuffs n/a 1 lb / 0.4 kg LED Incapacitator Electromagnetic/optical 1 lb / 0.4 kg The lethal option included Heckler and Koch MP5 sub-machine gun (referred to as a “machine gun” in the game) and a handgun. The single-shot probability of kill (SSPK) for the machine gun was 80%, for the handgun 60%. In addition, the lethal option included baton and handcuff since these are commonly carried by boarding teams. It was further assumed for the hybrid option that only one type of a rifle (e.g., a machine gun or a blunt- trauma gun) and one type of a handgun (i.e., a handgun or a TASER(TM)) could be used. Because the wargame considered only the NLC that could be carried by the boarding team, acoustic and optical system that could be employed by the mother ship or from the RHIB were not considered. 1.4 Targets Two target vessels were considered: container ship (assumed to be longer than 50 m), and a fishing vessel. It was assumed that in both cases that there would be 15-20 persons onboard, including crew and possibly several undeclared passengers; they would generally have a very negative attitude toward the boarding team, because they would perceive them as a disruption to their routine. In addition, the negative behaviour would be driven also by the far of having the Blue discover their contraband. Hence, while they initially comply with the Blue orders, the situation eventually escalates to an actual confrontation. STO-TM-SAS-094 PAPER NBR - 3 UNCLASSIFIED, UNLIMITED DISTRIBUTION UNCLASSIFIED, UNLIMITED DISTRIBUTION EMPLOYMENT OF NLW FOR VBSS OPERATIONS: WARGAME Figure 1: Target vessels (cargo ship - left, fishing ship -right) 1.5 Participants The game developers were acting as the White team; the boarding party was played by variety of US and non- US (e.g., Pakistan Navy) military subject matter experts (SMEs) from Navy, Army, and US Marine Corps background. For the purpose of the analysis they were denoted by their initials; Table 2 shows the participants, their background, and what type of previous experience (if any) with the VBSS operations they had. Table 2: Blue team players Participant Background Previous VBSS experience AB Navy No AD Marine Corps No AP Army No HO Marine Corps (pilot) Observed HY Navy Observed IM Navy Observed JE Marine Corps (pilot) No NA Navy Observed TA Navy Observed SH Marine Corps Boarding Team 1.6 Paper Organization The paper is organized as follows. Section 2 describes the VBSS scenario, considered weapon systems, behavioural response assumptions, and the game aids (board, cards). Section 3 contains discussion of the game conduct, observations, and results from the VBSS games.
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