Combat Assessment of Non-Lethal Fires

Military forces conduct information operations against one of the most complex, adaptive systems - the human mind. Linear thought processes, prevalent in the military, correspond to, and understand well, the linear mathematics that measure the effects of lethal fires. They do not lend themselves well to the thinking necessary for understanding the effects of non-lethal fires on the complex adaptive system of the human mind. While each of the capabilities of information operations (IO) has individual Measures of Effectiveness (MOE), the cumulative effects they achieve, once integrated and synchronized in IO, are not simply a sum of each of the capabilities' MOE. Nevertheless, these non-lethal systems, synchronized in information operations, must have predictive effects in order for commanders to employ them with confidence. Therein lies the problem; comprehensive MOE for information operations do not exist. The study of complex adaptive systems is a relatively new field of scientific study. Much of the study to date has been dedicated to developing non-linear mathematical models to measure complex adaptive systems found in nature such as ice, the human genome, and populated inner cities to name a few. The monograph determines that the military can use complexity science to predict and measure the effects of information operations in the same manner as linear mathematical models predict and measure the effects of kinetic weapons. Complexity science is a body of knowledge whose epicenter is the Santa Fe Institute in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The institute's scientists are the noted experts in the growing field of complexity. The monograph determines that the military must tap into this expert body in order to develop operationalized complexity models for use in planning, executing, and measuring the effects of information operations. It uses the historical analogy of the U.S. Air Force's efforts to establish the RAND Corporation in the 1940s to conclude that capitalizing