Scenario: Acceptable US Casualties Against 3rd World Armies

[Aeraaa]

Originally Posted by IronDuke99

I generally try to avoid as much military jargon as possible on here myself. Not sure it makes anything much clearer either, as, just to take your example, using the USA as a base I would probably make France and Japan peer, in game terms. While the Japanese Self Defense Force lacks much recent experience, their military history suggests they would be formidable, highly disciplined, troops.

So you might have USA (including USMC of course) UK, France, Germany, Israel, Japan, Russia and China as peer nations in terms of a land battle group as of this year.

Near peer would be much of the rest of Western Europe, including Poland, Canada, Australia, South Korea, Taiwan, India, Pakistan, North Korea, assorted former Eastern bloc nations, Vietnam, Egypt, Singapore, maybe South Africa (although nothing I hear about that army, these days, would give me all that much confidence in it against a serious enemy from outside Africa) perhaps one or two of the richer South American nations.

Non peer would be just about anyone else, including assorted terrorists/guerilla groups.

Of course you could argue about exactly what nations are peer and what are near peer (for example, I think you could make a strong case for Australia and Canada being rated as peer forces) and sometimes they change over time. Then you have exceptions like New Zealand, excellent, well trained, if very small Army, but, these days, they lack Armoured and air support.

I disagree with Germany's position. IMHO this has more to do with German army's reputation rather than their current capabilities. Germany belongs to the near-peer status.

[jp10]

In considering the OP question and not addressing terminology, I have thought of this.

We know how public reaction in the US to the casualty levels in Iraq and Afghanistan was portrayed.

I just quickly grabbed these numbers to see how it related as a % of total force.

1,429,995 total US Military Strength (at some point)

AFGHANISTAN

2,386 KIA in Afghanistan as of October 18th, 2016
20,049 WIA

22,435 total 2.46 % of total force


IRAQ

4,424 KIA as of June 29, 2016
31,952 WIA

36,376 total 6.47 % of total force

So if you are searching for a figure to be an upper limit of unacceptable casualties (US), perhaps 2% for start of political dissent, 6% for serious dissent and 10% for collapse of government? (4% between the different levels) of total forces involved.

Not etched in stone, just a quick calculation to test the theory.

[Suhiir]

Originally Posted by jp10

So if you are searching for a figure to be an upper limit of unacceptable casualties (US), perhaps 2% for start of political dissent, 6% for serious dissent and 10% for collapse of government? (4% between the different levels) of total forces involved.

I'd look at Vietnam too.

9,087,000 military personnel served on active duty during the official Vietnam era from August 5, 1964 to May 7, 1975.
2,709,918 Americans served in uniform in Vietnam.
58,148 were killed in Vietnam.
75,000 were severely disabled.
23,214 were 100% disabled.

But there is one MAJOR factor numbers can't account for.
Public perception.
If the public totally supports (WW II), generally supports (the "War on Terror"), is kept generally ignorant (the Russia vs the Ukraine), or is generally opposed (Vietnam) to a war the "acceptable casualties" vary considerably.

[jp10]

I agree that it is a very 'sliding scale' type of approach. Historical battles could more easily be analyzed to use this method as a rough guide to determine victory/defeat levels by casualties rather than victory points.

To increase casualty effects in the game currently a creator must edit the units to increase a loss effect to be greater/less for a particular side.

It could be done easier if an option in the game could be added during battle/scenario/campaign creation to add/decrease victory point modifiers between the forces to give more/less weight to casualty points for a side or even a 'political effect' modifier to reflect external support or even world reaction to a conflict.
This could offer battles that a player could tactically win but suffer defeat or draw in a larger context. Could add three victory results? Military (or tactical)/Strategic/Political ? Decisive Military Victory/Strategic Draw/Political Minor Defeat ?

[shahadi]

Originally Posted by jp10

I agree that it is a very 'sliding scale' type of approach. Historical battles could more easily be analyzed to use this method as a rough guide to determine victory/defeat levels by casualties rather than victory points.

To increase casualty effects in the game currently a creator must edit the units to increase a loss effect to be greater/less for a particular side.

It could be done easier if an option in the game could be added during battle/scenario/campaign creation to add/decrease victory point modifiers between the forces to give more/less weight to casualty points for a side or even a 'political effect' modifier to reflect external support or even world reaction to a conflict.
This could offer battles that a player could tactically win but suffer defeat or draw in a larger context. Could add three victory results? Military (or tactical)/Strategic/Political ? Decisive Military Victory/Strategic Draw/Political Minor Defeat ?

Interesting.

[Suhiir]

Originally Posted by jp10

It could be done easier if an option in the game could be added during battle/scenario/campaign creation to add/decrease victory point modifiers between the forces to give more/less weight to casualty points for a side or even a 'political effect' modifier to reflect external support or even world reaction to a conflict.
This could offer battles that a player could tactically win but suffer defeat or draw in a larger context. Could add three victory results? Military (or tactical)/Strategic/Political ? Decisive Military Victory/Strategic Draw/Political Minor Defeat ?

Not sure it could be done in a scenario but you could in a campaign as you can set the victory levels.

[Imp]

Originally Posted by jp10

I agree that it is a very 'sliding scale' type of approach. Historical battles could more easily be analyzed to use this method as a rough guide to determine victory/defeat levels by casualties rather than victory points.

To increase casualty effects in the game currently a creator must edit the units to increase a loss effect to be greater/less for a particular side.

It could be done easier if an option in the game could be added during battle/scenario/campaign creation to add/decrease victory point modifiers between the forces to give more/less weight to casualty points for a side or even a 'political effect' modifier to reflect external support or even world reaction to a conflict.
This could offer battles that a player could tactically win but suffer defeat or draw in a larger context. Could add three victory results? Military (or tactical)/Strategic/Political ? Decisive Military Victory/Strategic Draw/Political Minor Defeat ?

You can do it yourself just set up Excel with the formulas you want & enter the scores.

[jp10]

Thinking it further, maybe different terms for each?
military battle results: (current) decisive defeat/minor defeat/draw/minor victory/decisive victory
Strategic: planning disrupted/operations delayed/no effect/ position improved/ operational advantage
Political: world condemnation/ citizen dissension / draw/ prestige gain/ global acclaim

Anyone with better terms?

[Suhiir]

Originally Posted by jp10

Thinking it further, maybe different terms for each?
military battle results: (current) decisive defeat/minor defeat/draw/minor victory/decisive victory
Strategic: planning disrupted/operations delayed/no effect/ position improved/ operational advantage
Political: world condemnation/ citizen dissension / draw/ prestige gain/ global acclaim

Anyone with better terms?

I may steal the Political ones for the opening scenario in my forever-in-development campaign.

After all gunning down hordes of rock tossing civilians that may be in your way is generally frowned on ... well ... most places.

[shahadi]

Originally Posted by Imp

You can do it yourself just set up Excel with the formulas you want & enter the scores.

Originally Posted by jp10

Thinking it further, maybe different terms for each?
military battle results: (current) decisive defeat/minor defeat/draw/minor victory/decisive victory
Strategic: planning disrupted/operations delayed/no effect/ position improved/ operational advantage
Political: world condemnation/ citizen dissension / draw/ prestige gain/ global acclaim

Anyone with better terms?

Defining battle results in terms of political, military, and strategic is intriguing. Imp has suggested scenario designers use Excel in an effort to determine the outcomes of a battle within the game.

In the game guide the difference of damage points determines the outcome as either “Decisive Victory (8:1 ration),” “Marginal Victory (less than 8 but greater than 2),” “Draw (less than 2 but greater than 1),” and a “Defeat (less than 1).”

Not much wiggle room for a draw, but a designer could slice up the categories to include additional definitions with a lot of space to play with in decisive victory and defeat, with about 6 points to play within the marginal victory category, but we have no room for a draw to add additional categories.

I’ve been playing with what I call a “Battle Calculation Sheet” that calculates the difference between total scores of the two sides as follows:

=IF($N11/$O11>7.999,"DV",IF($N11/$O11<1,"DF",IF(AND($N11/$O11<=8,$N11/$O11>=2),"MV",IF(AND($N11/$O11<=2,$N11/$O11>=1),"DR")))).

Column N and O contain cells of the total scores between the two sides.
DV is a decisive victory, DF is a defeat, MV is a marginal victory, and DR is a draw.

Next step would be to pin down, based upon force values how much damage is acceptable within the scenario to say obtain a political, military, or strategic advantage.

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