It was senior year, and I had just taken a semester off to work for the Clinton campaign in Philadelphia. So I figured it’d be the easiest A ever if I signed up for an urban politics class.
The professor, a pearl-wearing blond fresh out of grad school, confessed she had never actually lived in a city before. But that didn’t stop her from having all kinds of theories about how urban politics really worked. And that included a formula — a mathematical formula — that she said described how mayors and aldermen made their decisions. I think I laughed out loud when she first wrote it on the blackboard.
This Navy proposal (scroll down) is way more serious, of course. And they claim that it’s already worked before. But I couldn’t help thinking of that professor back at Georgetown, when I read about the Navy’s idea to use a computer program to predict insurgent attacks in places like Iraq.
In current U.S. operations, terrorist and insurgent forces enjoy a significant advantage by being able to launch surprise attacks, whether by small arms, mortar, or improvised explosive devices (IEDs), against weakly defended or undefended targets and disappearing before U.S. forces can concentrate for a counterstrike. Better prediction of where and when such attacks are most likely to occur would therefore be of great benefit, allowing smart allocation of defensive resources as well as preparation for quick counteroffensive operations in response to terrorist and insurgent attacks. This task is significantly complicated by the fact that modern terrorist groups demonstrate an ability to learn and adapt quickly, making it difficult to predict future actions on the basis of past actions.
Recent work has applied and extended discrete choice models originally developed for use in econometrics to predicting the spatial probability of criminal activity. These point-pattern based density models have also been applied to the military domain for prediction of terrorist strikes and IEDs. The result is that the geographical patterns established by past events can be used to build threat maps showing where future strikes are most likely to take place, with accuracies notably better than hot-spotting techniques. The same basic strategy seems likely to be applicable to prediction of the timing of such activities as well as their location.
The technique utilizes as inputs a series of IED incidents… The models typically contain large numbers of attributes, such as population density, proximity to a police station, distance to a mosque, etc. From case to case different attributes and different numbers of attributes are important. For example, when this technique was applied to bombings in greater Jerusalem, it was found that a single attribute, the distance to a controlled intersection, was an accurate predictor.
A fundamental limitation of the techniques as they stand, however, is that they do not model changes in the subjects’ decision-making processes; they must currently assume that the subjects’ preferences are static. This limits the time horizon over which predictions are of use, and can cause periods of very poor prediction performance when a significant change in strategy occurs. An extension of discrete choice models that allows for learning-directed evolution in the subjects’ decision-making processes would greatly improve their applicability to dynamic military situations.
The program is part of a larger effort to address the “human element” of the IED problem, National Defense reports.
“I’d like to be able to pick the terrorist out. I’d like a detector ‘tricorder’ for intent or evil. I’d like to know ahead of time that this person is planning to hurt other people with the use of IEDs,” Office of Naval Research chief scientist Starnes Walker told the magazine.
This project won’t do that, of course. But getting it right “will not only contribute to defensive operations, saving lives of civilians and U.S. servicemen, but will also contribute to quick and effective counterstrikes to weaken and eliminate enemy forces,” the Navy notes. “The same techniques can be applied to civilian law enforcement to counter gangs, organized crime, and other groups with the capacity to adapt their patterns of behavior through experience.“
Maybe it could even predict politicians’ behavior, too.
This is simply one more sign of how US strategic culture is simply not geared to fighting wars like Iraq. We’re attempting to find a technical solution to what are in essence political problems. We’ld be far better off funding studies by area experts with language expertise and experience in country rathern than any number of studies using sophisticated econometrics.
Vietnam had lots of statistical studies too — only problem is that all the data put into them was wrong. Or, on the rare occasion a good study came out, the results were ignored by those actually making the decisions.
Two word: remote viewing.
These kids crack me up sometimes … when do the adults start to run things?
I know this sounds a little funny and fairly far fetched but it’s not as much as you would think. Predictive modeling has been working for years and gets better and better all the time. Like anything else in the Universe the more starting variables you have the closer your short term predictions will be. Correcting for those variables over time is often done with the same kinds of mathematics that make Chaos mathematics work. While predictions of a single person over any real length of time is very very difficult predicting what a large group of people will do over a short period of time (Longer the more often you correct the variables) will work well for a large percentage of the targets. (It’s not that different from the idea of inertial navigation really). So while this system will never be 100% accurate, it will be able to improve the prediction of where X or Y will occur orders of magnitude over guessing (Our current strategy).
A great example of this in action is traffic modeling, or urban growth modeling. Both of these have worked very well over the years and are improving all the time. While neither will predict what one single person will do, they work great for getting an idea of what the group will do.
So what contracter is skimming these millions to do what a private in a BCT headquarter used to do with a paper map and some color coded needles?
Reader TH says…
Topics that read like this are almost always intended for a certain
recipient — in fact, the person who will eventually win the award
was probably the one who wrote the topic, then gave it to someone in
the Navy to submit as an SBIR topic.
There are a significant number of these targetted pork topics in the
SBIRs, and they really annoy those of us looking for real topics to
respond to.
It’s not the silliest SBIR topic I’ve seen, though. A few years ago there
was one that claimed a particular approach was a breakthrough, and was
asking for proposals to use it to develop a universal cancer cure (for
just the usual ~800k, no less …)
This reminds me of Thomas Pynchon’s novel GRAVITY’S RAINBOW. I read it a while ago so it’s somewhat dim in my memory, but there was a correlation between the location of the protagonist’s personal arousal events and the landing of V2 rockets in WW2 London. And so interested adversaries attemped to read that pattern and either predict the next attack or obscure it to ensure its success. Long read, that book.
There is a growing concern that Iraq will go the way of Iran (or Afghanistan under the Taliban) and become an Islamic (sharia) Republic which will use Iraqi oil revenues to support right-wing religious terrorist groups.
What we need, therefore, is bait to draw out the religious fanatics…on our own terms in the place of our choosing.
Thus, what I call the Radical Right-Wing Religious Fundamentalist Roach Motel…where they check in, but they don’t check out.
Remember the “Blazing Saddles” scene with the fake town and the fake townspeople.
I propose that the U.S. military build fake towns on the edge of major Iraqi metropolitan areas…especially in southern Iraq. These fake towns would be cesspools of sin…or at least appear to be.
Fake towns with gaudy neon signs, brothels advertising their sex services, x-rated movie houses, liguor stores and Rock-n-Roll music blaring out 24/7.
Why, no self-righteous religious fanatic could possibly pass up the opportunity to try to blow some place like this off the map.
And our U.S. military would be waiting. And there’d be one less jihadist trying to set up a theocratic Iraq and one less religious fanatic terrorizing Iraqi citizens…especially the women and any non-Muslim Iraqis.
Can I get my government grant now?
Sure, it’ll take millions to rebuild the fake towns after they’ve been blown up, but it’ll be worth it, since our military will suffer fewer casualties and fewer Iraqi civilians in the cities will die, too.
The Right-Wing Roach Motels will draw out those intent on killing U.S. soldiers into the rural areas where our soldiers can take care of them on our own terms in a place of our choosing.
Aw, c’mon, it’s a great idea. And it can even be used here in the States to flush out our own rabid, religious fanatics hell-bent on turning US into a theocracy.
Reminds me of the often overlooked viet nam movie Go tell the spartans. A geeky officer is using a fancy algorithim to predict which is the next village to get attacked. Old school vet burt lancaster thinks is bunk. Great movie about our early years in vn. Not happy at all but burt l. is always good.
greg
I’m starting to hate some of the people in Pentagon to open their mouth way too much disclosing too many senstive technology to the public, including the recent publication of “Radar Scope” on the DODs’ site. I wish I could zip some of the mouth of these people in the Pentagon and lock it up and dump everything in the “Black”. I just can’t understand their philosophy, while the Far East countries have the philosophy of “Eagles hide their paws”. You always want the enemy to know less. Well, I think it’s a good age for journalists to get what they want from people in Pentagon.
Cyra Brown, this is something like statistics, not something to be like a prophet or God to predict the future. If you are expecting that, you are expecting way too far.
Hilarious. This completely ignores the reality of the IED as “smart weapon”, and the basic tactic of planting them where there is a good likelihood of a US or Iraqi army patrol/convoy passing; from what I can gather, insurgents even stage attacks with the explicit intention of drawing US forces out into IED traps — because they can model the behaviour of the US military! Something along these lines appears to have happened yesterday after the Karbala bombing, when a US military patrol heading there in response to the attack was hit by one.
I think the insurgents have the upper hand in the prediction business.
Isn’t it policy of US armed forces to “shoot and scoot. I guess the “insurgents” have learned how to copy the “freedom forces” and that just really pisses off the military brass doesn’t it.
Cyra Brown,
They wanted to use a system like this in the US. That’s why they tried to get TIA (Total Information Awareness) off the ground, cause the more you know to start with the easier it is to predict what will happen next. However we don’t stand for invasions of our privacy in the US like that and it never got off the ground. In Iraq however there are less restrictions and with more obvious activity from the enemy it’s easier to model.
dan, if you think the terrorists are in the advantage with an upper hand, you are wrong. Yes, terrorists in Iraq do their own research before attacks, but that does not guarantee success. Meanwhile, only few of the total IEDs in Iraq make success. I can tell alot, but I’m going to keep my mouth shut for that. However, I still can say you know not much nor did much research what is going on in the dark.
What a swell idea. Positively Gumpian. Smoke ‘em out with Fauxtown Americana and waste ‘em as they mount a mass stampede for the freedom fries franchise adjacent to the best little whorehouse in Baghdad. Transparancy dictates that Diebold must receive the bidless contract to program the insugent-predicting computers, in order to eliminate any uncertainties from outcomes. In thus fashion may God’s gift of Democracy be bestowed upon an ever so grateful Iraq.
Your tax dollars at work.
That project assumes that people are unable to adapt.
It fails to address the fact that people are the most adaptable organism on the planet.
I may not be a rocket scientist, but even I can figure out that if we followed the advice of a computer program, we would become extremely predictable, and sitting ducks for the bad guys.
I say we utilize those quacks to find and defuse the IED’s, instead of injuring and killing useful troops.
Sounds like a screenwriter’s pitch: Minority Report meets Numb3ers. The “tricoder?” Well, let’s not go there.
Suffice to say someone’s getting too many ideas from TV and the movies. Tip for government types: don’t confuse Hollywood and reality. Remember Dan Quayle and Murphy Brown?
Haven’t they figured out that every time there’s a large gathering of Iraqis to apply for jobs with the police a bomb goes off? You don’t need a computer program to predict that.
Thanks for working for the Clinton campaign. You helped damage military preparedness and the reputations of all service personnel. Reminder: Hillary probably will run soon, so set aside more time.
Predicting by looking at the past? Following trends? Sounds seductive and intuitive, but is practical nonsense.
Take this test. Blank out your vehicle windscreen — drive using the view from the rear view mirror — follow the “trend”.
Won’t work you say? Then spend a lot of money and come up with a computer program, using a lot of “fuzzy logic” and “sophisticated algorithms”.
Still doesn’t work? Don’t blame me. Anybody who claims to be able to “predict” the future is either a fool or a charlatan.
The game is the only hobby of him. He would like to give up, in all of us comfort and encouragement. He decided to join us to play the new mountain, he was still playing knife, I also playing a doctor, and we all give him a little Scions of Fate money.
At that time, I often saw wearing black with a particularly enviable, and hope that they can pay attention to me, give me some small things or a little cronous cro.
The first time played game, the first time made friends, first time chatted with MM, and the first time earned Archlord money, communicated from the language he started to like her.