COMPUTER ASSISTED EXERCISES MANAGEMENT ENVIRONMENT FOR CIVIL SECURITY

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Abstract:

Up to the beginning of the 90-s “security” was a synonym of “defense”. While today in most European countries security is firstly associated to risks like: illegal migration, ethnic and religious conflicts, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and, of course, terrorism. These may also include effective prevention, mitigation and management of the consequences of natural disasters and industrial accidents. That is why security is no longer a purely military concern. Nowadays it is also related to the social-economic development and all elements of the society are involved. In accordance the new demands towards security impose fundamental reforms of the national structures, investment models, systems for management, adoption and mass application of contemporary methods of operations research, system analysis and risk management. Without such approach the conclusions and decisions based on them cannot be fully substantiated. Without such approach the conclusions and decisions based on them cannot be fully substantiated.
The necessity to perceive the security sector in comprehensive manner involving all types of authorities, has been imposed by the complexity of the current security issue. The national security, as wellthe individual’s security has to be ensured within all dimensions – military, political, economic, social,societal and environmental. The more complex understanding of the term “security sector” also reflects such crucial topics of the current political and scientific discourses as is the good governance, eventually transition or integration in a better way.
Important part of the good governance is the crises management. In this area military and civilian actors need to plan together, operate in complementary ways and support each other. Such a comprehensive approach is an essential part of NATO’s transformation in the crisis management domain.
The need to promote a Comprehensive Approach applies not only to operations but more broadly to many of NATO's efforts to deal with 21st century security challenges such as fighting terrorism, improving energy security, preventing proliferation of weapons and dangerous materials, protecting against cyber attacks, and confronting the threat of piracy. NATO's contribution to a Comprehensive Approach is a key feature in the new Strategic Concept.
Main goal in that direction is development of professional forces, flexible enough to execute tasks in broad spectrum. . These forces must be effective, multifunctional, modulized mobile and professionally trained.
Current technologies bridge the training needs and improvement of capabilities. The information technologies provide optimal way for resolving key issues on national and global level and are appropriate for enhancing the preparedness and trainings.
Applying the modeling and simulation methodologies and tools in the commanding staff trainings is a new form for capabilities development, which is well accepted in NATO members
Establishment of centers for modeling and simulations, development of new training models in accordance to NATO standards, execution of computer assisted exercises and usage of lessons learned from the practice, contribute for the improvement of individual’s and team trainings. The computer assisted exercises (CAX) are one of the valuable tools for enhancing the effectiveness in trainings and achieving interoperability at low price and decreased risk level, in comparison to field exercises. CAX is a tool for testing doctrinal documents implementing the gained experience and lessons learned in past military missions. Despite the important role of CAX for enhancing training capabilities in the integrated security sector, unified CAX management environment practically is missing. This environment have to form organizational system of concepts, approaches, methodologies, tools and means for effective realization of processes and its improvement.
Design, development and utilization of unified CAX environment is a new multidiscipline systematic approach for CAX management and affords opportunity for planning, execution and results assessment of CAX projects in the civil security domain.
Adding a structured framework for project management assures monitoring and control on finances, tasks, resources, information, quality, risks and guarantees successful accomplishment of the projects. The specific benefits are as follows:
1. Project implementation in scope, in time and in budget;
2. Transparency, distinct distribution of responsibilities and assessment of deliverables and achieved results at each project stage;
3. More effective and efficient resource management; Storing data and knowledge bases.
Considering the CAX specific features and the best practices, the model has been developed on the conceptual basis for project management. The applied methodology follows the five phases of the project management lifecycle: initiation, planning, execution, control and monitoring and finalization.
Project management tries to see the CAX a whole, and systematically challenge the difficulties encountered with new re-thinking processes in order to increase the CAX management.
In addition, the portfolio project management cycle proposed, allows the creation of an excellent base of information that, with some extension and analysis may be transformed into knowledge, facilitating the post-mortem analysis of the decisions taken and of the scenarios in a specific period of time. This ability can enhance the CAX learning, gathering valuable lessons in order to avoid the repetition of past errors.
So it is of great importance to develop a flexible and expandable еnvironment for CAX management, which considers concepts, methods, approaches and tools and combine the different criteria in the most suitable selection of the project portfolio, involving the full participation of the decision makers and providing the users with a quick feedback impact, in certain parameters, with the consequences of the changes produced.