Navy Warfare Development Command recently marked a significant milestone with the completion of its 10th Strike Group 360 Degrees war game, as Carrier Strike Group 1 completed play, July 27.

Strike Group 360 Degrees is a tabletop war game played over Secret Internet Protocol Router Network (SIPRNet) by a carrier strike group staff against NWDC's "thinking" Red Cell, and is designed to help the strike group plan and execute major combat operations against a peer adversary in a highly contested environment.

"The tabletop war game creates a learning opportunity for the strike group staff in a non-graded, academic environment, develops a staff's 'tactical DNA,' and reinvigorates the critical warfare thinking process needed to succeed in a high-end sea control fight," said NWDC Operations Director Capt. Jim Loper.

Co-developed with the Naval War College in November 2012, NWDC has continually updated scenarios to reflect the latest developments in adversary capabilities and tactics, changes in U.S. Navy capabilities and doctrine, and geopolitical environments. Eight carrier strike groups and a command task force have taken part in the war game.

NWDC provides a SG 360 Degrees White Cell to adjudicate strike group moves and the opposing force (OPFOR) through participation of a "Red Cell." The Red Cell's team of subject-matter experts replicates all aspects of a specified OPFOR based on exhaustive all-source intelligence research and collaboration with various specialists throughout the Intelligence Community.

"Realism requires a combination of solid intelligence preparation, operational expertise, and rigorous analysis," said Cmdr. Matt Young, NWDC N32 Information Dominance/Intelligence Division. "Analysis is a key component in presenting situations and institutional behaviors that have not been observed or studied extensively in the real world. The 'art' of portraying OPFOR involves presenting plausible changes in OPFOR behavior, such as indications and warnings, reactions to Staff Group actions, likely political constraints and so forth, as they relate to event scenarios."

"The thinking adversary challenges the CSG staff to be able to react to unforeseen circumstances," said Cdr. Brian Lenk, SG 360 Degrees war game lead. "It forces the staff to really dig into the enemy capabilities to be able to assess risk to force, operational constraints, mission priorities, and commander's intent. The unscripted nature of the game helps staffs think out of the box to explore the latest tactics, techniques, and procedures for major combat at sea."

The SG 360 Degrees war game has also become an increasingly valuable tool in NWDC's capability development efforts.

"The results of each game exploring decision-making possibilities and capturing human insights are recorded in after action reports," said Loper. "What we learn from each game immediately impacts the next game iteration, improving the experience for the next strike group staff. We also use the insights to identify potential intelligence gaps, which we share with the Intelligence Community, as well as tactical gaps, which we are working hard to make available to all the strike groups and the training community. The real beauty of Strike Group 360 Degrees is that staffs can experiment with bold initiatives, and fail, without any real world risk. It's in this environment where we can really get at the goal of accelerating learning the way the CNO laid it out in 'A Design for Maintaining Maritime Superiority.'"

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