Title: A multi-criteria vehicle-target allocation assessment model for network-centric Joint Air Operations

Authors: Madjid Tavana, Matthew D. Bailey, Timothy E. Busch

Addresses: Management Information Systems, Lindback Distinguished Chair of Information Systems, La Salle University, Philadelphia, PA 19141, USA. ' Management Department, Bucknell University, Lewisburg, PA 17837, USA. ' Air Force Research Laboratory, AFRL/IFSB, 525 Brooks Road, Rome, NY 13441, USA

Abstract: Joint Air Operations (JAO) are traditionally orchestrated using centralised planning and scheduling that assigns air assets to mission packages for the purpose of achieving campaign objectives. However, the current command and control model used by the Air Force lacks |agility|, since it neither anticipate changes in the battlespace nor take advantage of continuous information provided by the sensors in a network-centric environment. In this study, we propose a Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis model that considers four competing objectives (effort, effectiveness, efficiency, and connectivity) to assess vehicle-target allocation for network-centric JAO. The proposed model uses entropy, multi-hop connectivity, and the Analytic Hierarchy Process to derive an overall measures of the performance for alternative vehicle-target allocation scenarios.

Keywords: analytical hierarchy process; AHP; entropy; Joint Air Operations; network-centric JAO; multi-criteria decision analysis; multi-hop connectivity; vehicle-target assignment; Air Force; vehicle-target allocation; performance measures.

DOI: 10.1504/IJOR.2008.017531

International Journal of Operational Research, 2008 Vol.3 No.3, pp.235 - 254

Published online: 15 Mar 2008 *

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