SIMNET

Video:

This video illustrates the SIMNET concepts and explores some of the implications.
There are three segments: Introduction (no narration), Simulated Combat Exercise, and Combined Arms Report.
I was an original contributor to the project, and produced the video.

from Tom Clancy's The Bear and the Dragon:

"They're at about 75% efficiency, sir. We need to put everybody on the SIMNET, to shake 'em all up a little." That was one of the Army's better investments. SIMNET, the simulator network, comprised a warehouse full of M1 Abrams and M2/M3 Bradly simulators, linked by supercomputer and satellite with other such warehouses, so that highly complex and realistic battles could be fought out electronically. It had been hugely expensive, and while it could never fully simulate training in the field, it was nevertheless a training aid without parallel.

... The free-form play allowed by simulators wasn't the same as being out there in your vehicles, but neither was it restricted by time and distance, and on the global SIMNET system you could play against a complete enemy battalion, even a brigade if you wanted your people to get some sweat into their play. Except for the bumpy-floaty sensation of driving your Abrams around, it conveyed the complexity better than any place except the National Training Center at Fort Irwin ...

Click an image to enlarge:

SIMNET simulations incorporate infantry, ground vehicles, aircraft, ...

First we investigated the reality ...

 

...then we built simulations.

SIMNET aircraft simulator.

Aircraft simulator out-the-window view.

 

 

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