<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p>The process used to determine site suitability for military base camps lacks a formal framework for reducing relative risks to soldier safety and maximise mission effectiveness. Presently, military personnel responsible for determining site suitability of a base camp must assess large amounts of geographic, socioeconomic and logistical data, without a decision analysis framework to aid in the process. By adopting a multicriteria decision analysis (MCDA) framework to determine site suitability of base camps, battlespace commanders can make better, more defensible decisions. This paper surveys US Army officers with recent base camp experience to develop a set of initial criteria and weights relevant to base camp site selection. The developed decision framework is demonstrated using an MCDA methodology in an illustrative example to compare alternative base camp locations within a designated Area of Interest (AoI). Leveraging the site ranking output and/or criteria weights resulting from the methodology provides decision-making support that can be used in the field when time, resources and data may not be readily available.</p></abstract>

The process used to determine site suitability for military base camps lacks a formal framework for reducing relative risks to soldier safety and maximise mission effectiveness. Presently, military personnel responsible for determining site suitability of a base camp must assess large amounts of geographic, socioeconomic and logistical data, without a decision analysis framework to aid in the process. By adopting a multicriteria decision analysis (MCDA) framework to determine site suitability of base camps, battlespace commanders can make better, more defensible decisions. This paper surveys US Army officers with recent base camp experience to develop a set of initial criteria and weights relevant to base camp site selection. The developed decision framework is demonstrated using an MCDA methodology in an illustrative example to compare alternative base camp locations within a designated Area of Interest (AoI). Leveraging the site ranking output and/or criteria weights resulting from the methodology provides decision-making support that can be used in the field when time, resources and data may not be readily available.

Siting military base camps through an MCDA framework

Journal of Military Studies

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

{"article-title":"Siting military base camps through an MCDA framework"}

The process used to determine site suitability for military base camps lacks a formal framework for reducing relative risks to soldier safety and maximise...

Criteria	Calculated weight (%)
Roads	12.6
Threat/enemy	12.0
Slope	11.7
Soils	11.5
Population	10.1
Local utilities	9.8
Land cover	8.9
Aquifer access	8.1
Interference/signal	7.8
Land use	7.5

Alternatives	Roads	Threat/enemy	Slope	Soil	Local utilities	Population	Land cover	Aquifer access	Interference/signal	Land use
Site 1	0.6	0.8	0.2	0.8	0.7	0.3	0.7	0.3	0.8	0.5
Site 2	0.9	0.2	0.0	0.3	0.5	0.2	0.3	0.9	0.4	0.3
Site 3	0.9	0.8	0.3	0.7	0.8	0.9	0.3	0.5	0.0	0.3
Site 4	0.7	0.3	0.1	0.9	0.3	0.8	0.6	0.4	0.3	0.8
Site 5	0.9	0.8	0.6	0.9	0.7	0.7	0.7	0.5	0.7	0.9
Site 6	0.4	0.1	0.5	0.1	0.4	0.2	0.8	0.0	0.3	0.2
Site 7	0.9	0.9	0.9	0.6	0.6	0.7	0.8	0.9	0.9	0.5

Alternatives	Calculated weight	Equal weight	Rank reciprocal weight	Opposite-weight scenario
Site 1	3	4	4	4
Site 2	6	6	6	6
Site 3	4	3	3	5
Site 4	5	5	5	3
Site 5	2	2	2	1
Site 6	7	7	7	7
Site 7	1	1	1	2

Criteria	Type of data
Population	Social/demographic
Enemy/threat
Interference/signal	Capability analysis
Roads	Civil infrastructure
Local utilities
Slope	Terrain/environment
Soils
Land cover
Aquifer access
Land use

Alternatives	Score
Site 7	0.78
Site 5	0.75
Site 3	0.58
Site 1	0.57
Site 4	0.52
Site 2	0.40
Site 6	0.30

Siting military base camps through an MCDA framework

Article Category: Original study

Data publikacji: 01 paź 2021

Zakres stron: -

Otrzymano: 01 lut 2018

Przyjęty: 10 lip 2021

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/jms-2021-0011

Słowa kluczowe
military, base camps, siting, MCDA, risk, decision analysis

© 2021 Jeffrey C. Cegan et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Fig. 1

Fig. 2

Average ranking and importance order comparison and calculated weighting

Alternative regions for suitable base camp sites based on criteria scores

Rank ordering of alternative sites across weighting schemes

Key criteria for base camp siting, categorised by data type

Ranking of alternative scores

Four sets of criteria weights used for sensitivity analysis

Criteria	Calculated weight (%)	Equal weight (%)	Rank-reciprocal weight (%)	Opposite-weight scenario (%)
Roads	12.6	10.0	34.1	3.4
Threat/Enemy	12.0	10.0	17.1	3.8
Slope	11.7	10.0	11.4	4.3
Soils	11.5	10.0	8.5	4.9
Population	10.1	10.0	6.8	5.7
Local utilities	9.8	10.0	5.7	6.8
Land cover	8.9	10.0	4.9	8.5
Aquifer access	8.1	10.0	4.3	11.4
Interference/Signal	7.8	10.0	3.8	17.1
Land use	7.5	10.0	3.4	34.1

Siting military base camps through an MCDA framework

Article Category: Original study

Data publikacji: 01 paź 2021

Zakres stron: -

Otrzymano: 01 lut 2018

Przyjęty: 10 lip 2021

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/jms-2021-0011

Słowa kluczowemilitary, base camps, siting, MCDA, risk, decision analysis

© 2021 Jeffrey C. Cegan et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Fig. 1

Fig. 2

Average ranking and importance order comparison and calculated weighting

Alternative regions for suitable base camp sites based on criteria scores

Rank ordering of alternative sites across weighting schemes

Key criteria for base camp siting, categorised by data type

Ranking of alternative scores

Four sets of criteria weights used for sensitivity analysis

Słowa kluczowe
military, base camps, siting, MCDA, risk, decision analysis