Linear Programming Streamlines Asset Allocation

Signal, Oct 2005 by Hawk, Jeff

Models address the complex problem of assigning global intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance resources.

Two seemingly unrelated events occurred in May.

Renowned mathematician George B. Dantzig died on May 13 at age 90, and the U.S. Strategic Command stood up a new component to focus on global intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance efforts on May 31. A mathematical model used to optimize resource allocation could tie Dantzig's work to the new group.

As a U.S. Air Force combat analysis branch chief during World War II, Dantzig applied his prowess as a statistician to analyzing bombing missions over Germany. His work in manipulating combat data helped Dantzig create his most noted invention, linear programming. In 1952, Dantzig, known as the father of mathematical optimization, began implementing linear programming on computers while working for the RAND Corporation. That methodology, still valid today and more applicable with faster computers, is now being re-examined and could become an essential tool to assist in global intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) asset allocation.

ISR expertise is coalescing under the U.S. Strategic Command's (STRATCOM's) Joint Functional Component Command-Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (JFCC-ISR) component. In March, secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld appointed Vice Adm. Lowell Jacoby, USN, director, Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), as the JFCC-ISR's component commander. The new group will reside at the DIA's facility but will remain a STRATCOM asset. Scholars and defense industry officials are pushing the new group to adopt Dantzig's solution to speed up and optimize the process of assigning global ISR assets. The nudge comes as the nation's ISR community sharpens its focus on the issue.

Officiais from both organizations declined to characterize current ISR asset allocation processes specifically, citing the discussion as premature until the new group solidifies. But current processes are "likely the same processes that have been in place," Donald L. Black, a DIA spokesman, says.

If this is the case, some say those processes could use a serious computer upgrade. Today, assigning ISR assets is largely a manual effort, says Dr. Andrew G. Loerch, associate professor, George Mason University (GMU), Fairfax, Virginia. Loerch directs the military track of GMU's operations research master's degree program. As a U.S. Army-trained operations research analyst, Loerch served as a division chief at the Center for Army Analysis, Fort Belvoir, Virginia, and is the past president of the Alexandria, Virginia-based Military Operations Research Society (MORS).

Because of his background and credentials, Loerch says he has access to high-level military analysts who are working on the global ISR asset allocation effort. He characterizes the current process in this way: "Smart guys sit around and say, 'This is what we're going to do.'" Computers assist ISR analysts, but "there's not a prescriptive method where you put in the parameters, punch a button and out comes a good solution of what to do," Loerch adds.

Linear programming could provide such a solution. In Dantzig's 1940s-era U.S. Army Air Corps, computers lacked enough power to handle linear programming. "Now you can solve huge problems using the method because computers are better and there are much more efficient algorithms," he explains.

Linear programming solutions addressing ISR asset allocation are surfacing in the academic and private sectors. A GMU graduate-level paper, presented on the day of Dantzig's death, takes on the problem of assigning global manned and unmanned ISR assets. Titled "Effective Allocation of Global (EAGLE) Airborne ISR Assets using a Mixed Integer Optimization Model," the recently submitted GMU effort is "a step in the right direction," Loerch says. He reviewed the model, nicknamed EAGLE ISR, as a graduate adviser for the operations research department.

Heath A. Hammett, a GMU graduate student in operations research and systems engineering, says the effort grew out of a realization that STRATCOM "wasn't using a very robust or optimal method for allocating ISR assets. Linear programming seemed like a perfect fit." Hammett and three other graduate students created the model to satisfy a GMU applications seminar requirement.

Hammett's idea for the paper emanated from observations made while working with STRATCOM officials as an associate for McLean, Virginia-based Booz Alien Hamilton, a strategy and technology consulting firm. He describes his take on the command's current process: Lower level commands send requests up the chain to subject matter experts who sit around a table and generate an allocation plan based on different criteria. They send those plans to combatant commands, which relocate assets when or where needed. The combatant commands then task the actual asset and fly the mission.

"From everything I've heard, it takes several days to generate these plans," Hammett says. STRATCOM officials were not available to verify Hammett's assessment of the command's current process. A DIA official says that fulfilling a normal request takes one to two weeks depending on the urgency. Urgent requests can be done within hours or sooner, the official says.