Probabilistic BMC4I Algorithms for Modeling BMD Uncertainties

"A key component of any ballistic missile defense system is the BMC4I element that makes the decisions of what to intercept, where to intercept, when to intercept and how to intercept. The key pieces of information that drive the decision as to the "what","where", and "when" are: 1) threat lethality and potential damage to defended assets, and 2) what is the probability of kill. However, it is well known that there are uncertainties and ambiguities in the knowledge, information and data used to plan amissile defense engagement. Such uncertainties include but are not limited to uncertainties in the threat state vector. Existing BMD systems base their engagement decisions primarily on mean parameter value (such as threat state vectors), withoutsystematically taking into consideration the associated uncertainties. As a result, engagement decisions are being made based upon estimates of success that are not robust. Decisions that do not consistently handle the stochastic nature of the engagementcan be overly optimistic or even overly pessimistic in their estimate of probability of kill. Any method that results in biased estimators result in both missile wastage and increased likelihood of damage to defended assets due to threat leakage andmissed intercepts. While the many-on-many engagement problem is key to real-time Battle Management, the proper formulation and solution of the one-on-one-engagement problem is the core building b