Wargaming in Professional Military Education: Challenges and Solutions

Abstract:Given the emphasis to employ wargaming in professional military education, how can instructors in the schoolhouses, operating forces, and supporting establishment—particularly those who are not experienced wargamers themselves—go about it? This article explains the necessity of crafting desired learning outcomes to selected, modified, or in-house designed serious wargames with the assistance of accomplished experts. Summarizing relevant recent scholarship, it provides foundational terminology and concepts that facilitate collaborative conversations, as well as offers advice regarding common but avoidable pitfalls of this dynamic and immersive teaching method.