AWSIM, ACE-IOS, CG, GIAC…what??

  • Published
  • By by Lt. Col. Julie Travnicek Burns
  • Korea Air Simulation Center director
OSAN AIR BASE, Republic of Korea --  The war-gaming floor of the Korea Air Simulation Center (KASC) is full of action this week and next for Exercise KEY RESOLVE 2009, and the U.S. and Republic of Korea participants behind the computers know the acronyms, and aren't afraid to use them. 

Twice a year, during Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS)-directed Exercises KEY RESOLVE and ULCHI FREEDOM GUARDIAN, well over 200 U.S. and ROK military, civilians and contractors augment the small staff of the KASC to run the US Air Force's Air and Space Cyber Constructive Environment (ASCCE) suite of models behind the exercise. 

The ASCCE suite feeds more than 245 server and gamer workstations and countless warfighter systems, and boasts a sim reliability and availability exceeding 99 percent over the past six major Korea exercises. 

It's the world's largest combat air simulation, and one of the few that integrates another country's models with US models, across land, sea and air domains. 

To a member of the training audience, it looks real. 

"The simulators and systems we have here at the KASC are specifically configured and continuously updated to stimulate the AOC's real-world systems," according to Scott Lovelace, KASC chief of simulations.   

"Our goal is to be so realistic that the players forget they're in a simulation. We are the only sim center in the world lucky enough to be co-located with our primary training audience, and we go to great lengths to ensure we are providing quality training to the war fighter." 

The KASC, with support from PACAF and in partnership with the Korea Battle Simulation Center at U.S. Army Garrison-Yongsan in Seoul, leverages the Joint Training and Experimentation Network and an expansive wide area network to distribute ASCCE within the Korea Peninsula and off peninsula to multiple command and control agencies and simulation centers in Japan and throughout the United States. 

The backbone of these virtual and constructive models and simulations comes from the Air Force Modeling and Simulation Training Toolkit, the multiple and diverse capabilities of the Joint Information Operations Warfare Command, the Air Force Synthetic Environment for Reconnaissance and Surveillance, and Los Alamos National Laboratory. 

While these models provide the backbone, the true strength of the KASC is the people who control the models, and the experience they bring to the Korea Theater of Operations. 
 
The Air Force Agency for Modeling and Simulation, Electronic Systems Command and the developer teams collaborate with the KASC to provide this essential continuity. 

The KASC's model control is supported with individuals whose experience in many cases spans over 20 major exercises here in Korea.   

For KR 09, KASC's 44 professional model controllers have a combined 327 events in Korea exercises alone. Complimenting this skilled augmentation are our gamer augmentees, who come from all over the world to support our exercises. 

Many of the augmentees are first-timers. 

"It's pretty impressive. I just didn't realize so much was involved with a simulation,"said Tech.Sgt. DavidDavenport, an augmentee here from Pacific Air Forces staff at Hickam AFB, HI. 

Others, such as Bruce Hara, who operates the Air Warfare Simulation and the Logistics Simulation models, have been participating in JCS command post exercises here in Korea for years. 

"This is my twenty-fifth exercise event in Korea in more than 14 years and I love coming here. I was stationed here on active duty and consider it an honor to return as a contractor to train the ROK and U.S. military members defending the peninsula." 

In case you are still wondering about the acronyms in the title of this article, they are some of the key models we use: Air Warfare Simulation (AWSIM), Air and Space Constructive Environment-Information Operations Suite (ACE-IOS), Chang Gong (CG, the ROK air model) and Graphical Interface Aggregate Control (GIAC).