executives and parliaments within the region using military and nonmilitary means .
While it is true that the region is isolated , it is only isolated to a certain extent ; events in Donbass have ripple effects for the populations in that region and also for Ukraine as a whole , for neighboring countries , and for the rest of Europe and the international community . These are the reasons to employ complex IPB , which emphasizes group behavior . Individuals compose a group , and groups compose populations . Populations are represented by some kind of state , protostate , rogue state , or third party . What IPB and JIPOE tend to neglect are ways to understand how these individuals , populations , and states all interact with one another , as well as how relatively small interactions can have significant ripple effects . Complex IPB accommodates this complexity in how it evaluates groups ( step 3 ) and their courses of action ( step 4 ). However , assessing what drives their interactions ( step 5 ) and how individuals and groups make certain decisions or take certain actions ( step 6 ) requires further analysis of the incentives or motivating factors — the fitness landscape effects .
Incentive structures are the conditions within the fitness landscape , or within the PMESII systems , that on a macro level promote cooperation or competition and on a micro level push individuals and groups to make decisions and perform actions . 21 Actions or decisions may be influenced by a central authority figure or made independently by individuals . If many individuals arrive at similar decisions , a bottom-up group phenomenon manifests . This is evident during color revolutions , for instance .
In Donbass , some individuals and ethnic groups support the separatist movement instead of the government in Kiev . Some of the reasons ( i . e ., the incentives ) individuals support the separatists include a general sense of mistrust toward the central government in Kiev , according to political science writer Elise Guiliano ’ s 2015 study “ The Origins of Separatism : Popular Grievances in Donetsk and Luhansk .” 22 Guiliano reports that a significant minority feel betrayed by the government , which they claim conducted “ discriminatory demographic redistribution within Ukraine .” 23 Some believe economic policies such as potential European Union membership will hurt their interests , and some are opposed to certain government policies . Therefore , while some share a sense of political and economic loyalty to Russia , the incentives leading individuals to support the separatists vary . Each group or individual may have different motives for their microdecision to support separatists ’ goals , but the macroresult is considerable support for the separatist movement . Furthermore , as individuals , groups , and states interact , microdecisions can change over time and cause the collective result to shift .
Training the Ukrainian Armed Forces
During the 2015 training in Yavoriv , the training team conducted a process with what amounted to the essential elements of complex IPB , while teaching an introduction to JIPOE lesson that included PMESII system mapping . The practical exercise was directly applied to operations in the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts in eastern Ukraine in order to understand the separatist movement — including the effort that was known as Projekt Novorossiya . 24 Because the focus of this course was intelligence preparation together with system and hybrid network analysis , and because of the complex nature of groups operating inside and outside of Ukraine , it was both appropriate and effective to utilize complex IPB concepts in this context .
The adapted process was more effective than typical intelligence preparation because it not only identified the threat actors and their behaviors but also went a step further to consider the incentive structures that helped create those behaviors and the likely effects of proposed lethal and nonlethal action to support , influence , disrupt , or neutralize targeted behaviors .
The exercise began by identifying actors through adversary evaluation . The usual process was then expanded by first producing a description of fitness landscape effects , and then a graphical evaluation of the major groups influencing political policy and military operations in Ukraine . Major groups ’ courses of action and group interactions influencing population behavior were also assessed in detail .
Next , the exercise performed complex network modeling that highlighted the sociocultural factors and elements of national power that drove instability , as well as fitness landscape effects and specific incentive structures present . Complex adaptive system emergence characteristics involving decentralized military operations and decision making were also modeled . In
62 January-February 2017
MILITARY REVIEW