Paul Thurkettle, from the Joint Education Training & Exercises section of NATO's Allied Command Transformation, gave a presentation on serious games and the Smart Defence Initiative. He discussed how serious games can be used for training, citing studies that show they are more cost effective than traditional e-learning. Thurkettle also explained Smart Defence, an approach that encourages NATO members to cooperate on capabilities through specialization, resource sharing, and combined projects. He believes serious games have potential to support Smart Defence by facilitating distributed, multinational training across platforms and helping to change perceptions of gaming.

1. Supreme
Allied
Commander
Transformation
Serious Games and the
Smart Defence Initiative
Serious Play Conference
22nd Aug 2012
Paul Thurkettle
Education & Training Technologies Section
Joint Education Training & Exercises
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2. Introduction
• I am a digital Immigrant but…
– Built a pong game in 1975
– Had a BBC micro, Sinclair Spectrum, Commodore 32/64, Atari
• Consider myself a geek
• Adopted a mobile phone in 2009
• Joined Facebook
• Still to twitter
• Struggling to watch my son on the 100+ hrs playing Skyrim
• Do get it, am excited about it but frustrated..
• Unable to multi-task effectively
• Overwhelmed in our age – time management, social awareness
acceptance
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• Partly avoidance of personal technology “need quiet time”

3. Overview
• Who are we..
• What is Smart Defence and CFI
• Virtual Worlds - Serious Games studies
• Naming conventions
• What are we up to?
• Changing mind-sets
• Future – working together
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4. Who are we?
North Atlantic Treaty Organisation
serving 28 nations
Allied Command Transformation
Based in Norfolk, Virginia, USA
One of two NATO Strategic Commands
Created in 2003
Vision Statement:
ACT is NATO’s leading agent for change, driving, facilitating, and
advocating continuous improvement of Alliance capabilities to
maintain and enhance the military relevance and effectiveness of
the Alliance.
Strategic Objectives:
Provide appropriate support to NATO missions and operations.
Lead NATO military transformation.
Improve relationships, interaction and practical cooperation
with partners, nations and international organisations.
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5. ACT Domain
Joint Warfare Joint Force Training
Allied Command
Centre (JWC) Centre (JFTC)
Transformation (ACT)
Allied Command
SACT Representative in Operation (ACO)
Europe (STRE)
Staff Element
Europe (SEE)
NATO Undersea Research
Centre (NURC)
Joint Analysis and Lessons
Learned Centre (JALLC)
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6. Joint Force Trainer (JFT) ***
• Responsible for NATO’s
individual and collective training
• Global Training Architecture
• “e-Learning is the future”
• National engagements
• Linking to academic standards –
Bologna
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7. NATO e-Learning Capabilities
ADL Collaboration
 Online  Portals
 > 33,000 Students
 > 300 hours online Immersive Learning Mobile Learning
 Supports all NATO E&T  Serious Game and  New requirement
 Supports nations Virtual World to be supported
 SCORM based technology  Specialist delivery
 Courses being (not reformatted)
developed
 Distributed Learning
Computer Based Training
 Stand Alone packages
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8. Our customers
Individual Support to
Training Collective NATO/
NATO School Training Nations
NATO SCHOOL
NCCIS eLearning
NCISS JFTC
NDC
NDC
JWC
NMIOTC
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9. Partnerships
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10. Training Spectrum &
Implementation of E&T
Technologies
Individual Collective Exercises
Education
Training Training
ONLINE COURSES
DISTRIBUTED TRAINING
SERIOUS GAMING / VIRTUAL WORLDS
MOBILE TECHNOLOGY / DEVICES
KNOWLEDGE PORTAL / COI SUPPORT
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11. Smart Defence
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12. "Smart Defence offers a new approach
to the delivery of capabilities.
It is designed to enhance the efficiency
with which Allies, together, field critical
capabilities, allowing them to do in
cooperation what they could not do
efficiently, if at all, alone."
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13. Smart Defence?
Smart Defence is based on capability areas that are critical for NATO, in
particular as established at the Lisbon summit in 2010. Ballistic missile defence,
intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, maintenance of readiness,
training and force preparation, effective engagement and force protection
For the purposes of Smart Defence, the Alliance nations must give priority to
those capabilities which NATO needs most, specialize in what they do best, and
look for multinational solutions to shared problems. NATO can act as
intermediary, helping the nations to establish what they can do together at
lower cost, more efficiently and with less risk.
• Capability Requirements
• Specialisation
• Cooperation
• Share resources
• All save money/manpower 13

14. Smart Defence
Governments
Industry Academia
Partners
Discussion, resource sharing, combined projects,
coordination, “Pooling and sharing” 14

15. Connected Forces Initiative
CFI
“The Connected Forces Initiative aims to preserve
the interoperability and enhance shared abilities
that have resulted from years of operations in the
field. It reinforces Smart Defense through greater
collaboration in military education, training and
exercises, and application of new technologies.”
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16. CFI and Education & Training
Governments
Industry Academia
Partners
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17. Is serious gaming the solution,
Or part of the solution?
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18. NATO two development tracks
Experimentation & Fielding
2009-2011 Virtual Worlds Investigation
• Virtual worlds
Led to acceptance by
• Gaming technology JFT and the start of
• Tactical level production
2011-2013 Strategic Decision Making
Training through Games
• Gaming technology
• Serious games
• Upper operational and political level
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19. What’s in a name?
Serious Games
Immersive Training
Virtual Worlds
Immersive technology refers to technology
that blurs the line between the physical
world and digital or simulated world,
thereby creating a sense of immersion.
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20. Considerations for design
• Useful, what if Guitar Hero had taught kids to
learn to read music or play a real guitar, what if
Skyrim taught map reading
• Multinational, non native speaking
• Limited bandwidths, platforms, military computer
restrictions
• “What’s in it for me” acceptance
• Longevity (to earn back the cost in numbers)
• Individual or multi player ?
• Clark’s “10 years ago why games, now why not”
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21. What are we up to?
 NATO owned & licensed for NATO
and nations to use for no fee
 Ability to offer distributed training
environment , convoy, FAC, C-IED….?
 Multinational involvement already,
proven joint training capability
 “Live” play 24/7 hosted servers on
internet, Intranet ready
 Ability to use as visualisation device
for computer systems as well as for
training and exercise training
development
 Over $15M spent by NATO nations
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22. NATO VBS 2
IED TTP’s Convoy Training
NATO Tactics/Doctrine Collation Ops
??????
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23. Skill Building
“Yo-ho-ho and a vat of
anthrax! Checking
cargo ships for WMD
and contraband isn’t
exactly swashbuckling.
In fact, as a NATO
video game makes
clear, it’s actually a lot
of dreary,
methodical
work.”
wired.com
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24. Why VBS Worlds ?
• User / Customer driven – ISD changeable
• Affiliated with VBS 2 – sharable assets
• Deliverable via multiple platforms
• SCORM compatable
• Multi player adaptable
• State of the art?
• Licensing that fits our needs
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25. Changing mindsets
• “Gamer” image
• Self paced training – not institutionalised
• Preparation for next gen of learners
• Meet expectations, “one chance to capture
them”
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26. ROI
Immersive learning e-Learning (ADL)
=> $75,000 per student hour => $36,000 per student hour
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27. Future …
• Convincing the Generals *+ (Budget holders) this is
worth doing (not with “cool” but with metrics)
• Should NATO be involved? (Nations seem to be doing fine ….
at least some of them) (Smart Defence – share, cooperate, inform)
• NATO E&T adoption …. Serious engagement - Resources
• AWARENESS (Industry, academia, nations)
• Mobile adoption “Fit the students needs”
• Challenges – Work to solve the ability to share between
nations both from industry and goverments
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28. Supreme
Allied
Commander
Transformation
Paul Thurkettle
Education & Training Technologies Section
Joint Education Training & Exercises
paul.thurkettle@act.nato.int
757 -747-3360
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