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Can Statistics Predict the Outcome of a War?

Posted by kdawson on from the first-you-have-to-get-the-inputs-right dept.

StatisticallyDeadGuy writes "A University of Georgia scientist has developed a statistical system that can, she claims, predict the outcome of wars with an accuracy of 80 percent. Her approach, applied retrospectively, says the US chance of victory in the first Gulf War was 93%, while the poor Soviets only had a 7% chance in Afghanistan (if only they'd known; failure maybe triggered the collapse of the USSR). As for the current Iraq conflict: the US started off with a 70% chance of a successful regime change, which was duly achieved — but extending the mission past this to support a weak government has dropped the probability of ultimate success to 26%. Full elaboration of the forecasting methodology is laid out in a new paper (subscription required — link goes to the abstract). Some details can be gleaned from her 2006 draft (PDF)."

7 of 572 comments (clear)

  1. 100% likely outcome by quokkapox · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Is that lots of people are going to suffer and die, and lots of money will be spent, usually with detrimental results to all parties involved.

    Oh yeah, and the companies that make bombs and guns will get richer.

    --
    it's a blue bright blue Saturday hey hey
    1. Re:100% likely outcome by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Is that lots of people are going to suffer and die, and lots of money will be spent, usually with detrimental results to all parties involved.

      Yep. Those original 13 colonies are still licking their wounds.

    2. Re:100% likely outcome by pchan- · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Can Statistics Predict the Outcome of a War?

      No. Statistics can never predict the outcome, they can only give you a probability of an outcome. That is, of course, unless the probability is 0 or 100%.

    3. Re:100% likely outcome by R2.0 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      "We are human beings, not lions or baboons. We're able to exchange knowledge to better ourselves and thereby avoid conflict through negotiation and compromise."

      HAAAhahahaha! What a hoot! I always like to start the day with a good laugh, and this one's a belly shaker. Can I have some of the air your breathing on your planet? 'Cause it sure isn't Earth.

      For those of us who need to live in THIS reality, here's an idea: War is a result of *being* human, not a relic from our bestial past. Animals don't go to war. They fight, individually and as a family or pack, but that's it. War, with tactics, strategy, and politics, is uniquely human construct. War will ALWAYS be with us, at least as long as we remain "human". Perhaps Homo Sapiens will evolve into Homo Pacificus (pardon my Latin, it's been over 20 years), but we won't act, or probably even look, like we do now.

      There is a quote that goes something like "'Peace' is a fictional condition, posited from the fact that there have been periods of relative inactivity between wars." An individual or tribe may not be fighting, and a nation or state may not be in battle, but *humans* will always have war.

      (BTW, $5. for whoever can tell me where that quote is from. Really - Paypal or cash in an envelope. I've been searching for the source and exact text for years.)

      --
      "As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly." A. Carlson
  2. If i'm reading this correctly by grahamsz · · Score: 5, Insightful

    She took a bunch of historical information about wars, built a model and then when run on that historical information it was 80% accurate.

    Amazing stuff.

  3. Psychohistory by ttys00 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Hari Seldon, is that you?

  4. Re:Project Management by dbolger · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I know I'm going to get modded offtopic at best here, but wasn't the point of the invasion to stop Iraq from deploying its extensive stockpiles of WMDs? Wasn't it supposed to be a pre-emptive strike to get him before he got America and its allies? Toppling Hussein was supposed to be a byproduct of that, but it was not the primary goal.

    You're right, statistical prediction is unlikely to suceed if every couple of months the goal of your war changes, but its next to impossible if even the initial point of the war gets retconned. How far can this go?

    We're going into Iraq to stop Saddam and his WMDs.

    No WMDs found? Oh, then we came to Iraq to stop Saddam and free the Iraqi people.

    Saddam gone and there's still fighting? Then we came to Iraq to fight the terrorists there so we dont have to fight them here.

    Terrorism worldwide increasing despite, or possibly /because/ of the invasion? Then, erm... SUPPORT OUR TROOPS!

    How far can you push this? No statistical model, no battle plan can succeed if the people in charge can't even make up their mind what they are fighting for.