MISSILE BATTERY PLACEMENT FOR AIR DEFENSE - A DYNAMIC-PROGRAMMING APPROACH

A procedure to evaluate surface-to-air missile battery placement patte rns for air defense is presented. A measure of defense effectiveness i s defined as a function of kill probability of the defense missiles an d the nature of the surrounding terrain features. The concept of cumul ative danger index is used to select the best path for a penetrating h ostile aircraft for any given pattern of placement. The aircraft is as sumed to be intelligent and well-informed. The path is generated using a dynamic programming methodology. The software package so developed can be used off-line to choose the best among a number of possible bat tery placement patterns.