In February 2022, the Joint Staff J7 asked SMA to initiate an effort extending previous work by the Army Training and Doctrine Command’s (TRADOC) Global Cultural Knowledge Network (GCKN), “Exploitable Conditions Framework,” to 1) inform Combatant Commands’ and Services’ ability to compete successfully in the future strategic environment and 2) supplement ongoing investigations into strategic competition.

The Anticipating the Future Operational Environment (AFOE) effort assessed the relationships among global challenges in which major power competition is likely to occur (e.g., revolutionary technology advances, shifting distributions of state power, globalization, climate change, global disease evolution, etc.) in the future operational environment. AFOE produced a theoretical and empirical foundation for understanding the multiple facets of, as well as both the direct and indirect relationships among, conditions in the competitive space —a foundation that is the indispensable basis for successful planning and operations in the strategic environment.

AFOE began as a two-phase effort. Phase I involved building a global, system-of-systems model—the Global Exploitable Conditions Model (GECM)—that reflects the interdependencies among the broad and diverse set of social, political, economic, environmental, technological, and human factors that characterize the current and future operational environment. In Phase II of the AFOE project, the generic GECM served as the foundation for the AFRICOM Exploitable Conditions Model (AECM)—a model of the operational environment tailored specifically to USAFRICOM’s area of responsibility (AOR). The AECM is a system-of-systems model built to reflect general conditions across the 53 countries in USAFRICOM’s AOR.

You can learn more about SMA applied and refined in Phase III.

The following is the list of reports completed in support of this effort. Reports and events can be accessed via the links provided.

*Reports without a link can be requested by emailing mariah.c.yager.ctr@mail.mil from a .mil or .gov email address or visit the SMA NIPR Inteldocs site (CAC-enabled).

AECM Model Reports by NSI

• AECM Report and User’s Guide
• AFRICOM Exploitable Conditions Model (AECM) Network Analysis Report
• Anticipating the Future Operating Environment (AFOE) Sahelian Computation Models Report

Quick Look Reports by NSI

Quick Looks are short, highly-visual, unclassified research reports based on the AECM that reflect a portion of the Phase II research findings using smaller sub-systems of the model to examine key topics.

• Food Security
• Drought
• Floods
• ICT Access
• Mineral Activity
• Urbanization
• Agricultural Production
• Government Surveillance
• Informal Economy
• Information Environment
• Information and Governance
• Population Wellbeing
• Social Ties and Population Resilience
• Peace Operations
• Two applied Quick Looks: Child Soldiers and Shahel Model

Invited Perspectives

• Why are we Integrating now—and how can we Integrate Better? History, Complexity, and Metacognition by Intelligent Biology

*Reports without a link can be requested by emailing mariah.c.yager.ctr@mail.mil from a .mil or .gov email address or visit the SMA NIPR Inteldocs site (CAC-enabled).

SMA held a speaker series to support the AFOE effort. Approximately 3,000 audience members dialed into the 24 AFOE speaker events. Links to the recorded events, when available, are below:

• 15 March 2022: Dr. Wayne Porter (Naval Postgraduate School) – Systemic Strategic Thinking, Policy Analysis, and Planning
• 14 April 2022: Prof. Ian Lustick (University of Pennsylvania) – The Perils of Sticky Rhetoric: A Discussion Led by Prof. Ian Lustick
• 5 May 2022: Ms. Nicole Laster (U.S. Army TRADOC G-2, Global Cultural Knowledge Network (GCKN)), LTC (Ret) Andrew Johnson (U.S. Army TRADOC G-2, GCKN) –The Exploitable Conditions Framework: Anticipating Exploitation of the Operational Environment
• 18 May 2022: Dr. Beth Chalecki (University of Nebraska Omaha) – Avoiding a Climate Arms Race: Why We Need the Baruch Plan 2.0 for Climate Geoengineering
• 8 June 2022: Dr. Singumbe Muyeba (University of Denver) – The Nature, Causes, and Consequences of Extreme Inequality and Why It Persists in Sub-Saharan Africa
• 22 June 2022: Dr. Mareike Ohlberg (Asia Program, The German Marshall Fund of the United States) – The CCP’s Ambitions to Control and Manipulate Information Spaces: Theory and Practice
• 14 June 2022: Dr. Lilian Alessa (University of Idaho) – Weaponizing Critical Resources on a Changing Planet
• 12 July 2022: Mr. Peter Zeihan (Zeihan on Geopolitics) – Living Through the End of the World
• 20 July 2022: Ms. Ananya Kumar (Atlantic Council) – Race for the Future of Money: Fragmentation, Competition, and National Security in the World of Distributed Ledger Technology
• 27 July 2022: Mr. Pete Steen (Joint Staff J5) – Value Chains in Flux: Commercial and Geopolitical Imperatives Framing Possible Futures
• 11 August 2022: Prof. Herman Wasserman (University of Cape Town), Dr. Dani Madrid-Morales (University of Sheffield) – Misinformation in Africa: An Overview of Current and Future Research
• 30 August 2022: Dr. Mark Duerksen (Africa Center for Strategic Studies, National Defense University) – Russian Disinformation Strategies in Africa
• 14 September 2022: Dr. Landry Signé (Brookings Institution) – Capitalizing on the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) to Advance Mutual US-Africa Prosperity
• 23 September 2022: Dr. Kathleen Galvin (The Africa Center, Colorado State University) – Climate Change and Food Security in Africa: From the Continent to the Local
• 11 October 2022: Dr. Nicholas Wright (Intelligent Biology) – Why Are We Integrating Now—and How Can We Integrate Better?
• 18 October 2022: Dr. Christopher Blattman (University of Chicago) – Why We Fight: The Roots of War and the Paths to Peace
• 30 November 2022: Dr. Larry Kuznar (NSI) – Modeling Exploitable Conditions in the 21st Century Strategic Environment
• 20 December 2022: Mr. Jon Bateman (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace) – US-China Technological “Decoupling”: Strategy, Policy, and Military Implications
• 10 January 2023: Dr. Anouar Boukhars (Africa Center for Strategic Studies, National Defense University) – Why Extremist Insurgencies Spread: Insights from the Sahel
• 15 February 2023: Dr. Aimée-Noël Mbiyozo (Institute for Security Studies, Africa) – Climate-linked Mobility in Africa: Opportunities and Threats
• 7 March 2023: Mr. Elijah Santiago (Fraym), Ms. Erica Turner (Fraym) – How Kenyans Are Responding to China’s Belt and Road Initiative: Adding Nuance with Hyperlocal Data
• 22 March 2023: Dr. Lina Benabdallah (Wake Forest University) – The Belt and Road Initiative at 10 Years Old and the Future of China-Africa Relations
• 30 March 2023: Dr. Joseph Sany (United States Institute for Peace) – The Dilemmas Posed by the Great Power Competition on Political Transitions and the Security Landscape in the Sahel
• 4 April 2023: Ms. Sam Howell (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace) – Assessing U.S.-China Technology Competition in Africa

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