Ember & Oak Leadership | Decision Lab

Joint Warfighting Decision Simulation

Assume a senior role inside a joint task force and lead one campaign from crisis through culmination. Your decisions alter the operating environment, constrain later options, and return as consequences.

35–45 minutes  |  Four campaign acts  |  Eight connected decisions  |  Doctrine-informed debrief

Operation Resolute Passage

Your command

You are the deputy commander of Joint Task Force Meridian. The fictional island nation of Talaris is facing military coercion from the regional power of Ordan. Ordan is combining maritime pressure, cyber effects, information operations, and long-range strike forces to create a political outcome before the coalition can respond.

Commander’s intent

Prevent a fait accompli, preserve coalition access, protect the force, and retain credible options if deterrence fails.

Planning term: A fait accompli is an adversary action completed quickly enough to leave others with the choice of accepting the outcome or escalating to reverse it.

Your responsibility

Frame the changing problem, integrate the staff, recommend risk, and keep the task force aligned as information and authorities degrade.

How this is different

No answer is scored as simply correct. You must identify what each decision protects, name the risk you accept, and live with delayed consequences.

Campaign debrief

The AAR reconstructs your decision chain, identifies your operating tendencies, connects choices to doctrine, and presents a counterfactual branch.

Choose the learning mode

Individual mode uses competing staff perspectives and reflection prompts to create the friction normally supplied by a group discussion.

Your typed reasoning remains in this browser and is not transmitted or stored externally.

Independent professional-development simulation. This fictional exercise is not affiliated with or endorsed by the Department of War. It does not reproduce the official Joint Warfighting Evaluation or predict performance on any military assessment.

Joint Warfighting Lab | Interactive Wargame

Joint Task Force Command Wargame

Command a fictional joint task force through six operational periods. Employ Air Force, Army, Navy, Marine Corps, and Space Force capabilities alongside joint cyber and special operations forces while managing readiness, access, sustainment, coalition cohesion, and escalation.

30–45 minutes  |  Six operational periods  |  Seven joint components  |  Replayable adversary

Operation Resolute Passage | Theater Command

Your command

You are the commander of Joint Task Force Meridian. Ordan is attempting to isolate the island nation of Talaris and create an irreversible political outcome before the coalition can respond. You must deny a fait accompli without exhausting the force, fracturing the coalition, or losing control of escalation.

Issue joint guidance

Select the supported component, command posture, main effort, and one scarce theater enabler during each operational period.

Employ components

Select a component and then select a mission. You can commit no more than five components per period. Uncommitted components recover readiness.

Read the adversary

Ordan follows one of several hidden strategies. Its actions provide indicators, but some reports will be incomplete or deceptive.

Create joint effects

Component capabilities overlap but are not interchangeable. Cross-domain combinations and correct sequencing create advantages.

Independent professional-development wargame. This fictional exercise uses no classified information and is not affiliated with or endorsed by the Department of War. It does not reproduce an official assessment.