Decentralized algorithms for netcentric force protection against antiship missiles

We model a decentralized network of decision makers charged with optimally deploying hardkill and/or softkill weapons (countermeasures (CMs)) to defend a task group from antiship missiles. Each platform (decision maker) observes missile threats using a combination of shipboard sensor measurement data and data from other ships, but acts independently when controlling its own weapon systems to cooperatively pursue the defensive objectives of the task group in a decentralized fashion. The main results are a formulation of the missile deflection problem as a stochastic shortest path Markovian game with constraints, a characterization of the Nash equilibrium solution, and a decentralized algorithm for computing the Nash equilibrium when the stochastic game is collaborative. Numerical examples are given to demonstrate the equilibrium policies and illustrate their sensitivity to the missile dynamics.