Preparing for International Operations in a Cyberworld: A Norwegian Army Example

Understanding culture is an integral part of international operations in developing countries and conflict zones. Cultural encounters in countries such as Afghanistan might introduce a number of challenges. This paper presents the experiences with the CAMO project (Cultural Awareness in Military Operations) seeking to address these challenges. The goal of the project has been to create a game-based simulation in the virtual world of Second Life for pre-deployment cultural awareness training among Norwegian military personnel preparing for service in Afghanistan. At the same time, due to the gradual withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan, training cultural awareness among civilian personnel becomes more important. This paper will present some experiences from the CAMO project, discussing how the proposed methodology could be extended for non-military use as well, and outlining the challenges and directions for future work.