🧠 Key Takeaways
- Wargaming fills the gap between known inputs and unpredictable human behavior.
- It’s not a replacement for models—but a complement when models fail.
- Escalation dynamics, logistics responses, and decision ambiguity are central to emerging risks from climate, cyber, and conflict.
- Wargaming is a tool not just for prediction, but for planning, stress-testing, and cross-silo communication.
When a model can’t give you the answer, do you turn to people?
In the latest episode of the Risky Science Podcast Dr. Jeremy Sepinsky, Lead Wargame Designer for The Center for Naval Analyses (CNA) talks about how wargaming is being used to simulate and understand complex, non-deterministic risks—from global conflict to natural disasters and cyber warfare.
While many of our readers and listeners live in the world of Monte Carlo simulations and catastrophe models, Sepinsky argues that even the most advanced risk models fall short when the outcome hinges on human decision-making under pressure.
“If you have a model that will solve your problem—use it,” he says. “But wargaming is for when the inputs are unclear or the decision process can’t be defined.”
That distinction matters more than ever as insurers, reinsurers, and governments try to model everything from geopolitical escalation in Iran to increasingly extreme natural disasters. Traditional catastrophe models can estimate structural loss or hazard probabilities. But who decides to evacuate a coastal city before a hurricane makes landfall? How do political actors respond to a cyberattack or a global supply chain shock?
In these scenarios, uncertainty is driven less by physics and more by behavior.
Sepinsky, who holds a Ph.D. in astrophysics, describes his approach as “programming with people.” He sees experts not as players in a board game, but as living functions—subject matter authorities whose decisions shape the simulation in real time. Whether modeling post-earthquake FEMA logistics or escalation scenarios in the Strait of Hormuz, the key is to capture decision logic that models simply can’t reproduce.
Wargaming, as practiced by CNA, has been applied to oil spills, hurricanes, cyber warfare, and even information operations. While it’s most closely associated with military planning, the method is gaining new relevance in the civilian risk sector as firms and governments seek more flexible, human-centric scenario tools.
“Wargaming helps us explore not just what could happen,” Sepinsky explains, “but why it happens—and how decision-makers misinterpret or respond to signals that traditional models miss.”
This is especially true in geopolitics. Sepinsky walks through how a wargame might handle conflict escalation with Iran—where miscommunication, cultural differences, and political pressure all shape the outcome. Unlike deterministic campaign models that track force movements and attrition, a wargame can pause, assess, and reflect real-world ambiguity: Who chooses to negotiate? Who misreads a maneuver as a provocation?
🎙️ Listen Now: Wargaming, Combat Modeling, and Escalation Risk With CNA’s Dr. Jeremy Sepinsky
