Rolling-Horizon Scheduling Algorithm for Dynamic Weapon-Target Assignment in Air Defense Engagement

In the real-world air defense operations, efficient weapon-target assignment is essential for the successful protection of defensive assets under the limited capability of simultaneous engagement of radars and the restricted number of weapons. Also the assignment must be adjusted dynamically according to the battle environment where trajectory of targets and engagement results are continuously changing. This study presents a mathematical model based on rolling-horizon scheduling algorithms for the dynamic weapon-target assignment decision making. The performances are evaluated for the various test scenarios under the consideration of the actual air defense operation, which are compared with the Shoot-Look-Shoot algorithm, the typical air defense policy. The results show the superiority of the proposed rolling-horizon scheduling algorithm in most of test scenarios.