An Attrition Game

This paper describes a two-person zero-sum game in function space concerning the optimal allocation of a homogenous defense force on different levels of readiness. The second player, the attacker, wants to determine the time for the attack such that the cost is minimized. As the defense is subject to attrition, a delay is preferable for the attacker. This is balanced, however, by a delay cost which increases with time. The existence of a solution consisting of a pure defense strategy and a mixed strategy for the attack time is proved elsewhere. This paper mainly treats an approximation of the game with a time-discrete version for which an algorithm is derived. Arbitrarily close upper and lower bounds of the value of the original game can be obtained by the algorithm, as well as feasible defense and attacker strategies that realize these value estimates. Computational results are given for two simple problems, one of which is also solved analytically.