Game-Politics: Wargames with the U.S. Army

On 24 October 2025, at 10:03, the Universidade Lusófona hosted a webinar entitled “Game-Politics: Wargames with the U.S. Army”, featuring the presentation by Dr Aggie Hirst, Associate Professor in the Department of War Studies at King’s College London.

Dr Hirst has been researching since 2017 the resurgence of wargames in the U.S. armed forces, examining how games and simulations are used as tools for training, planning, and cognitive development. Based on over 100 hours of interviews with practitioners, her study reveals how the act of playing can serve both as a learning instrument and as a behavioural conditioning mechanism. 

According to Dr Hirst, “what matters is not what we play, but how we play.” She encourages a critical reflection on the use of games in military training processes, raising ethical and political questions about transforming a playful activity into a means of cultivating force and discipline.