English

A Proof of the Bomber Problem's Spend-It-All Conjecture

Probability 2011-03-03 v1 Statistics Theory Statistics Theory

Abstract

The Bomber Problem concerns optimal sequential allocation of partially effective ammunition xx while under attack from enemies arriving according to a Poisson process over a time interval of length tt. In the doubly-continuous setting, in certain regions of (x,t)(x,t)-space we are able to solve the integral equation defining the optimal survival probability and find the optimal allocation function K(x,t)K(x,t) exactly in these regions. As a consequence, we complete the proof of the "spend-it-all" conjecture of Bartroff et al. (2010b) which gives the boundary of the region where K(x,t)=xK(x,t)=x.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1103.0309,
  title  = {A Proof of the Bomber Problem's Spend-It-All Conjecture},
  author = {Jay Bartroff},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1103.0309},
  year   = {2011}
}
R2 v1 2026-06-21T17:33:55.427Z