Veterans, gamers, history buffs and gun enthusiasts are shelling out to take part in military simulations. …
The Look 2020
Veterans, gamers, history buffs and gun enthusiasts are shelling out to take part in military simulations.
Photographs by Christopher Lee
Text by Chris Jones
Image
MilSim West is one of several companies that host military simulation events in the United States, including in Clovis, Calif., pictured here.Credit…Christopher Lee for The New York Times
In February, a group of several hundred military enthusiasts gathered to play-fight in Clovis, Calif., at the foot of the Sierra Nevada.
They had come for an event called the Road to Kharkiv, a simulation of a fictional NATO mission into Eastern Ukraine, hosted by a company called MilSim West. Roughly half of the participants played NATO troops; the other half, Russian forces. Visually, they were almost indistinguishable from a real-life military unit.
In MilSim — a portmanteau for “military simulation” —
