Armed Assault save files are stored in the same format as binarized config files http://community.bistudio.com/wiki/raP_File_Format_-_Elite, and can be viewed and unpacked with the same tools.
A save file may contain the following main classes:
A list of global variables. At the current time (1.08) ArmA will crash when restoring a saved game that has more than 240 entries in the variables list.