Land Warfare: IEDs concentrate military minds in Middle East | ADM Mar 08

1 March 2008

By Gregor Ferguson

One of the most sobering presentations at LWC 2007 was by BRIG Phil Winter, Commander of the ADF's Improvised Explosive Device (IED) Task Force.

Without disclosing sensitive data he provided a clear insight into the posed to Australian and Coalition troops in Iraq and Afghanistan by IEDs.

In Iraq, said Winter, some 70 per cent of coalition casualties were caused by IEDs; these were running at 90-100 incidents per day.

In Afghanistan the rate at the time of LWC 2007 was around 130 a month.

The IEDs reflect the type of enemy the Coalition faces: he is adaptive, and the threat therefore evolves as the enemy learns and innovates.

In Iraq the terrorists have targeted A-vehicles as well as soft-skinned vehicles, using Explosively-Formed Projectiles (EFP) and under-belly IEDs intended to penetrate heavy armour.

They have also used Radio-Controlled IEDs (RCIED), though as counter-measures to these evolve there is an emerging pattern of command wire and pressure plate-initiated IEDs.

In Afghanistan the Taliban is following in the footsteps of the Al-Qaida jihadists in Iraq: they employ RCIEDs, pressure plates and command wires, along with suicide bombers.

Analysts believe it's possible that EFPs will appear in Afghanistan in the future also.

The response to the threat is multi-fold; Winter sums it up in three key strands - Train, Defeat and Attack.

Training isn't just a matter of techniques, skills and processes, he said.

It's about inculcating a CIED culture among troops deploying to threatened areas.

And continuity of training is vital.

Defeating the threat is partly a matter of attacking the network behind the IED attacks, and gathering and employing the best possible Weapons Technical Intelligence from across the Coalition to help enhance force protection.

What about the Science and Technology (S&T) response?

This is a multi-faceted approach embracing the development of training systems, Device Characterisation capabilities, Change Detection techniques to help identify the location of possible IEDs, and of course protection of both personnel and vehicles.

Ongoing and future work demands interagency cooperation within Australia and effective international engagement across the Coalition, BRIG Winter said.

Specific areas of focus remain armour protection, persistent ISR, the development of organic CIED capabilities within units, systems integration, personal protection, new techniques for dealing with blast and fragmentation injuries and more study of the psychological impact of CIED operations.

Success in this business depends on many factors, Winter concluded: 60 per cent of it is due to good training and doctrine; about 30 per cent is due to equipment - and 10 per cent of it is due to what he termed the X-factor.

L-3 tackles IED threat

L-3 Communications' British subsidiary TRL Technology was unable to disclose much of the detail of its Counter IED systems on display at LWC 07.

The company makes a range of CIED RF counter measures devices under the collective name BroadShield which are in service with 16 Coalition partners in Iraq and Afghanistan, including Australia.

One of the areas of greatest concern to soldiers in the field is the threat of IEDs and especially Radio Controlled devices (RCIED), the company says.

The ability to defeat this threat can shift the balance of power on the ground quite dramatically by increasing the confidence of troops on patrol, and is an area where L-3 TRL believes it is achieving genuine success.

On display in Adelaide were the 10W Tactical Manpack (TMP) system weighing 15lb (6.5kg) and Modular Vehicle System (MVS) system capable of emitting 50-100W; this can be used for both vehicle and static base protection.

The TMP and MVS are based on L-3 TRL Technology's successful Compact EW System architecture.

They are designed for a high-threat environment and incorporate payload boxes with a 'mission fill' designed to counter identified threats at different frequencies.

The radios they employ are TRL digital radios.

The development of mission fills is an intelligence-led activity, ADM was told, drawing on HUMINT, SIGINT, reports from Ammunition Technical Officers (ATO) and post-incident analysis.

Being a UK company, TRL Technology isn't hampered by US ITAR restrictions and is acknowledged to be more 'coalition-friendly' than a US supplier.

The BroadShield philosophy is to carry out frequency management and selection at the highest levels in-theatre, then for the ECM solution to loaded onto a PC or secure "Fill Gun" to fill the transmitter.

The filling takes place at unit level.

With the lower-powered TMP device the emphasis is on identifying priority threats: the TMP has a receiver which detects threats and initiates counter-measures; in some areas it is necessary to broadcast a jamming signal continuously as there is no time to jam a threat signal if this is detected.

Where threats allow, in other areas "Hybrid jamming" - a mix of continuous and reactive jamming - is possible, which preserves battery life.