Below is an excerpt from an article in the Washington Post on US forces using
radio jamming to disrupt the detonation of IEDs against our troops. The link
takes you to the complete article. It was very interesting to me, both as a
radio hobbyist and just as general interest read on the problems and solutions
in Iraq. 73, Curt Curt Phillips, CEM, CMVP
W4CP ex-KD4YU; WB4LHI
ARRL Life; QCWA; SKCC; NASWA
Tar Heel Scanner/SWL Group
Monitoring DC to Daylight
Raleigh, NC
w4cp<at>arrl.net --
The only thing that can defeat the US military is US politicians. 'If you
don't go after the network, you're never going to stop these guys. Never.'
By Rick Atkinson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, October 3, 2007; Page A01
BAGHDAD -- In the early spring of 2006, perhaps the most important document
in Baghdad was known as the MOASS -- the Mother of All Spreadsheets-- a vast
compilation of radio frequencies that insurgents used to trigger roadside
bombs.
In some areas of Iraq, 70 percent of all improvised explosive devices were
radio-controlled, and they caused more than half of all American combat deaths.
An overworked Army intelligence officer tracked the frequencies, and an equally
overworked Navy electrical engineer matched them against 14 varieties of
electronic jammer used by coalition forces.
[SNIP]
By the end of 2006, the Department of Defense had spent more than $1 billion
during the year just on jammers. Fielding them "proved the largest
technological challenge for DOD in the war, on a scale last experienced in
World War II," according to Col. William G. Adamson, a former staff officer for
the Joint IED Defeat Organization (JIEDDO), the Pentagon office coordinating
the campaign.
The U.S. strategy was defined in six words: "Put them back on the wire." By
neutralizing radio-controlled bombs, the jammers would force insurgent
bombmakers to use more rudimentary triggers, such as command wire. Those
triggers would be simpler to detect, in theory, and would bring the triggermen
closer to their bombs, where U.S. troops could capture or kill them.
That strategy has succeeded. In the subsequent 18 months, radio-controlled
bombs would shrink to 10 percent of all IEDs in Iraq.
FULL STORY:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/02/AR2007100202366.html?referrer=emailarticle
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