- Aug 23, 2003
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Insurgents Making More Powerful Bombs
By ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer
WASHINGTON - Roadside bombs, which have been the Iraqi insurgents' main weapon against U.S. troops for more than a year, are getting larger and more powerful, a Pentagon official said Friday.
Termed "improvised explosive devices," or IEDs, by the U.S. military, the homemade bombs often are planted along roads used by U.S. troops and detonated remotely with makeshift triggering devices.
"We've noticed in the recent couple of weeks that the IEDs are all being built more powerfully, with more explosive effort," although the number of bombs has declined, Army Brig. Gen. David Rodriguez, the Joint Staff's deputy director for regional operations, told reporters.
Separately, Pentagon officials said Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld had dispatched to Iraq a retired Army four-star general, Gary Luck, to assess progress in developing U.S.-trained Iraqi security forces and recommend ways to speed that process.
"He's just a wealth of knowledge and has been used in a variety of mentoring capacities for a lot of senior general officers," said Larry Di Rita, a Rumsfeld spokesman. He said Luck's mission was limited to the matter of Iraqi security forces, not broader U.S. Iraq policy.
On IEDs, Rodriguez was responding to a question about the implications of an attack Thursday in Baghdad in which a roadside bomb struck a Bradley Fighting Vehicle, one of the more heavily armored U.S. military vehicles, killing all seven U.S. soldiers inside and destroying the vehicle.
"The way we're going to overcome that is a multi-pronged effort," Rodriguez said, noting that U.S. forces are striving to obtain better intelligence to prevent IED attacks before they happen.
The roadside bombs have been so effective that the Army has been adding armor to more vehicles, even trucks that haul supplies, as well as Humvees used as utility vehicles. Although that is believed to have saved lives, the attack on the Bradley showed that even heavily protected vehicles cannot always escape the deadly effects of IEDs, Rodriguez said.
Roadside bombs also have targeted U.S.-trained Iraqi troops and police. Earlier this week insurgents planted an explosive device with the decapitated body of a civilian in the northern city of Tall Afar, and when Iraqi police checked the corpse it exploded, killing one policeman.
Over the last two weeks, IEDs have been packed with larger amounts of explosives, Rodriguez said. Although there have been fewer, they have grown more powerful, he said.
"It's difficult to assess the trend in this particular threat, but it's one we're going after aggressively," Di Rita said. He added that U.S. commanders believe they are making progress in finding IEDs before they strike, and that the bombs have been "less sophisticated, more spectacular."
By ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer
WASHINGTON - Roadside bombs, which have been the Iraqi insurgents' main weapon against U.S. troops for more than a year, are getting larger and more powerful, a Pentagon official said Friday.
Termed "improvised explosive devices," or IEDs, by the U.S. military, the homemade bombs often are planted along roads used by U.S. troops and detonated remotely with makeshift triggering devices.
"We've noticed in the recent couple of weeks that the IEDs are all being built more powerfully, with more explosive effort," although the number of bombs has declined, Army Brig. Gen. David Rodriguez, the Joint Staff's deputy director for regional operations, told reporters.
Separately, Pentagon officials said Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld had dispatched to Iraq a retired Army four-star general, Gary Luck, to assess progress in developing U.S.-trained Iraqi security forces and recommend ways to speed that process.
"He's just a wealth of knowledge and has been used in a variety of mentoring capacities for a lot of senior general officers," said Larry Di Rita, a Rumsfeld spokesman. He said Luck's mission was limited to the matter of Iraqi security forces, not broader U.S. Iraq policy.
On IEDs, Rodriguez was responding to a question about the implications of an attack Thursday in Baghdad in which a roadside bomb struck a Bradley Fighting Vehicle, one of the more heavily armored U.S. military vehicles, killing all seven U.S. soldiers inside and destroying the vehicle.
"The way we're going to overcome that is a multi-pronged effort," Rodriguez said, noting that U.S. forces are striving to obtain better intelligence to prevent IED attacks before they happen.
The roadside bombs have been so effective that the Army has been adding armor to more vehicles, even trucks that haul supplies, as well as Humvees used as utility vehicles. Although that is believed to have saved lives, the attack on the Bradley showed that even heavily protected vehicles cannot always escape the deadly effects of IEDs, Rodriguez said.
Roadside bombs also have targeted U.S.-trained Iraqi troops and police. Earlier this week insurgents planted an explosive device with the decapitated body of a civilian in the northern city of Tall Afar, and when Iraqi police checked the corpse it exploded, killing one policeman.
Over the last two weeks, IEDs have been packed with larger amounts of explosives, Rodriguez said. Although there have been fewer, they have grown more powerful, he said.
"It's difficult to assess the trend in this particular threat, but it's one we're going after aggressively," Di Rita said. He added that U.S. commanders believe they are making progress in finding IEDs before they strike, and that the bombs have been "less sophisticated, more spectacular."
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