Military question?

Question

Why are our troups getting blown up by I.E.D.s?
Arnt we suppose to have allot of hi tec equipment?
I dont understand, It seems like something like a metal detector would find these I.E.D.s
Please explain if you have knowledge on this.

Answer 1

I'm in the air force and i have been to Iraq twice both for 8 months each... its not that easy... you have to realize when you are moving at 40 - 80 MPH you dint have time for metal detectors and if we did use them we would never make it to our destination if we stopped for every warning... we are getting better armor and we know the usual signs of an IED, but they are always coming up with new ways of hitting us... the Iraqis are always rebuilding their roads and sometimes the insurgents pay the builders to allow them to plant IEDs in the road to be built over so they aren't easily detected... it is easy to say we should have a way to not get hit when you havent been over there, but its not that easy... i could go on for days if you want to talk about it or hear some more i would gladly talk to you about it... if you want to

Answer 2

Improvised Explosive Device(s), Booby traps, etc might not have a lot of metal in them or be placed in areas with a lot of metal from building or shrapnel around. Many explosives have no metal at all, not even in the detonator mechanism. Soviet and USA land mines are good examples of these. Other detectors have been tried, from explosive sniffing dogs to bees that are attracted to the explosives. And even if the road is swept that does not mean that it is still safe ten minutes later.
another feature is that it might be something both metallic and heavy that does not look out of place. IED have at times been included in such things as cheap radios(boombox is a bad pun in this case) wired to detonate if you turn it on.

Answer 3

You don't need high-tech equipment to kill people. You can kill with your bare hands if you wanted. A knife is hardly high-tech and it could do alot of damage.There is so much metal in cities those metal detectors would be going off every time they found a pipe in the ground. Besides alot of land mines don't have metal in them, they are made of plastics.During World War 2 the English devised a way to fool German radar by throwing metal foil into the sky and fooling them.The Germans ended up chasing phatoms while the English bombed them where they didnt expect. Radar was high-tech, the metal foil was low-tech and it worked.Technoghy should be used as a tool to help us not replace us thinking for ourselves. Anything can be overcome.

Answer 4

The people devising Improvised Explosive Devices have been rather creative in building the bombs.

For instance, with all the rebuilding and new construction, who would believe that a bomb has been built into a street curb???????

And even if you are looking for that, how do you check ALL of the new street curbs.

Perhaps you could take your metal detector over there and show us how it should be done. Let me know and I will pay your way.

Answer 5

There are many reasons for this, actually.
First, let's start with what an IED IS. It is an improvised explosive device, meaning it can be ANYTHING. Literally, ANYTHING.
Second, soldiers do sweeps constantly. BUT, soldiers are human, sometimes they make mistakes. A friend of my husband's and mine was seriously injured by an IED because the driver of the five-ton he was in got careless, and wasn't paying attention to the road.
We DO have high tech equipment. Most times, our soldiers are able to avoid IED's, especially now that IED training is a requirement before a soldier deploys.
Hope this helps.

Answer 6

Not all I.E.D.'s are made out of metal. Improvised Explosive Devices are made out of what ever the enemy can get their hands on. Plus sometimes they are in places that you would never expect, for example insurgents have strapped I.E.D.'s to their own bodies before just to get the job done. Would you honestly expect for some random guy on the street to blow himself up next to you? They also have figured out ways to cleverly disguise these bombs so that we won't find them until it's too late. These are just a few reasons. But the ones that are found are either disarmed or blown up by the Explosive Ordinance Disposal guys.

Answer 7

For the exact reason it's called an Improvised Explosive Device. They tape some explosive to a piece of plastic or put it under something that looks like junk lying on the ground. It's programmed to a cell phone signal. When the vehicle or human comes by, the coward muslim dials a phone number and the signal sets off a charge that causes it to blow up.

Troops cannot stop at every piece of junk they see on the road, they would never get anyplace.

Answer 8

First, who is going to use a metal detector over the entire area of operations? That is absurd.

Second, many explosive devises nolonger use metal, or hidden in cars which are made of metal. How on earth would you find them?

Low tech gurreilla warfare is always effective. there is no way to stop short of getting rid of those that wage it.

Answer 9

IED's are placed on the side of roads, and are often camouflaged from view. Some are placed inside parked cars along the roads. The bomber waits for the military convoy to pass by, and when there is a lightly armored vehicle, such as a HMMWV, they detonate it.

If the bombs are discovered before detonation, the nearest EOD unit will respond to take care of it.

Answer 10

As others have noted... they are IMPROVISED... bury like a mine, or use in a parked car, or disguise as trash... WE have to patrol, they put them in our routes... and boom.

There ARE alot of cute hi-tech gadgets... things that disprupted the signals when they were using garage-door openers to detonate... robot-vehicles to detonate pressure or magnetic IED's, etc. But all that takes time and money to develop.

Technology is almost always behind... plus, military spending was cut tremendously following the first Gulf War (1991) thru to 2002.

Plus, Rummie hadn't PLANNED on a war-of-occupation or insurgents.