Suicide bombers.. how do we spot the bastards?

[SD]

Hi guys..

I have very few Ideas on the subject, and I only had one "potential SIED" during my tour, but I´d like to know more, and learn to spot and eleminate the threat.

Whats the Israeli way for instanse?

SD

[Argyll]

If you could spot them then you could react,trouble is you really can't spot them until it's two late

[Werewolf01]

They run screamng at you with a vest made of explosives?

[UoUo]

Hi guys..

I have very few Ideas on the subject, and I only had one "potential SIED" during my tour, but I´d like to know more, and learn to spot and eleminate the threat.

Whats the Israeli way for instanse?

SD

Hm....

57 years of experience.

And hell alot of cops in the streets and the borders.

[bluffcove]

If they are female they will generally ask:

Does my bomb look big in this?

Honestly though, what are you going to do if you recognise the bomber?
other than run! I think trying to arrest, apprehend or detain someone with an explosive taped to them is going to be hard enough as it is.

Rubber Shoes.

Jacket with them, wearing thick clothing
Looking fat.

mumbling to himself (praying)

Freshly shaved and perfumed (in preparation of burial, hmmm damn you smell good!)

With a bag, some sort of cloth hiding something on their hands.

Will just appear from nowhere.

Works Alone usually, but it depends, it might be consecutive bombings.

Most suicide bombers are young - between 17 and 30 years of age.

Usually you don't see this guys close enough, well if you do that's great because you are already dead.

Well this guys or basically suicide bombers simply detonate their explosive-strapped bodies, suicide bombers first hurl grenades and shoot into the crowd to inflict maximum damage, then top off their operation by detonating themselves. They also position themselves near pillars so that the explosion will bring down the roof causing more casualties.


Hope this will help, happy hunting. Well not really just being sarcastic, put yourself in one piece.

Richardson.

[Uhlan]

If they are female they will generally ask:

Does my bomb look big in this?



:D

[Mark_Aspen]

Uouo isn't entirely facetious. 50+ years of police/military practice, and citizen awareness make it a little easier, but not foolproof. We too fall victim to changes in political or diplomatic climate and let down the guard.

In general, we look for people acting out of character and displaying, how do I say it, a different or wrong kind of stress. If I'm at a roadblock in Jenin, I expect the Palestinians going through to be nervous, upset, maybe angry (I'll get to that in a moment). What I'm looking for is the one who isn't following the pattern, maybe is too overdressed even when you build in that adult Palestinians don't dress down to the degree Americans, Dutch or even Israelis will. He's too fidgety, she isn't demure enough. What does that mean? There are strict social norms for female behavior, especially single women, in Palestinian society; at this place and time (an Israeli roadblock) deviant behavior sticks out.

In the several times I've flown to the US, both before and after 9/11, I've been unimpressed with their security measures. The ticket agent blindly asking if my bags have always been with me, has anyone asked me to bring a package... all that stuff is pointless if he/she is also processiing your ticket, finding a bag label and assigining a seat. I also understand that El-Al has as many flights in one day as a small US airline does in an hour.

As to IEDs, it got to the piont in Lebanon that we wouldn't let civil traffic mix with our patrols and convoys.

[jason82]

Uouo isn't entirely facetious. 50+ years of police/military practice, and citizen awareness make it a little easier, but not foolproof. We too fall victim to changes in political or diplomatic climate and let down the guard.

In general, we look for people acting out of character and displaying, how do I say it, a different or wrong kind of stress. If I'm at a roadblock in Jenin, I expect the Palestinians going through to be nervous, upset, maybe angry (I'll get to that in a moment). What I'm looking for is the one who isn't following the pattern, maybe is too overdressed even when you build in that adult Palestinians don't dress down to the degree Americans, Dutch or even Israelis will. He's too fidgety, she isn't demure enough. What does that mean? There are strict social norms for female behavior, especially single women, in Palestinian society; at this place and time (an Israeli roadblock) deviant behavior sticks out.

In the several times I've flown to the US, both before and after 9/11, I've been unimpressed with their security measures. The ticket agent blindly asking if my bags have always been with me, has anyone asked me to bring a package... all that stuff is pointless if he/she is also processiing your ticket, finding a bag label and assigining a seat. I also understand that El-Al has as many flights in one day as a small US airline does in an hour.

As to IEDs, it got to the piont in Lebanon that we wouldn't let civil traffic mix with our patrols and convoys.

I'll concur on this one. We've been taught to look for loners, obviously nervous people, fidgety behavior, people won't make eye contact, etc.

Even though these terrorists are brainwashed heavily enough to want to blow themselves up in a crowd of people, it's kind of hard not to be nervous when you know that you are in your last few minutes on this planet.

The sad truth is though. that it's very hard to spot them once they are in the final phase of the mission. The majority of bombings are stopped by good intellegence and detterence, not by alert policemen/soldiers.

[Aerosoul]

Honestly though, what are you going to do if you recognise the bomber? other than run! I think trying to arrest, apprehend or detain someone with an explosive taped to them is going to be hard enough as it is.

Screw detaining them. If possible, take them out before they took you. Most of em are in cars, correct? Just hope they make it a little obvious that they're about to do something, and light that car up with all the fire you got.

Of course, I understand it can't be easy. Just wish it was.

On that note, any of you guys tha are going out there, good luck. :|

[Atlantic Friend]

"Suicide bombers.. how do we spot the bastards?"


Lemme see...Yes, there's something : they all tend to have propellers, this big, black red sun painted on the side of the plane, and pilots heavily stinking of sake, for some reason...

I refuse to let suicide mujaheedins impede my passion for bad jokes ! :bash:

[Bia]

They run screamng at you with a vest made of explosives?

Hahaha...too funny.

But....true. ;)

[Aerosoul]

They run screamng at you with a vest made of explosives?

Hahaha...too funny.

But....true. ;)

Is it? Cause I don't remember many stories of some fool just running at a checkpoint screaming Allah Akbar. Too bad it isn't true. If it were that easy, we'd be out by now.

[Bia]

They run screamng at you with a vest made of explosives?

Hahaha...too funny.

But....true. ;)

Is it? Cause I don't remember many stories of some fool just running at a checkpoint screaming Allah Akbar. Too bad it isn't true. If it were that easy, we'd be out by now.

I realise this....and was being facetious.
:)

[UoUo]

Well there are alot of events when sucide****ers got into a bus and the driver suspected them and he push them out side the bus and save the lifes of the passngers.


BTW : sucideboomers will most likely tries to blow them self in close area beacuse of the impact of exsplosion in close place.

[Midav]

Kinda like the EOD shirt: If you see me running try to keep up...

[(-USTASHI-SNIPER-)]

well its basically impossible to find a sucide bomber...

[Sayeret]

-Clothing they are wearing, for example wearing a winter coat during the summer.

-Often suicide bombers stare out into the distance.

-Hands may be clinched.

-Age group, suicide bombers are often young.

[PigSnake]

although what was mentioned above WERE they main ways one could spot a suicide bomber (ie: young, male, long coats etc), they have progressively evolved in order to elude detection so now we have women, children, older people. For example, one café bombing (in tel-aviv IIRC) a woman carried it out and stopped to talk with the security guard clamly for several minutes before setting herself off.

It must be noted that as soon as a suicide bombing goes off and security forces reach the scene, the first things they do is find witnesses and take their depositions so as to have a clear picture of how the bomber looked like, how they behaved etc hopefully to have alittle moe insight and be able to be one step ahgead of them.

bottom line is though that there is now way to make some sort of "manual" to aid in detection (for the reasons i tried explaining above) especially because one keeps looking out for one thing and therefore risks missing the other (ie: one looks out for a young clean shaven man with a long coat in summer and doesnt notice a suicide bomber with blond hair and a fake pregnancy). the key is to be alert at all times....

[Jedburgh]

SD, you mentioned a tour in Iraq....if you are US military, you have access to the Center for Army Lessons Learned (https://call2.army.mil/frontend/deers/ako-login.asp) website.

Once you're logged in, go to Collections, then you will find IED under Focus Areas. That will link you to the Joint IED Defeat Task Force resource area. That gives you access to IED newsletters from Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as quite a few GTAs and Smart Cards dealing with IEDs. There's also contact information, so you can request hard copies of what's on-line and more updated info as available.

http://madmikey.mu.nu/archives/Suicide%20Bomber%20Barbie.jpg

[Shiftyfive]

The one my brother was in - they didnt spot it - until the boom. They were damn lucky the sack o **** set it off early/and the armored truck absorbed a lot of the blast. His buddies got hit a week earlier with a naplam ied - they were not very lucky - his good friend was really injured badly and when I think about the horrible things he has had to indure I get very emotional inside - and I have never met the young man, but I think about him often.

[SD]

Your right..

But Im sure there is indicators of a suiside bomb.
I´ve heard they show the specifics of a martyr ( islamic bombers) for instanse. Thats the stuff Im fishing for.

[woofer]

In Northern Ireland PIRA used the PROXY bomb they would hold someones family hostage and strap them into a van full of explosives and tell them that if they didnt drive into a vehicle check point and detonate they would kill the hostages...

To counter this we would obviously keep well spread out(like an ambush with cut offs) and in permanant check points make maximum use of hard cover. Only one person would approach the vehicle. And because of this PROXY threat we would have wire cutters to throw to the driver off the vehicle whilst we legged it to cover. The wire cutters wont matter where you are but it was an 'attempt' to help the driver who was forced into the situation.

up the RA :roll:

[PigSnake]

Your right..

But Im sure there is indicators of a suiside bomb.
I´ve heard they show the specifics of a martyr ( islamic bombers) for instanse. Thats the stuff Im fishing for.

what do you mean?

[SD]

Disregard my last message.. I didn’t update the page, and didn’t see the answers.

This input is very helpfull. Thank you everyone.

[b33f]

If they are female they will generally ask:

Does my bomb look big in this?

Honestly though, what are you going to do if you recognise the bomber?
other than run! I think trying to arrest, apprehend or detain someone with an explosive taped to them is going to be hard enough as it is.

(if there is enough time left and you're ready:)
Kiss their chess with a 40mm HEDP...
Talk about stopping power...

Good insigths their woofer. I fear that you are giving too much information! hehe! yes, wire cutters just wondering if that person would be able to use it... he might be in alot of shaking...

[S'13]

If you could spot them then you could react,trouble is you really can't spot them until it's two late

You have a point, however there have been times when bus drivers/security personal managed to react and save lives.

You should read this article:
http://www.wzo.org.il/en/resources/view.asp?id=1391

[Sharp]

how do we spot the bastards?

The best way is, i think, to not let them a reason to "bomb" peoples..

[big80a2]

how do we spot the bastards?

The best way is, i think, to not let them a reason to "bomb" peoples..
man, burning all the korans will kill the ozon

[SD]

To Jedburgh:

I’m not American but Danish, so the US Army sites are out of my reach. But thanks. We’re doing our tours in the Basra region, where the IED´s aren’t as big an issue as in Baghdad yet. So far we Danes have taken very few casualties, and the SOP on IED warfare is therefore still under way. As always it takes the sad sight of body bags to get things moving in an Army. We have methods of course, but input and experience is always improvement.

So is opinions, and I have some thoughts I would like to share with you guys.

To make a point I’ll describe the only experience with SIED I’ve had myself. It’s not much, but it got me thinking.
My section was QRF and dispatched to intercept and stop a specific green car on a specific road, that Intel said was a SVBIED. We had no training for this and had to improvise. I’ll skip the details, but we had fixed it so that the car (- when spotted) would be made to stop a distance from the CP we’d established. The idea was that the possible bomber would focus on ( slowly approaching) the two 50 cal pointed at him, and I would then surprise him by charging at him from the side, yelling Arabic commands and aiming strait at his face ( 20 m distance). ROE was simple for the section, but I had to decide whether to shoot or not, based on the man’s body language. I knew that a normal civilian would stare at me (charging) with eyes the size of teacups, while a possible bomber would decide to do something. Therefore: If he had been fumbling with something by the dashboard or focusing on something in his own lap, I would have assumed it was a bomb and killed the guy. Luckily he was a scared civilian who reacted as he was supposed to, and after the car search was concluded and a polite apology made, he left happy. The real bomber never came.
I hope none of you think I’m trying to sound tuff or hardened. I know a lot of you guys have heard your fair share of angry shots fired, and I’m just describing the basis of my theories.

The point is no different than what has been said before on this web thread:
SIED must be spotted on body language and gut feeling

In addition it can be stated that:
- A soldier must react solely on the basis of this gut feeling, because to investigate is to force the bomber to detonate.

- The soldier can only choose between killing and hesitating. To hold down a bomber will not do. Therefore the firearm is the only tool the soldier has: Thus killing vs. hesitating

- Whatever the soldier does, mistakes can have very severe consequences.

- Reaction time is very, very short, to say the least.

These few assumptions are in my opinion the origin of a bad spiral:
When the soldier reads the body language and determines the threat he/she will try to avoid killing innocent civilians, and therefore hesitate. If his unit has been hit by SIED he will get nervous, and become more and more willing to risk killing civilians in stead of risking being blown up. This will again result in killing of innocent “possible SIED´s” with court marshals and punishments to follow. When there has been enough innocent killing because of nervous soldiers ( and their nervous behavior would be very understandable), soldiers will again start to hesitate until the SIED attacks escalate in numbers again, and the whole process starts all over.

So my question is: what can we do to better spot SIED´s at what means could improve the reaction in order to avoid civilian and military casualties described in the “Bad spiral”?
I think less lethal ammunition or similar weaponry would improve the soldiers chances.

My argument is, that the soldier needs means with which he can react, and still afford to be mistaken. Because the soldier has to react before he can confirm the threat 100%.

Picture a scenario with a soldier on a CP in Iraq, armed with his primary weapon, and a sidearm with powerful rubber bullets. The soldier spots a suspicious man walking towards the CP (20 m distance). Se soldier greets the civilian in Arab, but gets no response, interprets the body language, and fires rubber as a precaution. He dares to do so because there is room for error. He hits the suspect and one of two will then happen:
1. The suspect is an innocent civilian, who takes a hard dive, when hit by 3-5 rubber bullets. On the ground, bruised and confused he yells: don’t shoot don’t shoot in Arab. The soldier has forced the right reaction on the suspect and gained time from “suspicion moment” to “confirm moment”. The civilian is perhaps bandaged and compensated.

2. The suspect is in fact a SIED, and is physically and psychologically shocked and brought out of balance by the quick rubber attack. He also takes a dive and maybe even loses the detonator from his own hand. 1½ sec later, on the ground he ( in contrast to the innocent civilian) is not surrendering, but going for his pockets of reaching for the detonator dangling from its command wire. This “confirmation” if you will, makes the soldier – or his ready buddy, kill the SIED.

As a remark, ones pistol could be loaded with rubber on CP´s where the SIED threat is bigger, and loaded with leathal ammo when on the move, and CQB situations are more likely to occur.

I know all of this sounds a bit strange.. but like I said: It´s not a SOP, but a thought.

Is the thing possible?
Has it been tried?
Are there alternatives?

And please.. no silly backbrief. ;)

SD

[SD]

And thanks for the link S´13

good reading

[woofer]

Good insigths their woofer. I fear that you are giving too much information! hehe! yes, wire cutters just wondering if that person would be able to use it... he might be in alot of shaking...

the information is no good in my head! maybe someone in the forum may put it to good use it in the future.....and the shaking thing, I wouldnt be waiting to find out :lol:

[bluffcove]

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bluffcove wrote:
If they are female they will generally ask:

Does my bomb look big in this?

Honestly though, what are you going to do if you recognise the bomber?
other than run! I think trying to arrest, apprehend or detain someone with an explosive taped to them is going to be hard enough as it is.


(if there is enough time left and you're ready:)
Kiss their chess with a 40mm HEDP...
Talk about stopping power...

If I were a suicide bomber and I dint want to be stopped im fairly sure Id have a dead mans handle on the device that means the second I release my grip she blows - It would make sense, that way you dont need to be conscious or indeed alive to complete you mission - bombers arent thick, they are just martyr and can outwit a marksman I should imagine.

[b33f]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



bluffcove wrote:
If they are female they will generally ask:

Does my bomb look big in this?

Honestly though, what are you going to do if you recognise the bomber?
other than run! I think trying to arrest, apprehend or detain someone with an explosive taped to them is going to be hard enough as it is.


(if there is enough time left and you're ready:)
Kiss their chess with a 40mm HEDP...
Talk about stopping power...

If I were a suicide bomber and I dint want to be stopped im fairly sure Id have a dead mans handle on the device that means the second I release my grip she blows - It would make sense, that way you dont need to be conscious or indeed alive to complete you mission - bombers arent thick, they are just martyr and can outwit a marksman I should imagine.
Hmm.. there is no way to stop 'em then; just kill 'em, doesn't matter?!?

[Aerosoul]

^ Not if they got a switch that they're holding onto, like he said.

[b33f]

^ Not if they got a switch that they're holding onto, like he said.

Ya well i read what he said BUT: what are you going to to about the switch? Approach him and talk to him? Pack him onto a car? Scare him away?

=> No way out.

[Aerosoul]

Exactly our point.

[One?]

could be the guy driving a truck next to you, the person who delivers your coffee every morning. If it was that easy to spot them Israel wouldnt of had to build a wall...(not justifying that the wall is right either)

[S'13]

the person who delivers your coffee every morning.

This is why many Palestinians can't come into Israel in order to work as they used to do... thus the unemployment rate in the Territories is the highest it has ever been.