Astonishing article excerpted from Defense News by John Robb at Global Guerillas about the insurgent marketplace in Iraq. Welcome to “black globalization.”
Item: flat management structure
The groups in Iraq have no hierarchical structure, the officers said. Vast numbers of small, adaptive insurgent cells operate independently without central guidance. There may be some loose coordination of attacks, but then the cells go their separate ways.
Item: portfolio careers
One U.S. intelligence officer said that if you capture the leader of an IED cell, the leaderless foot soldiers simply get rolled up into another cell or start their own splinter cell.
Item: free agency
Small, highly skilled IED cells often operate as a package and hire themselves out to the more well-known insurgent groups, such as Amman Al Zarqawi's al-Qaida in Iraq or the Sunni group Ansaar al Sunna. They advertise their skills on the Internet and are temporarily contracted on a per-job basis, but otherwise remain autonomous.
Item: continuous improvement
The IED cells are patient and methodical and they follow an identifiable operational cycle. Five days is usually spent conducting reconnaissance of prospective targets, conducting pattern analysis of U.S. patrols and looking for vulnerabilities…The insurgents try to discover why and at what times American patrols travel along specific routes. Insurgents have even used hoax IEDs placed in plain view so they can watch the American response and gather intelligence on security methods and bomb disposal team operations to prepare for future attacks.
Item: delivery cycles
Five days of preparation are then followed by 10 days of heavy IED attacks, then the cycle starts again.
Item: learning organizations
Nine times out of 10, the military and intelligence officers said, the insurgents videotape IED attacks. The insurgents scrutinize the tapes - much as a coach watches postgame films - to prepare for future attacks. They're also used as motivational tools for new recruits and to advertise a cell's technical proficiency.
Item: skill set development
Bomb-making skills proliferate rapidly among IED cells in Iraq via the Internet, used by insurgents to share skills. The insurgents' technical proficiency has increased over time with experience. In recent months, shaped-charge explosives have become more common, Votel said. Also called platter charges, these devices combine an explosive charge with a low melting point metal like copper that is shaped in a concave way. When the blast occurs it shapes the metal into a molten slug that can penetrate the heaviest armor.
Item: outsourcing
As the vehicle is driven north to Baghdad, where most car bombs are detonated, additional components are added. This decentralized construction process makes it more difficult for American intelligence to identify a car bomb factory and eliminate it.
These guys are the McKinsey of terrorism. I think the first part of the above confirms the futility of thinking about the non-jihadi segment of the Iraqi insurgency in political terms. A leading group provides opponents with a head to cut off. A stated ideology gives opponents the chance to co-opt popular policies and drain support. Black globalization techniques give the insurgents the chance to function without these weaknesses, but it also hollows out the insurgency as a political entity, in much the same way that standard globalization hollows out the traditional nation state. Anyway, like the man said: read the whole thing.
Update. Jeremiah of Organic Warfare has been speculating along similar lines except with a good deal more technical knowledge:
The platter charges being used in Iraq are unsophisticated single-purpose warheads, but I understand that they are so powerful that the projectiles formed could easily defeat the armor on even main battle tanks. Uparmored hummvees offer no protection against charges of this type. Additionally, these are ranged weapons. They do not need to be in close proximity to the target, especially with light armored vehicles. This means that the IED battlefield is being changed, allowing hiding places farther from the road and increasing the search area for teams attempting to detect emplaced devices. These devices are also effective at long range as standoff munitions.
Jeremiah also links, though not direct to the article, to cryptographer Bruce Schneier's blog, where we get this:
Counterinsurgency experts are alarmed by how fast the other side’s tactics can evolve. A particularly worrisome case is the ongoing arms race over improvised explosive devices. The first IEDs were triggered by wires and batteries; insurgents waited on the roadside and detonated the primitive devices when Americans drove past. After a while, U.S. troops got good at spotting and killing the triggermen when bombs went off. That led the insurgents to replace their wires with radio signals. The Pentagon, at frantic speed and high cost, equipped its forces with jammers to block those signals, accomplishing the task this spring. The insurgents adapted swiftly by sending a continuous radio signal to the IED; when the signal stops or is jammed, the bomb explodes. The solution? Track the signal and make sure it continues. Problem: the signal is encrypted. Now the Americans are grappling with the task of cracking the encryption on the fly and mimicking it—so far, without success.
Inneresting. You've inspired some thoughts of my own here.
Posted by: Jon | August 04, 2005 at 09:36 PM
Of course, there's still room for the traditional artisan's approach:
Posted by: Robin Grant | August 05, 2005 at 02:12 PM
Hi there,
You may be interested in an article on my blog regarding platter charges and the evolving IED battlefield.
organicwarfare.blogspot.com
Posted by: Jeremiah | August 05, 2005 at 09:23 PM