U.S. Army Sgt. Andrew Connelly, an infantryman with 2nd Battalion, 3rd Infantry Regiment and Vancouver, Wash., native, walks along a path in the Counter-IED training course with a "target" in hand looking for IED indicators Dec. 10,
2011. The course had various examples insurgents use to disguise IED's in the Afghanistan environment. Photo by
Army Spc. Cody Barber
Soldiers look at homemade explosives drying outside a simulated HME production facility at the Counter-IED interactive training course Dec. 10,
2011. Service members get first-hand experience seeing what a real production facility could look like.
Photo by Army Spc. Cody Barber
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BAGRAM AIR FIELD, Afghanistan (12/19/2011) - Improvised explosive
devices are perhaps one of the greatest threats the insurgency uses
against armed forces in Afghanistan but with the counter-IED
training offered at Bagram Air Field they are hoping to change that.
The CIED training facility offers in-depth information and
hands-on training by allowing service members to walk through an
interactive environment with various examples of IEDs they might
encounter in theater.
Service members arriving in theater are
required to attend the CIED training course before going to their
actually duty location.
“[Service members] have an
opportunity to walk through different types of homemade explosives
production facilities in a closed natural setting here,” said Dirk
Sheffer, a native of Sierra Vista, Ariz., and senior instructor and
developer for the CIED course. “They get an opportunity to see how
all the different IED triggers really work and touch them. To know
what their form and function is and to better understand how they're
going to look in the Afghan environment.”
The course itself
is not to prevent IEDs but to make service members aware of them and
to make sure the service member has an “offensive mindset”, said
Sheffer.
“An offensive mindset isn't always pulling the
trigger,” said Sheffer. “An offensive mindset is looking at your
unit from the outside as insurgents would, 'How would I attack my
unit is this situation? What is our weak point from the insurgent
perspective?' We really try and get [service members] thinking about
the insurgent mindset.”
While Sheffer has been working at the
CIED training course he has noticed a positive effect the training
has had on service members in the battlefield.
“Since I've
been looking at it, we have seen an increase in found IED's, a
decrease in effective IED attacks and a decrease in injuries and
deaths in RC-East,” said Sheffer.
Improvised Explosive
Devices are related to more than 80 percent of injuries and deaths,
added Sheffer. The positive effect we are making on service members
is resulting in fewer casualties because they are finding the IED
indicators in advance.
“We have soldiers that come back and
tell us they found these IEDs because the training was spot on and
‘that's what we looked for so we found it',” said Sheffer.
Combat now is asymmetrical, said Sheffer. It's not a frontline
battlefield where the only people engaging in combat are combat arm
units.
“Any soldier can end up being in a convoy and every
convoy has the opportunity to encounter IEDs,” said Sheffer
emphasizing on the importance of the training. “So every soldier has
to be not only a sensor but he has to be equipped to deal with an
IED event.”
The training adapts to new methods the insurgents
are applying on the battlefield in RC-East, said Sheffer. Not
adapting to the changing tactics can set service members up for
failure and failure means losing lives or limbs.
U.S. Army
Sgt. Andrew Connelly, an infantryman with 2nd Battalion, 3rd
Infantry Regiment and native to Vancouver, Wash., just arrived in
theater and went through the CIED training and found the training
helpful.
“I thought the training was very good and very
thorough,” said Connelly. “I especially enjoyed the walk-through
program. It was very |
