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The LA Times' Andrew Cockburn noted last week that "U.S. troops raiding a Baghdad machine shop came across a pile of copper disks, 5 inches in diameter, stamped out as part of what was clearly an ongoing order."
If that's accurate, then building EFPs in Iraq becomes a fairly easy operation. Given the appropriate design (which is the tricky bit) any machine shop can turn them out by the hundred. (Today's New York Times notes that the disks found in Hilla, Iraq "look like a thick little alms plate or even a souvenir ashtray minus the indentations for holding cigarettes.")
It took years for the American military to learn how to make these weapons on the fly. And yet insurgents in
The ability to pick up and use this sort of technology gives an edge to guerrilla forces. As we have seen, insurgents have proved adept at using the Internet, mobile phones, and even interactive DVDs.
The .50 cal sniper rifles also allegedly found in Iraq having been bought originally by Iran are another interesting case. Steyr-Mannlicher, accused of supplying the rifles have given an official statement saying that they have not had any serial numbers to check, so these weapons cannot be confirmed as being those supplied to Iran. Further, they observe that:
"Since the international license for these guns has already expired, these weapons can be copied any time by other producers."
I am reminded of the story of the rifles in the Northwest Frontier. Over a hundred years ago, the British were amazed to find that their tribal opponents were armed with modern Martini-Henry rifles. Efforts to find where they were being imported from were fruitless. The Martini-Henrys were counterfeit, perfect copies manufactured locally in blasksmiths' forges; these days replica AK-47s (and who knows what else) are turned out by the same method Intermediate technology can be powerful when it is used constructive ends.
The charity Practical Action helps people in developing nations to do the same thing, for a more benign purpose. The group assists help the underprivileged "choose and use technology to improve their lives for today and generations to come." Success stories include efficient cooking stoves, simple micro hydro plants, and a range of manufacturing enterprises from dyeing and soap making to recycling. They key with all of these is that once the technology is developed, it can be implemented in the community using local materials and skills. Unfortunately, the same principle means that insurgents can now knock out M1 Abrams tanks using some plastic explosive and a machine shop only a little more advanced than those Khyber Pass blacksmiths.
UPDATE 1: An EFP can strike a target a hundred yards or more away, which perhaps explains this costly incident:
A Hercules C130 on a routine mission was involved in an incident on landing in Maysan on 12 February. The initial investigation suggests that it was struck by an improvised explosive device similar to a roadside bomb. After assessment of the damage, it was concluded that the aircraft could not be recovered without undue risk to personnel so the aircraft was destroyed by UK forces.
UPDATE 2: Today's New York Times article quotes an Army explosive expert, "Major Marty Weber," who "said the use of precision copper discs combined with passive infrared sensors amounted to 'a no-brainer' that the explosive components were of Iranian origin, because no one has used that sort of configuration except Iranian-backed Shiite militias."
That's a curious piece of "logic," along the lines of the old Woody Allen joke:
A: Socrates is a man. B: All men are mortal. C: All men are Socrates.
And are these bombs really only used by Shia groups? Remember, Sunni militants have been responsible for most of the 170 American EFP casualties.
UPDATE 3: And what about Major Weber's assertion, that "the shallow concave caps... were smooth and flawless, indicating... that they were manufactured in Iran because of the high precision required to make them so?" Well, as noted above, the caps didn't seem so flawless to the casual observer; more like ashtrays. And are we sure that there are no working Iraqi factories that could handle this kind of job? Also, how hard would it be to email a firm in Germany or Switzerland - or Britain - and order whatever you wanted? A copper disc is not obviously a weapon.
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