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British historian Nigel West said yesterday that the U.S. military in Iraq could learn a lot from British military counterintelligence operations in Northern Ireland against the terrorist campaign of the Irish Republican Army (IRA).
British intelligence scored impressive successes that led to the defeat of the IRA's terrorist campaign through the use of a combination of technology and human intelligence operations, said Mr. West...
One key lesson for Iraq, Mr. West said, is for U.S. troops to limit the time they set up vehicle checkpoints to no longer than 20 minutes. The Brits learned that IRA terrorists could locate a military checkpoint in 10 minutes and then take 10 to 15 minutes to get their weapons and explosives and launch an attack.
The rule is to set up a checkpoint, based on intelligence that terrorists may be passing through, and then move to another site quickly.
