Kinetic Targeting

Good article from the Jul-Aug 05 issue of Infantry magazine. AKO access required:

Kinetic Targeting in Iraq at the Bn TF Level: From Target to Detainee

Quote:

---

“Targeting” in the broad sense of the word at the battalion task force level involves incorporating lethal and nonlethal resources and methods to destroy/influence not only the enemy but the civilian populace with the intended end-state of defeating enemy activities and denying sanctuary. The task force S-2 plays a key role in targeting by analyzing past enemy activities, identifying trends, determining enemy intent, and making recommendations to best target the individuals or events. “Kinetic targeting,” however, is primarily the responsibility of the task force S-2. This process involves identifying individual targets, creating targeting packets on them, capturing them, and detaining them. In order to do this process you must understand who the enemy is and what motivates him, how his cell network is constructed, how to create a targeting packet, how to plan and coordinate the raid, and what the detention process is.

---

Another good article in one of our professional journals regarding coming to grips with intel in COIN, this one from the May-Jun 05 issue of Armor:

The Human Intelligence Game for Armored/Mechanized Units

Quote:

---

A mechanized infantry or armor unit is not, per its equipment, training, and structure, fundamentally prepared to operate in an insurgency/ counterinsurgency operation, such as the “terrorist hunt” currently underway in Iraq. Instead, it is equipped and trained to fight in a mechanized fight where mechanized scouts and aviators locate or fix enemy formations so they can be destroyed by follow-on tanks, fighting vehicles, or other assets. However, the current number of “hot spots” around the world have established the need for armored and mechanized infantry units (as
well as many others types) to conduct counterinsurgency operations.

Targeting is the biggest difficulty an armored force faces when confronted with an unconventional environment. There are no tank columns or other enemy formations to fix and destroy; the enemy does not use BRDMs and BMPs for reconnaissance. Instead, an armored force is faced with finding enemy operatives hidden with in the general population — a population that may or may not be hostile toward us.

Targeting in this environment requires collecting, sorting, and analyzing a great variety of intelligence media. However, in the insurgency environment, the chief intelligence media (if a commander wishes to maintain the initiative and keep the enemy on the defensive) is human intelligence (HUMINT), more commonly known as “word of mouth.” Unfortunately, the skills needed to collect and use HUMINT are not skills armor and mechanized infantry unit commanders normally have in their intelligence sections...

---