Roadside Bombs & IEDs (catch all)

**Johannes U** · 04-06-2013

OK gents, thanks so far for the feed-back.
Now some clarifications:
I am a firm believer in the idea, that only an offensive mindset brings you further toward success. Insofar i totally agree with Fuchs, Bill and Bob in your Statements, especially this one:

We never would have defeated any adversary in history if we focused on defeating their rifles, their artillery, their planes, etc.

I do not want to fight the IED, I want to fight its "user", its "financier", ... simply said: THE ENEMY.

Still, one fact remains: during the 1st world war, some armies still attacked an entrenched enemy using upright marching blocks of infantry ... and were cut down by the "new" machine gun. (When was the MG developed? ...)
My point is, that if your doctrine, tactics and battle drills are founded on a battlefield 60 years ago, they might not function any more on a modern battlefield (or at least without fault). So you have to adapt. Otherwise you will loose. And it's better to adapt before you fight than during or afterwards.

OK, so much for clarification. Now some ideas from my side:
When your forces conduct an offensive first-entry mission, the enemy might try to block your advance by using IEDs at choke points, culverts, bridges ...
If your advance guard conducts C-IED battle drills at each of those points, you might not get anywhere.
Thus your recce elements should cover, search and maybe observe most of those points in advance. But since those elements also have other missions and are (at least in Austria) in short supply, they will not be able to cover all.
My solution for this problem is the following:

responsibility for "clearing" those points is divided among the different recce elements on the different levels
the advance guard conducts C-IED drills only when its lead elements (the first vehicle) recognize an IED in front of it which cannot be bypassed or when ordered
if you still are hit by an IED (maybe in combination with a complex attack) you use the usual counter-ambush drills

Do you see the solution along the same lines?

One more thing:
In 2010 I attended a NATO-sponsored C-IED Train The Trainer Course in Croatia.
I realized that if you don't include those C-IED drills into your other battle drills, your mindset will become defensive and thus you begin to see the IED as the enemy.

**Fuchs** · 04-06-2013

Mines in small groups instead of used en masse are really only good for harassment and a little attrition.

You cannot defend anything with such means, but your can demoralise and it takes resolute leaders and some urgency to avoid a major mine-driven impact on operations.

Such mines aren't even serious obstacles, much less defended ones.

As an Austrian I would have a close look at a very, very different kind of mines; proper engineer demolition work for avalanches, collapsing bridges, closed-off tunnels and bursting dams. The isolated conspicuous object next to the road would be relatively insignificant and inefficient in your terrain.
Of course Austrians won't fight at home any time soon, but once the EU is under attack they would be expected to be among the few mountain warfare experts available to the EU.

(I'm the guy who thinks almost only about wars between great powers as scenarios because those are the problem; small wars are despicable games by politicians.)