Thailand (catch all)

[Jedburgh]

Here are a couple of articles discussing migration of IED TTPs from the Middle East to South Asia:

UPI, 15 Feb: Thai Militants Learn From Iraq Insurgency

Islamic separatists in violence-wracked southern Thailand have begun to employ weapons and tactics that appear to be imported from the insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to analysts and experts.

One technique in particular, the use of a cement casing around a homemade bomb which both disguises it to look like a roadside marker and increases its lethality by creating razor sharp shards of concrete shrapnel, seems to have been imported directly from Iraq.

"That comes straight from Iraq -- or at least from the same training manuals they're using in Iraq," said Zachary Abuza, author of "Crucible of Terror" -- widely considered the definitive study of Islamic extremism in Southeast Asia. "Certainly, those kinds of tactics were never used in Thailand before."

Over the past year, the separatists have undergone "a remarkable transformation. It's unique ... I've never seen anything like it before in an insurgency," said defense analyst Jeff Moore who has written about the issue for Jane's Terrorism and Insurgency Centre.

Moore told United Press International that during 2004 there were a half dozen raids and ambushes against Thai security forces and other targets, but in 2005, there were nearly 90. "Almost overnight they went from a gang of saboteurs and assassins to a small army. A guerilla army, but an army nonetheless," he said.

During the same time frame, Thai security forces also noted "an increasing sophistication in the construction and use" of improvised explosive devices by the insurgents, Panitan Wattanayagorn told UPI

Commentary from the Jamestown Foundation's Terrorism Focus:

Alternate Futures for Thailand's Insurgency

The Thai insurgency has formally entered its third straight year. Between January 2004 and January 2006, more than 1,200 people were killed. In January 2004, violent incidents averaged 30 per month; by December 2004, violent incidents averaged 120 per month. By June 2005, bombings averaged more than one per day. More than 300 were killed and more than 300 wounded in the six months following the introduction of the Emergency Decree in July 2005 (The Bangkok Post, October 24, 2005). In 2006 alone, 19 people have been killed, seven in one day—five of whom were policemen. The presence of over 40,000 security forces has done little to stop the insurgency.

While the majority of victims are killed in drive by shootings and assassinations, the technical capacity of the bombs has increased dramatically. Thai Muslim bomb-makers now assemble 10kg bombs composed of a variety of components, including powergel, TNT, potassium chlorate, and ammonium nitrate. The detonators have become sophisticated to the point that the government had to block all un-registered pre-paid cell phones in the three southernmost provinces. Authorities also have evidence that the militants are now experimenting with infrared devices as detonators, although they have not consistently deployed these bombs (The Nation, November 29, 2005). The Thai militants are also learning techniques from abroad. According to a senior intelligence official, "They have stolen cement kilometer road markers to make bombs, for which we have seen instructions posted on some web sites in the Middle East" (Reuters, October 6, 2005).

...and here's some additional background on the insurgency:

There is a decent discussion of the issue on the Counterterrorism Blog of 10 Jan 06.

ICG, May 05: Southern Thailand: Insurgency, Not Jihad

Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies, Dec 04:
Trouble in Thailand's Muslim South: Separatism, Not Global Terrorism

Edit: When I reviewed this post after posting the follow-up below, I discovered that 3 out of 5 links no longer led to the intended article. All of'em are fixed, although the UPI article was no longer available through the original source, thanks to a blogger it is still on-line in its entirety.