Improvised Explosive Devices

An improvised explosive device (IED) is a bomb manufactured in an unconventional way that incorporates destructive, lethal, noxious, pyrotechnic, or incendiary chemicals and is designed to destroy or incapacitate people, buildings, and vehicles, including aircraft and ships. Although such devices are much older, the term is believed to have originated in Northern Ireland, when it was used by the British Army after the Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA) manufactured and used bombs made from fertilizer and semtex smuggled from Libya.

An IED has five main components: an initiator, a switch, a power source, a main charge, and a container. Additional material such as nails or metal fragments can be included in the main charge or secured around the outside in order to increase its destructive ability. The main difference between an IED and a conventional explosive armament is that the former can appear to be any kind of object. IEDs have taken the form of luggage, cans of cooking oil, television sets, packages of various types, books, and letters. They have been sent through the mail, transported in vehicles—these are then known as vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices (VBIEDs)—or pedal cycles, or worn in vests or belts on the person. VBIEDs, including those carried by boats, can contain a huge amount of explosive material. The method of delivery list is endless.

IEDs planted by roads, commonly referred to as roadside bombs, are typically placed in drains or culverts or are buried close to the edge of the road and exploded by remote control as a target draws level. In such cases, the target forces often cease moving by road in favor of moving by helicopter.

Many commonly available materials can be used to manufacture IEDs. Powerful explosives can be made from precursor chemicals found in common consumer goods that are readily available commercially. For instance, ammonium nitrate, normally used in fertilizers, can be mixed with such items as fuel oil, icing sugar, nitrobenzene, and sugar. IEDs can be triggered using, among other things, a command wire, radio, and cell phone and a variety of timing devices, whereby the device is set to go off at a specific time. Advances in the miniaturization of electronics and the ready availability of cheap triggering devices such as cellular telephones, pagers, oven timers, video timers, and the like have enhanced the means of activation considerably.

IEDs were used by the Viet Cong against South Vietnamese and U.S. forces during the Vietnam War. In both the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts, IEDs have been used extensively against coalition forces, government forces, and civilian targets. In Afghanistan, IEDs were also used against Soviet troops following the invasion in 1979. In Chechnya, Russian forces have again been the target of IEDs since 1994. Between 1982 and 2000, [Page 494]Hezbollah regularly used IEDs to attack Israeli forces in Lebanon.

An Afghan National Army soldier participates in a simulated counter–improvised explosive device operation with U.S. Air Force explosive ordnance disposal technicians on March 13, 2012, at Kandahar Airfield, Afghanistan.

There are a number of examples of incidents where IEDs have been used in countries not associated with such conflict. In the United States, for instance, a truck containing an IED was driven into an underground parking garage at the World Trade Center in April 1993; the IED was subsequently estimated to be a urea-nitrate-hydrogen gas enhanced device weighing 606 kilograms. The occupants of the vehicle lit the 20-foot fuse and fled, leaving it to explode, killing six and injuring over 1,000 people when it exploded. Two years later, Timothy McVeigh drove another VBIED, manufactured from 2,300 kilograms of ammonium nitrate and nitromethane, and parked it outside the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. The IED exploded, destroying much of the building and killing 169 people. A year later, Eric Rudolph left a backpack containing “pipe bombs” in the Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta where the 1996 Olympic Games were being held. The resultant explosion killed two people and injured a number of others. In May 2010, a terrorist attack was foiled in Times Square when two street vendors noticed smoke coming from a car that had recently been parked. Inside the vehicle were four IEDs, making up one large IED, consisting of gasoline, a quantity of firecrackers, gunpowder, propane, and urea-based fertilizer. This was all connected by wires to two alarm clocks, which were to act as the triggering device. Fortunately, the device's ignition failed to set it off.

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