SAIC Steps Up to Help Defeat IEDs
Fall/Winter 2006
Called the top killer of American troops, improvised explosive devices (IEDs) have caused more than one-third of the U.S. troop fatalities in Iraq.
Helping the U.S. find solutions to identify and destroy IEDs stands as a top priority for SAIC, according to CEO Ken Dahlberg.
"Our company needs to step up and do this," said Dahlberg. "This travesty that is killing or maiming our military has to be stopped."
In response, Trey Smith, an SAIC group president, led a task team to bring together all the appropriate resources of the company to address the challenges of defeating IEDs. This resulted in the company establishing the SAIC IED Defeat Systems Management Office as a "magnet" for SAIC solutions to help defeat the IED threat.
"Trey Smith came forward with a proposal to me to stand up, in effect, a program office where we, the company, would fund … an all-out effort for us to take a systems approach to defeating IEDs," said Dahlberg.
In fact, the SAIC IED Defeat Systems Management Office stands as a single point of contact for the Joint IED Defeat Organization (JIEDDO) — which leads DoD efforts to defeat IEDs as weapons of strategic influence — for coordination, management, and data flow relative to potential SAIC IED solutions.
Formerly a joint task force, the JIEDDO became a permanent organization this year with a $3 billion budget to help defeat IEDs. The JIEDDO has a three-pronged approach to tackling the problem in Iraq and Afghanistan: defeat the network or the system providing the bombs, defeat the devices themselves, and train ground forces to detect and avoid falling victim. This will require new technology, tactics, techniques, procedures, and training, according to the DoD. "The challenge is that within SAIC we have all these pockets of technology… but until now, we've had no way of integrating them. This office is something we're creating by rapidly prototyping operational concepts," said Pete Quast, director of the SAIC IED Defeat Systems Management Office.
The key components of SAIC's vision, according to Quast, enable an integrated system framework — which includes persistent surveillance, forensics, and interdiction technology. The framework also includes biometrics, robotics, and knowledge- and risk-management tools.
Defeating IEDs is a tougher problem than most people realize, Smith said. Although many people would like an immediate solution, it will likely involve a system-level approach — rather than ad-hoc reactive measures — that may not be available in the near future.
However, given SAIC's skills in surveillance, interdiction, forensics, and robotics, the company is uniquely positioned to help the JIEDDO find a solution, according to George Ullrich, an SAIC senior vice president of advanced technology programs. He echoed Smith's and Dahlberg's thoughts that any solution should be on a system-wide level.
According to Smith, tackling the IED issue is not only a priority for Dahlberg, it aligns with SAIC's long history of taking on issues of national importance. In fact, Stephen Olexa, an SAIC senior technical recruiter who has worked in Iraq, knows from personal experience the critical importance of this undertaking.
"Bravo Zulu to you, Mr. Smith, and the Board of Directors on your appropriations of funds to devise methods to [defeat] IEDs in support of the insurgency attacks on our brave troops serving in war zones," Olexa said in an email to Dahlberg. "Having been on the receiving end of an IED… while riding in a convoy and on assignment with SAIC on the recruitment of the New Iraqi Army in downtown Baghdad, Iraq, I was profoundly made aware of how deadly these insurgent devices are and can be to life and limb to our troops."
New technologies take aim at IED threat
SAIC scientists and engineers are already at work on groundbreaking initiatives aimed at defeating IEDs. Improved intelligence and surveillance is essential to defeat the network and enable ground forces to detect these threats. That's the focus of some of our initiatives for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).
- SAIC recently won the Persistent Operational Surface Surveillance and Engagement (POSSE) contract. The system-of-systems effort aims to provide persistent surveillance and exploitation capabilities needed to help counter the wide range of threats facing deployed troops and allies.
- SAIC's experience in "Smart Dust" wireless networks may enable new capabilities for persistent ground surveillance to supplement current capabilities of airborne systems.
- We are also helping develop the SPEYES system, which is envisioned as an integrated suite of sensing and situation awareness tools for dismounted soldiers and Marines on the urban battlefield.
Getting the right information to the right place at the right time is also essential. That's the goal of an SAIC program for the Air Force Research Laboratory.
- SAIC is running a program called research and development experimental collaboration (RDEC) to develop enhanced information sharing capabilities. The goal is to provide early warning of terrorist activities.
- Our technical professionals also help develop and test other promising new technologies.
- SAIC's system-of-systems experience on the Future Combat Systems program may aid development of a comprehensive IED solution. That solution may include a technology SAIC and Teledyne Brown Engineering developed, built and tested — the Multipurpose Troop Transport Carrier System (MTTCS) — an armored troop carrier system designed to protect warfighters from most IED fragments (and small arms fire).
- We are investigating countermeasures for IED triggering devices.
- SAIC has also been involved in several advanced concept technology demonstrations (ACTD), conducting military utility assessments on technologies and systems that counter IEDs, including the Joint Explosive Ordnance Disposal Knowledge and Technology Operational Demonstration ACTD and Counter-Bomb Counter Bomber ACTD.
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