The 1st meeting of the SCI-321 task group, titled “UAV Application in Military Search” was held at the Swedish Defence Research Agency (FOI) and Swedish EOD & Demining Centre (SWEDEC)- Linköping and Eskjö, Sweden on 3-4 Apr 2019. The objective of this three-year Task Group is to assess the potential, limitations and challenges of the use of UAVs for the detection of targets in Military Search operations. A Cooperative Demonstration of Technology (CDT) in which defence R&D agencies, academia and industry will be invited to participate, can be foreseen as part of the assessment.

The 1st meeting included 16 attendees from: C-IED CoE, GBR, FRA, NLD, SWE, DEU and USA. The beginning of the first day’s meeting included 3 national presentations from Sweden, USA and Great Britain pertaining to current and developing UAV-borne documentation and detection systems. The majority of the first day was focused on the military search scenarios which included type of search, targets, and environments. The four agreed upon scenarios were route search (defensive), building search (defensive), working at heights (defensive which include under bridges, arena/venue rafters, etc.), and outdoor area search (offensive). A subtask group, which the CIED CoE is involved in, was established to cement the details of each of the four scenarios. The second day was a site visit to the SWEDEC Test and Evaluation facilities, which include Norra Kulla mine lanes, Sensorbanan long term mine and IED field, and the EOC indoor test facility.

CIED Strategy Development Seminar

The NATO C-IED COE participated in the United States Africa Command (USAFRICOM) Pilot Counter-IED Strategy Development Seminar at the Humanitarian Peace Support School (HPSS) in Nairobi, Kenya from 2-4 April 2019. The 20 student participants were senior military officers (Lt. Col / Colonel) and Civilians from Kenya, Uganda, Djibouti, Cameroon, Malawi, Ethiopia, Tunisia, Rwanda, and Sudan. The objectives of the seminar were to: Provide a broad and holistic understanding of the C-IED mission; Explore the principles of strategic thinking within the C-IED enterprise; Outline strategy development from an organizational, national, and regional perspective; and provide students with an introduction to the tools, mechanisms, and processes to participate in the strategy development process. The seminar was delivered by diverse international experts from military, police, security, and academia. The team of experts facilitated new ways of thinking in order to broaden perspectives, provided technical information, and advice to organizations, nations, and regional participants on a C-IED strategy. The presentations covered: Key Drivers of Violent Extremism; Drivers of Conflict; Transnational Threats and Information Sharing; Strategic Threat Brief; Strategic, Operational, and Tactical Lines of Effort; Doctrine Overview; Translating Strategy into Action; and the African Peace Support Trainers Association (APSTA) overview. The pilot seminar concluded with students participating in three small group exercises on identifying the Ends, Ways, and Means in a national strategy. Students explained examples of a strategy with regards to the Threat, Strategic Objectives, Operational Programs and Plans along with identifying C-IED solutions that would be applied through specific deliverables and outputs within a C-IED strategy. The students gained a better understanding of the strategic and operational impacts and planning for C-IED operations and activities, and their thinking began to move further away from Defeat the Device to a more whole of government approach.

EOD Staff Officer Course

Based on close cooperation among the Community of Interest, C-IED CoE had been invited to support the EOD CoE’s training activity for EOD Staff Officer Course which takes place at their premises from 01 – 12 April 2019. C-IED CoE contributed with one SME providing two lectures that took place in Trencin/Slovakia on 01 April 2019. The lectures were focused on the “C-IED Concept and Doctrine” according to AJP 3.15(C) as a main topic and “The Impact of IEDs on NATO Operations”.

CIUSAT

The Project named C-IED Interagency Unclassified Situational Awareness Tool (CIUSAT) Version 2 is delivered and ready to be use. CIUSAT Project was requested by European Defense Agency (EDA) and the CoE CIED developed it in conjunction with the Polytechnic University of Valencia. The program consists on real time open source oriented software that contributes to the analyst and to have situational awareness of the IED threat. Within its three modules, the system permits introducing data and reports, analyzing inserted data, visualization for situational awareness and so support decision making process or analyst in C-IED. This tool is an outstanding tool for analyst that needs to manage an important number of report, inquiries of IED events, and so provide a clear representation in the maps or graphics.