Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
Tampa Tribune
March 22, 2008 By Melissa Nelson, Associated Press
CORRY STATION NAVY BASE - Navy Lt. Mark Dye hadn't seen combat before a helicopter dropped him at the deadliest forward operating base for roadside bomb attacks in northern Iraq.
Twenty-two soldiers from the 101st Airborne at Forward Operating Base McHenry had been killed by improvised explosive devices in the previous seven months. Other Army units were suffering similar casualties in May 2006, and it was getting worse. Troops were finding an average of 18 roadside bombs a day.
Dye and 300 other shipboard electronics warfare specialists had an urgent task: Teach troops how to defuse the bombs by jamming the electronic signals the insurgents used to detonate them.
"They called on a Wednesday and told me I was leaving for Iraq on Saturday," said Dye, 38, who had spent his career on ships. "It was the right decision. Electronic warfare was our background, what we did for a living."
They called themselves "sand sailors," and they did their job well by reducing IED fatalities at their bases. Monthly American troop deaths from IEDs have dropped since reaching a high of 90 last May to 17 last month, largely because of their efforts, the military said in awarding Bronze Stars to Dye and others.
'Severe Learning Curve' For Troops
Army Capt. Matthew Rapp said soldiers had the jamming equipment, but no one had taught them to use it properly or ensured that it was being taken on patrols until Dye and the other sailors arrived.
The equipment "was being issued in theater, and we were expected to take this thing and figure out what makes it work. It was a severe learning curve," said Rapp, whose platoon was enduring almost daily roadside bomb blasts.
Electronic warfare specialists are trained at the Navy's electronic warfare and cryptological training headquarters here at Corry Station. It's an unassuming base on the outskirts of the more famous Pensacola Naval Air Station, home to the Navy's Blue Angels flight demonstration team and the initial training base for generations of naval aviators including U.S. Sen. John McCain.
"A lot of what we do is either behind the scenes or behind closed doors," said Capt. Connie Frizzell, who oversees the training.
Increasingly, though, the sailors, who also called themselves the "Narmy," are being recognized for their heroic - and effective - efforts to save troops.
One honored was Senior Chief Terry Thomas, an electronic warfare specialist who is scheduled to return to Iraq next month. He was stationed at Forward Operating Base Kalsu in south-central Iraq in spring 2006.
IEDs killed 56 soldiers and Marines from Kaslu during his tour, which ended last year. But the military says many more would have died if not for his determination to train troops, maintain equipment and adapt each time the enemy changed tactics.
When Thomas reported, the soldiers and Marines at Kalsu had several pieces of jamming equipment sitting unused.
In some cases, the soldiers took the jamming devices on patrols thinking that it was working when it was not because it had not been properly maintained. In other cases, they left the equipment behind because they didn't want to hassle with complicated technology, he said.
"We conducted the training on how to properly utilize it and made it a way of life," he said.
Although unable to describe details of the technology because of security reasons, the sailors said it works by "basically providing a protective bubble around a vehicle."
Incoming Signals Blocked
It jams incoming signals and blocks the remote detonation of bombs.
Thomas became the go-to man for soldiers before they left on missions.
"They would come and wake me up at 3 or 4 in the morning if they didn't have that warm, fuzzy feeling that everything was working," he said.
To convince the battle-hardened soldiers and Marines that the equipment could work, Thomas and Dye had to leave the relative safety of their bases and go on regular patrols with the troops into the surrounding towns.
"I'm not used to being that close to the bad guy," Thomas said. "The electronics, I understand that. The Army, they are used to putting bullets down range and seeing the results of what bullets do."
On Dye's first night outside the base, his convoy hit a cluster of roadside bombs, and the jamming technology stopped the chain-reaction explosion. Part of the first vehicle was hit, but no one was injured.
It was the first in a series of successes that led the troops to rely on the technology.
But the enemy always adapted, sometimes using simpler devices. Insurgents began placing various types of bombs common in Vietnam and World War II that detonate when stepped on or driven over.
"The only way you are going to be able to defeat it is to see it," Thomas said.
At Dye's base, he worked with the Army to increase the rate of discovering roadside bombs from 52 percent to 92 percent.
March 22, 2008 By Melissa Nelson, Associated Press
CORRY STATION NAVY BASE - Navy Lt. Mark Dye hadn't seen combat before a helicopter dropped him at the deadliest forward operating base for roadside bomb attacks in northern Iraq.
Twenty-two soldiers from the 101st Airborne at Forward Operating Base McHenry had been killed by improvised explosive devices in the previous seven months. Other Army units were suffering similar casualties in May 2006, and it was getting worse. Troops were finding an average of 18 roadside bombs a day.
Dye and 300 other shipboard electronics warfare specialists had an urgent task: Teach troops how to defuse the bombs by jamming the electronic signals the insurgents used to detonate them.
"They called on a Wednesday and told me I was leaving for Iraq on Saturday," said Dye, 38, who had spent his career on ships. "It was the right decision. Electronic warfare was our background, what we did for a living."
They called themselves "sand sailors," and they did their job well by reducing IED fatalities at their bases. Monthly American troop deaths from IEDs have dropped since reaching a high of 90 last May to 17 last month, largely because of their efforts, the military said in awarding Bronze Stars to Dye and others.
'Severe Learning Curve' For Troops
Army Capt. Matthew Rapp said soldiers had the jamming equipment, but no one had taught them to use it properly or ensured that it was being taken on patrols until Dye and the other sailors arrived.
The equipment "was being issued in theater, and we were expected to take this thing and figure out what makes it work. It was a severe learning curve," said Rapp, whose platoon was enduring almost daily roadside bomb blasts.
Electronic warfare specialists are trained at the Navy's electronic warfare and cryptological training headquarters here at Corry Station. It's an unassuming base on the outskirts of the more famous Pensacola Naval Air Station, home to the Navy's Blue Angels flight demonstration team and the initial training base for generations of naval aviators including U.S. Sen. John McCain.
"A lot of what we do is either behind the scenes or behind closed doors," said Capt. Connie Frizzell, who oversees the training.
Increasingly, though, the sailors, who also called themselves the "Narmy," are being recognized for their heroic - and effective - efforts to save troops.
One honored was Senior Chief Terry Thomas, an electronic warfare specialist who is scheduled to return to Iraq next month. He was stationed at Forward Operating Base Kalsu in south-central Iraq in spring 2006.
IEDs killed 56 soldiers and Marines from Kaslu during his tour, which ended last year. But the military says many more would have died if not for his determination to train troops, maintain equipment and adapt each time the enemy changed tactics.
When Thomas reported, the soldiers and Marines at Kalsu had several pieces of jamming equipment sitting unused.
In some cases, the soldiers took the jamming devices on patrols thinking that it was working when it was not because it had not been properly maintained. In other cases, they left the equipment behind because they didn't want to hassle with complicated technology, he said.
"We conducted the training on how to properly utilize it and made it a way of life," he said.
Although unable to describe details of the technology because of security reasons, the sailors said it works by "basically providing a protective bubble around a vehicle."
Incoming Signals Blocked
It jams incoming signals and blocks the remote detonation of bombs.
Thomas became the go-to man for soldiers before they left on missions.
"They would come and wake me up at 3 or 4 in the morning if they didn't have that warm, fuzzy feeling that everything was working," he said.
To convince the battle-hardened soldiers and Marines that the equipment could work, Thomas and Dye had to leave the relative safety of their bases and go on regular patrols with the troops into the surrounding towns.
"I'm not used to being that close to the bad guy," Thomas said. "The electronics, I understand that. The Army, they are used to putting bullets down range and seeing the results of what bullets do."
On Dye's first night outside the base, his convoy hit a cluster of roadside bombs, and the jamming technology stopped the chain-reaction explosion. Part of the first vehicle was hit, but no one was injured.
It was the first in a series of successes that led the troops to rely on the technology.
But the enemy always adapted, sometimes using simpler devices. Insurgents began placing various types of bombs common in Vietnam and World War II that detonate when stepped on or driven over.
"The only way you are going to be able to defeat it is to see it," Thomas said.
At Dye's base, he worked with the Army to increase the rate of discovering roadside bombs from 52 percent to 92 percent.