Fake bomb detectors still in use

[Siggie]

You may already have heard about this story a few months ago. A company sold the military very very expensive (between $18-60k each) glorified dowsing rods claiming they can detect explosives. Not only has the fact that these are useless been revealed, but the guy who sold them has been charged for selling them. You'd think that if people didn't realize before all of this. that they were conned, surely, they'd know it now right? They'd stop relying on these useless devices to detect bombs right? Nope!

I tuned in to CBS news last night to watch this piece Lt. Col. Hal Bidlack (friend of an organization I'm affiliated with) was interviewed for and I was appalled to learn that they are still in use!!!

Here's the CBS story that aired last night (click for the video... ) and below is the NY Times piece about it from a couple months ago. Just in the short video you can get an idea for how absurd the claims are about these. A reasonable person would wonder how the heck these could work, but apparently none of those people were in positions of power.

November 4, 2009
Iraq Swears by Bomb Detector U.S. Sees as Useless
By ROD NORDLAND

BAGHDAD — Despite major bombings that have rattled the nation, and fears of rising violence as American troops withdraw, Iraq’s security forces have been relying on a device to detect bombs and weapons that the United States military and technical experts say is useless.

The small hand-held wand, with a telescopic antenna on a swivel, is being used at hundreds of checkpoints in Iraq. But the device works “on the same principle as a Ouija board” — the power of suggestion — said a retired United States Air Force officer, Lt. Col. Hal Bidlack, who described the wand as nothing more than an explosives divining rod.

Still, the Iraqi government has purchased more than 1,500 of the devices, known as the ADE 651, at costs from $16,500 to $60,000 each. Nearly every police checkpoint, and many Iraqi military checkpoints, have one of the devices, which are now normally used in place of physical inspections of vehicles.

With violence dropping in the past two years, Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki has taken down blast walls along dozens of streets, and he contends that Iraqis will safeguard the nation as American troops leave.

But the recent bombings of government buildings here have underscored how precarious Iraq remains, especially with the coming parliamentary elections and the violence expected to accompany them.

The suicide bombers who managed to get two tons of explosives into downtown Baghdad on Oct. 25, killing 155 people and destroying three ministries, had to pass at least one checkpoint where the ADE 651 is typically deployed, judging from surveillance videos released by Baghdad’s provincial governor. The American military does not use the devices. “I don’t believe there’s a magic wand that can detect explosives,” said Maj. Gen. Richard J. Rowe Jr., who oversees Iraqi police training for the American military. “If there was, we would all be using it. I have no confidence that these work.”

The Iraqis, however, believe passionately in them. “Whether it’s magic or scientific, what I care about is it detects bombs,” said Maj. Gen. Jehad al-Jabiri, head of the Ministry of the Interior’s General Directorate for Combating Explosives.

Dale Murray, head of the National Explosive Engineering Sciences Security Center at Sandia Labs, which does testing for the Department of Defense, said the center had “tested several devices in this category, and none have ever performed better than random chance.”

The Justice Department has warned against buying a variety of products that claim to detect explosives at a distance with a portable device. Normal remote explosives detection machinery, often employed in airports, weighs tons and costs hundreds of thousands of dollars. The ADE 651’s clients are mostly in developing countries; no major country’s military or police force is a customer, according to the manufacturer.

“I don’t care about Sandia or the Department of Justice or any of them,” General Jabiri said. “I know more about this issue than the Americans do. In fact, I know more about bombs than anyone in the world.”

He attributed the decrease in bombings in Baghdad since 2007 to the use of the wands at checkpoints. American military officials credit the surge in American forces, as well as the Awakening movement, in which Iraqi insurgents turned against Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, for the decrease.

Aqeel al-Turaihi, the inspector general for the Ministry of the Interior, reported that the ministry bought 800 of the devices from a company called ATSC (UK) Ltd. for $32 million in 2008, and an unspecified larger quantity for $53 million. Mr. Turaihi said Iraqi officials paid up to $60,000 apiece, when the wands could be purchased for as little as $18,500. He said he had begun an investigation into the no-bid contracts with ATSC.

Jim McCormick, the head of ATSC, based in London, did not return calls for comment.

The Baghdad Operations Command announced Tuesday that it had purchased an additional 100 detection devices, but General Rowe said five to eight bomb-sniffing dogs could be purchased for $60,000, with provable results.

Checking cars with dogs, however, is a slow process, whereas the wands take only a few seconds per vehicle. “Can you imagine dogs at all 400 checkpoints in Baghdad?” General Jabiri said. “The city would be a zoo.”

Speed is not the only issue. Colonel Bidlack said, “When they say they are selling you something that will save your son or daughter on a patrol, they’ve crossed an insupportable line into moral depravity.”

Last year, the James Randi Educational Foundation, an organization seeking to debunk claims of the paranormal, publicly offered ATSC $1 million if it could pass a scientific test proving that the device could detect explosives. Mr. Randi said no one from the company had taken up the offer.

ATSC’s promotional material claims that its device can find guns, ammunition, drugs, truffles, human bodies and even contraband ivory at distances up to a kilometer, underground, through walls, underwater or even from airplanes three miles high. The device works on “electrostatic magnetic ion attraction,” ATSC says.

To detect materials, the operator puts an array of plastic-coated cardboard cards with bar codes into a holder connected to the wand by a cable. “It would be laughable,” Colonel Bidlack said, “except someone down the street from you is counting on this to keep bombs off the streets.”

Proponents of the wand often argue that errors stem from the human operator, who they say must be rested, with a steady pulse and body temperature, before using the device.

Then the operator must walk in place a few moments to “charge” the device, since it has no battery or other power source, and walk with the wand at right angles to the body. If there are explosives or drugs to the operator’s left, the wand is supposed to swivel to the operator’s left and point at them.

If, as often happens, no explosives or weapons are found, the police may blame a false positive on other things found in the car, like perfume, air fresheners or gold fillings in the driver’s teeth.

On Tuesday, a guard and a driver for The New York Times, both licensed to carry firearms, drove through nine police checkpoints that were using the device. None of the checkpoint guards detected the two AK-47 rifles and ammunition inside the vehicle.

During an interview on Tuesday, General Jabiri challenged a Times reporter to test the ADE 651, placing a grenade and a machine pistol in plain view in his office. Despite two attempts, the wand did not detect the weapons when used by the reporter but did so each time it was used by a policeman.

“You need more training,” the general said.

Riyadh Mohammed contributed reporting.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: November 5, 2009
An article on Wednesday about a bomb detection device used by the Iraqi security forces that is considered useless and costly by the American military misstated the surname of the leader of ATSC (UK) Ltd., the London-based company that has sold hundreds of the devices to Iraq’s Interior Ministry. He is Jim McCormick, not Mitchell.
source

[KanadaHye]

Re: Fake bomb detectors still in use

Ahhhh... isn't it great our tax dollars are going towards funding these new "westernized" governments. Bring Saddam back... at least he wasn't sucking blood and money out of us.

[Federate]

Re: Fake bomb detectors still in use

Great post. I still cannot believe the Iraqis keep using them. I think they just do not want to swallow the fact that they just wasted $85 million on garbage. You would think the cost of a human being would be more valuable. There must be SOMEONE in the Iraqi Ministry of Science that should be voicing their concerns, where are these people? The excuse the company gives as to why it does not work sometimes is just as ridiculous as people coming up with excuses as to why a certain invisible man's actions are often times illogical.

And someone needs to go to Lebanon and talk to one of these guards to explain to them why these glorified rods do not work, maybe over some shawarma and tabbouleh .

[Federate]

Re: Fake bomb detectors still in use

Ahhhh... isn't it great our tax dollars are going towards funding these new "westernized" governments. Bring Saddam back... at least he wasn't sucking blood and money out of us.

They spend a trillion dollars on these wars but need to be squeezed for money when it comes to helping Haiti or Africa. Iraq was prosperous under Saddam and less people died under his Western-backed regime in 25 years than in 7 years of this Iraq war.

[KanadaHye]

Re: Fake bomb detectors still in use

Great post. I still cannot believe the Iraqis keep using them. I think they just do not want to swallow the fact that they just wasted $85 million on garbage. You would think the cost of a human being would be more valuable.

The amount of corruption that it being built into these new regimes in Afghanistan and Iraq makes the Taliban and Saddam look like saints. And us tax payers are flipping the bill.

[Siggie]

Re: Fake bomb detectors still in use

The expression is "footing the bill."

[KanadaHye]

Re: Fake bomb detectors still in use

The expression is "footing the bill."

Why would I foot the bill? The bill is usually placed face down on the table and you pick it up and flip it over to see how much you have to pay.

[Muhaha]

Re: Fake bomb detectors still in use

lol at trying to say the U.S and other's are responsible for retarded Iraqis. Can anybody find anything that says Iraqis were doing anything Scientifically productive under Saddam's rule? What did they exactly pioneer before the evil Joos, Americans, Freemasons, and Shape Shifting Aliens came along and destroyed their glory?

[KanadaHye]

Re: Fake bomb detectors still in use

lol at trying to say the U.S and other's are responsible for retarded Iraqis. Can anybody find anything that says Iraqis were doing anything Scientifically productive under Saddam's rule? What did they exactly pioneer before the evil Joos, Americans, Freemasons, and Shape Shifting Aliens came along and destroyed their glory?

If you don't know anything about the history in the region, I suggest you read up on how Saddam came to power, how Iraq came to being, and how OIL is the reason why millions have been murdered in the name of God.

In support of the Ouija board... the manufacturers made a killing off selling that stupid thing, lol.

[Muhaha]

Re: Fake bomb detectors still in use

If you don't know anything about the history in the region, I suggest you read up on how Saddam came to power, how Iraq came to being, and how OIL is the reason why millions have been murdered in the name of God.

In support of the Ouija board... the manufacturers made a killing off selling that stupid thing, lol.

This has nothing to do with what I said.