Tracking them down in Iraq Published March 21, 2008 By Senior Airman Stephen Musal 17th Training Wing Public Affairs FORT HUACHUCA, Ariz. -- FORT HUACHUCA, Ariz. -- Putting the bad guys behind bars is the end goal of any good law enforcement operation, and for a team of highly-specialized Airmen in Iraq, the goal is no different. They are called Weapons Intelligence Teams, and one Airman from 17th Training Group Detachment 1 just returned from a year of working with them to put the baddest of the bad - the builders, marketers and users of improvised explosive devices - where they belong: behind bars. Master Sgt. Rodney Thompson is ordinarily a signals intelligence master instructor, now serving as a superintendent at the detachment. He deployed to Forward Operating Base Liberty outside of Baghdad, Iraq, to work as the NCO in Charge of seven five-man teams who tracked down the clues and identified the suspects in the IED business. Sergeant Thompson said his job was acting as a liaison - between the Weapon Intelligence Teams and the Explosive Ordinance Disposal units (usually Army) safely detonating the IEDs, and between the WIPs and the leadership of the Army's 1st Cavalry Division, who ran FOB Liberty. In addition, Sergeant Thompson went out on a few missions with the teams, to get a feel for what the task was. "Being able to sit back and look at things from a desk doesn't give you a feel for what's going on out there," Sergeant Thompson said. "I needed to get some firsthand knowledge from their perspective, and get some of the evidence myself." Gathering forensics, the Weapons Intelligence Teams' primary task, lets the teams learn the enemy's tactics, policies and procedures, according to Sergeant Thompson. The teams themselves included intelligence Airmen as well, he said, including career fields training on Fort Huachuca and Goodfellow Air Force Base. "Definitely, if you're in an intelligence career field, you'll go," Sergeant Thompson said. And the work, he added, is meaningful. "If you're on one of those teams, you'll definitely find yourself contributing to the war," he said. "You're actually out there battling the enemy, and the decisions you make and the reports you send out - people are reading these. A lot of what we do is saving people's lives. We think we're just sitting back and writing reports, but someone is taking information from this report to plan their next mission. We're gathering a lot of good intel, putting a lot of people in jail. We're getting things done in Iraq." The most fulfilling part of the deployment, Sergeant Thompson said, was being able to see all of his team put their lives on the line and still have everyone come home alive. "Another was to find out later that some of the individuals we'd gathered evidence on were not only arrested, but convicted and serving time, based on the work we'd done," he added. "We were able to directly tie some of the work we'd done to people being locked up. That's when you really know that what you're doing over there really makes a difference." The hardest part for Sergeant Thompson was seeing the effects of the IEDs and trying to figure out the mindset of some of the terrorists using the weapons. "I was reading one of the reports about a vehicle-borne IED going off and hearing about the person who used children as bait and then left them in the car while the VBIED went off. Knowing that these people were willing to use children to make a statement while children are some of the most innocent people on earth - that's what got to me the most," Sergeant Thompson said. Still, Sergeant Thompson said he was very prepared by both his unit and the training he was given. "The Army gave us some very good training as well," he said. "In the war, you never know what you might have to use. I'd rather be over-trained than under-trained," he added. "If you've never been to war on the ground, you can't watch a movie and determine that you're ready for this - it's totally different. Sometimes experience is the best teacher when it comes to certain things, and this is one of those things." In the end, Sergeant Thompson said he is proud of the job he and the rest of the Weapons Intelligence Teams did. "We're really gathering some great evidence, and I can say that first-hand," he said. "There are Airmen on the forefront, right out there, being a part of taking down an IED sale by some of the evidence they've got - that's vital," he added. "We're putting bad guys in jail."
