Article taken from the June 18, 2010 edition of National Defense Magazine

The U.S. military’s special operations units will take on the role of high-tech crime solvers this fall when they deploy to war with CSI-like kits.

The forensic kits will have tools designed to help special operators track down insurgents in Afghanistan by the clues they leave behind, officials say. The planned acquisition of these kits highlight the growing law-enforcement duties that U.S. troops now carry out in war zones.

“The kit is like CSI for special operations forces,” says Douglas Richardson, program executive officer for special reconnaissance, surveillance and exploitation at U.S. Special Operations Command. The gear is similar to that used by forensic scientists at a crime scene. But because special operators often work alone or in small teams in remote locations, the kit was customized with tools that are portable and can be operated in areas with little or no infrastructure, he says.

In a briefing to the Special Operations Forces Industry Conference here, Richardson says that the equipment will help operators collect DNA and fingerprints, find evidence hidden behind walls, identify traces of chemicals and extract data from cell phones and computers.

The collected material will be sent to U.S. databases where analysts can help identify targets and match up suspects to individuals previously identified as members of terrorist or insurgent groups.

In an interview, Richardson says the original goals was to build a kit that would make it easier for SOF troops to figure out who the potential enemies are, how to find them and collect critical evidence. In recent years, troops have complained that their jobs have become more difficult because they lack the evidence that is required to be able to prove that the individuals they captured have committed a crime, such as planting a roadside bomb. With the forensic kit, they will be able to produce the needed proof to detain and prosecute suspects, says Richardson.

During their recent tour in Iraq, troops from the 1st Battalion, 5th Special Forces Group (Airborne) say that one of the challenges they faced in assisting Iraqi forces was meeting the burden-of-proof requirements to obtain warrants to detain suspected insurgents.

“Every piece of kit that we employed, whether it was a sensitive site exploitation kit, or a helmet camera that allowed us to not only capture what had happened on the objective, but what we found on the objective, was crucial in ultimately getting that individual detained,” says Maj. Steve Hayden, a company commander for the battalion at the time.

Every operation required a warrant from an Iraqi judge, says Lt. Col. Dean Franks, commander of 1st battalion. The units that were working with Iraqi military “found themselves in a role that felt much more like serving high-risk warrants than it did a military raid.”

Operators helped to select the tools that will go into the forensic kit. SOCOM’s program executive office is in the final stages of evaluating the hardware. Once they receive the final stamp of approval, the kits will begin deploying with units by the end of the year.

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