This is what an IED looks like
(photo by P.J)
I took this photo near Kandahar, about an hour’s drive outside the city. I blew the aperture way out so that you can see the bomb in greater detail. I’m told it was about 50 gallons of explosive liquid, hooked up to a cell phone (pictured bottom right.) If the phone rang, we would all have been vaporized. Luckily, US vehicles have cell-phone jammers.
The IED was stuck in a culvert and found by some Afghan police before the convoy I was in drove over it.
IED deaths and attacks have skyrocketed in Afghanistan since the “surge” began, mostly because insurgents know they can’t fight toe-to-toe with the heavy armor and air support fielded by the coalition.
I was maybe twenty-feet from the culvert when I took this picture and the light-spots on the bomb are from mirrors that the soldiers used to reflect light onto the “subject.”
I haven’t seen many photos of IEDs, but with deaths from these bombs skyrocketing, I thought I’d post this pic here, so you could have a better idea what the US and NATO are up against.
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I’d like to write something smart and insightful right now but all i can think of is oh.my.god.
Thank you for posting this, P.J….and be careful out there.
My sentiments exactly, thank you very much for what your doing, you’ll be in my prayers. And now that you’ve posted it and we know what one looks like, no need to get that close again, K?
Thanks so much guys!
Andrea, I’m always careful.
Risin, as for not getting that close again, sadly, it just doesn’t work that way.
[...] is what an IED looks like In case you wanted a close up without being blown to bits. P.J. Tobia – Afghan Desk – This is what an IED looks like – True/Slant __________________ You can’t have a good marriage with a serial killer, that’s for sure. [...]
I haven’t seen anything like this in previous news coverage, P.J. It’s terrifying in its simplicity.
Thank you for capturing this, but I am with the others in urging you to be careful.
{Gulp.}
Ditto.
We’ve gotten so used to the lingo, the stories, the data, the opinions, wailing women we don’t really know, flies on kids we don’t really know. Somehow, despite all that, we find a way not feel and know that it’s about BOMBS. Thank you for making it personal, and immediate, and for making us nervous about you.
Likewise, thanks for this. And thanks for not making it a debate about whether or not we should be there.
[...] have to at least take a look at this. Few people have seem one of these and lived to tell about it. This is a picture of a real improvised explosive device planted by insurgents to kill U.S. and allie… or who ever else they don’t [...]
I don’t know what to say either except that this is what news is all about. I think there was once a time when the reporting your are doing would have been done by TV and print. People like you would have been the big shots.
In due time you will get the recognition you deserve for your hard work.
Well I know what to say: We’re Screwed.
When you can’t tell who the enemy is and bombs can be created this simply, the only defense is an excellent, deeply embedded counter intelligence force. I don’t think we are there yet.
You keep your head down, man and make lots and lots of friends.
[...] Quite a week at The Desk. It started with a lovely guided tour of Kabul’s poppy palaces, then we all got to see what an IED looks like. [...]
What liquid? Where from?
We all know about unexploded cluster bombs, widely dropped in s. afghanistan. And other unexploded stuff, simply simply turned around to get the pawns of the side whose elites had them deployed in the first place.
I can’t help but admire the perseverance and ingenuity of people who have lost everything and much of their families and villages, fighting back. No other options here, fighting back.
We need to bring our troops out right now, and if Afghan insurgents claim they defeated all our $$$ and high-tech and grisly “science”, and PR, they deserve to claim it because that’s precisely what they are doing. We really need these people in the gene pool, not dead.