DOJ, DoD build ties to train better bomb squads for Iraq

[seemslikeadream]

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/doj-dod-build-ties-train/story.aspx?guid=%7BFDCED539-CE15-450E-82FF-CFB8334D1150%7D

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- The Justice Department has beefed up bomb squad training for soldiers and Marines headed to Iraq and Afghanistan, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms said Tuesday.
ATF, a Justice Department agency, is doubling the training courses it provides to Pentagon personnel. The new initiative costs about $1 million and is funded by the Joint Improvised Explosive Device Defeat Organization, a Defense Department agency.
Better training will allow soliders to investigate a roadside bomb explosion faster and more safely, said Steven Beggs, head of ATF's explosives training branch. The new program also has developed new computer tools for cataloguing bombs and studying their construction.
"One of our main goals is to shorten the amount of time that the operator is out there getting that information. It is very, very dangerous work that these folks are doing," Beggs said in a telephone interview.
About 180 military personnel are expected to go through the new training in fiscal year 2007. The training program began in fiscal 2005 on a smaller scale, ATF said.
Roadside bombs, formally known as improvised explosive devices, or IEDS, are one of the biggest problems facing U.S. troops in Iraq. U.S. forces study these bombs carefully to learn how they work and who made them - U.S. officials currently are trying to determine how many advanced bombs are made in Iraq and how many are smuggled in from outside, possibly from Iran.
The Pentagon is planning major new