Soldiers learning to use non-lethal force - Army News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Army Times

Soldiers learning to use non-lethal force

FORT DIX, N.J. — Sgt. Tim Heck knelt on the red athletic mat. The instructor, standing behind him, took aim with the Taser.

Heck, 25, braced himself.

“I was like, ‘Ah, it’s not going to do much.’”

Then there was a sharp crack and the Taser fired two tiny harpoons into Heck’s back and left leg, introducing him to a pulsing 50,000 volts.

Heck stiffened violently, yelled, and then pitched forward like an overloaded bookshelf.

“They all seized up,” Heck said of his muscles. “They get so tight you can’t even move. You are just like, ‘Holy crap.’”

Welcome to non-lethal force.

Heck was one of a dozen soldiers here from the Pennsylvania National Guard’s 56th Stryker Brigade Combat Team who volunteered to endure the paralyzing effect of the Taser gun. The unit was training with a new package of non-lethal equipment the Army is fielding to combat units bound for Iraq and Afghanistan.

Law enforcement units have used Tasers for years, but the Army only began issuing them to combat units last summer as part of the brigade non-lethal set.

The 30 soldiers who attended the Jan. 5-9 exercise are the first Guard combat soldiers to receive instruction on the service’s new Brigade Non-Lethal Capabilities Set. The package of equipment, which includes specialized devices to stop vehicles and translate languages, is organized into modules to give units an alternative to lethal force in fast-moving situations, such as traffic checkpoints where innocent people can be mistaken for the enemy.

Heck and his fellow soldiers will spend the next several months training the rest of the soldiers in the 56th on the equipment before deploying to Iraq later this year. Some soldiers said that switching from thinking about lethal action to non-lethal is a difficult transition.

Each brigade set contains 18 X26E Taser guns. The X26E looks and feels like a toy pistol, but it fires a special cartridge containing two tiny darts designed to penetrate up to one inch of clothing out to a maximum range of 35 feet. The darts spread apart during flight. Once they strike the target, the coiled wires connected to the Taser create an electrical arc between the two darts that reaches an intensity of 50,000 volts.

The voltage is then spread out over 19 pulses per second for five seconds.

The effect is devastating, said Troy McVay, a civilian non-lethal systems expert and instructor who works for the Army Non-Lethal Scalable Effects Center at Fort Leonard Wood, Mo.

“With a Taser, you can’t fight through it,” he said. “It just shuts you down.”

The proof is in the pain

Heck, of C Company, 1st Battalion, 111th Infantry Regiment, said he volunteered to be Tased so he could better explain it to other unit members.

“You can say, ‘Yeah, I have been Tased, and it hurts like hell,’ but it is really good to do it because you understand the effects.”

Sgt. Matt Styborski, a squad leader B Company, 1st Battalion, 112th Infantry Regiment, said he has a lot more confidence in the Taser now that he has been on the receiving end.

“You are not capable of doing anything when the volts start flying,” he said. “You are out of the fight.”

This was especially important for Styborski, since he had a less encouraging experience with the Taser earlier in the day while practicing how to draw the weapon from its holster and fire it.

“My first experience with a Taser was, I pulled it out of the holster, and it didn’t work,” he said.

It turned out that the new holster was stiff and the battery compartment disconnected when he drew it from the holster, he said.

“It’s just something that everybody has to be conscious of; that is why we have hands-on [training] before we get into country. As long as the equipment is reliable, we have no problem using it.”

Soldiers spent a full day learning how to load, operate and troubleshoot Tasers, but that was just one part of the training.

The brigade non-lethal set is made up of four other modules of equipment organized for checkpoint, convoy, dismounted and detainee/crowd-control operations.

This new modular organization and weeklong training course is the latest approach to non-lethal equipment since the service first started issuing the gear in 2000, said Maj. Thomas Aarsen, an assistant product manager who helps oversee the program at Picatinny Arsenal, N.J. The Army began issuing these new brigade sets to units in July.

The service has fielded 13 brigades and plans to do the same for about 100 other units. So far, two brigades have deployed to Iraq with the new sets: 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 25th Infantry Division, and 2nd Heavy Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division.

Some of the items in the different modules are not new, such as flex cuffs, riot batons and shields, and high-intensity search lights.

Besides the Taser training, instructors focus the training mainly on the checkpoint operations module and allow the unit to train with the other equipment.

Checkpoints or traffic control points have been a common tactic in Iraq since the war began. While effective, there have been instances where innocent civilians have been hurt or killed because they failed to stop when ordered to do so.

Sgt. Christopher Rohrer saw this on his first tour in Iraq in 2003 with the 3rd Infantry Division.

His unit had set up a checkpoint just outside of Baghdad.

“It was right around sunset, so visibility was not good,” he said.

A fast-moving car approached and did not slow down, despite signs and verbal warnings, Rohrer said.

“A younger soldier had to make a decision whether to fire on the vehicle or not because it wasn’t stopping,” he said.

The soldier fired his M4 carbine, which brought the vehicle to a stop. When the soldier moved up to the car, “he saw that the little girl and the woman — it could have been the mother or an older sister — had been hit,” Rohrer said.

“We never found out, but we think the older one passed away, and it messed with him. He never returned back to the line because he couldn’t deal with his conscience.”

Rohrer pointed out that the soldier had followed all the rules of engagement for escalation of force.

“I could definitely hear him yelling to stop ... but the vehicle was approaching too fast and wasn’t paying attention,” he said.

The checkpoint modules contain several devices, big and small, designed to stop vehicles without harming the occupants.

There are caltrops — small multiple-sided, free-standing spikes that have existed for hundreds of years. These can be placed across a road and can easily puncture tires.

Other items are more sophisticated, such as the Portable Vehicle Arresting Barrier. This device features 24 feet of super strong netting packed inside a sectional container that resembles a speed bump when stretched across a two-lane road.

Two collapsible poles on either end of the device raise the net with compressed air. It can be activated by remote control from 300 feet away.

Multiple anchoring options ensure that it will stop a medium-sized vehicle traveling at speeds of about 40 mph, program officials said.

Soldiers were impressed by the PVAB, but Sgt. David Wellington said he doubted the unit would ever have the opportunity to use such a specialized piece of gear.

“I just don’t see how you can use it on a traffic control point,” he said. “It’s more of a permanent thing. I do like the fact that the Army is trying to think along these lines.”

The checkpoint module also includes the Vehicle Lightweight Arresting Device. The mat, measuring 9 feet, 8 inches by 16 feet, 4 inches, features a row of nail-sized spikes along the front edge. When a car rolls over the spikes, the spikes bite into the front tires and cause the mat to wrap around the front axle, stopping the vehicle. The VLAD rolls up and packs into a duffle bag when not in use.

In addition to the basics such as search mirrors, traffic cones and portable light sets, the module also includes a Phraslator — a handheld device designed to translate commands and basic phrases such as “may I search your vehicles?” or “turn your vehicle off” in Arabic, Dari, Iraqi, Kurmanji, Pashto and Urdu. The Phraslator can be hooked up to the Acoustic Hailing Device, a powerful speaker system in the module, to ensure commands are heard over city noise and other distractions.

Soldiers touted the Snake Eye, which is used for searching cars. It features a small camera on the end of a wand that shows what it sees on a handheld screen. The Snake Eye is designed for searching inside gas tanks, engines and other areas that are difficult to access.

“This thing works great,” said Wellington, a squad leader with A Company, 1-112th. “I wish I would have had this the first time around,” he said, referring to his tour in Iraq with the 3rd ID in 2004. “With all your gear on, it makes it hard to get down where you can see” into tight spaces.

Most of the soldiers said they liked the training and the equipment, but say it is hard to adjust to thinking in non-lethal terms.

“It’s a little bit different being infantry; everything we do is about closing in and using lethal methods,” said Staff Sgt. Eric Larsen, a squad leader with A Company, 1-111th Infantry Regiment. “And now obviously things have changed significantly to the point where they feel like [we] need to learn non-lethal methods, so it’s definitely different. The next training I get, we might be doing [urban] training where we are kicking in doors.”

Styborski agreed with Larsen.

“We have been talking about it all week,” he said. “It’s great to have the capability, but the question we have all been debating is: Is it going to be beneficial to use it?”

Styborski said he doesn’t recall many opportunities to use non-lethal force during his last tour in Iraq in 2005 with 3rd ID.

“It was either lethal or nothing,” he said. “The country has been changing — they tell us that every day, so if we get to use this stuff, that would be great. It may save some innocent lives of people that just didn’t understand that checkpoint or what we are trying to do.”