From battlefield to desktop: to train troops, Army creates digital reenactments of roadside bomb attacks.

• Author: Jean, Grace V.
• Position: Training & Simulation

NEWPORT NEWS, Va. -- It's the military's version of "Candid Camera," but insurgents caught on tape will not be smiling for long.

Almost daily, the U.S. military captures surveillance video of roadside bomb incidents and replicates the events in simulations that are distributed worldwide within days to help train troops who are preparing to deploy.

Video footage of insurgents burying improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, is among the data collected by analysts who are assisting simulation experts here at the joint training counter-IED operations integration center.

The center was established two years ago by the Joint IED Defeat Organization and the Army Training and Doctrine Command.

"We're replicating today's battlefield events for tomorrow's training," says Jeff Bittel, deputy for the modeling and simulation directorate at the center.

The demand for the video gaming technology that is used to reenact IED events is growing, says Steve Hopkins, vice president of professional services at CAE USA, a supplier of simulation technology.

Traditionally the Army would create a video game based on anticipated combat scenarios and would distribute it for training purposes. Now, commanders want to quickly build simulations based on the latest enemy tactics. That is achievable today with laptop computers, new software technology and digital imagery of the war zone, Hopkins says in a telephone interview. CAE built a large digital database of almost every part of Afghanistan and has seen a growing demand for the imagery by the Army for use in simulations.

Inside the darkened operations center here, analysts sit at computers sifting through data. Some confer with colleagues across the room. The facility can connect to deployed teams via video teleconference.

"This morning, we were in with Afghanistan and Iraq," says Chris von Jacobi, the center's chief of staff. "We're picking up on the significant events from the previous 24 hours."

From that, analysts choose which incidents are "truly significant either in terms of enemy success, or friendly failure." Simulation engineers are given four days to replicate an event and send copies out to units preparing to deploy, he tells reporters during a tour of the facility.

The center is now producing short 3-D simulations called machinimas--real-time computer animations generated by video game graphics engines.

Bittel plays one that depicts a new IED called the RKG-3, which is based on a Soviet-era weapon...