WASHINGTON – When Army patrol leaders in Iraq prepare to go out on missions in Baghdad, their last stop at headquarters is a computerized map on which they outline the area where they will operate. Then they watch as icons emerge, showing, in grim detail, the lurking dangers.
By clicking on those, they can bring up not only sites of past hostile action but also photos and background on local leaders – some to see and others to avoid – videos of hostile and safe places, and reports from previous patrols, said Brian Slaughter, a retired Army first lieutenant who served as an armored platoon leader in Iraq in 2004. Slaughter took part in developing the computerized Tactical Ground Reporting System, or TIGR.
Before TIGR, patrol leaders had only intelligence passed down from higher commands, primarily the locations of previous attacks. “Soldiers love it,” Slaughter said. “Now they have their own tool at company level that pulls up a wealth of information that helps determine their safest route.”
When the soldiers return from patrols, they feed information back into the system, adding to the data available to the next patrol leader, he said.
Mari Maeda, a project manager for TIGR, said the system also allows departing units to transfer tactical information to their replacements.
The TIGR software package is part of a networking technology developed by the Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency that about 2,000 patrol leaders in Iraq are using.
