Security Sweep Turns Up Biometrics Failings?

The news on Monday that a 36-day security sweep in Baghdad turned up a cache of identity cards and passports highlights one of the most important capabilities in biometrics: assured access. If you're going to establish secure areas in which to operate, whether a physical area such as the Green Zone, a network or some database, you have to be certain that the people getting in aren't working for the enemy.

But the Associated Press reported on Monday that Operation Arrowhead turned up two identity cards that would give the holder access to the Green Zone and another ID card with access to the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad.

How did these cards get into the hands of insurgents? That question hasn't been answered. In fact, during a press conference with reporters on Monday, Army Col. Steven Townsend, commander of the 3rd Stryker Brigade that led the mission, never even mentioned the ID cards. Although, to be fair, he did say that as a result of the operation "3,200 roadside bombs have been prevented, 42 terrorists were jailed, and enough weapons and explosives were captured to outfit an enemy infantry battalion."

The information was included in a list of items captured by U.S. forces during a security sweep from March 20 through April 26 and distributed after the briefing.

The list included 220 identity cards, including passports, Iraqi army ID cards, propaganda and even a "briefcase with drawings of 'remote airplanes' with flight plans around Baghdad," according to AP reporter Robert Burns.

I certainly don't mean to diminish the mission's successes. But roadside bombs and improvised explosive devices are easy to make --that's why they call them improvised. If you can't stop people from entering secure areas, how much good does it do to take weapons that they can easily replace? That's not to say that coalition forces shouldn't find and seize as many enemy weapons as they can, they should, but someone's got to do a better job of managing the I.D. cards.

Burns reports that lack of security within the Green Zone is a growing problem.

The adequacy of security in the Green Zone, also known as the international zone, has recently come into question, particularly in the aftermath of the April 12 suicide bombing in the Iraqi parliament building's dining hall. One lawmaker was killed in the blast, which was claimed by an al-Qaida-led amalgam of Sunni insurgents.

About two weeks before that attack, two suicide vests were found unexploded in the Green Zone. Less than a week before that, a rocket attack in the restricted zone killed an American contractor and an American soldier.

--Catherine MacRae Hockmuth