Mine Vs. Countermine: The Battle Continues
THE LAND MINE IS ONE OF THE most capable weapons systems available today. It is cheap, easily massproduced, and deadly. It is also controversial: It maims and kills soldiers and civilians alike. For much of this century, mine and countermine technology have gone round for round in innovation and counterinnovation. Here are some of the salient events of that fight.
In the 1920s Germany began producing antitank pressure mines, with fuses that detonated several pounds of explosives (up to 20 pounds or more in later models) when a vehicle ran over them. Other countries, including the United States, followed, and by World War II the devices were being put to use in Europe, Africa, and the Pacific. Since they were pressure-detonated, these early antitank mines typically did most of their damage to a tank’s treads, leaving its crew unharmed and its guns still operational but immobilized and vulnerable to aircraft and enemy antitank weapons. Manufacturers soon began to produce blastresistant tank treads —and mines aimed at piercing a tank’s thin belly armor, causing a “catastrophic kill.” In the latter the Germans once again took the lead. During World War II they began using a mine with a “tilt rod” fuse, a thin rod standing approximately two feet up from the center of the charge and nearly impossible to see after the mine had been buried. As a tank passed over the mine, the rod was pushed forward, causing the charge to detonate directly beneath it. The blast often killed the crew and sometimes exploded onboard ammunition. Now that tank crews were directly at risk, they were less likely to plow through a minefield.
These antitank mines, particularly when coupled with smaller antipersonnel mines (to keep soldiers from removing the antitank mines), were so effective that by the early 1950s most armed forces considered them a standard part of their arsenal. In fact, no one saw a need for further major innovations in mine technology until the era of the Vietnam War, when close fighting and ambushes became the norm. Tripwires were then used more frequently, as were remotely detonated mines, such as the dreaded claymore antipersonnel mine. The claymore, which entered service in 1961, consists of a plate filled with explosive and with hundreds of small steel balls that fly out over a 60-degree arc when detonated, causing massive damage to a distance of 50 feet or more.
During the Korean and Vietnam Wars two increasingly evident problems caused a technological shift in mine development. The first was that people had figured out how to detect and move mines without detonating them; American mines were frequently replanted and used against American troops. The second was that they posed a lingering threat to civilians for years after the fighting ended. To prevent enemy soldiers from picking up a mine and moving it, the United States added antihandling devices, secondary fuses designed to detonate when a mine is moved. Next came “smart” or selfdestructing mines, which helped decrease, if not eliminate, the threat to civilians. One version, for example, became inert once water seeped in and dissolved the explosive chemicals.
The United States tried a variety of smart mines during Vietnam, but the safety mechanisms were unreliable and a number of U.S. soldiers were injured by mines that were supposed to be dead. Then in the early 1970s a formal research and development program was begun. The results today are both highly reliable and capable of being rapidly disabled by hand, by armored vehicle, or even by aircraft. Exhaustive tests of the U.S. Army stockpile have proved the latest smart mines to be 99.999 percent reliable. These have limited lives of four hours to fifteen days, after which they either self-destruct or self-neutralize. The antitank version even contains a fuse that can detect the magnetic signature of an armored vehicle, ensuring that a pedestrian won’t cause an explosion.
As mine technology has progressed, countermining has had to keep pace. There are three main branches of countermining: detection, breaching, and clearing. Detection is obviously the most important, because it is the key to preventing civilian casualties and ensuring maximum military flexibility. The earliest countermine efforts consisted of probing the ground with long poles or bayonets, being alert for such visual cues as disturbed earth and tripwires, and, all too frequently, detonation. Unfortunately, the only real improvements in mine detection since World War II are fiberglass probes (bayonets can activate magnetic fuses) and metal detectors.
The earliest metal detectors were developed during World War II; in response, manufacturers soon began to develop mines that contained almost no metal. The small amount of metal in most modern mines is often lost in background noise in the detector’s earphones. At one point the Army tried a detector that measured the relative density of soil versus that of objects buried in it, but the device couldn’t distinguish between a rock and a mine. So American soldiers in Desert Storm had virtually the same detection capabilities as their predecessors in World War II. Today the Army is working on a full suite of mine detection equipment using lasers, infrared and multispectral imaging, and ground-penetrating radar.
Of course, once mines have been spotted, they must be ‘removed. This task is often more difficult than detection. In wartime it is usually done by breaching, cutting a lane through a minefield so that forces can pass and maintain the momentum of attack. Breaching places a premium on speed rather than safety. Since World War II it has usually been accomplished either by destroying individual mines or by using a special vehicle to plow them out of the way. The first method, in which engineers place charges next to each mine, is time-consuming, leaves soldiers exposed to enemy fire, and is ineffective when mines are buried. Frequently an explosive line charge is used instead: An armored vehicle fires a rocket-propelled flexible tube filled with plastic from the edge of the minefield to destroy or detonate mines and create a pathway. Unfortunately, modern blast-resistant mines can often survive even the largest line charges.
In the second method, mechanical breaching, a plow designed to withstand the blast of several mines at once is attached to the front of a tank or armored vehicle. It lifts mines out and off to the side. Mechanical breaching can conquer most mines, provided the ground is not too frozen or rocky, but mine technology has been keeping pace, and a number of countries are developing side attack or “off route” mines that can defeat breaching vehicles as they proceed through a minefield. These devices detect the presence of vehicles traveling along a path (through acoustical, seismic, or infrared means or with a tripwire or pressure tape) and fire armor-piercing projectiles at them from the side.
Military breaching operations remove or destroy only enough mines to enable a force to pass. Clearing all mines in peacetime, with a premium on safety and thoroughness, is much more difficult. However, clearing personnel can use a wide variety of detection and removal tools that are too deliberate and time-consuming for soldiers. Blast shields, mini-mine detectors, encasing foam that allows mines to be moved without detonations, and robotic mineclearing machines are just a few.
For every invention that has rendered mines harmless or, at the very least, less harmful, a new innovation has made mines all the more unstoppable. And vice versa.
