THE six British soldiers and two British civilian security guards killed by roadside bombs since July in southern Iraq were victims of a sophisticated method of insurgency attack using infra-red technology.

For several months there has been a growing use of improved explosives tech- nology in the hands of insurgents in the south. This expertise is widely believed to have come from outside Iraq.

In particular, infra-red “trip wires” have been used to set off explosives. This is a complex technique and one that has been mastered by the Hezbollah organisation in Lebanon.

When British military counter-insurgency specialists first discovered the infra-red technology, suspicion fell on Hezbollah, and by extension on Iran, which funds, arms and trains its militants.

The official British military maps in Basra in southern Iraq highlight the long border with Iran, a frontier denoted as a “totally-porous border”.

The counter-insurgency experts try to keep a step ahead of the insurgents, attempting to outwit them as they develop different ways of targeting British soldiers; but help from over the border, whether official or unofficial from elements in the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, has made their task more difficult.

“It’s a cat and mouse game, they [the insurgents] get better than us and then we get better than them, but every time they get better than us, someone dies,” a military source said.

The attacks are believed to be the work of a breakaway section of the followers of Moqtada al-Sadr, the radical Shia cleric, as well as Sunni insurgents.

The most recent British death was that of Major Matthew Bacon, of the Intelligence Corps, who was serving as a staff officer with the headquarters of the Multinational Division Southeast in Basra. Major Bacon, 34, was travelling in an armoured Land Rover in Basra when a roadside bomb was detonated by infra-red. He died and three other soldiers were seriously injured. The Land Rover was obliterated.

The other soldiers killed by the enhanced explosives technology were Fusilier Donal Meade, 20, and Fusilier Stephen Manning, 22, of the 2nd Battalion The Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, who were killed on September 5; and 2nd Lieutenant Richard Shearer, 26, Private Leon Spicer, 26, and Private Phillip Hewett, 21, of the 1st Battalion Staffordshire Regiment, who died on July 17.

Two civilians working for Control Risks Group security company, Andrew Holloway, 32, and Ken Hull, 48, were also killed by a roadside bomb.

Before the development of the more advanced roadside bombs, the British military had been dealing with devices detonated by remote control.

Since Operation Telic (the British campaign in Iraq) started in March 2003, 63 British military personnel have died as a result of hostile action.

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