WASHINGTON-A powerful lawmaker Wednesday directed the Federal Communications Commission to send its best scientists to meet with the Pentagon to help alleviate the continuing problem of improvised explosive devices.
“Would the FCC have some idea to solve the IED problem?” asked Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va.), chairman of the House Appropriations commerce, state, justice and the judiciary subcommittee. “I would like the FCC to get your very best people to go over and talk to the Department of Defense this week.”
Key fobs and cell phones can be used to detonate IEDs. The bombs used recently in Madrid were detonated with cell phones. Wolf believes FCC engineers may be able to work with the military to develop a detector that can be put on vehicles so that soldiers know to avoid a certain area.
“They put these devices in streets, on lamp posts, in dead animals. Would the FCC have some mechanism, some idea that could be put on an automobile that triggers the explosive device before the military gets there that sends a signal or a beacon?” asked Wolf. “Maybe there is something. Maybe there is nothing but get your best scientists or anybody else from any other agency to go sit down with DoD and maybe have someone go over to Iraq and just see if maybe there is something that can be mounted on the front of a military vehicle that we would know that a device is close by.”
FCC Chairman Michael Powell, a former army officer and the son of a celebrated army general, agreed with Wolf that something needs to be done.
Within hours after the appropriations hearing, where Powell defended the FCC’s $293 million fiscal-year 2005 budget request, Edmond Thomas, chief of the FCC’s Office of Engineering and Technology, told RCR Wireless News that the FCC would work with the Pentagon.
“We want to make sure we can supplement the expertise the Pentagon already has and see what kind of void, if any, is in their knowledge base,” said Thomas.
The Pentagon welcomed the assistance, noting however; more IEDs are detected than are detonated.
“My experience is that where the laws of physics and morality don’t dictate otherwise, we take a very proactive approach to solving threat-related and targeting-related technical questions-and then we do our level best not to tip off the enemy as to what we worked out,” said Lt. Col. Ken McClellan.
The FCC requested Congress appropriate $20 million from general revenues for its budget with the rest coming from regulatory fees imposed on FCC licensees. This amount represents a 6.9-percent increase. Powell said this increase was necessary to update and replace some spectrum-interference equipment and vehicles.
Wolf questioned why the FCC believes it deserves to have the entire $91 million in auction proceeds it is owed for fiscal year 2005 because there have not been many recent auctions. Powell said that auction activities are ongoing.
Last year the Senate imposed a cap on the amount of auction revenues the FCC could receive, and this forced the commission to lay off talented contractors, said Powell.
The FCC is supposed to receive 3 percent of auction revenues to pay for auction and licensing activities.
