NCJ Number
223603
Journal
Security Journal Volume: 21 Issue: 3 Dated: 2008 Pages: 139-146
Date Published
2008
Length
8 pages
Annotation
This analysis explored the time-space distribution of insurgent activities in Iraq related to attacks with improvised explosive devices (IEDs).
Abstract
It was found that events clustered in space and time more than would be expected if the events were unrelated, suggesting communication of risk in space and time and potentially informing next event prediction. The data showed that the highest risk of future IED attacks was a distance of up to 1 kilometer for a period of 2 days after an IED attack. The analysis represented a proof of concept that the risk of IED attacks was communicable and suggestions for further analysis addressing prevention or suppression of future incidents are briefly discussed. This paper describes analyses to determine whether there is a space-time dependency for insurgent activity, and the approach used seeks to identify patterns in the actions of distinct cells of operatives with quantitative data at fine levels of resolution in space and time. The data used for the research was 3 months of terrorist incidents attributed to the insurgency in Iraq during the U.S. occupation. Attribute fields included unique incident number, location in latitude and longitude coordinates, and date. A total of 2,168 records were used, all from 2004, with about 40 percent involving an improvised explosive device. The methods used were based on a well-established body of work using police recorded crime data. Tables, references