The Defense Department has approved a realignment of the Joint Improvised Explosive Device Defeat Organization (JIEDDO) with the goal of improving oversight and accountability, a Pentagon spokesman announced today.
The organization will get a new name and transition from a jointly manned activity to a combat support agency under the authority, direction and control of the Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics.
JIEDDO was first stood up as an Army task force in 2003 to rapidly counter the threat posed by the growing number of improvised explosive devices in Iraq, which had become the largest cause of casualties among U.S. troops there.
The task force reached out to Army components, its sister Services, the private sector and academia to improve threat-intelligence gathering, acquire counter-IED technologies and develop C-IED training.
The early success of the Army IED Task Force, which saw a reduction in casualty rates per IED attack despite an increased in-theater use of the devices over its period of operation, led then Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul D. Wolfowitz to transform the entity into a Joint IED Task Force.
In February 2006, the joint task force was converted into a permanently-manned entity: the Joint IED Defeat Organization.
Given the role and resources to comprehensively attack and defeat the IED threat, the organization has grown to support a broad spectrum of C-IED initiatives, tools and programs with a staff comprised of military, government civilians and contractors.
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