Quest. for Bob Smalser

[shamus]

Bob, you mentioned that you did some support for UN inspectors on another thread. I read somewhere that there technical crews were using scanning equipment of some kind that could detect suspect compounds/elements at long ranges. Like a long range spectrophotometer or something. Could this be true? it sounded dodgy to me at the time I read it, as I never heard of such a device.

[LeeG]

I wonder if it's possible to illuminate something with specific frequencies from a laser and analyze the reflection for some information. "some information" might be like a "a whitehouse source" but it might be better than no information until a scratch and sniff test occurs.

[shamus]

OK Bob, thanks anyway. I tried googling for info on this sort of thing but didn't come up with anything matching the description, guess it was BS. Though it's marvellous the stuff they come up with these days.

[Jim H]

If I remember correctly, we did try to use an airborne device in Vietnam that could detect chemical compounds.

[ahc]

I doubt that you will find much info on the latest technology as I believe it is classified. I have friends who work in the industry and they can't say much but we do have lots of work going on regarding various detection technology.

[Jim H]

I thought about it some more last night. I remember reading a book about the efforts to detect troop movement on the ho chi minh Trail. They used seismic devices planted by recon units and eventually were dropping them from aircraft (disguised as small trees). IIRC they were using an airborn deviced to detect urine, which would be detectable if a large troop concentration was in the area. Either that or I'm having another pre-senior moment...