Pentagon Solicits Proposals on Combating Terrorism

A broad agency announcement calling for new techniques in fighting terrorism was jointly released Oct. 23 by the undersecretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics and the Combating Terrorism Technology Support Office Technical Support Working Group.According to a spokesperson at the Defense Department, the solicitation is aimed primarily at research and other profit or nonprofit organizations meeting federal eligibility for contract work. Small and disadvantaged businesses are encouraged to apply.In particular, the Defense Department wants ideas on combating terrorism, defeating difficult targets, conducting protracted operations in remote areas and developing countermeasures to weapons of mass destruction. A list of specific proposed projects was also announced, including research in:*Automated speaker recognition systems;*Tagging, tracking, locating and remote sensors;*Locating and identifying faces in video images;*Human video tracking;*Terrorist behavior and actions predictions technology;*Developing an information integration center.The technologies and approaches should be able to be developed and fielded within 12 to 18 months.The announcement, executed under the Federal Acquisition Regulation for the competitive selection of basic research, calls for a three-phase process. Interested parties will submit a one-page description of their ideas, due Dec. 23. The Defense Department will then request more detail of the ideas in which it is interested. The third phase will call for full proposals that may form the basis of contracts.More information can be found at www.bids.tswg.gov, under notice BAA#02-Q-4655.