Remote chemically specific detection of trace impurities in the atmosphere from distances on the order of kilometers is an important problem from both an environmental and a national defense viewpoint. A new scheme is discussed consisting of the remote generation of a backward propagating stimulated Raman pulse. This pulse is then used to drive a coherent anti-Stokes Raman scattering scheme, resulting in a strong chemically specific signal propagating back to the detector. 2013 Taylor & Francis.