Study Blames Many Iraq Deaths on Body Armor

[Barrett808]

Study Blames Many Iraq Deaths on Body Armor
By ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer
Sat Jan 7, 4:27 AM ET

WASHINGTON - Most torso wounds that killed Marines in Iraq might have been prevented or minimized by improved body armor, a Pentagon study found.

The unreleased study last summer by the Office of the Armed Forces Medical Examiner looked at 93 fatal wounds from the start of the war in March 2003 through June 2005. It concluded that 74 were bullet or shrapnel wounds to shoulders or areas of the torso not protected by ceramic armor plating.

The findings underscore the difficulty facing the Army and Marine Corps in providing the optimum level of body armor protection in a war against an insurgency whose tactics are constantly changing.

Both services have weighed the expected payoff in additional safety from extra protection against the measurable loss of combat effectiveness from too much armor.

"In response to the changing battlefield conditions and as new technologies emerge, the Army continues to develop improvements to soldier protection equipment to enhance survivability and mobility," Army spokesman Paul Boyce said Friday.

(more)

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060107/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/iraq_body_armor

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