U.S. soldiers have best body armor, Pentagon says

[sabra]

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N11162382.htm

U.S. soldiers have best body armor, Pentagon says


WASHINGTON, Jan 11 (Reuters) - U.S. troops in Iraq are using body armor that strikes a balance of protecting them while allowing movement to do their jobs and withstand hot temperatures, the Pentagon said on Wednesday.

The Senate Armed Services Committee summoned defense officials to a closed briefing to explain a Pentagon report disclosed last week that said more complete body armor could have prevented or limited about 80 percent of the fatal torso wounds suffered by Marines killed in Iraq.

Army officials said improvements are being made to armor systems to provide more side protection but that mobility also is a concern.

"We must not burden our soldiers with weight to the point that they become ineffective and susceptible to other dangers," Army Major Gen. Stephen Speakes told reporters after the briefing.

[Occulus]

1. How about giving them some to begin with? n/t

[RagingInMiami]

2. Well if the Pentagon says so

Then it must be true. No need to dwell on that issue anymore.

[Imagevision]

15. What about the Humvee's???!

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

3. Yep, the very best armor their families send them

after paying for it out of their own pockets...

[Democrats_win]

4. BS & Fallacy! Because it's the best doesn't mean it's good enough.

Remember the recent study that showed it didn't protect the sides of soldiers torso's? This is a weakness that any good military would try to fix rather than explain away.

Besides, the enemy might take advantage of this weakness.

BTW, our poorly paid soldiers are trying to fix it themselves while these lead bottoms sit in Washington doing nothing but collecting their undeserved pay!!!

[pinerow]

5. Guaranteed to repel any sponges thrown at them...

sheesh

[dave502d]

6. Will than give it to them.n/t

[Joe for Clark]

7. I think their kids should go fight the war

and then see how they feel about it.

"We must not burden our soldiers with..." PROTECTION - where is your kid, buddy!!

Un fuckingbelievable.

Joe

[sidwill]

8. As somebody already stated, this is a nonstarter of an issue.

Typical of our leadership today, they get caught up in the smaller details of this conflict instead of leading on the larger issue of wether this war is moral or not.

Basically the leadership comes across as nitpicking about a periperal issue (news flash, soldiers die in wars, body armor or not) instead of LEADING public opinion towards questioning the morality of this war.

This type of half assed sniping will guarantee that we continue to be viewed as irrelevant.

Last thought: If Kerry had taken a strong stance AGAINST the war and campaigned on a platform opposing it he may have very well still lost, but what kind of a position would our leadership be in today?

[Joe for Clark]

9. Great thoughts.

That thing with Kerry still bothers me. And I couldn't agree with you more.

When we grew up and our parents grew up it was different.

The day Joe Kennedy died in that failed attack against German rocket bases, it was Jimmy Roosevelt flying his wing. You knew, we knew - when presidents send their own children to fight, it had to be right. I guess that day is long over.

I grew up around war. And I appreciate the true costs. I do not see how anyone can have a lesser standard. The day the presidents send their kids off to die, I'll go myself - and I am getting a little old now, but I'd still go.

Oh, Clark should have been president - I do not always agree with him, but I really trust his judgement.

Joe

[Joe for Clark]

11. Not to forget,

Of course, Teddy Roosevelt's boy commanded on Omaha Beach. In fact, directed/commanded the initial attack.

Joe

[Adelante]

13. Nitpicking?

Hardly.

Do me a favor and sign the petition in my sig, would ya?

[FrenchieCat]

14. All Issues are important, and with this one, live and death are involved

in a very real way.

If one of your loved one was fighting in Iraq without the right kind of body armor, this would not be a "small detail" nor would you consider it "nipicking".

The body armor is what is "half ass".....not the fact that there are those who care enough to bring it up.

This war is immoral, and the inadequate body armor that our soldiers are forced to use is too!

[w8liftinglady]

17. that was MY response to someone who said this is a non-issue to ME

[MichiganVote]

10. Well gee...not sure anybody else in Iraq HAS body armor

[Joe for Clark]

12. I don't understand what you mean.

I do have a twenty something year old kid that was (and is going back) there.

Let me give you the skinny - they don't have to look for the bombs at the side of the road - we do, our kids do. They don't need much armor to plant it - and our kids need alot of armor to survive it.

Let me tell you what happens when a five hundred - even a two hundred and fifty pound bomb goes off.

The moment of concusion, the air is sucked from your lungs. Dad dropped these in Frankfort, many times. Hotels, housing - perhaps - 600 or 700 people had immediate fatalities of 50 or 60 percent - do YOU UNDERSTAND!! It is on FILM. That is how they figured it.

You know how they counted them?? - by the bodies. DO YOU UNDERSTAND, REALLY!!!

I know and I had to live through the aftermath. And I know the suicides that followed. IT is impossible to reconcille the results. Eight ships come back from a mission and one boy blows his brains out, and maybe a year later, trying to reconcille such results.

MORALITY AND DUTY TO COUNTRY DO NOT EQUATE!!

They never did and never will.

SO, it better be a pretty important deal to have to do such things.

I'd say he failed, but it is such an understatment.

Joe

[w8liftinglady]

18. Joe,I know exactly how you feel...

I thought my son was fairly "safe" when he became a heavy equip mechanic,only to find he goes to all the sites where trucks have been blown up to retrieve salvageable parts,tow the trucks,etc.He had the bare minimum flak jacket,because he wasn't infantry.Let their kids go over there,if they think these boys are so well protected.

[MichiganVote]

22. You know every now and then somebody really goes around the bend

and aims a post in my direction that is completely left, or right, of what I was trying to say. So before you attempt to judge my post as anti anything other than ALL soldiers should have the very latest of armor, re-read you initial statement,

"I don't understand what you mean" and lets just let it go at that.

I'm too tired for a pissing match today. Good luck to you and your son Joe.

[Imagevision]

16. If this story was true? why are there army bloggers borrowing vests tov go

out on convoys? -- Obvioiusly Pentagon, like Bushco, will tell any tale to squash a story be fore it gains momentum -- I believe they're lying because of so many reports of families sending Kevlar vests from home to protect their loved ones...

Can you believe anything the Bush aDMINISSTRATION SAYS??

[EFerrari]

19. Of course they're lying. That's what they get paid to do. n/t

[Brooklyn Michael]

20. Please define "best"....

...because it wasn't that long ago when Bush called Harriet Myers the "best" qualified candidate for the Supreme Court. :eyes:

[FredUptoHere]

21. and produced by the LOWEST bidder...

ain't capitalism grand?

[Solly Mack]

23. LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL. That's the punch line...right?

lololololololol

[wildwww2]

24. Body armor does not defend against a lose-lose situation. Iraqi war crime

will not be helped by body armor. The troops need protection from a lunatic commander in chief. Will the American people who seem to be sheep to the corporations ever demand that the lunatic Bu$h be removed? Arm our troops with the truth and they will stop dying for nothing (but corporate profits).
Peace
Wildman
Al Gore is My President

[NuttyFluffers]

25. but, pentagon, tell me all about the candy and flowers?

is a rose encrusted with shrapnel smell just as sweet?

[ismnotwasm]

26. Not according to my daughter

Who thank any Gods that exist is getting out of the army after 9 years because of shit like this. She did her time in Afghanistan and Korea. She's coming to visit in a week or so, and has agreed to be interviewed by me for a paper I'm writing. I once said to her something similar "You know how I feel about war, but I also believe our soldiers should have nothing but the best equipment available" Her response? "Well we don't"

There was a picture in the Army Times a year or so ago with a new body armor design, It may have been a prototype. I'm sure it was designed with soldier's safety in mind, but it was a ridiculous appearing piece of equipment, with what looked like a friggin' COD PIECE as it's most prominent feature. It did not look very fucking mobile to me. So here we are, still working on it?
Soldiers are dying.
Aesthetics aren't necessary if lives are at stake, of course. But few soldiers received this particular piece of equipment. Or anything new at all.

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

27. Sure, the few who actually get to wear any. Get the best. n/t