[middle-east] troops 'deliberately under-equipped' in the middle-east

Interesting that the Beeb ran the piece [below] on shoddy equipment because I took a swipe at this business with my question in an earlier post: 'Why are the Dragonsuits [Dragon Skins] not allowed?'

So to today's article by the Beeb:British troops fighting in Iraq urgently need better-protected patrol vehicles to prevent more being killed by roadside bombs, MPs have warned. The all-party defence committee said the "under-equipped" soldiers needed more helicopters, as well as air conditioning to stop heat exhaustion.Its report said members had seen first hand how overstretched troops were during a visit to Iraq in June. Committee chairman James Arbuthnot said:

"We cannot send them on operations without giving them the tools they need to do the job."We were disturbed by the deficiencies in equipment they faced," Committee chairman James Arbuthnot reported. "

The MoD must address equipment shortages and capability gaps as a matter of urgency."Ha! These equipment shortages are no accident – they are the result of short-term expedient purchase from the lowest bidder and the most connected. This is about sweetheart deals over the last fifteen years and further back down the track in other areas.There is no serious lack of forethought - only defence contracts.

Simply that. Most Britons and Americans with any sort of patriotism, while maybe not actually supporting the war, nor applauding its goals and purposes, nevertheless would be right behind the men and women over there. And yet the ground troops and others are being sold short.

Here is one small case in point:

Defense Review has confirmed [that] just as we expected, Pinnacle Armor SOV-2000 Dragon Skin body armor appears to be significantly superior in every combat-relavant way to U.S. Army Interceptor Body Armor.DefRev recently got a chance to see the actual specs from three different facilities: H.P. White Laboratory, Inc. , United States Test Laboratory a.k.a. USTL, and U.S. Army Aberdeen Test Center a.k.a. ATC .The technical data continues in the article and then the conclusion:

The data proves that in Level III/III+ (SOV-2000) and Level IV (SOV-3000) versions, Dragon skin surpases SAPI and ESAPI performance levels in 9 different areas, by huge margins:

- Ballistic Performance
- Weight
- Multiple Repeat Hit Capability
- Flexibility with the Ability to add coverage
- Durability
- Substantially reduced backface deformation (less trauma to the body)
- Ergonomic capabilities (mission specific, concealed, female rifle defeating capabilities)
- Better edge hit capability

There's simply no way anyone who has seen the data that we saw could come to any other conclusion other than Dragon Skin is vastly superior to Interceptor Body Armor. It's not even close.Bottom line is, all relevant ballistic test data is available for viewing and validation (just like we viewed and validated it), exactly as Pinnacle Armor has offered in their written response to the SOUM and the Pentagon Brief by General Sorenson.

So what is the point being made and what is the point of this article? It's this:

Why the negative statements about Pinnacle Armor to Margaret Warner on News Hour with Jim Lehrer Armor for U.S. Troops In Iraq (Jan. 11, 2006) and why Major General Jeffrey A. Sorenson's, Col. John Norwood's, Col. Thomas Spoehr's negative statements about Dragon Skin in their recent news briefings?

These denials either show ignorance of the facts, a lack of knowledge of the available ballistic data, outright lies or are deliberately deceptive.Well, this is due to the fact that the military has (for years) outsourced these types of positions at Natick and PEO to [certain] civilians, instead of maintaining them within the military. Unlike military personnel these civilians do not have the same level of oversight or controls on them to maintain the typical checks and balances necessary to ensure true and unbiased evaluation of performance-based products (like SOV/Dragon Skin, for instance) for the protection of the America's soldiers.

This theme is continued in the following article:

...well, the next day (January 14th), Mr. Helms wrote about a very disturbing situation. Helms reported that two soldiers getting ready to deploy to Iraq were being forced to leave their Pinnacle Armor Dragon Skin vests behind.They were informed that if didn't leave the Dragon Skin body armor behind, their $400,000 SGLI life insurance policies might be nullified in the event of their deaths, so their beneficiaries would receive nothing.

Helms also reported that the two soldiers were told they might also face disciplinary action for not complying with the order to leave the Pinnacle Armor vests behind.According to the SFTT report, the soldiers complied with the order, so they will now have to... wear official issue body armor--most likely the Interceptor Multi-Threat Body Armor System Outer Tactical Vest (OTV), which has been the subject of considerable criticism of late, with regard to ballistic performance and durability.

Helms/SFTT reports that one of the soldier's commanders expressed deep regret about ordering him to leave his Dragon Skin body armor behind, but that he "had no choice because the orders came from very high up."If this report is true, it's DefenseReview's opinion that an investigation should be launched immediately into who is behind these orders. Whoever it is, (again, if the SFTT report is accurate) they deserve to be prosecuted. They're putting the lives of infantrymen in danger by increasing the likelihood they'll be killed in combat.

The body armor situation is really just par for the course, since our infantry has been contending with sub-standard small arms for decades. The 5.56x45mm FN M249 SAW/LMG (Squad Automatic Weapon/Light Machine Gun) should have been replaced a long time ago. It's too heavy (a claimed weight of 16.75 lbs) for an LMG/SAW, and isn't sufficiently reliable or accurate.Every bonafide small arms expert that DefenseReview has spoken with has characterized the FN M249 SAW as "a piece of crap", and we're quoting them diplomatically.

The 7.62x51mm FN M240B GPMG (General Purpose Machine Gun), at 27 lbs empty, is way too heavy for mobile infantry use.And, both weapons represent approx. 50-year old tech. Even the latest variants of the M16, the M16A4 rifle and Colt M4/M4A1 Carbine represent technology that's at least 50 years old, now, and should have been replaced with a better solution a long time ago.It goes on and on.

The M16 A4 I know of myself and concur with the above article. Now to my part of the world where I'm living and the military here smile at the equipment the Brits and Yanks have to contend with and can't understand why they stick with it. Every time I hear a military man explain to me, nay, even show me the capabilities of this piece or that, compared with the equivalent H&K or FP piece, for example, I seethe.

Of course, these guys here have their own barrow to push, eg. I'm more interested in handguns such as the Yarygin PYa, Serdjukov SPS / SR-1) and particularly the lightweight GSh-18, but nevertheless, the point stands.

Our troops in the UK and the US are being sent to fight a war, with flagship equipment at the highest levels, but at ground level it is really not the best going. Today's Beeb report refers to the tip of the iceberg.

posted by james higham at Thursday, August 10, 2006