"When they actually had to go they suddenly became C.O's and refuse to deploy."
Personally, I don't give a damn what happens to them. Maybe they're just using college and "bad career choice" as some kind of excuse.
I'm inclined to think that these two cases are isolated enough not to warrant changes in the way the military is presented to recruits. But I'm just raising the question about the way it's marketed.
Is someone "baited" into taking a job that gives them a hiring bonus? If a firm is trying to hire you away from another and they offer you 10,000 up front was it bait? No. They are simply saying for this job you get x amount and this bonus up front if you do it. Same with the military, it's is saying we will train you for a job while you earn money and also money to go to school if you choose. In exchange you just might be called upon to do the job we've paid and trained you for. Were they baited? Did they not realize what would happen if there was war? Did someone not mention that the military is the ones who fights wars? They weren't baited. They knew what they were doing and when it came time for them to do their job and uphold their oath as well as protect their brothers they ran.
Q: Yes, Mr. Secretary. My question is more logistical. We’ve had troops in Iraq for coming up on three years and we’ve always staged here out of Kuwait. Now why do we soldiers have to dig through local landfills for pieces of scrap metal and compromise ballistic glass to up-armor our vehicles and why don’t we have those resources readily available to us? [Applause]
SEC. RUMSFELD: I missed the first part of your question. And could you repeat it for me?
Q: Yes, Mr. Secretary. Our soldiers have been fighting in Iraq for coming up on three years. A lot of us are getting ready to move north relatively soon. Our vehicles are not armored. We’re digging pieces of rusted scrap metal and compromised ballistic glass that’s already been shot up, dropped, busted, picking the best out of this scrap to put on our vehicles to take into combat. We do not have proper armament vehicles to carry with us north.
SEC. RUMSFELD: I talked to the General coming out here about the pace at which the vehicles are being armored. They have been brought from all over the world, wherever they’re not needed, to a place here where they are needed. I’m told that they are being – the Army is – I think it’s something like 400 a month are being done. And it’s essentially a matter of physics. It isn’t a matter of money. It isn’t a matter on the part of the Army of desire. It’s a matter of production and capability of doing it.
As you know, you go to war with the Army you have. They’re not the Army you might want or wish to have at a later time. Since the Iraq conflict began, the Army has been pressing ahead to produce the armor necessary at a rate that they believe – it’s a greatly expanded rate from what existed previously, but a rate that they believe is the rate that is all that can be accomplished at this moment.
I can assure you that General Schoomaker and the leadership in the Army and certainly General Whitcomb are sensitive to the fact that not every vehicle has the degree of armor that would be desirable for it to have, but that they’re working at it at a good clip. It’s interesting, I’ve talked a great deal about this with a team of people who’ve been working on it hard at the Pentagon. And if you think about it, you can have all the armor in the world on a tank and a tank can be blown up. And you can have an up-armored humvee and it can be blown up. And you can go down and, the vehicle, the goal we have is to have as many of those vehicles as is humanly possible with the appropriate level of armor available for the troops. And that is what the Army has been working on.
And General Whitcomb, is there anything you’d want to add to that?
GEN. WHITCOMB: Nothing. [Laughter] Mr. Secretary, I’d be happy to. That is a focus on what we do here in Kuwait and what is done up in the theater, both in Iraq and also in Afghanistan. As the secretary has said, it’s not a matter of money or desire; it is a matter of the logistics of being able to produce it. The 699th, the team that we’ve got here in Kuwait has done [Cheers] a tremendous effort to take that steel that they have and cut it, prefab it and put it on vehicles. But there is nobody from the president on down that is not aware that this is a challenge for us and this is a desire for us to accomplish.
SEC. RUMSFELD: The other day, after there was a big threat alert in Washington, D.C. in connection with the elections, as I recall, I looked outside the Pentagon and there were six or eight up-armored humvees. They’re not there anymore. [Cheers] [Applause] They’re en route out here, I can assure you. Next. Way in the back. Yes.
Here are some responses in the blogs:
"I work for a manufacturer of parts for military aircraft. We are a small company that sells our parts to the large companies you have heard of (Raytheon, Northrop Grumman).
At least in my experience we are (now) working three shifts already. After a lull the business has really picked up and we are just about at capacity. I would say that there are several reasons that the production can't just be ramped up by adding factories.
The first is the byzantine nature of military purchasing. We usually hear about a job long before it gets to us... and by the time they get to us everything is already late.
The second is turf battles. If you have created a company that makes a specific part you are not particularly willing to share the engineering and process it takes to make that part with someone opening a new factory. It will take them a long time for any new entrents to the market to get up and running.
Thirdly - mil-spec. There are very demanding specifications for the manufacture of anything for the military. Many comapnies aren't particularly interested in, nor do they have the capacity to do the detailed work for the military. There are many hoops to jump through for every part. As each part is tested it may be approved - or it may be kicked back for repair or to be scrapped.
This is not like WWII when the nation was mobilized to build tanks for victory. I don't think the major automakers are going to shut down their minivan assembly lines in order to produce up-armoured Humvees."
“Mr. Lowry,
I can give you a partial answer to your query.
A friend of mine supervises the production of armor kits for trucks and Humvees here in Albany, GA. I can tell you for sure that they ARE working triple shifts and overtime to get the job done---and have been doing so for many months. They are also busy modifying existing designs in response to emerging threats and "customer" suggestions (e.g., increased height to improve head protection).
As for opening new factories: I have gotten the impression that there is some difficulty getting adequate supplies of armor grade steel. Such steel also requires special equipment to cut, shape, and weld, so maybe there is a shortage of facilities with the necessary capabilities. I do not know if Humvee armor incorporates ceramics (e.g. Titanium DiBoride) but, if so, there are relatively few companies capable of producing such materials in suitable sizes and volumes (e.g., Ceradyne Inc.).”
And a long one:
Army's Cold War thinking impeded production of armored HMMWV
on the front page of today's Wall Street Journal (subscription required) that reports on why it has taken the Army so long to develop, procure, produce and deploy its up-armored HMMWVs in Iraq. The article also does a great job of generalizing from this instance to make a larger argument about the Army's anachronistic thinking about weapons systems and the battles it would need to procure gear for in the 21st Century. Here's a short excerpt:
On the eve of the war in Iraq, just 2% of the Army's world-wide fleet of 110,000 Humvees were armored, and the Army was planning to cut back its purchases. As late as last May, the Army saw little need for the armored Humvee, saying it needed only 235 of them in Iraq. Only in October, with its soldiers under daily attack, did the Army decide it needed 3,100 armored Humvees. Today, the requirement stands at 4,500 and climbing -- a number the Army doesn't expect to hit in Iraq until late this summer or early fall.
The Army's failure to produce more of the vehicles, a hot topic among soldiers in Iraq, is slowly becoming an issue among lawmakers. A look at why the armored-Humvee program has struggled to gain acceptance shows flaws in the Army's vision over the past decade of how future wars would be fought. Even as the armored Humvee proved itself in small conflicts around the globe, the Army failed to buy more because it was focused on preparing for major wars with other large armies -- rather than low-end guerilla conflicts.
Moreover, in pursuit of big technological leaps that fundamentally alter the way wars are fought, the service also has tended to overlook simple, low-cost innovations that often count for much more on the battlefield. "Getting the Army to support the armored Humvee was like pushing a limp rope up a hill," says Jim Mills, a retired colonel who was a senior manager on the program for several years in the late 1990s.
Critics of the armored Humvee had pointed to its limitations: Unlike an Abrams tank, the vehicle can't repel a blast from a rocket-propelled grenade or .50 caliber machine-gun fire. Iraq, however, has shown that even a marginal technological advance can save lives. While the armored Humvee may not deflect a blast from a rocket-propelled grenade or roadside bomb, the solders in the vehicle are far more likely to emerge from the attack with their lives.
Prior to the Iraqi war, senior Army officials, looking to save money in the 2004 budget, drafted a plan that would have cut the number of armored Humvees the service planned to buy by 2,800 vehicles to a total of 1,000.
Now the Army, rushing to fix the imbalance, says it needs 11,000 of the vehicles world-wide. In addition, it is scrambling to produce about 8,400 add-on armor kits that can be bolted to existing Humvees with sheet-metal or fiberglass skin and canvas doors.
Analysis
: If there is a good news story here, it is that the Army has learned (relearned?) the lessons of urban combat in Iraq and seen the utility of this vehicle. More importantly, it has jumpstarted production with emergency procurement orders for up-armored HMMWVs, and transferred almost every up-armored HMMWV in the world to forces in Iraq. The Army had a problem, and it responded the best it could with the resources it had in place. Some general officers probably deserve a pat on the back for making what is normally an inflexible Army supply/procurement system respond so quickly to this problem.
However, the larger problems of the system remain. In many ways, this problem could never be satisfactorily solved because the Army did not have the resources on the battlefield in order to move them to the right place and time. That problem owes to procurement decisions made much further upstream by the Army, in which it decided this was not a valuable system. As evidence of that, I submit these two passages from Mr. Jaffe's story:
Army officials insist that no one could have predicted that the service would have been involved in such a huge peacekeeping effort, which dwarfs previous missions to the Balkans, Haiti and Somalia. Nor could the Army have predicted Iraqi insurgents would use remote-detonated roadside bombs so effectively to kill U.S. soldiers, says Brig. Gen. Jeff Sorenson, a senior Army procurement official. "We didn't anticipate this threat nor were we prepared for it," the general says.
Really???
That's a planning failure of the most basic kind -- the failure to anticipate the threat. And I find it quite hard to believe, honestly, that the Army could fail to appreciate this kind of warfare after watching all of the brushfire conflicts of the 1990s. From Somalia to Chechnya, it was clear
what kinds of wars
we'd be fighting in the next century to anyone with a clue about history and the population trends that were moving towards urban centers. Moreover, as one of my NSRT colleagues
points out
, the Army recognized these trends and incorporated them into exercises at the Joint Readiness Training Center as early as 1993. Roadside IEDs were a known threat, and the Army trained for it -- it just didn't buy the gear it needed to have to meet this threat effectively.
A second passage from Mr. Jaffe's article is even more damning:
... The program's most enthusiastic backers were military police, who specialize in riot control, peacekeeping and stabilizing an area following combat.
But officials involved in the program worried that the Army might not embrace a peacekeeping vehicle. They were also concerned the relatively small military-police force, which boasts no three- or four-star generals, lacked "the horsepower to get the armored Humvee built," says John Weaver, an Army program manager who oversaw the service's Humvee fleet. So Mr. Weaver and his colleagues instead pitched the armored Humvee as a scout vehicle that would venture out in front of the tanks during big battles and beam back information about the enemy.
The armored Humvee proved terrible at that job. Early test vehicles were too heavy, and whenever they ventured off road in soft soil they got stuck in the mud. Senior officers in the Army's armor school, which trains and equips the service's heavy-tank force, wanted to kill the armored-Humvee program entirely.
It is true that early armored HMMWV prototypes had problems. They basically bolted armor onto an existing HMMWV and it was too much for the engine, chassis, suspension, and steering to bear. However,
all
prototypes have these problems, and the up-armored HMMWV certainly had less problems than the early Abrams and Bradley prototypes. (See the book
Pentagon Wars
The Armor community may have cited these problems in its decision, but the real issue was that it didn't want to procure equipment for anything less than high-intensity combat. You see, an admission of the value of equipment for low-intensity conflict and peacekeeping operations would diminish the value of armored forces, which are designed to fight high-intensity battles. The Armor community was even willing to do so at the expense of its scouts, who drive the exact same M1025 un-armored HMMWVs that MPs do. This Cold War high-intensity combat paradigm was so prevalent in the Army that the MP community -- the Army's center of excellence for peacekeeping ops -- could not sell this program to the Army in any sufficient numbers. Mr. Jaffe is right that the MP corps lacks a 3- or 4-star general. The path to advancement in the Army has never been through low-intensity conflict or peacekeeping operations; it has always been through the combat arms. Senior Army leaders today may see things differently, because many have Balkans experience (like retired Gen. Eric Shinseki, who predicted it would take "several hundred thousand" troops to secure Iraq). But in the mid-1990s, when this program was in the early stages, the Army still believed in its Cold War/Gulf War I paradigm.
The armored HMMWV problem isn't the only procurement problem to surface during Operation Iraqi Freedom. The other big one was the lack of
Interceptor Body Armor
to save lives. Thousands of troops (including a disproportionate number of reservists) went into combat wearing Vietnam-era flak jackets capable of stopping some shrapnel, a level of protection far below what was available. Again, this traced back to procurement decisions made far upstream by military and civilian officials who decided they could afford a phased purchase of IBAs, rather than a one-time purchase, because they didn't see this kind of conflict on the horizon. Once again, that reflects a very big failure of the imagination. The military
did
prepare and procure for the kind of tech-heavy conflict it wanted to fight in the 21st Century; it bought JDAMs, it bought cruise missiles; it bought into R&D on programs like the
Future Combat System
. What it did not do was buy equipment to fight the low-tech battles that many experts predicted would become the norm in the 21st Century. And the results are now becoming clear.
But wait -- there's more. Vehicles and body armor are just two equipment problems, and they're quite narrow. If you look at the Army's vehicle fleet generally, you will see that very few vehicles have any sort of armor or crew protection at all. The vast majority of Army HMMWVs and cargo trucks were designed to move in a permissive "rear area" environment, and thus they have nothing but fibreglass and canvas to protect their occupants. Similarly, if you look at the Modified Table of Organization and Equipment for most "rear area" units -- from maintenance companies to medical companies to signal companies -- you will see a noticeable lack of combat equipment. These support units lack crew-served weapons, night-vision goggles, GPS systems, and tactical radios. Simply put, they
don't have the equipment necessary
to protect themselves while they do their support mission.
I don't think we need to transform transportation companies into door kick-in'ers. But I do think we need to equip these support units with the gear they need to defend themselves in a convoy or logistical base. Until now, the Army's paradigm was that these units would fight on a linear battlefield and rely on front-line units to kill the bad guys before they could get back to hurt them. That paradigm looks nice on paper, but it's not the reality we're likely to face in future conflicts, as illustrated by recent experience in Iraq.
And by the way LUV... Kerry has NOTHING to do with it, not now, and not with that stupid $87 Billion that he is accusedof fighting against. What an OLDÂ load of shit that accusation is. Kerry
So you'll never bring up any candidates or presidents since they have nothing to do with it now? The fact is he voted against the 87 billion period. Yet you had no trouble pulling the lever for him. Fine.
 Now that they are actually asking Rumsfeld the hard questions that even the "MSM" won't ask him,
Actually it was the MSM that asked it.
Oh and wtch the whole press conference. Rummy got a standing ovation at the end of it.
The fact is he voted against the 87 billion period.
and Bush threatened to veto another bill to help the troops unless it was exactly as Republicans wanted it and the Republicans prevented other bills to help the troops.
Bush used our troops to ram through partisan bills and to prevent bills that would have helped the troops from getting through.
the fact is, the bill Kerry voted against contained what was basically a blank check and in light of the millions of dollars that have now gone missing, it was a bad bill.
Kerry voted against giving them carte banche to give to their business buddies and not to our troops.
What absolute Bullshit. None of the bills were accountable. But it's not the time to haggle. Kerry voted against it because Dean was making inroads in the polls with the anti war crowd.
You're not giving these guys much credit for free will, Rob.
Again, like I said I have no problem with the question being asked. I just don't like the underhanded way it was done, what's so hard ot understand about that.
There was another trooper that the reporter coached.
soldier to embedded reporter: man, this really sucks about the armor situation, I wish I could tell someone.
reporter to soldier: you can.
soldier to reporter: how?
reporter to soldier: let me help you understand how the media would go about it
this is "coaching". I'm sorta glad to think that a soldier with questions would get help asking them from someone who's profession is asking questions.
Where is the proof that these guys were coached by reporters anyway?
Reporter planted GI's question for Rumsfeld
CNN) -- The question a U.S. soldier asked Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld Wednesday about the lack of armor on some combat vehicles in Iraq was planted by a newspaper reporter embedded with the soldier's unit, the reporter told colleagues in an e-mail.
Almost immediately after returning to camp yesterday after the visit by the SECDEF, I did a google news search and read the AP Wire article and noted that, although the piece was fairly accurate, there was definitely a sense of exaggeration in the tone that presented the townhall meeting as a gripe session. As one of the soldiers in the audience, I felt that presenting the morning in such a fashion was misleading, and with such negative connotations, I wondered how long it may be before the MSM ran with the story and turned a pleasant morning with the Secretary of Defense into a scenario that resembled a defendant being cross-examined by the prosecution in a court room. I knew the story was generating heavy circulation when I saw it headlined on Drudgetoday (click here for story).Â
Before I dig in, I want to address one item in particular from the story linked above that I think was not made clear enough. When it stated:
Spc. Thomas Wilson had asked the defense secretary, "Why do we soldiers have to dig through local landfills for pieces of scrap metal and compromised ballistic glass to up-armor our vehicles?" Shouts of approval and applause arose from the estimated 2,300 soldiers who had assembled to see Rumsfeld.
Rumsfeld hesitated and asked Wilson to repeat his question.
I believe Secretary Rumsfeld hesitated because it was difficult to hear the first part of the question Spc. Wilson asked. Perhaps because of nerves, he spoke at first very quickly, and the acoustics of the hangar were hardly concert-hall quality. The Secretary asked others to repeat parts of their questions as well apparently because of difficulty hearing the question in its entirety. I do think Spc. Wilson is justified in asking such a question. It is a serious issue, and if logistics or "physics" is the obstacle from accomplishing the tasks of up-armoring vehicles to add to soldier safety, then we need to do our best to overcome that obstacle. The Secretary concluded with an anecdote in which he spoke of the recent terror warning surrounding the election. He said he looked out the windows of the Pentagon one day and saw 6-8 up-armored HMMWV's perched at the perimeter of the building. He then said, "Guess what, they aren't there any more."Â
I also want to express that as a person who has worked in politics for years, I was very surprised when we were told there would be the opportunity to ask questions without first having them screened. I would have assumed there would have been some process where those who had questions submitted them prior to asking the Secretary, and had them approved. Instead, everyone in the room was given the option to stand, motion for one of the soldiers holding a microphone, and ask anything they desired. There was no particular order of what kind of questions were asked and the soldiers who asked questions ranged in rank from Specialists to Lieutenant Colonels. When I say I was surprised that this part of the event was not micromanaged, I want to ensure you that I was pleasantly surprised. In my opinion, it shows the attitude that this Secretary has towards the soldiers he is sworn to represent. It shows those in uniform that he does not see us or our concerns as "below his level," but instead sends a signal that we are his concern, and ensuring we can accomplish the mission is his highest priority.Â
One more thing I would like to add is this, not one soldier present asked questions about why we were here, or expressed the sort of anti-war sentiment that Michael Moore led some to believe was prevalent in the military. Rather, the concern was about ensuring we would be supplied with all necessary equipment to accomplish the mission and return home safely. Let there be no doubt, this was not a hostile crowd eager to catch the Secretary of Defense off guard by grilling him with questions he has never had to answer. This was a group of truly admirable American's and patriots, receiving confirmation from the man who controls the Department of Defense, that we have the full fledged moral, financial and logistical support, to accomplish the mission.Â
Thanks to 2Slick, for commentingand clearing up the air as well, be sure to check out his post on the subject
IÂ reposted YOUR words, because you said that
THE question that some reporter is accused of "Coaching" the guy on...? I re-posted that because there were THREEquestions asked that were shown on TV. Not THE, not ONE, but THREE.
Because we were talking about that question. I'm aware there were other questions. The reporter in fact coached another soldier on another question as I pointed out.
Typically, people are granted duty in non-combat roles if they claim to be CO's. Not now however, and that is why many of those guts ran from duty. Now I am not saying that they should or should not be caught, and brought back to face our justice system(ther UCMJ).
I amsaying that the status and treatment of CO's has changed because of Stop-Loss, and because of hidden codes that they never read when they sign-up and the changing times we are in, and laws that just might be forthcoming, because of all these things and more.
Do you have something to show that the treatment of CO's has changed?
If you are a CO you tell them that when you enlist. One of the guys I read about was more than happy to collect his checks for 3 years and then when Afghanistan came up he was suddenly a CO.Â
I don't have any proof of anything, but if I did, I am sure there would be at least 4 of you that would claim I was making it up or lying. I mean, Do YOU have any proof to the contrary? HA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Gimme a break.
All I asked for was a link or something. If it was just your hunch fine just say so. Instead you get defensive. Forget it.
Of course you plan. It's your ability to improvise and overcome adapt that matters and that's what are guys are doing, it's what makes our forces the best in the world. The Soviets and Germans were very poor at adapting because nobody dared speak against their commanders or question their plan something there's no shortage of here. Mistakes and failures happen in every war. It doesn't mean you don't speak out. It doesn't mean you don't hold people accountable. It's also to what degree do you do so or criticize? Our plans for Normandy went haywire in the first 10 minutes. The press today would have savaged Ike. The failed arial bombardments that didn't nuetralize the guns at Pointe Du Hoqe?. Why didn't they know? Thousands died due to that. Many men drowned coming off the lcd's. Why weren't they given life vests? Many of the tanks that were supposed to give them cover sank even though they worked in trials so we had almost no armor in the first few waves. Our men got airdropped in the wrong places and were scattered. Men died in overloaded gliders. And at the end of the day thousands were dead and we only occupied a small beach head. Was their some criticism due of Ike? Probably. Were people calling for his head or Roosevelts? Not that I'm aware of.
I have no problem with the soldier asking the question he did. He didn't seem to know though that they wouldn't be heading north without level 3 armor. Was that the reporters fault for not knowing or was the soldier just ill informed? The ones that are not armored are not being used in places like Ramadi and Fallujah. They're used on the bases where mortar rounds are the biggest danger which armor really wouldn't help anyway. The other problem is the IED's they are using are big. Big enough to take out an M1 tank. Should we put everyone in a tank? Should they have anticipated that and ordered thousands more tanks? The Hummer was never designed for armor, that's while you'll note no A in their acronym. I'm glad they are being armored, perhaps they should have been when first designed but again it's highinsight. Now does that mean we shouldn't press our leaders and make sure we have the best equipment possible? Of course and that's why I have no problem with the question being asked. I'm glad to hear the remaining ones are being armored and they ought to do it ASAP.
 I'll ask: do you think it's a good idea to "bait" people to sign up?
Acutally I find it something more than a career. But the way it was marketed has something to do with that.
Could expand on what you mean by that ?
Makes you wonder about the prudence of GI Bils and other cash inducements to join.
"Could expand on what you mean by that ? "
It seems more of a commitment of the heart. A sense of duty.
"Should we expect them to get nothing in return?"
They get the privilege of wearing the uniform. Do you think the military should be sold as a job training program?
"When they actually had to go they suddenly became C.O's and refuse to deploy."
Personally, I don't give a damn what happens to them. Maybe they're just using college and "bad career choice" as some kind of excuse.
I'm inclined to think that these two cases are isolated enough not to warrant changes in the way the military is presented to recruits. But I'm just raising the question about the way it's marketed.
Do you think the military should be sold as a job training program?
Do you think the military should be sold as a job training program?
Absolutely, and it is.
"bait"
Maybe jethro is just at a loss for another word.
"
bait
"
"Actually makes you wonder about those that take the bait."
What is your perception of them jethro?
Is someone "baited" into taking a job that gives them a hiring bonus? If a firm is trying to hire you away from another and they offer you 10,000 up front was it bait? No. They are simply saying for this job you get x amount and this bonus up front if you do it. Same with the military, it's is saying we will train you for a job while you earn money and also money to go to school if you choose. In exchange you just might be called upon to do the job we've paid and trained you for. Were they baited? Did they not realize what would happen if there was war? Did someone not mention that the military is the ones who fights wars? They weren't baited. They knew what they were doing and when it came time for them to do their job and uphold their oath as well as protect their brothers they ran.
First, here's the full question and answer:
Q: Yes, Mr. Secretary. My question is more logistical. We’ve had troops in Iraq for coming up on three years and we’ve always staged here out of Kuwait. Now why do we soldiers have to dig through local landfills for pieces of scrap metal and compromise ballistic glass to up-armor our vehicles and why don’t we have those resources readily available to us? [Applause]
SEC. RUMSFELD: I missed the first part of your question. And could you repeat it for me?
Q: Yes, Mr. Secretary. Our soldiers have been fighting in Iraq for coming up on three years. A lot of us are getting ready to move north relatively soon. Our vehicles are not armored. We’re digging pieces of rusted scrap metal and compromised ballistic glass that’s already been shot up, dropped, busted, picking the best out of this scrap to put on our vehicles to take into combat. We do not have proper armament vehicles to carry with us north.
SEC. RUMSFELD: I talked to the General coming out here about the pace at which the vehicles are being armored. They have been brought from all over the world, wherever they’re not needed, to a place here where they are needed. I’m told that they are being – the Army is – I think it’s something like 400 a month are being done. And it’s essentially a matter of physics. It isn’t a matter of money. It isn’t a matter on the part of the Army of desire. It’s a matter of production and capability of doing it.
As you know, you go to war with the Army you have. They’re not the Army you might want or wish to have at a later time. Since the Iraq conflict began, the Army has been pressing ahead to produce the armor necessary at a rate that they believe – it’s a greatly expanded rate from what existed previously, but a rate that they believe is the rate that is all that can be accomplished at this moment.
I can assure you that General Schoomaker and the leadership in the Army and certainly General Whitcomb are sensitive to the fact that not every vehicle has the degree of armor that would be desirable for it to have, but that they’re working at it at a good clip. It’s interesting, I’ve talked a great deal about this with a team of people who’ve been working on it hard at the Pentagon. And if you think about it, you can have all the armor in the world on a tank and a tank can be blown up. And you can have an up-armored humvee and it can be blown up. And you can go down and, the vehicle, the goal we have is to have as many of those vehicles as is humanly possible with the appropriate level of armor available for the troops. And that is what the Army has been working on.
And General Whitcomb, is there anything you’d want to add to that?
GEN. WHITCOMB: Nothing. [Laughter] Mr. Secretary, I’d be happy to. That is a focus on what we do here in Kuwait and what is done up in the theater, both in Iraq and also in Afghanistan. As the secretary has said, it’s not a matter of money or desire; it is a matter of the logistics of being able to produce it. The 699th, the team that we’ve got here in Kuwait has done [Cheers] a tremendous effort to take that steel that they have and cut it, prefab it and put it on vehicles. But there is nobody from the president on down that is not aware that this is a challenge for us and this is a desire for us to accomplish.
SEC. RUMSFELD: The other day, after there was a big threat alert in Washington, D.C. in connection with the elections, as I recall, I looked outside the Pentagon and there were six or eight up-armored humvees. They’re not there anymore. [Cheers] [Applause] They’re en route out here, I can assure you. Next. Way in the back. Yes.
Here are some responses in the blogs:
"I work for a manufacturer of parts for military aircraft. We are a small company that sells our parts to the large companies you have heard of (Raytheon, Northrop Grumman).
At least in my experience we are (now) working three shifts already. After a lull the business has really picked up and we are just about at capacity. I would say that there are several reasons that the production can't just be ramped up by adding factories.
The first is the byzantine nature of military purchasing. We usually hear about a job long before it gets to us... and by the time they get to us everything is already late.
The second is turf battles. If you have created a company that makes a specific part you are not particularly willing to share the engineering and process it takes to make that part with someone opening a new factory. It will take them a long time for any new entrents to the market to get up and running.
Thirdly - mil-spec. There are very demanding specifications for the manufacture of anything for the military. Many comapnies aren't particularly interested in, nor do they have the capacity to do the detailed work for the military. There are many hoops to jump through for every part. As each part is tested it may be approved - or it may be kicked back for repair or to be scrapped.
This is not like WWII when the nation was mobilized to build tanks for victory. I don't think the major automakers are going to shut down their minivan assembly lines in order to produce up-armoured Humvees."
“Mr. Lowry,
I can give you a partial answer to your query.
A friend of mine supervises the production of armor kits for trucks and Humvees here in Albany, GA. I can tell you for sure that they ARE working triple shifts and overtime to get the job done---and have been doing so for many months. They are also busy modifying existing designs in response to emerging threats and "customer" suggestions (e.g., increased height to improve head protection).
As for opening new factories: I have gotten the impression that there is some difficulty getting adequate supplies of armor grade steel. Such steel also requires special equipment to cut, shape, and weld, so maybe there is a shortage of facilities with the necessary capabilities. I do not know if Humvee armor incorporates ceramics (e.g. Titanium DiBoride) but, if so, there are relatively few companies capable of producing such materials in suitable sizes and volumes (e.g., Ceradyne Inc.).”
And a long one:
Army's Cold War thinking impeded production of armored HMMWV
Greg Jaffe has a
brilliant article
on the front page of today's Wall Street Journal (subscription required) that reports on why it has taken the Army so long to develop, procure, produce and deploy its up-armored HMMWVs in Iraq. The article also does a great job of generalizing from this instance to make a larger argument about the Army's anachronistic thinking about weapons systems and the battles it would need to procure gear for in the 21st Century. Here's a short excerpt:
On the eve of the war in Iraq, just 2% of the Army's world-wide fleet of 110,000 Humvees were armored, and the Army was planning to cut back its purchases. As late as last May, the Army saw little need for the armored Humvee, saying it needed only 235 of them in Iraq. Only in October, with its soldiers under daily attack, did the Army decide it needed 3,100 armored Humvees. Today, the requirement stands at 4,500 and climbing -- a number the Army doesn't expect to hit in Iraq until late this summer or early fall.
The Army's failure to produce more of the vehicles, a hot topic among soldiers in Iraq, is slowly becoming an issue among lawmakers. A look at why the armored-Humvee program has struggled to gain acceptance shows flaws in the Army's vision over the past decade of how future wars would be fought. Even as the armored Humvee proved itself in small conflicts around the globe, the Army failed to buy more because it was focused on preparing for major wars with other large armies -- rather than low-end guerilla conflicts.
Moreover, in pursuit of big technological leaps that fundamentally alter the way wars are fought, the service also has tended to overlook simple, low-cost innovations that often count for much more on the battlefield. "Getting the Army to support the armored Humvee was like pushing a limp rope up a hill," says Jim Mills, a retired colonel who was a senior manager on the program for several years in the late 1990s.
Critics of the armored Humvee had pointed to its limitations: Unlike an Abrams tank, the vehicle can't repel a blast from a rocket-propelled grenade or .50 caliber machine-gun fire. Iraq, however, has shown that even a marginal technological advance can save lives. While the armored Humvee may not deflect a blast from a rocket-propelled grenade or roadside bomb, the solders in the vehicle are far more likely to emerge from the attack with their lives.
Prior to the Iraqi war, senior Army officials, looking to save money in the 2004 budget, drafted a plan that would have cut the number of armored Humvees the service planned to buy by 2,800 vehicles to a total of 1,000.
Now the Army, rushing to fix the imbalance, says it needs 11,000 of the vehicles world-wide. In addition, it is scrambling to produce about 8,400 add-on armor kits that can be bolted to existing Humvees with sheet-metal or fiberglass skin and canvas doors.
Analysis
: If there is a good news story here, it is that the Army has learned (relearned?) the lessons of urban combat in Iraq and seen the utility of this vehicle. More importantly, it has jumpstarted production with emergency procurement orders for up-armored HMMWVs, and transferred almost every up-armored HMMWV in the world to forces in Iraq. The Army had a problem, and it responded the best it could with the resources it had in place. Some general officers probably deserve a pat on the back for making what is normally an inflexible Army supply/procurement system respond so quickly to this problem.
However, the larger problems of the system remain. In many ways, this problem could never be satisfactorily solved because the Army did not have the resources on the battlefield in order to move them to the right place and time. That problem owes to procurement decisions made much further upstream by the Army, in which it decided this was not a valuable system. As evidence of that, I submit these two passages from Mr. Jaffe's story:
Army officials insist that no one could have predicted that the service would have been involved in such a huge peacekeeping effort, which dwarfs previous missions to the Balkans, Haiti and Somalia. Nor could the Army have predicted Iraqi insurgents would use remote-detonated roadside bombs so effectively to kill U.S. soldiers, says Brig. Gen. Jeff Sorenson, a senior Army procurement official. "We didn't anticipate this threat nor were we prepared for it," the general says.
Really???
That's a planning failure of the most basic kind -- the failure to anticipate the threat. And I find it quite hard to believe, honestly, that the Army could fail to appreciate this kind of warfare after watching all of the brushfire conflicts of the 1990s. From Somalia to Chechnya, it was clear
what kinds of wars
we'd be fighting in the next century to anyone with a clue about history and the population trends that were moving towards urban centers. Moreover, as one of my NSRT colleagues
points out
, the Army recognized these trends and incorporated them into exercises at the Joint Readiness Training Center as early as 1993. Roadside IEDs were a known threat, and the Army trained for it -- it just didn't buy the gear it needed to have to meet this threat effectively.
A second passage from Mr. Jaffe's article is even more damning:
... The program's most enthusiastic backers were military police, who specialize in riot control, peacekeeping and stabilizing an area following combat.
But officials involved in the program worried that the Army might not embrace a peacekeeping vehicle. They were also concerned the relatively small military-police force, which boasts no three- or four-star generals, lacked "the horsepower to get the armored Humvee built," says John Weaver, an Army program manager who oversaw the service's Humvee fleet. So Mr. Weaver and his colleagues instead pitched the armored Humvee as a scout vehicle that would venture out in front of the tanks during big battles and beam back information about the enemy.
The armored Humvee proved terrible at that job. Early test vehicles were too heavy, and whenever they ventured off road in soft soil they got stuck in the mud. Senior officers in the Army's armor school, which trains and equips the service's heavy-tank force, wanted to kill the armored-Humvee program entirely.
It is true that early armored HMMWV prototypes had problems. They basically bolted armor onto an existing HMMWV and it was too much for the engine, chassis, suspension, and steering to bear. However,
all
prototypes have these problems, and the up-armored HMMWV certainly had less problems than the early Abrams and Bradley prototypes. (See the book
Pentagon Wars
-- or the Kelsey Grammar
movie
-- for some examples.)
The Armor community may have cited these problems in its decision, but the real issue was that it didn't want to procure equipment for anything less than high-intensity combat. You see, an admission of the value of equipment for low-intensity conflict and peacekeeping operations would diminish the value of armored forces, which are designed to fight high-intensity battles. The Armor community was even willing to do so at the expense of its scouts, who drive the exact same M1025 un-armored HMMWVs that MPs do. This Cold War high-intensity combat paradigm was so prevalent in the Army that the MP community -- the Army's center of excellence for peacekeeping ops -- could not sell this program to the Army in any sufficient numbers. Mr. Jaffe is right that the MP corps lacks a 3- or 4-star general. The path to advancement in the Army has never been through low-intensity conflict or peacekeeping operations; it has always been through the combat arms. Senior Army leaders today may see things differently, because many have Balkans experience (like retired Gen. Eric Shinseki, who predicted it would take "several hundred thousand" troops to secure Iraq). But in the mid-1990s, when this program was in the early stages, the Army still believed in its Cold War/Gulf War I paradigm.
The armored HMMWV problem isn't the only procurement problem to surface during Operation Iraqi Freedom. The other big one was the lack of
Interceptor Body Armor
-- newly designed body armor that was
proven
to save lives. Thousands of troops (including a disproportionate number of reservists) went into combat wearing Vietnam-era flak jackets capable of stopping some shrapnel, a level of protection far below what was available. Again, this traced back to procurement decisions made far upstream by military and civilian officials who decided they could afford a phased purchase of IBAs, rather than a one-time purchase, because they didn't see this kind of conflict on the horizon. Once again, that reflects a very big failure of the imagination. The military
did
prepare and procure for the kind of tech-heavy conflict it wanted to fight in the 21st Century; it bought JDAMs, it bought cruise missiles; it bought into R&D on programs like the
Future Combat System
. What it did not do was buy equipment to fight the low-tech battles that many experts predicted would become the norm in the 21st Century. And the results are now becoming clear.
But wait -- there's more. Vehicles and body armor are just two equipment problems, and they're quite narrow. If you look at the Army's vehicle fleet generally, you will see that very few vehicles have any sort of armor or crew protection at all. The vast majority of Army HMMWVs and cargo trucks were designed to move in a permissive "rear area" environment, and thus they have nothing but fibreglass and canvas to protect their occupants. Similarly, if you look at the Modified Table of Organization and Equipment for most "rear area" units -- from maintenance companies to medical companies to signal companies -- you will see a noticeable lack of combat equipment. These support units lack crew-served weapons, night-vision goggles, GPS systems, and tactical radios. Simply put, they
don't have the equipment necessary
to protect themselves while they do their support mission.
I don't think we need to transform transportation companies into door kick-in'ers. But I do think we need to equip these support units with the gear they need to defend themselves in a convoy or logistical base. Until now, the Army's paradigm was that these units would fight on a linear battlefield and rely on front-line units to kill the bad guys before they could get back to hurt them. That paradigm looks nice on paper, but it's not the reality we're likely to face in future conflicts, as illustrated by recent experience in Iraq.
Thanks for the info Muskwa.
And by the way LUV... Kerry has NOTHING to do with it, not now, and not with that stupid $87 Billion that he is accusedof fighting against. What an OLDÂ load of shit that accusation is. Kerry
So you'll never bring up any candidates or presidents since they have nothing to do with it now? The fact is he voted against the 87 billion period. Yet you had no trouble pulling the lever for him. Fine.
 Now that they are actually asking Rumsfeld the hard questions that even the "MSM" won't ask him,
Actually it was the MSM that asked it.
Oh and wtch the whole press conference. Rummy got a standing ovation at the end of it.
and Bush threatened to veto another bill to help the troops and the Republicans prevented other bills to help the troops.
it wasn't that simple, period.
"Actually it was the MSM that asked it."
Bullshit. They asked the question of their own free will. They didn't have to do it if they didn't want to.
and Bush threatened to veto another bill to help the troops unless it was exactly as Republicans wanted it and the Republicans prevented other bills to help the troops.
Bush used our troops to ram through partisan bills and to prevent bills that would have helped the troops from getting through.
it wasn't that simple, period.
the fact is, the bill Kerry voted against contained what was basically a blank check and in light of the millions of dollars that have now gone missing, it was a bad bill.
Kerry voted against giving them carte banche to give to their business buddies and not to our troops.
Kerry voted for financial accountability.
[Edited by molegrass on Dec 10, 2004 at 05:08am.]
but it still passed and Bush's buddies have gotten richer and the troops still don't have what they need.
He knows that Crabs, he just cannot bring himself to criticize the man.
Yea I've never criticized him before. ......Rolls eyes.
Â
Bullshit. They asked the question of their own free will. They didn't have to do it if they didn't want to.
Kerry voted for financial accountability.
What absolute Bullshit. None of the bills were accountable. But it's not the time to haggle. Kerry voted against it because Dean was making inroads in the polls with the anti war crowd.
What did the reporter do, Rob, break down their resistance with Mind Rays?
What did the reporter do, Rob, break down their resistance with Mind Rays?
So the reporter had nothing to do with it?
He has something to do with it in the sense he suggested a question. So what?
You're not giving these guys much credit for free will, Rob.
[Edited by on Dec 10, 2004 at 05:20am.]
Did they GET that money, LUV?
You're not giving these guys much credit for free will, Rob.
Again, like I said I have no problem with the question being asked. I just don't like the underhanded way it was done, what's so hard ot understand about that.
What you think is underhanded about it.
bullshit.
I thought conservatives were supposed to be stong on financial accountability.
The reporter said, in a memo to his editors that he suggested the question.
[Edited 3 times. Most recently by on Dec 10, 2004 at 05:30am.]
soldier to embedded reporter: man, this really sucks about the armor situation, I wish I could tell someone.
reporter to soldier: you can.
soldier to reporter: how?
reporter to soldier: let me help you understand how the media would go about it
this is "coaching". I'm sorta glad to think that a soldier with questions would get help asking them from someone who's profession is asking questions.
Where is the proof that these guys were coached by reporters anyway?
Reporter planted GI's question for Rumsfeld
CNN) -- The question a U.S. soldier asked Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld Wednesday about the lack of armor on some combat vehicles in Iraq was planted by a newspaper reporter embedded with the soldier's unit, the reporter told colleagues in an e-mail.
http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/12/09/rumsfeld.reporter/index.html
crabgrass 12/10/04 5:32am
That's a really nice imaginary conversation.
You really think that soldier had no problem with the armor situation and just got up and said it was a problem because a reporter told him too?
talk about imaginary.
Almost immediately after returning to camp yesterday after the visit by the SECDEF, I did a google news search and read the AP Wire article and noted that, although the piece was fairly accurate, there was definitely a sense of exaggeration in the tone that presented the townhall meeting as a gripe session. As one of the soldiers in the audience, I felt that presenting the morning in such a fashion was misleading, and with such negative connotations, I wondered how long it may be before the MSM ran with the story and turned a pleasant morning with the Secretary of Defense into a scenario that resembled a defendant
being cross-examined by the prosecution in a court room. I knew the story was generating heavy circulation when I saw it headlined on Drudgetoday (click here for story).Â
Before I dig in, I want to address one item in particular from the story linked above that I think was not made clear enough. When it stated:
I believe Secretary Rumsfeld hesitated because it was difficult to hear the first part of the question Spc. Wilson asked. Perhaps because of nerves, he spoke at first very quickly, and the acoustics of the hangar were hardly concert-hall quality. The Secretary asked others to repeat parts of their questions as well apparently because of difficulty hearing the question in its entirety. I do think Spc. Wilson is justified in asking such a question. It is a serious issue, and if logistics or "physics" is the obstacle from accomplishing the tasks of up-armoring vehicles to add to soldier safety, then we need to do our best to overcome that obstacle. The Secretary concluded with an anecdote in which he spoke of the recent terror warning surrounding the election. He said he looked out the windows of the Pentagon one day and saw 6-8 up-armored HMMWV's perched at the perimeter of the building. He then said, "Guess what, they aren't there any more."Â
I also want to express that as a person who has worked in politics for years, I was very surprised when we were told there would be the opportunity to ask questions without first having them screened. I would have assumed there would have been some process where those who had questions submitted them prior to asking the Secretary, and had them approved. Instead, everyone in the room was given the option to stand, motion for one of the soldiers holding a microphone, and ask anything they desired. There was no particular order of what kind of questions were asked and the soldiers who asked questions ranged in rank from Specialists to Lieutenant Colonels. When I say I was surprised that this part of the event was not micromanaged, I want to ensure you that I was pleasantly surprised. In my opinion, it shows the attitude that this Secretary has towards the soldiers he is sworn to represent. It shows those in uniform that he does not see us or our concerns as "below his level," but instead sends a signal that we are his concern, and ensuring we can accomplish the mission is his highest priority.Â
One more thing I would like to add is this, not one soldier present asked questions about why we were here, or expressed the sort of anti-war sentiment that Michael Moore led some to believe was prevalent in the military. Rather, the concern was about ensuring we would be supplied with all necessary equipment to accomplish the mission and return home safely. Let there be no doubt, this was not a hostile crowd eager to catch the Secretary of Defense off guard by grilling him with questions he has never had to answer. This was a group of truly admirable American's and patriots, receiving confirmation from the man who controls the Department of Defense, that we have the full fledged moral, financial and logistical support, to accomplish the mission.Â
Thanks to 2Slick, for commentingand clearing up the air as well, be sure to check out his post on the subject
http://www.missick.com/
Â
The(only) question a U.S. soldier asked Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld Wednesday about the lack of armor ...
Who' post are you getting that from ?
IÂ reposted YOUR words, because you said that
THE
question that some reporter is accused of "Coaching" the guy on...? I re-posted that because there were THREEquestions asked that were shown on TV. Not THE, not ONE, but THREE.
Because we were talking about that question. I'm aware there were other questions. The reporter in fact coached another soldier on another question as I pointed out.
Typically, people are granted duty in non-combat roles if they claim to be CO's. Not now however, and that is why many of those guts ran from duty. Now I am not saying that they should or should not be caught, and brought back to face our justice system(ther UCMJ).
I amsaying that the status and treatment of CO's has changed because of Stop-Loss, and because of hidden codes that they never read when they sign-up and the changing times we are in, and laws that just might be forthcoming, because of all these things and more.
Do you have something to show that the treatment of CO's has changed?
If you are a CO you tell them that when you enlist. One of the guys I read about was more than happy to collect his checks for 3 years and then when Afghanistan came up he was suddenly a CO.Â
"I DO read papers, and I DO watch all those MSM Devils..."
There's your problem. Old Media screwin' with your head. Makin' you say things.
[Edited 2 times. Most recently by on Dec 10, 2004 at 06:20am.]
I don't have any proof of anything, but if I did, I am sure there would be at least 4 of you that would claim I was making it up or lying. I mean, Do YOU have any proof to the contrary? HA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Gimme a break.
All I asked for was a link or something. If it was just your hunch fine just say so. Instead you get defensive. Forget it.
"Well they are all doing the Devils handiwork, after all. "
Us, too. They made that clear during the last election.
That's why The Rat is The Rat,
That's why someone makes up a psudeo name for his psuedo name.
See, everyone else has one.
CooKookiChoo I'm the walrus.
Only one for me but I'm kinda leaning towards making up a new one. Crabby Bodine. I like the sound of that :)
You mean like THX, and JT?
The only reason I created JT was to ignore your sorry ass.
I think I'll go back to using JT.
"No plan survives contact with the enemy." German 19th century Field Marshal Helmuth von Moltke
"No plan survives contact with the enemy."
Then there's no need to plan, and no justification when you try to hold planners accountable?
They can just say, 'hey, shit happens.'
Maybe Field Marshall von Moltke was called on the carpet a couple times and that was his answer.
[Edited 3 times. Most recently by on Dec 11, 2004 at 11:10am.]
Of course you plan. It's your ability to improvise and overcome adapt that matters and that's what are guys are doing, it's what makes our forces the best in the world. The Soviets and Germans were very poor at adapting because nobody dared speak against their commanders or question their plan something there's no shortage of here. Mistakes and failures happen in every war. It doesn't mean you don't speak out. It doesn't mean you don't hold people accountable. It's also to what degree do you do so or criticize? Our plans for Normandy went haywire in the first 10 minutes. The press today would have savaged Ike. The failed arial bombardments that didn't nuetralize the guns at Pointe Du Hoqe?. Why didn't they know? Thousands died due to that. Many men drowned coming off the lcd's. Why weren't they given life vests? Many of the tanks that were supposed to give them cover sank even though they worked in trials so we had almost no armor in the first few waves. Our men got airdropped in the wrong places and were scattered. Men died in overloaded gliders. And at the end of the day thousands were dead and we only occupied a small beach head. Was their some criticism due of Ike? Probably. Were people calling for his head or Roosevelts? Not that I'm aware of.
I have no problem with the soldier asking the question he did. He didn't seem to know though that they wouldn't be heading north without level 3 armor. Was that the reporters fault for not knowing or was the soldier just ill informed? The ones that are not armored are not being used in places like Ramadi and Fallujah. They're used on the bases where mortar rounds are the biggest danger which armor really wouldn't help anyway. The other problem is the IED's they are using are big. Big enough to take out an M1 tank. Should we put everyone in a tank? Should they have anticipated that and ordered thousands more tanks? The Hummer was never designed for armor, that's while you'll note no A in their acronym. I'm glad they are being armored, perhaps they should have been when first designed but again it's highinsight. Now does that mean we shouldn't press our leaders and make sure we have the best equipment possible? Of course and that's why I have no problem with the question being asked. I'm glad to hear the remaining ones are being armored and they ought to do it ASAP.
Â
[Edited by on Dec 11, 2004 at 12:30pm.]
Thank you, Rob -- very good points.