The Stryker: US Military`s Great White Hope against Iraqi RPGs

DebkaFile ^ | December 03, 2003

[Darksheare]

"The US army does not intend, in the first stage, to replace all its tanks in Iraq with Strykers."

That line gives me the creeps.
The Stryker was sold as a do all be all and it isn't.
And it honestly isn't the one on one tank replacement that Shinseki said it was.
And if the 'replacement' that they're talking about in this instance is swapping the tanks with Strykers to continue the tank's mission in Iraq, like having someone take your place while you do a different job, the Stryker isn't capable of that either.

It could have been a MUCH better system, like maybe give it a stabilized gun of 20 or 30mm size round.
Maybe give it some better secondary weaponry.
Give it grossly overpowered weaponry for it's size, more so than it needs, and that will improve it's survivability somewhat.
Don't use it in an IFV or MBT role and you'll keep even more people alive.
It's merely a troop carrier, and inefficient at that for reasons hashed out already.
Stryker isn't even designed to go against infantry.
It's designed to have it's crew dismount to take on the enemy while it sticks to the rear, a mildly armmored target useless for the mission.
In an urban setting, that is ridiculous.
Especially if one needs to take cover behind one's own vehicle.

On the bright side(?), if it's used by police forces in the US against civilians, no-one has weaponry that can do anything to teh Stryker.
It looks more like it was designed with situations like Ruby Ridge and Waco in mind.

[Travis McGee]

These innovative vehicles are destined to eventually replace the heavy Abrams M1 battle tank and the Bradley M2 fighting vehicles in Iraq.

Yeah, and ballerinas are going to replace middle linebackers in the NFL.

[crazycat]

Surely you can just shoot out the tyres, it looks hopeless in comparison to a tracked vehicle.

[vikk]

This thing looks like a piece of crap.

[Darksheare]

They're supposedly run flats.
However, if you set them on fire the run flat doesn't do it's job.
It can catch on fire in several ways, one of which is to shoot the external unprotected fuel tank between the last pair of wheels on each side.

It is supposedly more manueverable according to Shinseki, but it has the turning radius of a greyhound bus at best.
I dunno, gimme treads anyday, I can spin about within on evehicle length and split alot faster than someone who needs to find a traffic circle to waddle around like the Stryker needs.

I'm convinced that Shinseki's "Tires are more manueverable" comment was fueled by ignorance of being stuck up to one's axles in Fort Drum sand.
More than once my unit had that happen.
And tracked vehicles drove by with a smile, a wave, a pointed finger, and outright laughter at times.
*chuckle*
Fond memories of training now, but at the time it wasn't funny at all.
And in a combat sitch, one cannot be stuck like that at all.
Might as well paint a big red bull's eye on the vehicles and erect a huge neon sign saying "Please shoot us"

Another shortcoming of the Stryker is it's unstability on normal rolling terrain.
It is currently restricted to roads, and told to stay away from road shoulders.
It flips and rolls.
Or throws tires.
It has unrealistic restrictions on it's mobility, and that makes it useless.
So much for being more manueverable.

[archy]

Kind of like using chain link fence around fixed position. If I'm not mistaken, the slant armor they're talking about won't stop income RPG fire 'like a catchers mask', but will explode the shell to diffuse the jet of molten metal that penetrates conventional armor.

Sometimes. But like the Vietnam-era chainlink fencing *RPG screens* the reail idea is to cause the outside metal shell of the PG-7 rocket to become dented and come in contact with the copper shaped charge liner, since both are used as electrical contacts for the piecoelectric crystal in the rocket's nose that when crushed, creates enough of an electrical charge to detonate the electrical blasting cap and booster charge at the back of the warhead. If the two metallic components are in contact they short out and no explosion results, in practice, about 50% of the time when chain link screen is used; the slats may do a little better or not quite as well.

Some rounds, no doubt, will detonate on the outside if the slats themselves if they hit just right. Whether the stand-off distance will be enough to reduce the shaped charge's armor-cutting effect or will more effectively focus it to cause even more damage will be another question soon to be answered. If the slat armor is suddenly removed fron the vehicles in service, we'll know the answer.

The addition of the slat armor now raises the weight of a loaded Stryker squad carrier in excess of 23 tons, no longer 19. It'll also be interesting to see if the truck-component axles, designed for a 15-ton truck load, can handle the additional overload.

-archy-/-

[crazycat]

Mny Tks yr reply.

An "exposed fuel tank".

Just great.

As to the fact that it is not all terrain, further confirms, that it a bigger Humvee and nothing more.

Unfortunately good men are going to die because of this machine. Shineski should be put in one and sent out into the Sunni Triangle, to prove it's worth.

[archy]

A commander does not need to go into the field and personally deploy his troops at their most effective combat points. He simply moves his resources around on a screen.

Leadership in the 21st century?

That may help save some young lieutenants from being *accidentally* shot by their own troops, particularly the platoon sergeant. I doubt if a similar accident will happen to such a deserving LT's vehicle with the full crew aboard, but one with just the offending candidate and the driver may have to go.

-archy-/-

[archy]

How well does the Stryker handle mines?

That's what the crews are about to find out. But when similar Russian BTR-80 series 8-wheeled armored cars deployed in Afghanistan and Chechnya, with weights of 21,000 kilos and similar crew loadings hit a TM-46 or TM57 antitank mine with around 15 pounds of explosive inside, typically the driver is killed and the vehicle is rolled over on the side opposite of that under which the mine detonates. And when one centers on two mines stacked atop each other [common because one 20-pound mine can be carried in either hand] and sets off a tilt-rod firing device, the vehicles are sometimes flipped over backwards, end-over-end. All fuel tanks and containers are typically ruptured from the shock of the initial explosion, with resulting fires as hot engine components ignite spilled fuel

[Darksheare]

Welcome.
There's more info than I have available.
People to talk to about the Stryker with MUCH more info include archy, who is here in thread.
There's also the Stryker ping list, the Tread Head ping list, and the Field Artillery ping list.
There's various voices on all of the above mentioned lists, with various contact people to join or be removed from each list.
But there's alot of info available from each group.
*chuckle*

[archy]

One feature that arouses controversy among military experts is the comparatively mild punch packed by the novel contraption’s M2 0.50 caliber machine gun, 21.7 mm grenade launcher and 7.62 mm MK240 machine gun.

Mild punch? That’s pretty heavy for a troop carrier!

If it was true, but it's not. The Stryker's Norwegian-designed Remote Weapons System mounts Either a M2 .50 Browning machinegun, common on US troop transports since the WWII M3 halftrack and the M113 tracked APC of the 1960s-'70s, OR the 40mm Mark 19 grenade launcher, not both. A turret fitting both weapons was a feature of the Military Polices 4-wheeled Armored Security Vehicle, [ASV] ordered cancelled lest its success overshadow Stryker's questionable future.

In live-ammunition weapons testing with the RWS, the .50 experienced repeated ammunition belt hangups and stoppages resulting in bursts of 45 rounds or less before the operator had to expose himself and come out of the hatch to clear the jam. One Stryker crewman has told me that the RWS sighting arrangement won't stand up to the recoil of the 40mm launcher, and that re-sighting the unit even when the .50 is used is a daily task.

The problem here may not be the Stryker itself but the weapons subsystem used aboard it, of which several possible workarounds might be possible. One of the most immediately obvious would be the combined weapon turret of the ASV.

>

[gaijin]

good link.

marking.

[finnman69]

You know the tropps are going to love hanging their laundry out to dry on this.

[R. Scott]

Many of the problems could stem from high tech for the sake of high tech. It seems to be pervading all military equipment.

[Darksheare]

In the summer, it'd be the perfect drying rack.
In Iraq's summer, some of the polycotton and nyloncotton articles will be flash fried with alternating lines of cooked and not cooked cloth..

[Cannoneer No. 4]

These innovative vehicles are destined to eventually replace the heavy Abrams M1 battle tank and the Bradley M2 fighting vehicles in Iraq.

I actually think the armor and mech inf will eventually redeploy, most likely to prepare for operations against Syria or Iran, or put back into storage in Kuwait, or brought home, leaving Strykers and armored humvees as the primary mounts of the US Army remaining in Iraq. I think one of the six Stryker Brigades is going to be in Iraq pretty much continously for awhile.

We are going to have troops in Iraq for decades, but they need not necessarily be armor/mech troops, or, if they are, the heavy brigades would likely occupy former Republican Guard kasernes and spend most of their time at NTC West while Constabulary troopers run the roads in wheeled vehicles.

[exnavy]

The trial by fire is about to begin, I'll be praying for our boys.

[Cannoneer No. 4]

Stryker brigade rolls into Iraq from Kuwait

The Stryker brigade rolled into Iraq on Wednesday and brought along the Fort Lewis weather.

It rained all morning on the five convoys that pushed north across the border, making it a cold, nasty ride, especially for the soldiers riding in open humvees.

But when they arrived here some 250 miles later at this Army camp south of Baghdad, nobody'd been shot at and nobody'd been hurt."

I just want everyone to make it there safe," said Spc. Victoria Wright, before her convoy pushed off about 4 a.m. at the Kuwait-Iraq border.

She got her wish.

To read more from embedded reporter Michael Gilbert about the Fort Lewis-based Stryker brigade's first foray into Iraq, read Thursday's edition of The News Tribune.

(Published 10:29AM, December 3rd, 2003)

[Cannoneer No. 4]

Keep praying. The Lord heard you today.

[Cannoneer No. 4]

They needed to get out of Camp Udairi. Wonder if their departure was "accelerated" because they wore out their welcome in Kuwait?