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Army Considers Trading Armor for Speed
Military.com ^ | Feb 12, 2014 | Matthew Cox

Posted on 02/16/2014 11:52:44 AM PST by null and void

For the past decade, armor protection has dominated U.S. combat vehicle programs. Now, maneuver officials are breaking with that tradition, abandoning armor for highly transportable, all-terrain vehicles.

The Maneuver Center of Excellence at Fort Benning, Ga., recently reached out to the defense industry to see if it could build the new Ultra Light Combat Vehicle -- a new effort to equip infantry brigade combat teams with go-anywhere vehicles capable of carrying a nine-man squad.

Lawmakers recently cut most of the funding for the U.S. Army's Ground Combat Vehicle -- a move that has all but killed the high-profile acquisitions effort.

The ULCV instead would be designed to travel 75 percent of the time across country and on rough trails.

Army officials continue to work with the Marine Corps to deliver the Humvee replacement, the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle. Leaders from both services were forced to pare down expectations for this truck as costs spiraled out of control as officials wanted to increase armor while lightening the overall weight.

Maneuver officials maintain that the ULCV is not competing against the JLTV. The ULCV is designed to fill a capability gap of being large enough to carry a nine-man squad but light enough -- at 4,500 pounds -- to be sling-loaded by a UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter.

The only way to achieve this weight and meet the capability is to trade armor protection for speed and mobility, Parker said.

"A lot of the stuff we have seen is more ATV-looking rather than enclosed with a cab," Parker said. "Then again, if someone brings something with a cab, we are not telling them not to."

(Excerpt) Read more at military.com ...


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; Government
KEYWORDS: stupidity; usarmy; usnavy
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To: blueunicorn6

Good point, and the guys recommending the move away from armor won’t be riding in the vehicles taking fire.


41 posted on 02/16/2014 12:53:49 PM PST by Hardastarboard (The question of our age is whether a majority of Americans can and will vote us all into slavery.)
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To: Covenantor
But the very first big damn thing to do is change the ROE and lock up all the JAGS in Guantanamo for the duration...or maybe until an asteroid strikes earth.

Now, you're talking about actually attaining victory over a named enemy. This is about the circle of life inside the DoD and defense industry church of procurement. These two things only incidentally match up on rare occasion, like a giant asteroid hitting the earth.

42 posted on 02/16/2014 12:53:57 PM PST by TADSLOS (The Event Horizon has come and gone. Buckle up and hang on.)
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To: null and void
"Maneuver officials"?
What the hell's a "Maneuver official" - other than someone who has never been caught in a firesack while driving a lightly armored vehicle before?
43 posted on 02/16/2014 1:05:02 PM PST by grobdriver (Where is Wilson Blair when you need him?)
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To: 1rudeboy

Jutland


44 posted on 02/16/2014 1:15:51 PM PST by Dawggie
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To: null and void

On the actual battlefield they will, like the HUMVs be uparmored with whatever shielding can be fastened on by the troops and will be found to be terribly underpowered..


45 posted on 02/16/2014 1:17:57 PM PST by arthurus (Read Hazlitt's Economics In One Lesson ONLINEhttp://steshaw.org/economics-in-one-lesson/)
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To: Dawggie

Really? Please elaborate.


46 posted on 02/16/2014 1:18:48 PM PST by 1rudeboy
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To: null and void
Every armchair bureaucrat talks "light and lethal." It gets lots of head nods at meetings. The problem is, the shoe clerks have never seen an artillery attack, or experience carpet bombs rattling their pink bodies.

Once the lead starts flying, you don't want "light" separating you from the hot lead, and the "lethal lite" doesn't break the other guy's heavy so well. In the end, it will get you killed.

People want "light and lethal" because they don't want to deal with heavy air and sea lift required to the get the heavy stuff to where the bad guys are. But heavy lift ultimately wins wars.

47 posted on 02/16/2014 1:20:35 PM PST by SkyPilot
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To: 1rudeboy
WW2 saw the demise of some battleships. The Gulf War saw the effective use of a ww2 battleship, actually.
48 posted on 02/16/2014 1:22:02 PM PST by arthurus (Read Hazlitt's Economics In One Lesson ONLINEhttp://steshaw.org/economics-in-one-lesson/)
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To: grobdriver

An official from “The Maneuver Center of Excellence at Fort Benning, Ga.”

See paragraph 2...


49 posted on 02/16/2014 1:24:13 PM PST by null and void (<--- unwilling cattle-car passenger on the bullet train to serfdom)
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To: grobdriver

“Maneuver Center of Excellence” once known as the Armor School and was at Ft. Knox. Now thanks to what I suspect was bureaucratic infighting among Army generals, we now have the Armor School renamed and moved to Ft. Benning, GA; home of the Infantry. Artillery is now called “Fires”.....I guess some genius figured for his Six Sigma project we would rename and move Combat schools and say we saved money. In 20 years the circle will be complete and that “1 D 10 T” will be the general authorizing the moving and renaming of the “MCE” back to Armor School and it’s movement back to Ft. Knox.
Waste of time and money, but he got his Black Belt and promotion.
( I D 10 T = idiot )


50 posted on 02/16/2014 1:24:50 PM PST by rustyboots
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Comment #51 Removed by Moderator

To: 1rudeboy

Use google...It is a search engine


52 posted on 02/16/2014 1:34:12 PM PST by dennisw (The first principle is to find out who you are then you can achieve anything -- Buddhist monk)
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To: null and void

This is what happens when stupid people are elected


53 posted on 02/16/2014 1:41:32 PM PST by GeronL (Vote for Conservatives not for Republicans!)
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To: Covenantor

I’m glad you posted the pictures. I was going to mention how light trucks are being used in the Mid East in that fashion.

As I see it an “ultra-light” combat vehicle would need several things to survive as a fighting force. First off Numbers, ie. quantity vs. quality. Second an extremely low profile that conversely would need high ground clearance capability. (Look to low-riders for such technology.)

Third, an added reconnaissance advantage. (Look at the pneumatic towers News Vans use to push Cameras and Communication dishes to heights over forty-five feet.)

Fourth, a moderately heavy punch per vehicle. Look at M2 .50 Cal machine guns or 7.62 miniguns. Relatively lightweight with a good punch.

Selected vehicles could have a heavier Punch, Javelins or Tow Missiles.

In any case their small size would necessarily mean that there can be no one size fits all category for such a vehicle. And that alone will cause the brass to have a heart attack. They want do-all be-all vehicles, planes, ships and that’s just the nature of that beast.


54 posted on 02/16/2014 1:44:48 PM PST by The Working Man
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To: Chode

read post 30 and 34. interested in your thoughts.


55 posted on 02/16/2014 1:48:35 PM PST by Tailback
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To: blueunicorn6

TANKS are vulnerable without accompanying infantry!

“IEDs” (Booby traps, mines, whatever) can be made more powerful quicker and at less cost than armor can be improved. The USS Cole was taken out with a Zodiac inflatable, the Murrah Building with a Ryder rental box van.

Politically Correct Rules of Engagement do as much harm as too light an armor. Make the enemy HURT, make his leadership HURT, make it very costly for him to place IEDs in your sector and then things will improve. Ask the ROK Marines about Vietnam.

Realistically, we do not have the resolve to wage war to win. We make our troops respond as if they were Mall Cops dealing with a looting flash mob.

As much as I despise that ^@^%%^*& Yankee, I must say that Gen. William T. Sherman understood this very well.


56 posted on 02/16/2014 1:51:22 PM PST by BwanaNdege
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To: null and void

In WW-II the US fielded the M18 “Hellcat” which was a lightly armored but fast tank destroyer.


57 posted on 02/16/2014 1:52:52 PM PST by The Great RJ
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To: null and void

"Highly transportable, all-terrain vehicle..., travel 75 percent of the time across country and on rough trails, ...light enough to be sling-loaded by a UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter"

Hmmmm, I think I might know of such a vehicle...

/bonus: it's inexpensive as hell

58 posted on 02/16/2014 2:01:04 PM PST by FreedomCalls (It's called the "Statue of Liberty" and not the "Statue of Security.")
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To: xone
Germany, as a continental power didn't use carriers like its ally or its enemy. Its naval strength lay in its U-boats, which succumbed or lost effectiveness to airpower.

And then only because we knew where they were operating because Bletchley Park cracked the Engima code.

59 posted on 02/16/2014 2:03:40 PM PST by FreedomCalls (It's called the "Statue of Liberty" and not the "Statue of Security.")
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To: FreedomCalls

bump!!


60 posted on 02/16/2014 2:22:35 PM PST by GeronL (Vote for Conservatives not for Republicans!)
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