Army Seeks Short-Term Payoff From Future Combat Systems

National Defense Magazine ^ | December 2003 | Sandra I. Erwin

[Qatar-6]

Armored Humvees in my opinion are not the answer.

Look, you can only put so much armor on a Hummer frame, even a reinforced one.

Most anti tank rockets can still penetrate one

Give you some protection against a small mine/IED. Something the size of an anti-tank mine will still total one and cause 100% crew casualties.

Restricts your field of vision and your ability to fire from the vehicle terribly (unless you're in the gunners position, in which case you're exposed and out of the armor, some new gunshields too. But nothing as good as the old TC position in an ACAV).

Hummers are loud on the inside, get inside a armored hummer and you cant hear

Just me? I take the opposite approach.

All doors and roofs off of Hummers

Seats rearranged to face out in different directions

Everyone with a sector of observation and a long gun, no more 9mm pistols as a primary weapon.

Reinforce the bottom with Kevlar and sandbag the floor in the passanger compartment to protect agains mines/IEDs but that's it.

No seatbelts, all they do is keep you in the vehicle to take the full blast of a mine/IED and prevent you from exiting in a hurry while you are in contact

Vehicles should be open with troops facing out able to use all their senses

Armored Hummers are a defensive reaction and they have their place.

Giving everyone an armored Hummer isolates you from what's going on. Might as well be in a Bradley

Thems my thoughts

Al the best

Qatar-6

[SLB]

On the subject of M1114 Armored Humvees and the shortage thereof in Iraq: y'all have anything you would like ranger to mention on O'Reilly's radio show?

Ranger might mention how enamored the Army has been with the gee whiz stuff while leaving the tried and true behind. If anyone thinks that FBCB2 is going to protect a vehicle from a rag head with an RPG who is hiding in a shed waiting for a vehicle to pass they are smoking dope. The C4ISR stuff is neat, shows commanders lots of great battlefield icons and supposedly has real time SA, but the reality of war is that lone guy with an RPG. We had them in Vietnam, they had them in Bosnia and Somalia and Afghanistan. Iraq is no different.

Another area that really gets my goat is the refusal for the leadership to let good old GI ingenuity to take over. It sounds like if something is not on the MTOE, then it doesn't happen. I had a heated argument in that venue in Germany once. There was an article in PS magazine on turning forklifts into snowplows. I wanted to order some new forks for a 10,000 RT forklift, modify a set into a snow plow and provide a service to both the military and German communities by removing snow from highways and streets. The commander would not approve the request, it was high dollar and needed his signature, so when the next snow hit we just suffered. The battalion commander asked why we had not modified the forklift as shown in PS magazine. I told him the commander had refused the request even though I had shown the article to him, you bet I dropped a dime on him, he got a but chewing and I got my forks. OBTW, he tried to screw me on an OER and when it got to the Bn Cdr, my senior rater, it was sent back at least twice.

[Voice in your head]

Thank you. I have tried explaining this in the past, but people just thank me for the information and go on griping. What you described is exactly how we did it and it worked.

[SLB]

Your #161 is the best logic I have seen on FR in a long time. The M151's came close to providing that until the Army decided to put ROPS on them. Required everyone to wear a seatbelt. Just try to get untangled from the LBE web gear and un-ass the vehicle in a firefight. Mission impossible, but without the ROPS and no seatbelts, put sandbags on the floors and fenders and there was at least a psychological effect that you might survive a small mine.

[Voice in your head]

I don't see the "shortage" of M1114s as a major issue. But, if he could mention something about this, that would be nice. Along those lines, it would be nice if he could get the message out about the conflict between needed equipment and the constraints of TOE/MTOE that SLB alluded to in post 162, though that might be a little too technical for O'Reilly. Perhaps Ollie North would be a better host for that one.

[SauronOfMordor]

And given that M1114 is not on any sort of real production line, we ought to build a real production line for a real armored vehicle.

I would think that a civilian armored truck (the kind the banks use to ferry cash) with a dual-.50 turrent bolted to the top would do fine for convoy protection and carrying troops on concentional roads. And we make a bunch of them per month anyway for the civilian market

[ExSoldier]

I'm not sure if this can be done given the politics of money and contracts. BUT, I say we get rid of the Beretta 9mm and go back to a .45 caliber sidearm (maybe the Springfield Armory V10 comp gun) AND we trash the M16 in favor of something like the M14 (maybe an FN/FAL) but in carbine length, and in 7.62x51 caliber. I have heard too many stories from Iraq and Afghanistan about having to put many more than one round from either of these weapons into a fast closing adversary in order to "make the stop." I'm sure this is not something easily done, but perhaps now is the time to start discussing things with Congress.

I'd also put in an order for better constructed desert boots, and ditch the concept of the old "canteen" in favor of something like a "camelback" hydration system. Items like this are probably more "doable" than taking on the legal forces of Colt and Beretta. lol

[ExSoldier]

"Over how much of the earth's surface can you really go 50 mph in a Main Battle Tank"

Back in 1993, when I did my transition into the Abrams tank, I went through the TCPC (Tank Crew Proficiency Course) wherein all of us rotated through the positions which must be occupied in the vehicle: Gunner, driver, loader, and commander. When it came time for me to drive this sports car of armored vehicles, I was able to scream through the driving portion and was told by the instructors that at one time the tank went "airborne" with daylight visible under the treads all around. Inside, my fellow officer trainees, didn't notice the acrobatics, so smooth was the ride. The same thing happened on the gunnery course, except that time (I was loading as I recall) the main gun fired at the top of the arc and hit it's target over a thousand meters away. One shot, one kill.

[ExSoldier]

"If this nation was mobilized for war there would be no Hummer H1's available for civilian sale. The entire manufacturer's output would be bought up by DOD."

LOL My buddy was telling me that during first Gulf War, back in '91, when his SpecOps unit hit the desert the first thing they did was go over and buy about 70 Range Rovers and Toyota Land Cruisers for the SOF guys to do recons. An H-1 is the most recognizable piece of American battle equipment in the world. The feeling was at the time that a Range Rover or Land Cruiser tooling across the desert could be a wandering sheik instead of an American patrol and would therefore be less likely to become an "rpg magnet." But he was telling me they bought SUV's off the lot via "local purchase" and they were fully loaded. I just have this hilarious image of a bunch of SOF guys rolling across the sand with the AC blasting and the stereo pounding with (take your pick) Charlie Daniels or Steppenwolf.

[Tailback]

How about him bringing up the Army not building any more ASV's (armored security vehicles) and all of the M113's sitting in storage not being used while soldiers are getting killed in soft skinned vehicles.

[VOA]

Your approach to the situation reminds me of how (IIRC) one of the American generals (Bradley?)
spent a day in a funk over the way American armor was getting creamed trying
to get through the "hedgerows" of France...
until he decided that the current approach of sending the tanks in, with "boots on the ground"
following behind...
things should be tried in the reverse order.

Sometimes what sounds wrong at first blush is just about the best fix (and even
then, that may be just for the short-term, until something better comes along)

[Voice in your head]

Outstanding point.

[VOA]

...I was able to scream through the driving portion and was told by the instructors that
at one time the tank went "airborne" with daylight visible under the treads all around.

Maybe 10 years ago, Joan Lunden (sp?), the lady who was on "Good Morning America"
did a news special in which she got to drive the Abrams at a training facility.
IIRC, she put the pedal to the metal and had the tank mostly (not totally) airborne
while topping some rises at high speed.

I don't know if the Army has females jockeying Abrams, but the Lunden special
but I suspect that some ladies that don't get enough of an adrenaline rush out of
their civilian Hummer probably were saying "I've got to get me one of those!"

[Cannoneer No. 4]

See Post 74

[Cannoneer No. 4]

Post 89

[Cannoneer No. 4]

Personal Weapons Use In Iraq

The NATO standard pistol is worthless

Discussion of above.

[Cannoneer No. 4]

These are the points I asked ranger to think about:

Why is M1114 production so slow?

Why has the gov't not bought up all the Hummer H1's and had them armored and sent the to Iraq? There is a war on. Requisition.

There are many companies that apply armor to vehicles. If O'Gara-Hess cannot meet the demand, why does the Army not contract with these other armoring companies?

Why has the Armored Security Vehicle made by Textron been terminated?

Textron also makes the Dingo Mine Resistant Vehicle. Why has the Army bought none?

The Swiss company MOWAG makes the Eagle armored HMMWV. Have we tried to buy from them? If not, why not?

The Turks make a HMMWV-based armored vehicle called the Cobra. Have we tried to get any?

The old Iraqi Army and Republican Guard had several thousand wheeled armored vehicles. Where are they now and what use is being made of them? The Army went into Iraq with tanks for its tankers and Bradleys for its mechanized infantrymen and M113's for its combat engineers and self propelled howitzers for its artillerymen, then when they tried to turn all these soldiers into Army of Occupation Constabulary troopers they discovered they needed a patrol vehicle. The M1114 was already in the inventory, so that is what was demanded. They did not anticipate the high demand, and they have not been flexible enough in procuring substitute patrol vehicles.

[Tailback]

Good list, hopefully O'reilly can light a fire under the army's a**.

[Cannoneer No. 4]

Qatar-6, you raise excellent points that need to be considered. Force protection has become a higher priority than mobility and nontechnical situational awareness. I am concerned that a perception is developing that it is cruel and unusual punishment to mount a soldier in an unarmored vehicle.

Please comment on Unfit for Combat Humvees need armor to give them a fighting chance

[Voice in your head]

Thanks for the reminder on personal weapons use. Being in a mechanized infantry unit, our company was only authorized 2 handguns. That was fine, because of the number of handguns that were confiscated. It was SOP that anyone driving a HMMWV carried a handgun, since you cannot really keep your rifle at the ready, while driving. Unfortunately, Haji only carried pieces of crap, but it was enough to cover your butt, to buy some time to grab your rifle or your buddy to engage the threat with his rifle. Almost every weapon that we had was a 9mm or a 38 special. Next time around, I can't imagine what possible reason the powers that be would have for not allowing soldiers to bring along personally owned sidearms. My Glock model 23 will be in my duffle, even if it means I have to bury it somewhere in the desert before returning home. If it gets me through another year in Iraq, it pays for itself.

BTW, here is an old thread: The stopping power of different handgun cartridges. According to this thread, a .40 is better than a .44 or a .45, in terms of stopping power. It seems that this would be the ideal for a new Army issue sidearm.