Army questioning soldiers' plan to armor vehicles

bayarea.com ^ | Thu, Dec. 18, 2003 | DAVID A. LIEB

[11th_VA]

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. - Fearing roadside bombs and sniper bullets, the members of the Army Reserves' 428th Transportation Co. turned to a local steel fabricator to fashion extra armor for their 5-ton trucks and Humvees before beginning their journey to Iraq earlier this month.

But their armor might not make it into the war, because the soldiers didn't get Pentagon approval for their homemade protection.

[KriegerGeist]

"I'm hoping that the Pentagon will take a close look at some of the ideas that these guys have, take the best of those ideas, standardize them and take this effort forward. The guys probably know the basics of what needs to be done better than anyone."

Test pilots test a plane's flying capability. Test drivers test an auto's driving capability. So, it's only fitting to get the expertise of guys who have been shot at, or have witnessed the failure of their's (or other's) vehicle first-hand, how best to armor it. Not some pencil-necked desk jockey who has never been in the line of fire. I'll bet that a lot of these "good ole farm-boy" soldiers could rig up some very safe and effective armored vehicles...

You know, fear for one's life and limb can be a better "mother of invention" than is necessity. Those boys in Viet Nam came up with some pretty niffty stuff to save their bacon... This "new-breed" of soldier is no different.

[Blood of Tyrants]

Only an idiot Pentagon bureauracrat desk jockey would consider nothing at all to be better than "unauthorized modifications".

I say weld and shut up.

[r9etb]

Before deployment it could be a problem. Added armor that’s not in the books would play hell with the load plans for both air and sea movement.

I think you've got the real point here. I know for a fact that the Army's not opposed to guys doing this kind of stuff over there.

Consider the implications on a C-17 if the vehicles showed up sporting a couple of thousand extra pounds of metal, with several extra inches added on per-vehicle.

[Blood of Tyrants]

Four per day, huh? At that rate it should only take them about 20 years to upgrade them.

[John Jorsett]

If I were in this position, I'd be tempted to go ahead and armor my vehicles anyway and dare the Pentagon to court-martial me, with all the bad publicity that would entail.

[alfa6]

And the best part of the Rhino mods was that the steel used came from the former German beach defenses.

Payback can be hell at times, eh.

Regards

alfa6 ;>}

[Darksheare]

My response would be: "If I live, sue me."

[george wythe]

They screwed up by asking if they could do it. It's easier to get forgiveness than permission.

Absolutely.

I'm in the construction industry, and I deal daily with Bureaucrats-R-Us.

When I know I will not get a permit on a timely manner, I go ahead with the construction change, document it carefully with digital pictures to show the quality of workmanship, and then, boom, I take the inspectors to discover 'accidentally' the change to the plans.

If I don't deliver the building on time, my company will get fined heavily and lose its reputation as a company that delivers on time.

Excuses only take you so far. In matters of life or death, I side with the soldiers who seek extra protection from homemade improvements.

[Happy2BMe]

Walp, this is a crock of chit.

It was common practice during WWII and Korea to reinforce the M35 duce-an-a-half with steel plates in the bed and mount a 50 cal machine gun in the back.

G.I.s have always improvised - that's why they are G.I.s

I'd like to see some of those Pentagon pukes head out on Iraqi roads in the light armored POS our boys are having to use.

Aweseome platform - killed many enemy in WWII and Korea.

[caltrop]

Just another symptom of the all volunteer Army. In Vietnam we did all kinds of modifications, cannibalized equipment, etc. I don't know if the modifications were authorized but I know the cannibalization wasn't. Nobody ever said a thing about any of it and, frankly, wouldn't have gotten very far if they had. "It's easier to beg forgiveness than it is to get permission" was frequently heard but even more frequently heard was "what are they going to do, send me to Vietnam?"

If their equipment is going by air there's probably something to the Army's (and Air Force's) concerns. Once in country, however, it shouldn't be anybody's business but the soldiers using the gear.

In addition to extra steel plate, the units should always add sandbags to the floors in the cabs of their vehicles. Sandbags saved some of my troops from serious injury and always made everyone feel better about driving down dirt roads.

[caltrop]

I don't know what they're doing for gun trucks but it's a great point. I can't imagine they aren't using them and gun trucks have to be put together in the field. That assumes, as I think it's safe to do, that they don't have enough armored cars to accompany all the convoys.

In Vietnam a gun truck, for those who aren't familiar with them, was usually a five ton truck with heavy steel plate on the doors protecting the driver and assistant driver. On the sides, front and rear of the truck bed they installed heavy steel plate high enough to permit the troops to stand upright and be protected. Machine guns were mounted to permit the gunners to bring fire on any attackers foolish enough to take a crack at us. We didn't have any but I've heard some units mounted miniguns instead of machine guns.

[vetvetdoug]

I would start investigating the DPSC employees that work for the Pentagon. Those folks are noted for taking kickbacks from government contractors. I was involved with a large corruption scandal in 1973-74 when, as an inspector, I found large amounts of substandard food being sold to the military by dishonest contractors and the DPSC employees. Unfortunately, it resulted in the Army taking over USAF inspector jobs because it was the USAF that caught the Army and DPSC members corruption. Another Democrat Jimmy Carter job and bait and switch operation.

[jriemer]

Some gun truck pics

[maxwellp]

Thank you, Leatherneck_MT for your service to America. During Vietnam I was very young and newly married. I worked with a young black man at that time and he was drafted and sent to VietNam. I wrote him while he was there and when he returned he told me "Thank you for your letters - you will never know how much they meant to me and the guys I was with". Americans in the war on terroism after 9/11 will never stop saluting our military. Thank God for my letters during Vietnam.

[Gunslingr3]

He wouldn't. He was a big proponent of GI's making any necesary mods. He himself tried time and again to get the Army make numerous changes on the Sherman and later tanks to no avail.

He was also a driving force behind the aquisition of the undergunned and underarmored Sherman because he preferred mobility. It meant his tankers suffered roughly 5 to 1 losses. Thank god we had the skies.

[norton]

The awesome gunships of today grew from some Captain's bright idea of placing a .30 in the door of a C-47 and flying in circles above a target.....seems to me that the Pentagon should have learned a lesson from that.

Or, from the hedgerow cutters of WW2,

Or, from Chenault telling them that a classic dog-fight was suicide,

Or, from the record of anybody's attempts to win a war by bunkering in and defending a perimeter...

Seems like it, but don't count on it.

[longtermmemmory]

military inteligence?

[Oatka]

He [Patton] was also a driving force behind the aquisition of the undergunned and underarmored Sherman because he preferred mobility

I think it was the History Channel that showed a Sherman where the Brits had mounted one of their long-barreled 12-pdrs in the turret. The breech was so big they had to mount it sideways but it punched right through the German armor are far longer distances. I understand that our 75mms had to get to within 300-400 yds to penetrate. The Army refused it because we didn't think of it and the crews continued to be incinerated in their under-gunned "Ronsons" (a cigarette lighter that "lit up" every time on the first try. The Germans called them "Tommy Cookers").

I think it was the same show where they showed how we used our 4-to-1 advantage against the Panzers. While the Panzer was busy lighting up the first three, the fourth ran up behind him and put a round through the lightly armored rear. Worked every time but we ran through a lot of tanks and crews.

[TankerKC]

Before deployment it could be a problem. Added armor that’s not in the books would play hell with the load plans for both air and sea movement.

Exactly. Anything beyond that standard TUCHA or TUDET weights and dimensions will screw up load planning and could cost extra airlift sorties (assuming airlift). This may seem bureaucratic, but standardization has to be maintained.

[longtermmemmory]

can't they just take it off? Seems this who concept should be under that new expedited system they claim they have.