Replies

You have a good point. How much of this statement is truth and how much is the "Stryker Mafia" supporting its cause?

Is Stryker, I would assume still in low production, the answer? How about an up armored USMC LAV. Not nearly as big as the Stryker, but in the standard configurations has more firepower. I don't know their relative armor levels, but the LAV is small enough for city streets and the 25mm cannon is sweet.

Stryker is *an* answer for some things; probably the engineer version, maybe the medic version [though it only carries two litter patients- we've got a couple of FReeper medics who may have better viewpoints on that] and possible the new 105mm sp artillery piece. But at 3 million bucks apiece, it's an awfully expensive tripod for a .50 machinegun....

The LAV is a good answer for the Marines, but their vehicles are aging and replacements may be necessary down the road. I think it can be expected that their vehicles will probably need to retain an amphibious capability though, and that pretty well leaces the Stryker out.

Archy,

I have seen the original memo that fostered this debate (let's just say I was in the room when the original issue was raised by GEN Ellis in Feb); it was actually written about another issue (acceleration of the 6th Stryker BDE)...

His point as I understood it at the time, was that there has been anecdotal evidence from Commanders in Iraq that the Stryker is doing well, whereas the "armored" HMMWV is a stop-gap measure at best (the shortcomings of the M1114 have been documented here and elsewhere). GEN Ellis' point was that we could reroute some funding that is going to Bradley refurbishment (a system that will be eventually leaving the inventory after transformation) and put it into building additional Strykers (the PM was also in the room, and stated that production of Strykers could be boosted...it was a matter of funding). What GEN Ellis was looking for (and I belive also) is that the convoy support missions, and some of the other missions we are using M1114's and kitted HMMWV's for could better be executed with Strykers. A Stryker vehicle minus all the C4ISR bells and whistles is fairly inexpensive...and you could slap the same FBCB2 stuff in it we are now putting in the HMMWV's.

Voila, you have something better than the HMMWV, and are continuing to pursue army transformation by getting more Stryker equipped units in the field. GEN Ellis knows as well as anyone that the new "reset" of the army is built around the SBCT model minus the Stryker vehicles...the force structure and capabilities are similar.

To see this used for political gain is not surprising, but is despicable...

regards,