[oceanview]

but not all the soldiers are being killed by artillery shell IEDs. a level 6 armored car can stop AK47 fire according to some websites I saw. what do those military Humvees cost the Pentagon? the troops could probably be riding around in an armored mercedes for the same $$$s.

my only point is - for whatever reason (clinton era military budget cuts the most likely culprit), we haven't made any investments in this area for R&D, and we could have done better.

[Palmetto]

Well, hopefully we took out quite a large cache of potential IEDs with the Spectre last night. And I would still like us to set up a Trojan-horse Humvee to lure out the perps.

[lepton]

but not all the soldiers are being killed by artillery shell IEDs. a level 6 armored car can stop AK47 fire according to some websites I saw. what do those military Humvees cost the Pentagon? the troops could probably be riding around in an armored mercedes for the same $$$s. my only point is - for whatever reason (clinton era military budget cuts the most likely culprit), we haven't made any investments in this area for R&D, and we could have done better.

The problem wasn't technology, it was doctrine and cost. We didn't set up our military to be static occupying troops - sure we could do a little, and we had some vehicles designed to do so. We further have a problem in that all of the regulations to make sure that there's competitive bidding talk a long time to work through - look at the problem getting weapons and equipment for the Iraqi security forces. For very human reasons, there are times where you just don't want the troops to feel safe within their armored vehicles - many would never look around, much less get out. Turtling inside your APC - which has the illusion of being a tank while not being one - is a sure way to get killed.

What we need are a few Armored cars for specific places and positions within a patrol or convoy, and better tactics for dealing with the IEDs.