[Snidely Whiplash]

Oh,man.If that is true.......

Assume it is...so what? Judging from the reaction in the room (lots of loud applause), it would seem that this particular soldier was echoing the concerns of many of his brethren. It's certainly been a topic of discussion for quite some time that our Humvees are under-armored. God knows it wouldn't be the first time our forces have been sent underequipped into harm's way. Why would this war be any different?

But, by the same token,I feel personally that Rumsfeld's response was inappropriate.You don't make cavalier comments such as he did to a gathering of soldiers at wartime. .(Now,before the flaming starts,let me say that I am not siding against Rumsfeld.The man has a tough job.[...]

I dunno...it didn't surprise me much...he's always struck me as a bit of a hack. Yeah, he's can be funny, and he's a smart guy, but funny and smart counts for jack squat when we're in a war. What I want is a SecDef who'll play to win. ISTR Rummy originally wanting to do the Iraq thing with something like 50K troops. Can you imagine the chaos that we'd be seeing now if we only had 50,000 guys in country?

SW

[FreedomCalls]

God knows it wouldn't be the first time our forces have been sent underequipped into harm's way.

Underequipped? This is the best-equipped military force in any conflict, any where, any time, in the history of mankind. Soldiers will always complain no matter what they have. You can't send them into a conflict with a Star-Trek style force field bubble around them you know.

[WmDonovan]

"I dunno...it didn't surprise me much...he's always struck me as a bit of a hack. Yeah, he's can be funny, and he's a smart guy, but funny and smart counts for jack squat when we're in a war. What I want is a SecDef who'll play to win. ISTR Rummy originally wanting to do the Iraq thing with something like 50K troops. Can you imagine the chaos that we'd be seeing now if we only had 50,000 guys in country?"

Rummy's plan was to use a lot of exiled Iraqis as troops, attack from both North and South, and to keep the existing Iraqi army somewhat intact and turn it over to our side quickly. His plan was also to hand over the government to the Iraqi's in at most a few month's after the invasion. Mr. Powell and the State Dept over ruled him on these points and really screwed things up in my opinion. The Iraqi exiles needed to put their money where their mouths were and would have had great symbolic importance besides. Keeping the Iraqi army intact would kept their members under a command structure and may have keep lawlessness under control. The whole affair could have been done more speedily as well, which could have stabilized things before the out-of-country terrorists invaded en masse and the former Baathists in country set up shop.

If his original plan had been put into motion then 50,000 may have worked. Not certain, but could have. Something that will be debated in military strategy circles for decades to come. I know it was a different situation, but not a lot of troops on the ground were used in Afghanistan either and the US military was the first military since who knows when to take Afghanistan. The British and the Russians threw gobs of troops into Afghanistan only to bury them there.

As far as armor goes, heavy armor makes Humvees top heavy and prone to accidents. Bottom line is that they were not designed to be used as armored cars. Sure they should be retrofitted but cold war era M-75's would be a better choice. Seems like the Stryker vehicles have some armor as well. I think that the South Africans have an interesting design for a troop carrier (with a V-shaped hull that deflects the blast around the vehicle) that is resistant to land mines, for what it is worth. The Humvee armor won't do a thing against serious land mines which is the real problem anyway.

[fastattacksailor]

I'm no expert on the Hummvee, but you are right on about under or ill equipped.

A good example:

In WWII, the USN used ships in regular combat action that shouldn't have been near a ship-on-ship gun battle (the ships were the ATLANTA-class Light Cruisers [Anti-Aircraft]) The ATLANTA's were designed for AA defence, NOT for a running surface gun battle. The ships were fast (40 knots) but horribly thin-skinned and easily damaged when hit

One of them, USS JUNEAU, was battered in the first Guadalcanal battle (torpedo hit which snapped the keel)

On the way out of the area, JUNEAU was torpedoed again--this time the ship was literally blown to pieces. 700 died.

Some asked "why was she there?". The Navy's answer was very simple: The ships in the battle were all they had.