{"id":1315,"date":"2006-01-12T21:48:47","date_gmt":"2006-01-13T03:48:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/?p=1315"},"modified":"2006-01-12T21:52:44","modified_gmt":"2006-01-13T03:52:44","slug":"army-pledges-to-equip-gis-with-better-armor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/?p=1315","title":{"rendered":"Army Pledges to Equip GIs with Better Armor"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The body armor <a href=\"http:\/\/www.chicagotribune.com\/news\/nationworld\/chi-0601120200jan12,1,2974339.story?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed\">story<\/a>.  Yet again.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>The Army announced Wednesday that it plans to distribute 230,000 side-protecting armor inserts to troops in Iraq over the next year amid growing criticism that the Pentagon has delayed life-saving upgrades to body armor.<\/p>\n<p>Last year, the armed forces medical examiner found that 80 percent of the Marines who died of torso wounds from March 2003 to June 2005 in Iraq might have lived if their vests had contained additional protection for the sides, arms and neck.<\/p>\n<p>That report, leaked to news outlets last week, prompted Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John Warner (R-Va.) to summon Pentagon brass to Capitol Hill on Wednesday to explain delays and materials shortages that have plagued the armor programs of the Army and Marines.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We will complete the delivery of this particular equipment this year &#8230; 230,000 that will be done throughout this year,&#8221; Army Maj. Gen. Jeffrey Sorenson said of the side plates.<\/p>\n<p>Sorenson refused to provide details on production and distribution, which annoyed some Democrats who attended the closed-door meeting. &#8220;We wanted to know why the Army has had all these delays and he didn&#8217;t have a good answer,&#8221; said one Senate staffer.<\/p>\n<p>Marine commanders requested improvements to side armor last June, but few of the inserts have made it to those fighting. That has prompted criticism from Senate Democrats, including Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.), who said hundreds of soldiers may have died as a result of inadequate armor.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>The Army blamed delays on material shortages and pointed out that it has altered its armored vest design seven times to date.<\/p>\n<p>As <a href=\"http:\/\/confederateyankee.mu.nu\/\">Confederate Yankee<\/a> shows us, the Army is constantly testing and evaluating armor concepts, including even <a href=\"http:\/\/confederateyankee.mu.nu\/archives\/150860.php\">one that may just satisfy Sen. Clinton<\/a> and bring about the threat of entire units becoming heat casualties.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The body armor story. Yet again. The Army announced Wednesday that it plans to distribute 230,000 side-protecting armor inserts to troops in Iraq over the next year amid growing criticism that the Pentagon has delayed life-saving upgrades to body armor. Last year, the armed forces medical examiner found that 80 percent of the Marines who [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,4,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1315","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-military","category-politics","category-war-on-terror"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1315","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1315"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1315\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1315"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1315"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1315"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}