Why Does Battlefield Armor Bother Republicans So Much?

[Dinner]

*Thanks go out to ahtzib at Speakeasy for this tidbit*

Posted 4/21/2005 8:30 AM Updated 4/21/2005 10:35 PM

Senate approves extra Humvee spending
By Tom Squitieri, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON — The Senate on Thursday approved spending an extra $213 million to buy more fully armored Humvees, a week after a government watchdog criticized the Pentagon's pace in providing the vehicles to forces in Iraq.

The amendment to the bill authorizing another $81 billion to be spent on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan also orders the Defense secretary to report to Congress more frequently on how many Humvees are needed and on how to get them to Iraq faster.

The extra money will keep an armored Humvee productionline running at full capacity until July 31. Without the money, production would drop from 550 this month to 239 in June, zero in July, 40 in August and 71 in September.

Sponsored by Sens. Evan Bayh, D-Ind., and Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., the amendment passed 60-40, while the overall spending bill was approved 99-0. Since the House approved spending an extra $185 million on the factory-armored Humvees last month, the military is virtually assured of having more money for the vehicles when differences in the two versions of the bill are reconciled by the House and Senate. The White House originally sought $743 million for the Humvees.

Kennedy said a quarter of all U.S. combat deaths (roughly 400) in Iraq happened to troops in unarmored Humvees.

Earlier this month, the Army said it was 855 vehicles short of reaching its goal of having 8,105 factory-armored Humvees in the military theater that includes Iraq and Afghanistan. The Army argued that it met that goal but counted armored Humvees based in the United States and elsewhere.

Bayh said the Army has consistently underestimated its needs for Humvees in Iraq. "When will we do more instead of less?" he asked.

The measure comes a week after a report by the Government Accountability Office, Congress' non-partisan watchdog group, that said the Army failed to use extra production capacity available to make factory-armored Humvees as well as the add-on armor kits that strengthen the unarmored models.

The GAO report said the Defense Department had a production pace only to meet the first armored Humvee needs "but did not use the maximum available production capacity as the requirements increased dramatically" in Iraq.

Bayh cited the GAO report during the Senate debate. "This report proves that serious planning errors at the Pentagon led to soldiers driving around Iraq in inadequately armored Humvees," he said.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-04-21-war-spending_x.htm

Senator votes

YEAs ---61
Akaka (D-HI)
Alexander (R-TN)
Allen (R-VA)
Baucus (D-MT)
Bayh (D-IN)
Biden (D-DE)
Bingaman (D-NM)
Boxer (D-CA)
Burns (R-MT)
Byrd (D-WV)
Cantwell (D-WA)
Carper (D-DE)
Chafee (R-RI)
Clinton (D-NY)
Coleman (R-MN)
Collins (R-ME)
Conrad (D-ND)
Corzine (D-NJ)
Dayton (D-MN)
DeWine (R-OH)
Dodd (D-CT)
Dorgan (D-ND)
Durbin (D-IL)
Feingold (D-WI)
Feinstein (D-CA)
Harkin (D-IA)
Hutchison (R-TX)
Jeffords (I-VT)
Johnson (D-SD)
Kennedy (D-MA)
Kerry (D-MA)
Kohl (D-WI)
Landrieu (D-LA)
Lautenberg (D-NJ)
Leahy (D-VT)
Levin (D-MI)
Lieberman (D-CT)
Lincoln (D-AR)
Lott (R-MS)
Lugar (R-IN)
Martinez (R-FL)
McCain (R-AZ)
Mikulski (D-MD)
Murray (D-WA)
Nelson (D-FL)
Nelson (D-NE)
Obama (D-IL)
Pryor (D-AR)
Reed (D-RI)
Reid (D-NV)
Rockefeller (D-WV)
Salazar (D-CO)
Santorum (R-PA)
Sarbanes (D-MD)
Schumer (D-NY)
Snowe (R-ME)
Specter (R-PA)
Stabenow (D-MI)
Talent (R-MO)
Thune (R-SD)
Wyden (D-OR)

NAYs ---39
Allard (R-CO)
Bennett (R-UT)
Bond (R-MO)
Brownback (R-KS)
Bunning (R-KY)
Burr (R-NC)
Chambliss (R-GA)
Coburn (R-OK)
Cochran (R-MS)
Cornyn (R-TX)
Craig (R-ID)
Crapo (R-ID)
DeMint (R-SC)
Dole (R-NC)
Domenici (R-NM)
Ensign (R-NV)
Enzi (R-WY)
Frist (R-TN)
Graham (R-SC)
Grassley (R-IA)
Gregg (R-NH)
Hagel (R-NE)
Hatch (R-UT)
Inhofe (R-OK)
Inouye (D-HI)
Isakson (R-GA)
Kyl (R-AZ)
McConnell (R-KY)
Murkowski (R-AK)
Roberts (R-KS)
Sessions (R-AL)
Shelby (R-AL)
Smith (R-OR)
Stevens (R-AK)
Sununu (R-NH)
Thomas (R-WY)
Vitter (R-LA)
Voinovich (R-OH)
Warner (R-VA)

http://www.optruth.org/main.cfm?actionId=blogShowExcerpts&blogId=14&entryID=498

[Az]

No money left, since all the budget is gone on fitting cage armor on TEH STRYKER.

[Ted Striker]

Yeah TEH STRYKER PWNZ JOOZ!@@@@@@@@2@!

[Dinner]

I just seems like Republican law makers are very hypocritical when it comes to military spending. They wrap themselves in the flag and declare their support for the troops but some how all of the massive defense spending never seems to make it down to the troops. Republicans love defense spending pork and declare we need three new fighter planes which all do the same thing or that we need a 30 year old outdated piece of junk like the Stryker or a trillion dollar boon-doggle star wars program but what do soldiers actually get? The Republicans have come out against raises for enlisted (they love the idea of "targeted raises" which only officers get; which is currently against the law), they are against increasing the life insurance for soldiers killed in combat, they are against buying more body armor , they are against speeding up the production of armored humvees, and they are against increasing the manpower of the Army to reflect current operational needs. Many of those would save lives but Republicans are penny pinching.

Billions for Halliburton and a trillion for star wars but not a penny more for armored vehicles? There are some very screwed up priorities.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Interestingly, Trent Lott is on the Yea side.

[Az]

Yeah TEH STRYKER PWNZ JOOZ!

antisemite.

[DRoseDARs]

John Ensign (R-Naturally) voted Nay. Big f***ing suprise.

Because it would force them to acknowledge that since the very beginning of this conflict our troops have never been fully supplied due to poor planning by the Bush Administration et al.

[Ted Striker]

Originally posted by Az

Yeah TEH STRYKER PWNZ JOOZ!

antisemite.

[KrazyHorse]

Armour is for pussies. Real men stop the bullets with their chests. Or vote to send other men to do that for them.

[Az]

A question to all the US military guys:
The US Army and military in general probably has tons of Pattons in storage, yes?
In Israel, there is an ongoing program to refit old MBTs to the role of extra-heavy APCs that would give troops infinetly more protection. Why is there no similar program in the US? It seems that many of your armored vehicles would need it. ( I am not talking about the Humvee, they come in different configurations, but generally, there is little chance of them stopping anything. )

[Ned]

What bothered me was the NYTimes article the other day where the Marines in Ramadi were also denied the use of tanks because they were "too threatening" to civilians. So, when a some of their comrads were in a heavy firefight and needed to be reinforced, the marines at base had to drive humvees through a bunch of ambushes. Needless to say, there were a lot of Marines killed.

Now, where have we heard this kind of **** before?

I thought we had learned our lesson from "Black Hawk Down?"

[KrazyHorse]

The US army decided years ago that tanks were outmoded. As long as the generals don't have to ride in Stryker deathtraps they aren't going to change that policy decision.

[Az]

I just hate those "ligh-rapid-flexible-slick-combined****face" bull**** top brass. "Oh, we don't need armor anymore, the era of the conventional war is over. today it all should be flexible, However, we do need another 100 fighter-bombers"

It gets real rediculous, and the scary **** is that our brass is falling for this, head first. Meanwhile, RAFAEL already has a stryker armor upgrade prototype. ( too bad the tires and the engine won't pull through, IMO )

[Ned]

What bothers me about that Ramadi story is that the Marines there are from Camp Pendleton. This is the same camp where my nephew is based. He is scheduled to go to Iraq at the end of the summer. So I fear he might be deployed to Ramadi and have to fact the same kind of **** as detailed in the NYTimes story.

[KrazyHorse]

Yeah. I hate to tell them this, but a dude with a RPG-7 is always going to be less detectable, more flexible etc. than is a dude sitting in dressed up SUV in the middle of the street. The advantage the dude in the SUV needs to have is to force the RPG to go through 6 inches of steel plate.

Otherwise he's a sitting ****ing duck.