Armor Could have Saved Marines
06 January 2006 6:23 pm by Taylor Marsh
Armor Could have Saved Marines
A secret Pentagon study has found that at least
80 percent of the marines who have been killed in Iraq from wounds to their
upper body could have survived if they had extra body armor. That armor has
been available since 2003 but until recently the Pentagon has largely declined
to supply it to troops despite calls from the field for additional protection,
according to military officials.The ceramic plates in vests currently worn by the majority
of military personnel in Iraq cover only some of the chest and back. In at
least 74 of the 93 fatal wounds that were analyzed in the Pentagon study of
marines from March 2003 through June 2005, bullets and shrapnel struck the
marines' shoulders, sides or areas of the torso where the plates do not reach.
Thirty-one of the deadly wounds struck the chest or
back so close to the plates that simply enlarging the existing shields “would
have had the potential to alter the fatal outcome,” according to the
study, which was obtained by The New York Times.For the first time, the study by the military's medical
examiner shows the cost in lost lives from inadequate armor, even as the Pentagon
continues to publicly defend its protection of the troops. Officials have
said they are shipping the best armor to Iraq as quickly as possible. At the
same time, they have maintained that it is impossible to shield forces from
the increasingly powerful improvised explosive devices used by insurgents.
Yet the Pentagon's own study reveals the equally lethal threat of bullets.
The vulnerability of the military's body armor has
been known since the start of the war, and is part of a series of problems
that have surrounded the protection of American troops. Still, the Marine
Corps did not begin buying additional plates to cover the sides of their troops
until this September, when it ordered 28,800 sets, Marine Corps officials
acknowledge. …
So, let me get this straight, we waged an elective war
that didn't have anything to do with keeping America safe and we did it without
the armor, which in the last secret analysis, could have saved 8 in
10 Marines.
A Republican president and his administration led the way, but
the majority of Democrats in Congress followed.
This is what we've come to in this country. Spineless, feckless,
worthless congressional representatives that care more about their own political
future than making sure that when we wage war the fighting men and women we
send will have the very best equipment, not only to kill the enemy, but to save
themselves.
Rummy wants to talk about going to war with the military you have,
not with what you would like to have, but nothing would have changed in our lives if we would
have waited until our soldiers were equipped. For them, however, many fewer Marines would have died. This makes me sick to my stomach.
Every single person who voted for the Iraq war should have to
face the families, spouses and children of soldiers slain, or the soldiers themselves,
who have lost arms and legs and the lives they knew.
This secret Pentagon report is a disgrace, not fitting of the
United States or our military men and women who President Bush continues to
use in Iraq so he can continue playing his favorite role of all, Terror Guy.
